With election day upon us, how is everyone feeling about the presidential race? Angry? Hopeful? Anxious? Exhausted? Perfectly Zen? If we could take an aura photograph of the American electorate – a portrait filled with blobs of colour by electromagnetic sensors, intended to reveal the subject’s character and state of mind – what would it look like?

According to daily polling from Civiqs, which has been charting America’s mood about the direction of the United States, the vibes around this so-called vibes election have been strikingly stable. This despite an electoral journey that has featured more ups, downs and bizarre twists than that Australian breakdancer at the Olympics: a twice-impeached ex-president and felon vowing political retribution; a spiralling escalation of violence in the Middle East; two assassination attempts; foreign disinformation plots; malefactors torching ballot boxes; xenophobic smears involving pet-eating migrants; the radicalisation of childless cat ladies. It has been a lot. But through it all, the electorate has stayed on an even keel, except for at one critical moment that shifted America’s spirits like nothing else: President Joe Biden’s decision to bow out in July.

Out goes Joe. In comes Kamala. And just like that, Democratic voters reported a 14-point jump in hopefulness and a slight uptick in excitement, along with modest declines in fear, anger and depression. It was as though the blue team had taken a double dose of next-generation antidepressants. What I was hearing out on the campaign trail matched the poll results, with progressive organisers and voters reporting a rush of post-Biden energy.

Biden’s departure had an effect, albeit less dramatic, on Trump’s team as well. Republican voters’ fear factor and depression went up a percentage point or two, as did their sense of hope. Their anger eased a bit – going from 47 per cent of the dominant emotion to 42 per cent – but stayed high enough that their aura was still swamped by a deep, burning red. Anger, it seems, is a big part of what defines Trump’s Republican Party, which is likely to surprise exactly no one.

The overwhelmingly positive vibe shift for Democrats gave them a welcome boost in what had been a soul-sucking retread of an election. But it also was a harsh statement about the disservice Biden had done to his party, the nation and his legacy by overstaying his time.

If Harris winds up in the Oval Office, Biden’s display of vanity is likely to be forgiven and his legacy redeemed, at least among Democrats. If Trump prevails and wreaks even a portion of the anti-democratic havoc he has vowed, history’s judgment could prove much harsher.

But no matter how the race turns out, Biden will long be remembered as the president who hung on too long – a leader who for many of his own voters became a symbol of the sclerosis, dysfunction and entitlement of America’s political establishment.

Candidates and their campaigns can try to spin the fundamentals of an election, but the vibes don’t lie.