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[firelizard5]

Happy post-election day! I hope that your favored local candidates did well, and that no one managed to shove through any stupid local laws with a ballot measure*. My favored mayoral candidate looks like he will win, though as our local ballots are paper, it might be a couple of days before they are all counted.

It is November, which means that

Comments

[elwood012]

Things went pretty well here-Eyman's latest initiative going down in flames (see above), our expanded domestic partnership law being upheld, the stealth republican running for county exec getting defeated, and a very competitive race for mayor (less than a 500 vote margin).

Regarding Eyman, the No on 1033 campaign had some of the best flyers ever, with a header saying that the initiative was sponsored by Tim Eyman + usual ominous copy text, with the rest of the flyer being instructions on how to vote no, showing a magnified ballot with a giant arrow pointing towards the appropriate box, marked no. Not sure if they sent these outside of King County, which went 67% against, but that's evidentially all they need to do here...

Oh, and yeah, amendments, we had a few of those this year, including 'strike obsolete language' for some administrative thing that didn't exist anymore :p

[firelizard5]

We prefer to just let our legislators handle that sort of thing. That's why we pay them. Sort of. We give then $13k a year, anyway, and free tickets to Duke and UNC games, which means that they are paid slightly better than Americorp volunteers, and slightly worse than graduate students.

[elwood012]

Indeed. Unfortunately, since we do have a strong initiative system, they tend to end up rather straightjacketed by unfunded spending mandates and tax cuts enacted by initiatives, as well as a balanced budget amendment and a requirement that any tax increase requires a 67% supermajority in the legislature or a public vote (this is from a previous Eyman initiative).

As a result, instead of getting set by representatives who get paid about as much as postdocs (~$36K, though cost of living is substantially higher up here) to spend most of their time legislating, much of the fiscal policy here is set by people who may or may not even read their voter's pamphlets...

[firelizard5]

Wow, your voters get pamphlets? We get a postcard when we initially register to vote, telling us our polling location. We are supposed to just work it out from there.

[elwood012]

Washington is 100% mail-in voting as of the election before this one. The closest thing that we have to polls now is mailbox-like drop boxes for ballots.

Comprehensive pamphlets with candidate statements for every candidate as well as the full text of every initiative, proposition, referendum, or amendment since well before the switch. As some of the laws proposed by initiative or put to referendum are quite long, these can be rather thick tomes some years.

I'm surprised that you don't in NC -- do they really expect people to make up their minds at the polls or from TV commercials? Of course, there are almost certainly a ton of people who don't read their pamphlets, but at least our secretary of state's office *tries*...

[firelizard5]

Our ballots are not as complicated. We vote on candidates only--there is no referendum or initiative system. The only other thing that gets directly voted on are constitutional amendments (the real kind, not wording changes). The ballot is a single piece of paper, more than half blank space.

I think the idea is to try only to collect the opinion of informed voters. The ballots are a strict list of names--no photos, no listed party affiliations. A police officer stands outside each polling location to stop doorside vote soliciting. If you want to vote, you have to a)leave your house and b)research the candidates in advance (or vote based on who has the prettiest last name, I guess). It means we have absurdly low turn-out, <15% of the registered voters, but it does mean that everyone who voted cares, or knows someone who cared enough to drag them out

[elwood012]

Ours, on the other hand, sometimes require nonstandard-sized paper and more than one stamp.

Regarding informed voters, it's a tossup. People may research more deeply, or they may just be more likely to go with whomever their newspaper/union/friends recommends, or whoever has the shortest last name.

As far as advertising, people throw a lot of money at local races here. Yes, you get the signs, door-to-door campaigning (sometimes even by the candidates), and flyers, but TV, radio, and internet advertising are also common. Contributions for this year's mayoral race (officially nonpartisan, but between two Democrats) were on the order of $1M, and were in the tens of millions for the 2008 Governor's race.

[firelizard5]

There is nothing inherently wrong with voting based on the recommendations of others, as long as you trust them. If your goal, for example, is to pick alderman who will work for the best interests of your union, then you should vote for your union's candidate. If you lack the time or interest to research candidates, but have a friend who does--and you generally agree with said friend on politics--then you should go with their picks. I usually help my mother select candidates, for example, as she lacks the free time to research them really well, and I know her opinions. I have even, once or twice, recommended contrary to my own vote.

[elwood012]

I'm not claiming there's anything inherently wrong with that--I was saying that it does not necessarily follow that people will research candidates if information is not provided about them, just as it does not necessarily follow that people will read information about candidates if it is provided.