THE BURNED OVER DISTRICT

The current vote counts do seem to bear that out as the numbers disclosed so far don't match either pre-election polls or expectations.

Even though the polls this year have generally been pretty accurate, they were way off in Alaska. Stevens was running between 7% and 22% behind his Democratic challenger in the polls, but now he is narrowly ahead in the vote count.

The polls also consistently showed Rep. Young as losing by at least 6%, but he is currently ahead in the vote count by 8%. Even in the presidential race, where polls showed McCain leading by 14% or less, the vote count has him winning by 61% to 35% -- precisely the same margin as George Bush in 2004. That represents a polling error of at least 11% to 14% in all three races.

At the same time, total voter turnout appears to be about 11% lower in Alaska this year than in 2004 -- despite over 20,000 new registrations, heavy turnout in the primaries, record early voting, long lines at the polls on Election Day, and the state's own governor being on the ballot, all of which had led to an expectation of record participation.

A polling error of 11% and 11% lower turnout than expected. A facile comparison were it not for the unease of the professional pollsters themselves at the way the numbers have played out so far.

The Washington Post reports that pollsters themselves are "not happy" about the results. "Anchorage pollster and Republican political consultant David Dittman, a Stevens supporter, predicted a 'solid Begich win' The national polling firm, Rasmussen Reports, accurately predicted every Senate race in the country within the margin of error in their most recent polls -- except Alaska. Alaska pollsters Ivan Moore, Craciun Research Group and Hays Research Group all also had Stevens and Young trailing in the lead-up to the election."

There are still many ballots to be counted but that can not coverup the smell of salmon in the hot sun up in Alaska. The only thing we can count on is that the governor will probably shiv old Stevens in the back if he wins. Then she can run in the special election to replace him.