So proud of Georgia

The south lost the civil war in 1865, but today is the day the South fell. The people of Georgia now know what they can do. And the people of Mississippi and Alabama were watching. I look forward to a new black holiday. Janteenth doesn't quite fit, but January 5 is a red-letter day. Black Lives DO Matter.

Democrats appear on the brink of taking control of the U.S. Senate with Raphael Warnock the projected winner over Republican Sen. Kelly Loeffler and Democrat Jon Ossoff leading Republican Sen. David Perdue in Georgia’s two Senate runoff elections.

  USA Today

And Mitch McConnell has lost his seat! The whole country won. (I'm assuming a win for Ossoff if the votes they're counting now are mail-in and those fall the way they did in the general election.)

Trailing much of the night, Ossoff surged ahead of Perdue by more than 8,500 votes after batches of votes from Democrat-heavy DeKalb County were released. Most uncounted votes remain in Democratic strongholds in the metro Atlanta area.

[...]

Around 2 a.m. ET Wednesday, the Associated Press projected Warnock the winner over Loeffler after the Atlanta pastor built his statewide lead to more than 46,500 votes.

And that should widen under my assumption about the mail-in votes.

Warnock made history with his election win, becoming the first Black Democrat elected as a U.S. senator from a state in the South and only the 11th Black senator in the history of the nation. He becomes the first Democrat to win a U.S. Senate race in Georgia in 20 years.

[...]

The Perdue campaign was not ready to concede.

Of course not.

“We will mobilize every available resource and exhaust every legal recourse to ensure all legally cast ballots are properly counted. We believe in the end, Senator Perdue will be victorious.”

Gabriel Sterling, Georgia voting system implementation manager, said he expects most ballots to be counted by Wednesday but for final counts not until Friday.

[...]

The possible Senate sweep in Georgia would give Democrats control of the Senate for the first time since 2004 and boost President-elect Joe Biden’s ability to carry out his early legislative agenda.

Not to mention take McConnell's foot off the throat of the Senate and actually allow bills to come to the floor for votes.*

Tuesday’s election was a rare double run-off. Ossoff and Warnock ran against Perdue and Loeffler in the Nov. 3 general election, but no candidate in that race passed the 50% threshold under state law to win the Senate seats outright, forcing Tuesday's runoffs.

And don't think the MAGAts won't be screaming about being cheated because of it. In fact, I'm actually rather surprised Georgia uses that system. I suppose that reveals a level of arrogance on the part of the GOP that no other state has dared reach.

Georgia election officials said turnout Tuesday shattered the previous record for a run-off in the state, including more than 3 million who voted early.

[...]

Following the playbook that helped Republicans retain control of the Senate after the general election, Loeffler and Perdue attacked their opponents as "radical socialists" and said the fate of nation was at stake with the race.

Well, they were right about that last part.

Congratulations, Georgia! You may have just saved democracy in America.

P.S.  A lot of credit goes to power house Stacey Abrams, who worked tirelessly organizing blacks to vote.  Governor Kemp's days are numbered.

UPDATE 8am:

Democrat Jon Ossoff, who leads Republican David Perdue by about 16,000 votes in the Georgia runoff that could give Democrats control of the U.S. Senate, claimed victory Wednesday in the race. The Associated Press, which NPR relies on for its results, has not yet called the contest.

  NPR 

*I didn't realize Senate Majority leader does not automatically go to the party with the most senators. (I thought that would be a tie, broken by Kamala Harris.) I just read this tweet that seems to indicate the Senate votes on the leader, no matter who has the most seats. Manchin better not bail on the Democrats. Surely he wouldn't, would he?