October 04, 2003
California Campaign
Watching the campaign in California up close and personal (so to speak) as a newly transplanted Oregonian gives me a very different perspective than I might have had just living in California.
Here we are just a few days away from the actual election day and the campaign is running hot and heavy. If this was an Oregon campaign, the late breaking news about Arnold might not have any effect on the election, because Oregon's elections are conducted using Vote By Mail and a high percentage of the ballots would have already been cast by today. (You need to get the ballot in the mail by the Saturday before election day to guarantee it will be received by the time the polls close.)
What I'll be watching for here in California is how many absentee ballots have already been cast and what effect will they have on the election? How many votes went to Arianna and now are orphaned votes?
Here in California the Get Out the Vote drive is focused on election day. In Oregon, the Get Out the Vote drive is dispersed over 3 or 4 days since people have at least 2 weeks to vote. And you can work from the roll of voters that haven't yet voted.
Frankly, I like Oregon's vote by mail method better than the standard go to the polls on election day. The things that work better in Oregon include having much higher voter participation (possibly because the GOTV efforts are more focused) and voters have a chance to consider their votes since they get the information and usually vote after spending some time reviewing the ballot in the comfort of their own home.
California had the edge on Oregon on voter pamphlets. California's voter pamphlets (when I lived here before) were much better that those in Oregon. And I thought it was easier to find good independent information in California. (So is this still true? I'll let you know when I finally vote in the upcoming primary election.)
One of the biggest and most hotly contested campaign issues here in California is the car registration taxes. Arnold (and Bustamante) would repeal this horrendous tax increase because it is so unfair and such a burden on the taxpayer. What I've realized when I moved back is that horrendous tax burden is now back to what we had been paying in California for decades. The car tax had been cut and just putting it back to where it was is considered the most awful and terrible burden. Well, in my opinion, the worst burden we Californians have are in our failing public infrastructure: our inability to fund our schools and to provide adequate healthcare and to have a safety net to catch the poor and unfortunate. This is where we are truly impoverished. And ultra-rich Arnie wants to increase that burden because he feels overtaxed.