This should be fun.

After a marathon campaign that has captivated many of us for a year, we’re finally gonna choose a new president.

And we might even know who it is before we go to bed Tuesday night or early Wednesday.

Then comes the drama of choosing the players in the next administration, setting priorities and beginning to craft both legislative and foreign policy.

With the economy in free-fall and the world waiting to hear from the winner, exciting days lie just ahead.

For a change, there’s even a little mystery in Nebraska.

Up the road in Omaha and Sarpy County a presidential electoral vote and a House seat are in play. Recent internal polls suggest those are one-or-two-point races.

In terms of the possibility of a Democratic electoral vote, that’s a first time in 44 years event.

Nebraska hasn’t elected a Democratic member of the House in 16 years. Might not happen this year either, but the contest between Lee Terry and Jim Esch could go either way.

Keep an eye on Omaha tomorrow night.

OK, let’s go vote.

Top thinkers

Two Nebraskans made the list of Cabinet choices listed by 10 “top thinkers” in the current edition of “Foreign Policy.”

Chuck Hagel was Grover Norquist’s choice for secretary of state.

“If you cannot go back in time and change mistakes, you can replace those who made the errors with those who had the wisdom to oppose them at the time,” wrote the president of Americans for Tax Reform.

Hagel was chosen for secretary of defense by Cesare Merlini, executive vice president at the Council for the United States and Italy.

Warren Buffett was selected by two of the thinkers as secretary of the Treasury.

Meanwhile, Grist — an environmental Web site — placed Ben Nelson on its list of prospects for secretary of agriculture in a McCain administration.

No doubt, Dave Heineman would be Nelson’s strongest supporter.

If Nelson leaves the Senate, the governor names the Democratic senator’s Republican successor.

Wyoming power

A Nebraska voter has twice as much power as a Florida or Texas voter in naming the next president.

But a Wyoming voter has the greatest power of all, twice that of a Nebraska voter.

Presidential electoral votes are allocated among the states based on both Senate and House representation. Equality of representation in the Senate tilts electoral vote power to individual voters in the small-population states.

Nebraska voters rank 13th in power, according to a chart devised by LJS statistics guru Mark Andersen.

Finishing up

* Big early vote in Douglas County, but Obama campaign director John Berge was disappointed the only early voting site was in west Omaha: “Very early on, we asked for consideration of satellite locations and that was denied.”

* NBC’s Chuck Todd: “One of the interesting potential missed opportunities for Democrats is the (Nebraska) Senate race. Republican Mike Johanns could have been given a tough race, but Democrats chose not to.” Scott Kleeb “hasn’t made a Bush case against Johanns,” Todd says, and could have done so with negative TV ads.

* Only six of Nebraska’s 93 counties count more registered Democrats than Republicans: Dakota, Douglas, Greeley, Saline, Sherman and Thurston.

* Milo Mumgaard has been working in Indiana as Common Cause mounts a “voter protection” effort to combat voter suppression in battleground states. He’s now Midwest regional director of state operations for Common Cause.

* The Washington Post’s Chris Cillizza is the latest national observer to flag Nebraska’s 2nd District House race as a possible Democratic pickup. Cillizza writes that “both parties confirm that Terry is in serious trouble” in his re-election contest with Esch.

* If Esch wins, Jeff Fortenberry emerges as Nebraska’s senior House member with just two terms under his belt.

* Bob Kerrey, in an op-ed in The New York Daily News, suggests that Barack Obama, if he is elected president, convene bipartisan meetings with congressional leaders and governors to seek some agreement in moving forward on Iraq, the economy, health care and energy.

* When Kleeb spoke on the UNL campus last Friday, his audience included one witch. The Phantom of the Opera skipped the meeting, hurrying down a hall in the Student Union before Kleeb arrived.

* It’s November. Out of the meadows and into the woods.

* Pitchers and catchers report on Feb. 14.

* Can’t remember a big game being over in the first 5½ minutes. That schooner is framed in the rear view mirror; push the pedal.

* KU on Saturday is the difference-maker between improvement and a substantial step forward in the first year.

Reach Don Walton at 473-7248 or dwalton@journalstar.com.