How to follow an American election?

Just a very very simple reminder of how things will unfold tonight: 

The basic approach is to have a map and colour in blue or red each State as the results come in. 

Along with a map and the allocation of electoral college votes by State, you need a two column chart. When a State is called for one or the other candidate, you then put the number of electoral college votes allocated to the State in the column of the winner ( "winner takes all system"). 

A candidate needs 270 electoral college votes to win the election. 

I will be watching Virginia ("Virginia is the new Florida" is the title of an article dealing with difficulties at the polling stations, posted on the Nation's website) and Pennsylvania ( and perhaps Indiana, Ohio or Colorado as well) very carefully : whoever wins both will be well on his way to win the White House. But I don't expect the results to be in before late in the night or early in the morning in Europe. 

For some last predictions : 

-  read Ken Rudin's appraisal : Obama wins and the Democrats do well in Congress. In his opinion, Obama keeps Pennsylvania blue and takes the following red states :Virginia, Colorado, Iowa, Nevada and New Mexico. Mc Cain fails to win over any blue States and keeps Florida, Indiana, Missouri ( thus loosing its bellwether status!), North Carolina, Ohio, West Virginia. 

Ken Rudin ( a favourite commentator of mine from It's All Politics podcast) does not fail to remind his readers of his rather poor record on predictions : he had predicted Democratic victories in 2000 and 2004!

If you are too impatient to wait for the main networks to broadcast the results, here is a recipe for finding things out for yourself. 

Look at the early returns of several key or representative/bellwether counties in the key States. Political analyst Tom Oliphant gives you the tools to become your own political expert and pundit. Will his recipe work? 

For more advice of this kind : visit the Nation's page on how to decipher early signs along with a count down of what to expect during this long night.  Look out for Kentucky where polls close early and an Obama win would probably signal a Democratic landslide; keep an eye on Virginia and Indiana; some Senate races will be equally indicative of the national mood : Georgia's senatorial contest is very close, a Democratic victory would be good news for their camp. The results of New Hampshire will be known fairly early in the night : this is State that McCain should win...