Tonight NH 01 was Shea-Porter's backyard

A couple quick comments before I turn in:

First, um, wow!   

When my colleague Andy Smith of the University of New Hampshire pegged Carol Shea-Porter's chances at 40-60, I confess that I thought he was optimistic. 

My best-case scenario for the Rochester activist, as I sketched out in my last few posts, was a big win on the Seacoast that would outweigh state Rep. Jim Craig's performance in Greater Manchester. 

My scenario did not include Shea-Porter winning all of Rockingham County by more than two-to-one over Craig.  She not only crushed her opponent on the Seacoast -- by more than 2 : 1 in Dover, 3 : 1 in Portsmouth, 3 : 1 in Rye, 3: 1 in Exeter, 5 : 1 in Newmarket, 7 : 1 in Durham.  She also won in places like Candia and Derry, where I cannot imagine she spent much time.

I thought that she might get a mild boost from Carroll County.  She won there something on the order of 4 : 1. That included a 5 : 1 victory in Wolfeboro, and a 12 : 1 victory in Tamworth. 

Where my assumptions went most awry was Craig's performance in Greater Manchester.  While he did beat Shea-Porter by a 3 : 1 margin in his home city, his home-court advantage mostly ended at the city limits.  He did carry Hooksett, but lost Bedford., Merrimack and Londonderry.

If an outside observer looked at the vote results without knowing any details on the campaign, you would be hard-pressed to convince him that Shea-Porter was out-raised almost 10:1.

This was the classic New Hampshire grass-roots insurgency -- on steroids.