One grabs hold of anything in these last five days that induces a smile, and so here comes Joel Achenbach in the WashPost with a full dissertation on a new medical condition, Pre-Election Anxiety Disorder (or PEAD) (not to be confused with Pre-Erection Anxiety Disorder, which Bill O'Reilly evidently suffers from, in spades!).

Achenbach: "No one is talking about voter apathy anymore, because the opposite is more likely the case. People care too much. They're losing sleep. They're having bad dreams about unfavorable tracking polls .... It's a bipartisan disorder, but Democrats are struggling the most, haunted by what happened last time. Republicans, though guardedly optimistic, are still supremely frustrated by the way this thing is dragging out and staying close...."

But at least an Ohio judge has killed the gambit by the Ohio GOP to challenge in advance the eligibility of some 35,000 Ohio voters, their last-ditch effort to turn back a tidal wave of Kerry support in that state. What the Ohio GOP now plans is to challenge those 35,000 -- mostly black voters in urban areas -- on election day itself by means of some 3,400 paid "monitors" whose job description includes disruption of the democratic process.

It's stuff like this crap in Ohio -- not to mention our own brand of A-number-1 crapola locally -- that'll bring on bouts of PEAD. That's if you're a Democrat. If you're a Republican, your main worry appears to be whether the Divine Being is paying close enough attention to intercede on El Presidente's behalf.