pennsylvania was close!!!

[Inverted Things]

Call times from CNN, central standard time:

Tuesday
6:00 PM: IN, KY, GA, VT
6:30 PM: WV
7:00 PM: CT, DE, DC, ME (3), MD, MA, NJ, AL, IL, TN, OK
7:30 PM: VA, SC
7:41 PM: NC
8:00 PM: NY, RI, NE(4), SD, TX, WY, KS, ND
8:33 PM: LA
8:34 PM: MS
8:53 PM: NE (5)
9:00 PM: UT
9:13 PM: AR
9:15 PM: MO
9:52 PM: PA
10:00 PM: CA, ID
11:10 PM: AZ
11:11 PM: FL
11:25 PM: MT
11:27 PM: CO
11:41 PM: OR

Wednesday
12:00 AM: AK
12:09 AM: ME (4)
12:19 AM: NH
12:36 AM: WA
1:32 AM: MI
1:33 AM: MN
1:35 AM: HI
2:55 AM: NV
4:05 AM: WI
1:12 PM: OH

Friday
Around 12:00 PM: IA, NM

[Inverted Things]

CNN took 5 hours, 33 minutes to project MN, which had a 3.5% margin. Seems like a slow Kerry to me. CNN also took 3 hours, 35 minutes to call Hawaii which had an 8 point margin. Again slow Kerry.

Now, compare Virginia (also 8 point margin) to Hawaii. Virginia was called after 1 hour 30 minutes by CNN.

[Inverted Things]

CNN took 5 hours, 33 minutes to project MN, which had a 3.5% margin. Seems like a slow Kerry to me. CNN also took 3 hours, 35 minutes to call Hawaii which had an 8 point margin. Again slow Kerry.

Now, compare Virginia (also 8 point margin) to Hawaii. Virginia was called after 1 hour 30 minutes by CNN.

There were 8 states that Kerry won by between 5 and 11%

With the sole and exclusive exception of Hawaii (where polls did not close till waaay late) CNN projected every single one for Kerry essentially upon poll closing.

Connecticut : Bush + 10.47%      1
California : Kerry + 10.36%      0
Illinois : Kerry + 10.12%      5
Arkansas : Bush + 9.83%   195   
Hawaii : Kerry + 8.74%      96
Virginia : Bush + 8.23%   101   
Maine : Kerry + 8.03%      0
Delaware : Kerry + 7.57%      2
Missouri : Bush + 7.30%   136   
Washington : Kerry + 7.18%      0
Colorado : Bush +6.45%   204   
New Jersey : Kerry + 6.17%      0
Florida ; Bush + 5.01%   255

There were 5 Bush states between 5% and 11% - The FASTEST Bush state was Virginia at 101 minutes - slower than the SLOWEST Kerry state.   

Average of Bush states between 5 and 11% margin => 179 Minutes
Average of Kerry states between 5 and 11% Margin => 13 minutes (under 2 minutes if we exclude Hawaii)

Again, I am sure just a product of bad exit polls

I thought the polls in HI closed at 10:00 PM CST. CNN called it at 1:35 AM. That's more than 96 minutes.  Anyways, your challenge was to find ONE state that fit into either fast Bush or slow Kerry. I submit that I have done just that.

[Inverted Things]

In addition to bad exit polling, another cause for delayed Bush calling may have been that it's usually the cities that report first, giving Kerry a huge boost off the start in most of the swing states (OH being the lone exception as far as I know).