Who are you voting for?

I am positively voting for Kent Kanoy because he is the only candidate that is unequivocally opposed to the Iraq War and Occupation, has the integrity to espouse impeachment for Bush's obvious illegalities, and values our Constitutional rights.

County Commissioner is a tough one with the postive situation in which at least four of the top candidates would all make excellent commissioners.

I know for certain than I am voting for Alice Gordon. She has been a steady advocate for a variety of authentic progressive policies, a Board leader on environmental issues, and a person who has served for many years with forthrightness and resisted the urge to play politics with the power afforded her.

I'm thinking positive thoughts, especially about all the judges who sent me many beautiful gloossy brochures with pictures of them and thier lovely families. I was positively moved to find out that they really care about our community, want the future to be better, and are committed to being fair. Now if I only knew which ones were Tarheel fans.

I voted for a whole slate of candidates, but am most concerned about the rest of the world voting for:

Fred Battle
Mike Nelson
Adam Stein

I will be voting for
Barry Jacobs
Fred Battle
Kent Kanoy

#185 at Morehead 9am this morning

These are who I personally endorse:

Alice Gordon
Fred Battle
Adam Stein

And like Ruby, I am also voting for some other people, but am not excited enough about them to shout about it. Thanks for the great discussion on the judges.

Ruby
Did you ask about the delay or report it to the board of elections?
This is not cool
jacquie

Mike Nelson
Adam Stein

I too had a slow time early voting in Carrboro... I'm doing GOTV at the Farmer's Market tomorrow and I hope they clear it up...

ken

Nelson
Battle
Fox
Stein

The Town Hall computer slowed things down yesterday also. One waits for a print-out to sign.

David Price for Congress

Barry Jacobs for Commissioner

Robin Hudson for Supreme Court (Orange Co. Democratic Party has endorsed her, by the way)

[Pseudonymous comment deleted. -Ed.]

Alice Gordon is a definite and Mike Nelson is a probably.

I'm a Chatham County voter, so most of my votes are of no interest to you all.

But in the Superior Court race, I voted (early voting, yeah!) for Allen Baddour and Michael Patrick. We could only be so lucky.

I also voted for Robin Hudson for the N.C. Supreme Court.

Duncan
Your votes as a Chatham County voter ARE very much of interest to those of us in Orange County.I think that this year's race for Chatham County Commisoners could have more of a long term impact on our lives in Orange County then our own elections.
Good luck!
JAcquie

I had the same trouble at Carrboro Town Hall...the printer was VERY slow. I hope this can be fixed for the general election's early voting period.

I voted enthusiastically for:
Kent Kanoy
Fred Battle
Mike Nelson
Barry Jacobs
Adam Stein
Allan Baddour
Robin Hudson

...and a few others.

-Elizabeth

If you're still not sure who to vote for, come on over right now and hang out at my and Al (McSurely's) house -- 415 West Patterson Place, 27516 -- we've got good food, drink and lots of friends here. This is a party for Fred Battle, who we support for County Commissioner.

It is secondarily an Impeach Bush party (we're voting for Kent Kanoy, who, btw, is here now, too).

Adam Stein is here. We support him for Superior Court judge.

Of our non-candidate friends who are here, my favorite is Misha Coleman.

Thanks and see you soon I hope,
Ashley Osment

At the Morehead Planetarium site it had nothing to do with the new machines, rather it was an IBM laptop communicating with a HP printer. It seemed to take a fairly long time after they hit the print button.

Hey Pierre in this case we are voting on who judges us, which I spose' could be viewed as leading. Think of the opportunity presented to you. Someday you might have to face this person (the one your voting for) from across the judiciary bench. Therefore, you might want to vote for a judge who does not have a nasty predisposition towards whatever demographic you fall into.

Well, I'm having a hard time picking anyone for the County. A recent conversation with Alice Gordon convinced me to vote for her, and I have two people I will not be voting FOR, but other than that I am STILL undecided.

Pierre,

Please reconsider, there is a place in politics for everyone... even dead French anarchists.

Wow Ken, good catch. The link is for the rest of us philosophical freshmen. First person to call himself an anarchist? I guess someone always has to be first.

Wow indeed! And who said everybody doesn't have access to a computer and the Internet?

I voted for the whole slate, but these are the people I enthusiastically support:

Rep. David Price
Judge Chuck Anderson
Barry Jacobs
Ted Triebel
Debbie Piscatelli

Mark, this is an assumption now (my wife always tells me that's what gets us in trouble), but I think you can safely assume that Allen Baddour is a Tar Heel fan. He is Dickie's boy, after all.

