Your guide to the region's top events, mixed with some commentary about life, media, gossip and politics in Washington, DC.
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Election-Night Madness
Much of Washington celebrated the historic election last night, as crowds gathered throughout the region to watch the returns. We want to hear what happened where you live, and see your photos of the madness! Send them in, and we may publish them in an issue of Washingtonian Magazine.
By
Emily Leaman
The crowds at 14th and U streets, Northwest. Photo by Flickr user Alex Barth Last night marked an historic moment in US history—an African-American won the presidency. Though Barack Obama will officially take office at the end of January, Washingtonians started the celebration en masse last night.
Obama won easily in Maryland and the District, where he secured 61- and 93-percent of the vote, respectively. But Virginia remained “too close to call” for several hours. Just after 11 PM, with West Coast polls showing clear Obama wins in California, Washington, and Oregon, CNN and other networks felt comfortable declaring Obama the president-elect. Minutes later, Virigina’s results were finally decided—Obama eked by with 52-percent of the vote.
The streets of Washington erupted. We were driving back to the city from a watch-party in Virginia around 11:30 and were greeted by good-natured honks of car horns and pockets of boisterous young people headed, we quickly realized, to the White House.
Crowds formed all over the city. A friend in Northeast said that he saw fireworks. From P Street, Northwest, we heard the cheers of the crowd on U Street, five blocks away.
Were you part of the celebration last night? What was going on in Virginia and Maryland? We want to hear your stories and see your photos! Leave us your version of the events in the comments, and send photos to eleaman@washingtonian.com. We’ll start a slideshow to document our readers’ perspective of last night’s historic occasion. See also: Tell Barack Obama where he should dine when he arrives in Washington.
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Posted by: xxxd, Apr 07, 2010 10:11:14 PM
My 22 year old daughter and I got in the car and drove downtown towards the White House Tuesday night after Obama’s speech. It was really unbelievable. Thousands of young, old, African Americans, whites, Latinos, big cars, economy cars, bicycles, trucks, taxis, busses... horns honking in staccato ... beep-beep-beep ...Yes-we-can ...U-S-A...O-BA-MA...white men and women in dinner clothes running up to minorities at bus stops and hugging them, people dancing on tops of cars... one middle aged black man with hands clasped in front of him saying to passers-by.... "thank you, thank you, thank you" ... American flags everywhere, and most of all, EVERYBODY SMILING!
Posted by: Alicia C. Brown, Nov 07, 2008 03:00:28 PM
I took this Wednesday night coming home on the Metro
http://www.flickr.com/photos/chip_py/3006941468/
Posted by: Chip Py, Nov 06, 2008 04:48:52 PM
Listen to the crazy streets of DC - I need more car horn! http://tinyurl.com/5enodk
Posted by: Doug, Nov 05, 2008 02:14:55 PM
I love these stories! Keep them coming!
Posted by: Emily at Washingtonian.com, Nov 05, 2008 12:20:34 PM
Two of us in These United States (the band, that is) had to drive to Lexington, KY last night to start a tour. We hit the road with our Sirius-equipped minivan about 4PM.
About 7:30 we turned on NPR and started listening. They were calling things a little too slowly...so we started channel surfing. We listened to BBC for awhile, then swapped over to CBC.
As things got a little more exciting, we started frantically switching between the three (unsurprisingly, the Beeb’s coverage of our own election was far and above the best). Then our phones started going off - text messages by the dozen from all over...a nonstop cavalcade of "ding . ding ding".
There was something magical about barreling through the darkness of Kentucky - just the two of us - while somehow simultaneously celebrating with the rest of the world.
Posted by: J. Tom, Nov 05, 2008 11:29:58 AM
I’ve been home, surfing the web and checking out blogs, since I was a little too worried to watch the TV coverage. Blog posts where fast and furious once he got enough votes. I could go to sleep in peace!
Posted by: YB, Nov 05, 2008 11:03:05 AM
I sat alone in my tiny apartment last night, flipping between ABC, NBC, and Comedy Central’s Stewart/Colbert InDecision 2008 election coverage special, comfortably in my pajamas. I watched as the predictions of each state’s polls were discussed, chewing my nails, sending instant messages back and forth with friends all over the country, taking deep breaths, sipping a glass of red wine to temper my nerves, and praying for change.
Early in the evening, Obama showed a significant lead in electoral votes, but I refused to count my chickens before they were hatched, so to speak. I refused to let myself believe it would all be OK only to wake up the next morning to some different news, as was the case in 2000 when we went to sleep thinking Al Gore was our President, only to awaken to the recount fiasco.
As the numbers climbed, I nurtured my hopefulness and faith in a forward-thinking America.
At 11pm EST, news correspondents officially called the election for Barack Obama. "Yes!" I said to the television screen. "YES, we CAN! and we DID! and we DO! and we WILL!".
I started receiving text messages on my cell phone shortly afterward from various friends in the District of Columbia, telling me that people are dancing in the streets, with high-energy smiles, anonymous hugs and high-fives, and shouting on the White House lawn "Obama’s House! Obama’s House!". The text messages kept coming with similar sentiments of joy and excitement until about 1:30am, long after I’d finally fallen asleep for the night.
I woke up this morning and was comforted by the morning talk-radio DJs confirming that everything is as it was when I finally fell asleep last night. We have awakened to a New Day.
Posted by: Bethany Moore, Nov 05, 2008 10:31:42 AM
Check out my roommate’s pics of the White House rally (just ignore those of our pre-election dinner party). http://tinyurl.com/5a479w
Posted by: Nicole, Nov 05, 2008 10:28:22 AM
I live at 14th & U. Took some video clips and posted them on my flickr page. Good times!
http://flickr.com/photos/paulwhit/sets/72157608665029426/
Posted by: Paul, Nov 05, 2008 10:18:44 AM
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