Both of these will be SATURDAY!

Rob McKenna to rally GOP supporters
Attorney General Rob McKenna will be in Pierce County on Saturday, October 25th at 10:00am to rally an enthusiastic group of Republican supporters.

McKenna will appear at the Pierce County GOTV center to meet with and speak to phone bank volunteers supporting McKenna, Rossi and other GOP candidates.

What: Campaign rally with Rob McKenna
When: Saturday, October 25th at 10:00 a.m.
Where: Lakewood GOTV office
10029 S. Tacoma Way Ste. E-6
Lakewood, WA 98499

The Mass Transit Now folks also will be dropping brochures on doorsteps in Tacoma's North End, trying to drum up support for the $17.9 billion Proposition 1 measure on the ballot in Pierce, King and Snohomish counties.
(I live in the North End and it's sorta like preaching to the choir: There are lots of Mass Transit Now! signs up there already.)

NEWS ADVISORY
October 24, 2008
Mass Transit Now
Alex Fryer
Communications Director
alexfryer@masstransitnow.org
206-321-9730

Pierce County Rally for Proposition 1

Seattle—Representatives of the Tacoma-Pierce County Chamber of Commerce, Sierra Club, Transportation Choices Coalition, Tacoma Streetcar Alliance and the Sound Transit board of directors meet to rally our volunteers before they canvass Tacoma neighborhoods.

WHEN: Saturday, October 25, at 10:00 AM
WHERE: Tacoma Dome Station, Link Light Rail, 424 E. 25th Street, Tacoma

Fryer says somewhere between 10 and 30 people are expected. They'll focus on precincts in the 27th Legislative District because it's "The most amount of doors in a short distance."

The first thing you have to know about this story is that Democrat Debi Srail, a history teacher at Curtis Junior High School, was only 823 votes behind incumbent Republican state Sen. Mike Carrell in the Aug. 19 primary election for the 28th Legislative Distict.

That's with 25,000 people voting. Twice that number probably will vote Nov. 4, so it's really a close race, and everyone knows it. So, that's the context.

Enter Gigi Talcott, a former teacher, and not exactly a disinterested observer in the Srail-Carrell race. Talcott is a former Republican state representative in the 28th Legislative District, wife of former Pierce County Republican Party Chairman Ron Talcott and longtime political ally of Mike Carrell.

Talcott didn't directly accuse Srail of anything. Instead, she just put a bug in the ear of Srail's boss, University Place School Superintendent Patti Banks, by asking a very damning question, based on hearsay:

"Is it true that one of your teachers, Debi Srail, had one or more University Place students make phone calls that encouraged them to lie to
further her political campaign for the WA Senate? I heard that University
Place students have been given telephone scripts that say she is their
favorite teacher, even if the student had never had Ms. Srail as a
teacher."

Sounds pretty bad, doesn't it? Serious enough for a school superintendent to look into it right away, right?

To her credit, that's exactly what Banks did. It's like getting a bomb threat at school: 99.99 percent of them turn out to be false, but you have to check them out anyway.

I also looked into it, and here's what I found: There is no evidence that Srail, her campaign staff or the student volunteers did anything that Talcott implied in her e-mail "question" to the UP school superindent.

=> Read more!

This just in from FUSE and their particular take on what they call "Builder-Gate."

I'm posting it because blogs are like radio: Breaking news first.

Keep in mind it's from the vantage point of the folks who are suing the Building Industry Association Washington and the Dino Rossi camp.

I'll update later. There will be a story in our paper on Saturday, too.

For Immediate Release Oct. 24, 2008
Contact: Aaron Ostrom
Email: Aaron@fusewashington.com

Judge Upholds Lawsuit Against BIAW/Rossi, Postpones Decision on Rossi Deposition Until Monday

=> Read more!

When your last election was decided by only 133 votes, you'd probably want to do what Gov. Chris Gregoire is doing and leave everything on the field. Hence, the 26-city, 11-day tour she's starting on Saturday.

I'm sure challenger Dino Rossi will be doing the same. We'll post his schedule when we get it, especially if he spends time in our neck of the wood, Pierce, Thurston, South King and Kitsap counties.

You've got to admire the stamina of both gubernatorial candidates. I get tired just reading their itineraries. Of course, this refresher from state elections on the 2004 finish explains why they're both tireless these days.

For your files, here is a handy recap of the county-by-county tallies in the three tabulations in the 2004 Rossi-Gregoire race. Rossi won the first regular count by 261 votes, the mandatory machine recount by 42 votes and Gregoire prevailed by 129 votes after the hand recount. The judge in the election challenge added to Gregoire’s lead, for a margin of 133 votes out of 2.8 million cast. You will see both 129 and 133 used, and both are correct if stated properly. Gregoire won the office by 129 votes after the three counts were complete and final. Or, she won by 133 votes after three counts and the subsequent court challenge. I prefer the finality of the 133 number. Class dismissed. --David Ammons, Secretary of State's Office.

Here is the county-by-county list that Ammons refers to.

Here's Gregoire's weekend schedule and Rossi's schedule for today and Saturday:

For Immediate Release Media contact: Debra Carnes, 206-669-6559

Release Date: Oct. 24, 2008 Campaign office: 206-382-2008
Governor Gregoire launches “Fighting for Working Families” Tour

Governor welcomes two women governors on Sunday; will connect with voters in 26 cities over 11 days

WASHINGTON STATE – Governor Gregoire will be reaching out to voters across the state on a 26-city, 11-day tour of the state starting on Saturday, Oct. 25 in Tacoma.

=> Read more!

David Ammons, spokesman for Secretary of State Sam Reed, passes on this update on voting in the general election.

It looks as if 10 percent of the ballots statwide -- 300,000 of 3 million -- already are in. That's 10 percent of those who are expected to vote in the Nov. 4 general election.

(Seems strange saying "Nov. 4" election when hundreds of thousands of ballots are in 12 days before the official election date.)

FYI: Here are some mail-back voting stats from the counties we’re monitoring by their Web sites, seven counties with about 65 percent of the population. Also, I learned something new by reading the King County elections site and seeing info about what amounts to another method of early voting. I was reminded that counties are required by federal law to maintain at least one poll site with voting equipment (usually touch-screen) for use by voters with handicaps -- and any voter registered in that county is free to use it. Communications Director Bobbie Egan says they’ve seen modest in-person usage of their machine at county election center at Renton. In-person voters, of course, may not cast a mail ballot as well, and the counties are able to make sure that two votes are not counted for the same person. http://www.kingcounty.gov/elections/voting/earlyvoting.aspx

David Ammons
Communications Director
Office of Secretary of State
360) 902-4140

Ammons was forwarding an email from David Motz:

As of this morning, the seven counties that show counts of ballots received on their websites show a total of nearly 298,000 in so far.
(*King, Pierce, Snohomish [with lag of 1 day behind], Spokane, Clark, Yakima, Kittitas. These counties total about 65% of all voters.)

Of our nearly 3,622,000 voters, it looks like about 456,000 – or about 12% - will be poll voters (366,000 in King & 90,000 in Pierce).

As of last night, the percentage of absentee and vote by mail ballots that have come in for the seven counties are:

King................15%
Pierce..............10.5%
Snohomish...........10.5% (without Oct. 23 numbers)
Spokane.............21%
Clark...............16%
Yakima..............22%
Kittitas............23%

CAUTION: almost every number in this email can/will change.