Month: November 2008

Once again, I present my not-so-surprising voting decision.

POTUS: McCain. In a previous post, I noted that the a presidential picking website generally favored McCain as my pick. If there’s any other reason for me to choose McCain over Obama, it is this: The National Federation of Independent Business gave Senator McCain a rating of 100 in its 110th (2007-2008) Pre-Election Congressional Report, versus a 50 for Obama. The NFIB determines the ratings of its candidates using information gathered by surveying its members… people like my uncle Marty. Basically, McCain is considered better for small buisness than Obama.

US Senate: Pat Roberts. I find it somewhat amusing that Jim Slattery is riding on the Obama style change Bandwagon. Slattery was our US representative in the 2nd District for many years, then ran unsucessfully for Govenor in 1994. (That election was basically called at 7:01 CT) Outside of Douglas County, Senator Roberts remains popular. He also received a 100 from the NFIB.

US House – District 2: Lynn Jenkins. Although Boyda received a respectible grade from the NFIB (70), the fact is, the rest of her party, particulary the incumbant speaker of the house, generally have low marks.

State Senate – 3rd District: Roger Pine. His opponent, Rep. Tom Holland, has been running attack ads, to which the incumbant Senator has found unworthy of response.

State Rep – 47th District: Republican Lee Tafanelli is running unopposed

County positions – All GOP, all unopposed.

Sales Tax – 1/4 cent for County matching KPERS. Yes.

Judicial Retention – None of the Judges that serve my district have run into contraversy. I voted to retain them all.

Other issues of interest
Lawrence Sales Tax – since I no longer live in Lawrence, this issue is not on my ballot. There’s currently a ballot measure for major infrastructure projects and for the transit service. I support the infrastructure measure, but oppose the transit measure on the grounds that, based on ridership and demographics, a fixed route bus system is *not* an nessecity for Lawrence and should be decommed.

JoCo question 1: Johnson County has a ballot measure to switch Judges from an appoint and retention system to direct election. This should be interesting

JoCo question 2: This question is on a sales tax to fund research development in cooperation with the state universities.

Kansas City Light Rail: This one is similar to the “T” question in Lawrence. Those opposed to the Light Rail basically argue that the demographics are not present to support rail transit just yet. I do believe, however, that the use of rail transit should be considered in cooperation with busses and automobiles.