Illinois more than did its part to deliver some good news on Tuesday, not just sending Barack Obama to Washington in a record-breaking landslide but also flipping one Republican Congressional district in the suburbs to the Dems. My own near-northwest neighborhood didn’t reprise the primary election’s lackluster turnout. Indeed, Obama actually got more votes in the 32nd ward than in Hyde Park’s 4th and 5th wards.

Just over one million votes were cast in Chicago, or just over 20,000 votes per ward. Local wards had healthy turnout, although interestingly it was the heavily White and Black wards (32nd, 27th, and 1st) which bested the city average and the Latino wards (35th and 26th, despite a long history of civic engagement) which had markedly lower turnout. GOTV efforts here in Wicker Park were apparently pretty successful, even with a largely young voter base. Then again, perhaps the shelf placement of the 9/11 commission report at Quimby’s says it all: True Crime.