Tom - I suspect you're right on Allen. As an Adam Stein supporter I'm compelled to say that I have personal knowledge that Adam is a big Tar Heel fan and it is a trait he has passed on to his children. Chapel Hill is an interesting place in terms of the basketball/intelligensia overlap. I tribute it to the great program and social responsibility of Dean Smith.

For what it's worth, as in other areas Judge Anderson's Tar Heel credentials are unparalleled:

He played under Coach Gutheridge on the freshman team in 1968-69, where he worked tirelessly with a young Roy Williams to keep the bench adequately warm.

From what I've heard, they were successful.

Allen Baddour is a fan of truth, justice, fair play, and excellence. So of course he's a Tar Heel fan. He grew up in Chapel Hill. He attended UNC as an undergraduate and a law student. He prefers the creatures of the light to the forces of evil, and so he is a Tar Heel fan.

Not sure what this has to do with the judicial race, but it _is_ fun! I wonder if, seriously, you could be elected to office in Orange County as an "out" Dookie. (That is, a Duke basketball fan. I have no problem with graduates or employees of the very fine university itself, on the whole. At least, the ones who are from here, or remain here.)

This is much less of an issue in Chatham, where we have more than our fair share of State fans.

d

p.s. Please pardon the interruption on this endorsement thread. I'm not trying to hijack it, I just thought the question of politics and basketball was funny.

Adam STein
Michael Patrick
Mike Nelson
Fred Battle

Duncan
Is there a site we can go to to keep up with what is happening in the Chatham elections?
JAcquie

Stein
Nelson

After that I was hoping to be swayed by one of you.

Jacquie,

There are a couple of listservs in Chatham which are not nearly as comprehensive as this one (although, on the big one, Chatham Chatlist, there's a once-a-week virtual swap meet which will keep you informed on the best places to get guinea hens and find doctors who make house calls). If you e-mail me offline, I'll send you some of those. Gene Galin runs the big one. There's a lot of bickering going on back and forth at the moment -- predictably about the commissioner's race, but also the Clerk of Court race, surprisingly enough -- but it's hard to get a reading off any one of the lists about how candidates might be doing.

However, if I were to handicap it, I'd say:

Lucier and Thompson win seats on the county commission, thus giving the forces for right a majority.

Vanderbeck has been a very good campaigner, is well-respected, and actually _lives_ in the district he wants to represent, but he's still got a monster to slay in Bunkey Morgan. On the other hand, putting up a candidate that ran hard against Bunkey may be helping Lucier and Thompson -- Bunkey has been mainly focused on Bunkey this season, and the others running who would be Bunkey people -- Emerson and Nettles -- have not benefited from this. I'm not counting Vanderbeck out, but even if he loses he may have helped us win.

So score one for the angels!

Some folks on the lists are disturbed by the activity of the Chatham Coalition, especially their formation of a slate (Lucier, Thompson, Vanderbeck) and their independent campaign on behalf of their slate. This kind of thing is still new in Chatham County, at least to be so public about it, and some people are a little put off. (The Chatham Coalition is strongly identified with northeast Chatham, which can put off the Siler City/Goldston/Bear Creek (and to a lesser extent, Silk Hope) people, and if it wants to a force for change in the longterm, the coalition will have to branch out and explain why their values are also good for western Chatham. That will take some time.

Duncan

p.s. Just a reminder, vote on Tuesday!

Turnout is going to be incredibly low-

1,193 people voted early.

Two year ago it was 2,225.

Even in the municipal elections in the fall 1,780 people voted early.

Very high early turnout numbers in Chatham though, which I can only imagine is good news.

Also to be noted:

the early voting two years ago went heavily for the two candidates endorsed by nomerger.org so the lower early voting turnout could be a reflection of a reduced role in the election this year by that group.

That might mean bad things for Fred Battle, as the non-incumbent candidate endorsed by that group. All the more reason to go cast a vote for him tomorrow!

I'm narrowing my field. I've got to go with Fred Battle.

An observation - Barry has that knack for seeming to be a Tarheel fan or a Duke fan depending upon who he's speaking with.

Last year, or perhaps this past fall, sometime after the 2005 national championship, Barry Jacobs wrote an article in the Indy about UNC's improbable run to the national championship. That after we were preseason #1 in some polls. That irked me enough to remember it... and would a real Tar Heel ever think our victories were improbable? Or at least admit it out loud?

And that may be, deep down, part of the reason that if I manage to remember to go vote today (feel free to send me emails reminding me to do so), I will vote only for Mike in the commissioner race.