Look, I just finished two hours of door knocking for the Democratic party in the People's Republic. The ballot return rate, as of Saturday's Secretary of State scan, was 42% - considerably behind the normal rate for this late in the election process. We're not concerned about Obama taking Oregon- that's in the bag - but are extremely concerned about the Merkely / Smith race. We only knocked on doors for registered Democrats and non-affiliated voters who hadn't yet returned a ballot. A few had sent them in and hadn't yet been tallied; most hadn't. Some didn't know it was too late to mail. And of that group, a few didn't know where to take it.

You do what you have to do. he reasomn that the volume is up so high is the 42% number.

Turn in your ballots, folks.

The unleashed dishonesty in the no on M64 campaign amounts to near total disdain for the taxpayer and voters.
IMO.
Makes me want to never vote for any money measures/levies that fund any of those Public employee unions/jobs/agencies.

I've not seen any pro-64 ads, but a slew of the anti-side are plastering the airwaves.

Mean Bill Sizemore, trying to silence the folks who teach your kids and protect your life.

I'm no Sizemore fan, but using him as a boogeyman seems a bit childish.

And where's all the money coming from to pay for these ads? They wouldn't be from union dues, would they?

Wouldn't it be nice if the teachers, cops, and firefighters could keep that money and use it as they see fit?

I've received all this election porn, but I also received a Yes on 65 mailer that came in a basic white envelope and contained one
8 1/2 X 11 sheet of paper with the main points typed on it. Totally low budget.

So for that reason alone, you should vote for 65.

extremely concerned about the Merkely / Smith race

With both sides in that race being excruciatingly negative, it's no wonder people are turned off. You reap what you sow.

I'm in New Jersey for college, but my family was kind enough to send some of the election porn with the ballot. Such a joke.

Jack, did you go with NYJ like I told you and not NE in the underdog pool?

Yep.

You reap what you sow.

Doing nothing almost always favors the incumbent. And that in turn means six more years of Gordo.

No thanks.

Doing nothing almost always favors the incumbent.

Who said anything about doing nothing? How about highlighting what Merkley will do differently from Smith? Instead it's Smith's golf clubs, Smith hires illegal aliens, Smith is like Bush, Smith is with Big Oil, yada yada. Smith's campaign is just as bad, but it's Merkley who gets hurt by low turnout caused by voter turnoff.

Voting early can eliminate the election porn, but why give up your edge. Ugly things can be revealed up to the last minute. Kind of like putting your money down for a particular sports team before reading the final injury report.

Can't you have it both ways? It seems to me that if you change your mind after mailing you can go to the election office and get a replacement ballot -- and only the latest one will be counted.

Voting early can eliminate the election porn...

Voting early appears to stop the phone calls, but I think the printed stuff is bulk mailed at a cheaper rate, so it's still sent to everybody.

John Rettig, you said,

"We only knocked on doors for registered Democrats and non-affiliated voters who hadn't yet returned a ballot."

So, the counties will freely tell you the names of party and non party afflilated voters who havent turned their ballots in?

Voting early stops the phone calls within 24-48 hours, the knocks on the doors within 48-72 hours, and the bulk mail within 3-4 days.

Campaigns get daily reports from the SoS office detailing who has voted, and that information is added to the databases they use to generate calling, walking, or mailing lists. The effects of being stricken from those first two lists are pretty instantaneous, but obviously the lag time on a mailing operation is a little longer.

the counties will freely tell you the names of party and non party afflilated voters who havent turned their ballots in?

Technically, the Secretary of State, but otherwise true. All public information, along with age and gender.

I always vote as soon as possible in order to minimize the phone calls and mailer info. Of course, I'd welcome a visit from john rettig any day. He and I could catch up on the old days in HFCD.

I do agree that the no on 64 commercials were stupid. From the ads you would think that m64 had something to do with locking up fireman or maybe burning schoolteachers at the stake? It must be something really awful based on the ads but then I read the measure and realized that the no on 64 ads were basically just lies. So given all the lies from the no side I had to vote yes.

Interesting. For some reason I hadn't ever thought about the sec. of state etc. handing out that info. I'm all for it being available in a general sense but it irks me greatly that anyone of any party gets to know when I've voted before the election. Explains why this morning I've gotten 1 repub party call, 1 Obama campaign call and someone else who didn't leave a message and had an out of state area code. Maybe I should get my ballot in earlier. I tend to prefer to drop it off in most cases in the last 1-2 days before the election.

I had 4 damn calls on Sunday from some unknown group with the 000-000-0000 caller ID. When I finally answered it at night, it was after a pause it was some gal asking if I was informed about all the state measures. Not who she was herself or what organizaion, just start asking questions outright. I told her I was informed, thank you and have a nice night.