Well, I'll be waiting to see this coming out into the streets. But I think one'd better get real, and accept the numbers for what they are saying -- unless there's been systematic random fraud (see other post).
Look, if people were quite unhappy with Bush and Kerry, they could still go with Nader or one of the others, or stay home. But from the numbers -- it looks like there was a large turnout, and contrary to the expectations, quite a bit of it went with Bush. The vaunted youth vote disappeared, the eminem video, etc. notwithstanding.
More, there are also the other numbers -- for the senate and the house. obama's win excepted? but elsewhere? and where there was the gay marriage thing...
The total picture is, I think, ugly, and there's no running away from that.
I note that you're now quite happily accepting the poll numbers? Hey, at this point, if these are from the exit polls, I would bracket them off as, well, unreliable.
Still, the numbers you cite tell an even more dismal story, and one contrary to your reading of them: (1) Most voters were voting their candidate -- not quite the no-choice scenario you paint; (2) most of those who were voting against the other candidate were those voting against Bush. From this, how you arrive at your conclusion beats me. It's even more depressing: people voted Bush because they backed him, not because they didn't want Kerry, not by a long shot.
kj
PS: Re the business of the "divided left" (W Barber) -- I'm not seeing that in the numbers. Could you point that out? For instance, do they report "spoilt" votes -- were people turning up and signalling their dissatisfaction with the candidates by spoiling their votes? If not, where then is the "divided left"? They just stayed home? If so, then I think it would not be hyperbolic to say the world wishes to thank them for having handed us another four years of Bush -- may they be damned!