I have always appreciated Thomas and his regular Our Campaigns email updates. It's a pleasure to endorse him for President. Good luck Thomas.

Thanx Travis. I think you will make an equally impressive and dedicated President. You've proven that you can work hard to improve and expand the site. It's a hard choice. He asked. And where I live politicians still ask people for their vote, it's something I grew up with. Thanks for everything you do, I know you are greatly appreciated by myself and many others.

"Hell, the polls open here before they even close on the Dem primary." - User#1490 No, they don't. They close on the Dem Primary poll at 12am and open here 6 hours later at 6am.

If this SOS is doing it, it'll be online a bit later, say 7:45 am.

Ah, my mistake. Still, a six-hour campaign in the middle of the night? I mean I know it's peak working hours for us college students, but...

The Democratic primary was *supposed* to end on the 5th, but there was an error when the poll was entered, and it's too difficult to alter it.

Randy, I was wondering how you determine which votes are considered valid and which votes are considered invalid. Could you please explain how you decide who is eligible and in good enough standing to vote?

It depends on how active they are as members and how long they've been here. If someone has been here less than about a week, I chuck their vote. If someone has been here a long time, but never posts or enters data, I chuck their vote. Members who were really active before but haven't been recently, I keep their vote.

Thanks Randy

Randy, thanks for the information. I was hoping, however, for something a little more formal (so that everyone knows what the exact rules are before hand so there are no problems) The first people you said you would remove are those not registered 7 days before the election. Is this the start of the primary election date or the general election date? The second one seemed very vague. You wrote: “If someone has been here a long time, but never posts or enters data, I chuck their vote. Members who were really active before but haven't been recently, I keep their vote.” Are there a number of posts you are looking for? Do they have to enter so many pieces of election data? If you could clarify how you determine “active” members from “non-active” members it would be greatly appreciated.

OFFICAL BALLOT:

I think Randy is being deliberately vague as not to give people the knowledge how to register duels for voting purposes and get them around Randy's spidey senses.

VOTED! GO BOBBY!

"I think Randy is being deliberately vague as not to give people the knowledge how to register duels for voting purposes and get them around Randy's spidey senses." - User#215 Bingo. Anything else allows people to game the system. Plus, it would take forever for me to verify specific log in times and how many messages posted. And just posting messages doesn't count if they're all troll messages. (BTW, it's duals, not duels. Unless you mean fighting. :) )

That may or may not be the case, but it is unfair to the candidates. They have to get as many users to vote for them as possible. They need to know what rules the election is operating under. I don’t think Randy would change votes in favor of any particular candidate, however as the Florida Presidential and Washington Governor elections have proven –rules need to be very clear before an election starts. This is so candidates cannot complain that the rules were changed after the election to favor their opponent. Also, candidates have to operate under the rules that Randy makes. It is only fair they know exactly what these rules are.

Yea!!! I've at least now tied my vote totals for the first time I ran!!! :)

dual... *smacks head* And since you are here Thomas, I wish you good luck, I may not be supporting you obviously, but I still wish you all the best.

At least having some specific guidelines in place could remove any questions if the results are razor-thin, like in the Val-Tester outcome. It appears that in another three-way race, we may encounter a similar situation.

I think what Randy gave where pretty specific.

Would it be possible to list the users whose votes are invalidated, if any?

"I think what Randy gave where pretty specific." -Robert Actually, what Randy said was quite arbitrary. He did not define what an active user is, what a troll is, etc. Thus those campaigning do not know which people he considerers a registered voter. As Scott points out, part of this also protects Randy’s integrity. If the election is close, no one can question the votes that were disqualified if Randy tells us why he disqualifies votes ahead of time. Because I know Randy would not disqualify a vote if there was not a good reason, I personally don’t care (I am sure Scott feels the same way). However, so none of our conspiracy theorist can complain (and we have a lot of them), if he just posted specifically how he decides these matters it would be better for everyone.

Yes, exactly. On a political site, you know there are going to be people throwing around conspiracy theories, even if unfounded.

Stupid question (or perhaps a stupid user!!!), is there a specific url address which will take a user to this page so the ballot will be seen? This past week, every time I come back to the site, everything is refreshed from the last time I was here. Maybe it is just me, but a link would be helpful, perhaps even in the info at the top of this page, so if a lot of posts are made, it won't take forever to find the poll. Thanks.

Regardless, I still don't have the time to find all the specifics for each voter immediately after the election, and some decisions are just going to have to be subjective, like trolling. Neal Patel is an example there. He's been here a long time (under many accounts) and he posts a LOT. I think he's a troll. Others might not agree. I have two choices for solutions to propose then: 1) I post a list of the people I intend to reject and why without noting what their vote was. If there are any objections to any, we can vote on their eligability. 2) Pre-election, the Secretary of State (or whomever the President designates) compiles a list of elligible voters for the upcoming election and gives it to me. I just chuck everyone that isn't on the list.

"is there a specific url address which will take a user to this page so the ballot will be seen?" - User#334 http://www.ourcampaigns.com/RaceDetail.html?RaceID=174524&WhenStart=2005-04-08+09%3A13%3A00