Both Parties See New Promise When the Ballot Is in the Mail

[Judi Lynn]

Both Parties See New Promise When the Ballot Is in the Mail
By MICHAEL MOSS

Published: August 22, 2004


Between work and his seven children, Felipe Lundin was sometimes just too busy to get to his polling place in Tucson and vote. Then a local Democratic official knocked on his door one day to tell him about voting by mail with an absentee ballot.

"He told me how to get it and explained it to us," said Mr. Lundin, 58, an administrative worker for Pima County. When the ballot arrived, Mr. Lundin continued, "he called to see that we were fine."

The house call was part of an aggressive absentee-ballot campaign by Democrats in 2002 to win the governor's race for the first time in two decades. And that tactic has become an important part of both parties' strategy for the presidential election.

The party sent applications for absentee ballots to as many as 500,000 people identified as most likely to vote Democratic. Officials were given access to county election records to see who had requested a ballot and who had not mailed their ballots back. Then they bombarded the laggards with letters, phone calls and visits by some 2,000 volunteers eager to see the votes go Democratic.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/22/politics/campaign/22vote.html
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[Whoa_Nelly]

1. Primaries are coming up in my state

and I sent for my absentee paper ballot...just got it in the mail today. Have gotten so this is the only voting venue I trust.