Midday links while I wonder whether tonight's elections will go long or short.

* Open Left wisely points out that today's elections don't really tell us anything about national politics while Kos's Jed Lawson pre-spin takes a different tack in arguing that Owens wins even if he loses. Steve Benen points out that a district in California that is essentially a mirror image of NY-23—historically very Democratic, though significantly less one-sided than NY-23's century-and-a-half Republican streak—is having a special election tonight that doesn't count (UPDATE: Think Progress, too), while TPM debunks in advance the bogus assertions of electoral fraud already erupting anywhere Republicans could lose tonight.

* Virginia is never enough: McDonnell 2012? Really? Even Sarah Palin managed to serve a few months before seeking national office.

* Reid too is saying there's no deal with Lieberman. Maybe not anymore.

* Why do humans kiss? To spread our germs.

* A brief history of innoculation.

* And MetaFilter wishes happy birthday to Sputnik and the Blob while saying goodbye to Claude Lévi-Strauss and Laika the dog.

Let's talk about famous people.

* Larry David is waiting for November 4.

* Scott McClellan gives Barack Obama the kiss of death.

* Alan Greenspan's lost his faith.

* Will Ferrell returns to Saturday Night Live.

* And Stephen King again finds himself confronted by one of his own creations.

Noam Scheiber at TNR writes about "the redemption of Ted Kennedy"—as if anyone who was seriously paying attention to this race could have ever denied the big effect Kennedy had and continues to have—as well as echoing the consensus here that John Edwards has plainly missed his moment:

Now that pretty much every last Edwards supporter has decamped for Obama, does anyone think Edwards is getting them back for Hillary? Does anyone think Obama would feel indebted if Edwards were to come his way?

Meanwhile, at TPM, I see that Rudy Giuliani's campaign managed has given his official seal of approval to the Clinton strategy:

“Clearly, she has had success in larger states and there are a whole bunch of delegates at stake on March 4,” Mr. DuHaime said. “They are not trying to figure out who can win the most states; they are trying to figure out who can win the most delegates.”

John Marshall rightly calls it a kiss of death.