On Sunday, October 31, Palm Beach County was rocking. Haitians for Kerry had a sound system at the café across the shopping center from KE04 HQ, complete with toastmaster, buoyant riddims, and endless shout-outs. Their more sober compatriots at the downtown Pentecostal storefront were immersed in the eight-piece church band's hypnotic groove; they probably would have ridden that wave straight through the service if we hadn't interrupted from the pulpit. We told them we would be on hand Tuesday to make sure their votes counted, and they nodded sadly, then resumed swaying. The combo at the nearby Baptist church was less fluid, but the whole congregation was swinging with them, belting out spirituals about deliverance like they were written for this election.

Monday we recruited hosts for the Get Out the Vote buses, MCs to move the crowd from the street to the polling place. The campaign had rented a fleet of slow cruisers with booming systems to run loops through our precincts in search of people who might otherwise forget to vote. They wanted us to find some kids to keep a rolling party going on board and reel in those apathetic pedestrians. We followed our ears, signing up students at a voc-ed who were passing the afternoon pumping their car stereos. You bring the music, we said; we'll supply the bus, the speakers, and the megaphone. Everyone we approached was down for the cause. The celebration was already beginning.

All day Tuesday we monitored the vote, fixing a few problems and handing out water and legal information to the folks in the long line of voters of color—at our poll site, the white people had their own entrance, their own machines, and no wait. It was a sunny, festive day. Passing cars honked for us, our visibility crew was dancing and cheering the news from their boombox, and even the no-wait white people were giving the thumbs-up. An hour or so before the polls closed, the campaign sent someone around to pass on two crucial pieces of information: the victory bash would be a soca dance in Riviera Beach, and exit polls showed we had a four-point statewide lead.