The Indiana Court of Appeals is lifting a Marion County court’s order regarding the treatment of absentee ballots.

Last week, a Marion County Judge ordered  County Clerk Beth White to instruct all poll workers to treat any challenged mail-in absentee ballot like a provisional ballot.  Republicans argued that the Clerk’s training manual was incorrect when it told poll workers to put all absentee ballots into voting machines.

The Court of Appeals ruled that absentee ballot challenges could be handled by precinct while in-person challenges be handled by the Election board.

GOP chairman Tom John says this gives more protection to mail-in votes than in-person votes thus creating a double standard.

More than 92,000 early votes have been cast in Marion County. 

Note: at 6 p.m. tonight I got word that The Indiana Supreme Court just issued an order overturning the Court of Appeals ruling.

I have heard Democrats and Republicans referring to the 2007 Mayoral race in Indianapolis as a reason not to trust polls because of Greg Ballard’s come from behind victory over Bart Peterson.

Might I suggest looking at the actual results.

In the May 2007 primary, there were 17,150 Republican votes for Mayor cast and 21,435 on the Democratic side.  That means 38,535 voters cast a vote for Mayor.  Since everyone knew who Peterson was and only a handful of people knew who Ballard was, we need to focus only on the Peterson votes.

Peterson received 18,794 votes, or 46% of the total votes for Mayor.  So in a primary, a two-term incumbent Mayor got less than 50% of the vote.  In the general election, Peterson only got 47% of the total votes. 52.7% of the voters chose Ballard or Fred Peterson.  Like I said, anyone who paid attention at the time saw this coming.  Now a lot of other things fell into place (the tax increase, Council antics, etc.) but the primary was the first real indicator that Peterson was in trouble and the GOP had a shot at winning.

So if you’re running behind and want to draw a Ballard-Peterson analogy, feel free but you might be looking at the wrong candidate.

Okay guys, it’s the day before the election.  Here’s your chance to make your predictions, not endorsements. Feel free to offer explanations if you wish.  Here are the questions.

1. Who wins the Presidency (Electoral votes and popular vote percentage)?
2. Which Presidential candidate wins Indiana (popular vote percentage)?
3. Who wins the Governor’s race (percentage)?
4. How many seats do Democrats pick up in the U.S. Senate?
5. How many seats do Democrats pick up in the U.S. House?
6. Does the Indiana State House of Representatives change?
7. Do the Township Assessors stay?
8. Does IPS get $278,000,000 of your money?

My girlfriend, who is as busy as I am, voted today.  I asked her to write about the experience.   She was kind enough to do so.   And for the record, she’s a split-ticket voter.

This morning, as I was pulling into the parking lot of J. Everett Light Career Center on 86^th Street, reminded me of the weeks before Christmas at like Best Buy or Wal-Mart.  You remember the special deals on the products that everybody wanted and the people that brought their tents, chairs, and food sitting near the entrance ready to be the first to enter.  I arrived at 10:00 a.m., an hour before the doors were to open.  The crowd of people was already wrapped around the side and near the back of the building.    Many people that were standing behind me were amazed at how far the line already was.

At about 10:20 a.m. we were informed they would be opening early and to have our government ID ready when entering the facility.    There were a few young adults that were coming around selling coffee, hot chocolate and brownies for a buck.  Anything to buy the time just standing around—and the money went back to the school.  At around this time the line actually started moving a bit faster and some of the people that were on the ballot started making their way to the crowd “selling themselves” and why we should vote for them.  County Treasurer  Michael Rodman, Republican  Judicial candidate  Jim Joven, and County Surveyor candidate Debra Jenkins were just a few of the people that were out speaking and shaking hands with the people.

I noticed there was a lot of emphasis put on the Democratic Party and forms to show just how to vote a straight Democratic ticket.  I thought it was interesting that there weren’t as many public figures out to boost the Republican team.  I was told by one woman that there were more Republicans out pushing their party  last Sunday.  I thought it was a good move for the candidates to get out and show their faces and talk to the people that just might vote for them.  Although I thought most people had it in their minds already that they were going to vote for, I felt that this could only help their chances for the few undecided in races like the circuit court judge or the county treasurer.

All in all I must say that this voting facility was very organized and got us in without a lot of mass confusion.  It took me a total of 2 and a half hours to finish the whole process.  Voting early has really helped me in making sure my work week isn’t bombarded with voting on Tuesday and I did it all in heels too!               

It hasn’t been easy but here’s a  rough “guestimate” of an early breakdown of early voting in Marion County.

• City-County Building,  80-20 Democrats.
• J . Everett Light,  60-40 Repubicans.
• Southport Community Center,   70-30 Republicans.
• Mail-in, 60-40 Republicans.

