elections

All-

We are almost finished with our round of Clay County candidate video interviews, and many of them are now available on MyClaySun.com/video

For a bit of background, we invited all candidates who are running opposed in the primary elections on Aug. 26th to the Times-Union for video interviews. We (well, I) asked each candidate three questions - all candidates in the same race received the same questions and there were no time limits for their responses.

I won't post every single video here, but I will list the races and candidates names who stopped in for an interview. If you don't see a video for a candidate listed below, don't worry, we have one more day of interviews and all videos should be up tomorrow evening. Click on the candidate to watch their video.

Do you have a voting strategy?  In contemplating the upcoming elections which I do alot, and in speaking with friends, other citizens and hear the differing points of view there is also strategy revealed.  I'm not just talking local elections but all that you will vote on.

Is your strategy to vote strictly based upon party?  Do you vote for someone because based upon six degrees of seperation you may just possibly have a connection.  How much do you weigh what your friends and family say, especially if there are opposite party lines?  Perhaps a great many do alot of reading, or watching tv to get information.  Don't you also have to investigate the sources of your news and information.  If you stop to think about it the only possible way to have a decent grip on accurate information it has to come straight from their mouths....live.....with no editing, does that even exist unless you're attending something local? 

All-

In addition to the sheriff candidate's live blog interview on MCS.com, we have invited all of the clay couny candidates in for video interviews at the Times-Union building.

*note - we invited only those up for the Aug. 26 primary elections, so candidates who automatically advance to the Nov. 4 general elections were not included in this round of video interviews* 

We will be asking each candidate 3 questions at these video interviews and we want your input. Here are the race and candidates we have asked in. If you have any questions for these candidates just reply with a comment and make sure to specify which candidate or race.

I just picked up a flyer today at a store and I see the address is 3860 Doctors Lake.   I just wanted new to share that since I had not seen the location posted on the blogs.

I will now go back to lurking

Soon Clay voters will make one of their most crucial decisions in 4 years…They will decide who leads our schools:  Steven Richards, Patrick Thurman, or Ben Wortham.

Clay Action Network (CAN) invites you to a FORUM for School Superintendent Candidates. Each candidate will answer questions about their background, their goals for Clay County schools, and their strategy to achieve them.

Although it has not made it onto the SOE website as of yet it's still official.  District 5 now has an "Independent" contender for the District 5 seat of the BCC, and that is my Husband, Fred Catchpole.

He is not merely running with "NPA", Fred has been a registered Indpendent all of his life.  According to the SOE Fred is a rare bird because we put up our own personal money in order to meet the deadline to get on the ballot because it's too late for petitions.  He was told this is "unheard of".  To some extent we have now put our money where our mouths are. 

Can someone explain where this "I approve this message" came from?  I've thought all this before but after the latest John McCain commercial where it's his face, his voice I have to give into the madness and ask why?

How in blue blazes does this make any sense?  If you see an ad for a Candidate and it's not them talking I could maybe see the point of "I approve this message".  But when you have the face of the candidate staring at you while speaking, the words match the way his lips are moving it's bizarre. To say "I approve this message" when you can cleary see and hear what is coming out of his mouth?  Am I the only one that finds this.....ummm....dumb?

The relationship between leadership and character is very close.  A leader without character is not a leader at all.  As I’ve sat back and watched the school board here in Clay County, I can’t help but wonder when a leader is going to emerge.  Abraham Lincoln said, “Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.”

As soon as the present board members ascended to office, they forgot why they were put there.  They are more consumed with the power they’ve been trusted with than with the needs of their constituency.  It is time for change on the Clay County School Board.  It is time for parents, teachers and students alike to start having their voices heard.  We owe it to ourselves and to the future of Clay County to hold our elected representatives accountable.

Does Money Make It Right? By OneMann - Wed, 08/08/2007 - 9:04pmAnother blogger has twice mentioned the need to raise big money in order to attain political viability, either as a candidate for office or to support or oppose possible amendments to the Clay County Charter.  The writer added that not believing so meant one was not living in the real world. In the past few years there have been quite a few changes in local government, from those elected officials who retired or were otherwise forced out of office to a Charter addition mandating a new ethics ordinance to, next year, adding two new members to the County Commission.My question is this:  Has the American electoral system been reduced to merely who raises the most money and, if so, what does that say about local politics? 

Oneman, to answer your Question's;Submitted by winn1955 on Thu, 08/09/2007 - 1:18pm.Oneman, to answer your Question's; Has the American electoral system been reduced to merely who raises the most money, and if so, what does that say about local politics”? The answer to the first part of your Question is yes. The political arena has been reduced to who has the most in their war chest, and it is truly unfortunate to have too depend on the dollar to win an election. Baxley hit the nail on the head when he said name recognition, but he did not mention the second reason. An election is about two items, as Baxley stated; name recognition, and Two, being able to express your point of view. And in order to achieve those goals; one must be able to put those two items in front of the people. And how do we do that? We gather as many donations as possible, build a war chest, use our own money, and advertise, advertise, advertise.  The second part of your question, “and if so, what does that say about local politics”? That’s an easy one. It say’s that the politician with the biggest war chest will most likely win the election, sad but true. And as Baxley states; “there’s the rub”.  Baxley you say, “It seems almost un-American in some ways, but maybe it is oh-so-American.  I hate it.  I wish there were some other way, but how?  Here is my opinion on how too change it. With today’s technology there is absolutely no reason that anyone running for any office should have to pay to make the two points that I stated above. An election benefits any and every American involved in that particular election, whether national, or local. So ask yourselves; what is a politician? The answer; they are a public servants.  Yes that is right; they serve you and me. So! Here is what we do, send a bill to the legislators that would require all elections to be broadcast as a public service announcement. Give the politician an equal X amount of time to make the two points mentioned above. For a more in-depth announcement on the positions, and views send the people too a web page. All the media outlets should be involved. If need be give the media outlets and incentive in the form of a tax break. The more time given to the election the bigger the tax break for that media outlet. Sounds to simple, it may be, but it would work! It would place anyone that wanted to run for office on an even playing field. If adopted even a poor man like me could run for office.  

No, I did not know the Keystone election results before the polls closed. But you would think so, if you noted the time of 9 am posted on my previous blog. I noticed the mistake the moment I hit the "submit" button. Help, come back! I figured there might be some way to edit my mistake, but no such luck. I had a difficult time posting the blog to begin with, as I thought I could just "paste" the neat, orderly file I had done in a word document. Again, no such luck. So it took me forever to straighten that out. Then I noticed in the "preview" section that the date and time were listed as 12/31/69 - 7 pm.