It's looking less and less likely that Rudy Giuliani will end up challenging Kirsten Gillibrand for her Senate seat in 2010. Two weeks ago, Giuliani aides suggested the ex-mayor would probably announce his candidacy within "the next 48 hours." But there hasn't been any news of a political bid since then, and today Rudy's security firm announced it will be advising Rio de Janiero on its preparations for the Olympic Games in 2016. Rio is one of the world's most dangerous cities, of course. So that should keep him busy for the next six years, no? [NYDN]

Mike Bloomberg spent a fortune on his campaign for a third term and still only managed to prevail by less than five percentage points, so it's probably to be expected that the mayor's staff dropped this piece of news on the day after Thanksgiving. According to data released on Friday, Bloomberg spent a record $102 million on his reelection campaign (or $174 per vote), a figure that is expected to go up once the mayor hands out a big bunch of thank-you bonuses to senior members of his staff. [NYT, NYDN, NYP]

Shamelessly corrupt dictator-presidents should know that predicting a near-100 percent victory two days before an election is bad behavior, even for them. Unless they care more about enriching themselves while their country starves, like Equatorial Guinea's Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo.

Yesterday the Daily News seemed to suggest that a run for Senate by Rudy Giuliani was pretty much inevitable. Today? Not so much. The former mayor is now just "mulling" such a bid, the paper reports before going on to quote several of his aides who say the ex-mayor "is not particularly tempted by any public office."

Rudy Giuliani has decided not to run for governor next year, reports the Times:

Doug Hoffman was the ultra-conservative candidate that Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity backed in an election upstate. The district then went Democrat for the first time in 200 years. But don't worry, it was all an ACORN conspiracy.

Democrat Bill Owens originally had a 5,000 vote lead over Hoffman. That vote shrank to 3,000. There are 5,800 of absentee votes left to count! And though Hoffman would need to win 75% of those votes, and though presumably many of those votes were cast before Republican Dede Scozzafava withdrew from the race (and endorsed Owens), Hoffman has decided that his concession was premature. Well, Glenn Beck decided that Hoffman's concession was premature. And Hoffman just does whatever Glenn Beck says. Because he is a true conservative.

You knew that Mike Bloomberg went to extraordinary lengths to get himself elected to a third term, spending close to $100 million to blanket the local airwaves with commercials and stick flyers in the mailbox of every New Yorker. It turns out his campaigning extended far, far beyond New York as well:

Anthony Weiner is finally admitting that he'd probably be New York City's mayor-elect right now if he hadn't made the decision last spring to remain on the sidelines. Not that he has any regrets, of course. Had he elected to run, he would have totally neglected his responsibilities in Washington and then he wouldn't have been able to play such a central role in passing health care legislation. Obviously! Weiner also says that if he'd jumped into the race, Mayor Bloomberg would have been forced to spend $150 million on his campaign (instead of the $90 million he spent going up against Bill Thompson), since Bloomberg's advisers "were afraid" of him. So Weiner saved the mayor $60 million? Sounds like someone deserves a gift, Mr. Mayor. [NYT]

And here we were thinking that the end of the 2009 election cycle meant we wouldn't have to see any annoying campaign commercials until at least the fall of 2010. New York's gubernatorial elections are a full year away, but Gov. David Paterson is "making the highly unusual move" of airing two new commercials beginning tomorrow in the hopes of boosting his low approval numbers. We can't see how the two spots are going to do much to salvage his political fortunes. But you can have a look at the two commercials here and decide for yourself. [NYDN]

Hah, the Republican pagan won in Queens. Breaking! What does that say about the mood of the electorate, exactly? (That they dislike Asians, maybe?)

We told you about Mike, and about The Gays, but there were a couple other elections that news people are talking about today. These were, obviously, early referenda on Barack Obama, and he lost.

Jon Corzine was unseated as New Jersey's governor yesterday. Meanwhile, Bank of America is desperately seeking a new CEO and just yesterday announced it would be fine with having its next chief based in the New York area, instead of at BofA HQ in Charlotte. Is it possible that Jon Corzine could decide to return to his Wall Street roots and take over the troubled bank? Stranger things have happened, clearly. [Dealbreaker]

Congratulations to the National Organization For Marriage, a group dedicated to making sure a large segment of the population cannot get married, on their successful campaign to scare people in Maine.

Brilliant executive, richest man in town, and beloved mayor-for-life Mike Bloomberg joins Ed Koch, Fiorello LaGuardia, and Robert Wagner (not the actor) in the third-termers massive failure lame duck mayor club!

That sure was close, wasn't it? Going into the election, pollsters and pundits were predicting a double-digit win for Michael Bloomberg. But for all the money he spent ($157.27 per vote, compared to Thompson's $13.12), flashy endorsements he lined up, political rivals he forced into submission—and even with an opponent like Thompson who never quite got his act together—Bloomberg only managed to win by five percentage points. Yesterday's results will have implications for years to come, of course. We've rounded up a few of the early winners and losers below.

Have cable news on and Secretary of State sites loaded up? Good, let's all start looking for interesting nuggets as the returns from this off-year election night start coming in. At the Gawker Decision Desk tonight is Peter Feld.

The good news for Ivanka Trump: She did remember to go out and vote today and displayed a surprising amount of courage and independence by breaking with her father and throwing her support behind underdog Bill Thompson. (Just kidding!) The bad news: She forgot to wear her giant wedding ring when she appeared on The View this morning. Elisabeth Hasselbeck wasn't happy about it. But really, how do you expect someone to fully concentrate when democracy is in action? Cut the lady some slack! [Twitter, People]

Are you quivering with anticipation about how much Bloomberg's margin of victory will be? Whether moderate Republicans have been banished from Northeast New York? Whether Maine's letting gays marry? Oh good because Peter Feld's hosting an election-night live blog tonight.

You may remember Peter as the man behind last year's Gawker Decision Desk. Election Night 2009 doesn't hold quite the same promise of jubilant street celebrations, but there will be plenty to discuss. So, please stop by around 8pm when polls begin to close. In the meantime, for those of you actually bothering to vote, here's Peter's rebuttal to yesterday's Gawker Endorsement: Don't Vote for Bloomberg in which he gives you ten reasons to return a billionaire to City Hall.

Another reason not to vote today courtesy of NY1's John Schiumo: You run the risk of waking up a poll worker enjoying a relaxing nap. You wouldn't want to do that, would you? [Twitter]