Election Day in Point Roberts

Cloudy today, with an expectation of rain most of the day, although there were occasional glimpses of sun. But it doesn't really matter whether it's raining or not with respect to its being election day because nobody in Point Roberts goes to the polls to vote. When we first moved to Point Roberts, you could choose to vote by mail. You didn't have to claim that you wouldn't be here on election day or anything. You just chose to vote that way. We usually did, because we often weren't here on the actual day, although I did once vote in person over at the Community Center. It wasn't a particularly memorable event: I was the only person there at the time and, because I had previously voted by mail, I had to cast a provisional ballot in order to make sure that I hadn't also voted by mail (and somehow forgotten that fact?).

But a few years back, the state of Washington decided we could just all vote by mail, and so we do. About three weeks before the election, you get a ballot and its paired return envelopes and a state-prepared ballot explanation/statement, to offer explanations of initiatives, which we always have: that quality we share with California. My view is that an initiative is almost always worth voting against. I can imagine another possibility but the initiative people have to convince me that they're the one. You do your mail balloting by pen (black or blue ink) and then you get it postmarked by election day. The last mail goes out of Pt. Roberts at 3:15 p.m., so here at 3:34 p.m., the vote is over.

We voted a couple of weeks ago, so today is, in that respect, not much of a ceremonial event. I drove down to see a friend today and passed maybe a half dozen signs for Obama. Well, four signs for Obama and two signs against McCain/Palin. The Ron Paul signs that used to adorn many telephone polls are all gone away by now and weren't replaced by Bob Barr signs. So, from Washington, which nobody thinks is a state that might go for McCain, to the rest of the country: We're done. Take it away.