These are guestimates based on conversations with people who pay pretty close attention to this stuff. Please note, this also does not mean that all Democrats will vote Democratic and Republicans will vote for Republicans.  I’m getting more and more reports of split ticket voters every day.

Early voting continues thought 7 p.m.  Go do it if you can.

This final Sunday before the election I figured would be the perfect time express a thought or two about the Presidential and gubernatorial races.

I’ve been accused of being a shill for the Barack Obama people, although no one can point to an example of where I’ve written for Obama anywhere.   And I got a note the other day telling me I was treating the Jill Long Thompson campaign unfairly.  

I will honestly admit a certain fascination for both Obama and Republican Governor Mitch Daniels.   Not for the reason you might think, but more for the reason that they get it!

I have been involved in politics in one capacity or another since the early 1990s, either as a graduate student working on his Master’s Degree, a reporter covering candidates, or as someone working on a campaign or giving friendly advice to someone running. 

One thing I learned in all that time is at the end of the day, campaigns are fundamentally lost on the campaigns.

It’s part money, message and organization.  And when you screw up these three, you’re going to be left behind real quick.

Both Obama and Daniels secured their money, message and organizations a long time ago.  I still don’t know what JLT stands for except she’s not Mitch Daniels and wants a referendum on DST.

John McCain sowed up the Republican nomination in March.  Between that time and June when then Democrats picked their nominee he could been crafting and delivering a very simple message “cut taxes, cut spending and the crap in Washington.” 

Both McCain and JLT squandered opportunities by having no clear message, bad organizations and money issues.   Now that doesn’t mean they still can’t win on Tuesday.  Everyone points to Greg Ballard, but even the Mayor’s win was about being organized and having a message, even though he didn’t have a lot of money.

So when I say John McCain and JLT have run bad campaigns, I mean it, but I’m not being mean.

I got this tonight from the JLT campaign.  All I can say is thank God this race will be over in 72 hours.

 

Dear Friend,

Sunday morning at 2:00 a.m., Hoosiers across the state will be moving their clocks back one hour, thanks to Mitch Daniels and his one-sided decision making style. His approach to the issue of Daylight Savings Time has left too many Hoosiers in the dark.

As Governor, Jill will work for a statewide referendum on the issue of Daylight Savings Time, so that the voices of all Hoosiers can be heard. She believes that with your input, we can create a policy that better suits the needs of Indiana.

It’s time to change more than our clocks.  It’s time to change our Governor.

Sincerely,

Travis Lowe
Campaign Manager
Hoosiers for Jill

P.S. November 4th is almost here and we need your help getting out the vote.  Can you spare a few hours on or before Election Day? Click here to volunteer: http://www.hoosiersforjill.com/page/s/election.

The Republican candidate for President, in the last days of the campaign, is rallying the faithful in Indiana.

The Democratic candidate for President, in the last days of the campaign, is running commercials in Arizona, Georgia and North Dakota.

The polling data and anecdotal evidence shows a significant number of Hoosiers are going to vote for Barack Obama for President and Mitch Daniels for Governor.

IPS is closing six schools, firing 400 teachers and is still asking for millions in tax dollars to make improvements.

The Republican and former Democratic Mayor of Indianapolis who fought a brutal race are teaming up against township government.

And the Washington Township assessor was forced to admit Friday consolidation would not be bad, as long as it wasn’t done while she was still in office.

What kind of world are we living in?

A Marion County Judge is ordering County Clerk Beth White to instruct all poll workers to treat any challenged mail-in absentee ballot like a provisional ballot.  

Marion County Republicans argued that the Clerk’s training manual was incorrect when it told poll workers to put all absentee ballots into voting machines.

The GOP said the clerk failed to instruct poll workers about what to do when ballots were challenged and that once ballots were put in the voting machine they were considered cast.

White says she will comply with the Court order.

So far more than 85,000 absentee ballots have been requested.and 26,000 have been returned by mail.

Marion County Assessor Greg Bowes is disputing claims by the township assessors that the property tax appeals are proving their initial assessments were more correct than the reassessed property values.  

The assessors, who are fighting a proposal to consolidate their office functions to the county level, say many of the residential appeals show homes were over-assessed and the County can’t do a better job so citizens should oppose the consolidation referendum.

Bowes says the townships’ math is misleading.  He says while some reassessment appeals have come back closer to the township figures, he says 75-percent of all the property in Marion County was not appealed and the County captured nearly $2 billion of  assessed value missed by the assessors.

In addition, Bowes also says only 10 percent of the appeals have been completed, so the township assessors assertions that the reassessments were bad is premature at best.