It's already time to vote again

Early voting for the general election begins Monday.

I know, it feels like we just finished taking down the campaign signs from this summer's primary, but starting Monday, Fayette's registered voters can walk up the stairs to Suite 208 of the Stonewall Complex in Fayetteville and cast their ballots for the next governor of Georgia, a U.S. Senate seat, the Georgia District 3 post in the U.S. House of Representatives and a host of important state offices.

Thanks to legislation passed by the Georgia General Assembly, we can now vote up to 45 days ahead of the actual election day. Sure, school is in session and football season has started, but the real sign that summer is over comes Monday, when we realize that the first Tuesday in November is only 45 days away.

I'm not ready to vote. I know a little bit about the major candidates for governor, U.S. Senate, Attorney General, Lt. Governor and the Fayette County School Board, but there are about a dozen down ballot races featuring candidates about whom I know nearly nothing. According to Fayette County Elections Supervisor Tom Sawyer, I'm not the only one in this predicament.

"Since we went to a 45 day early voting format in 2009, turnout has been very slow during the first few weeks," Sawyer said Tuesday. "We'll have the polls open at the elections office, but we're going to go with a limited staff until we see the numbers rise."

I'm not one of those people who vote based on the 'R' or 'D' in parentheses next to a candidate's name. I try to learn as much as I can about every candidate in each race. I then do my best to dig beneath the party rhetoric to find the best person for each job on the ballot.

Sometimes that is not such an easy task.

A case in point is the big ticket race atop this cycle's ballot. For the next governor of Georgia, we get to choose between a 62-year old career politician and lawyer and a 68-year old career politician and lawyer. Both started their political careers as Democrats. Both are white males. Both have consistently changed their stances on issues to please their constituents back home.

Both started off as moderates. The one who lives in increasingly Republican-leaning Hall County switched parties and became a Republican in the mid-90's. The one who lives in increasingly Democrat-leaning South Cobb stayed true to the Democratic party. With the economy in the tank and the Democrats in Congress staring down dismal approval ratings, both governor candidates have now painted themselves as the "pro-jobs conservative" on the ballot. Both have tried to leap onto the anti-incumbent bandwagon.

One candidate became ridiculously wealthy as a private attorney after his first term as governor concluded. The other candidate padded his bank account with a no-bid state contract for his auto salvage business while he was serving in Congress. He then resigned from Congress before the Office of Congressional Ethics fully pursued charges that he improperly used his office staff to pressure Georgia officials to continue the no-bid contract, which generated hundreds of thousands of dollars a year for his family’s auto salvage business. Because of a separate failed business venture with his daughter, the latter of the two candidates now faces financial insolvency, at least according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution.

That is the top of the ticket. Nathan Deal or Roy Barnes.

We the voters are to blame for this "lesser of two" conundrum. We had six other candidates running within each party during the primary, but Deal and Barnes are who we chose. There's always John Monds, the Libertarian candidate, but his chances for November victory are slim to say the least.

I will pay attention to the upcoming governor's debates, but if I were to vote Monday when the early polls open, I would probably just skip past the governor's slot on the ballot.

That being said, we do have a few decent candidates on the ballot this year. I will have no qualms about voting for Sam Olens (a Republican running for State Attorney General) and Carol Porter (a Democrat running for Lt. Governor), but I have a lot to learn before I visit Mr. Sawyer at the Elections Office. I have a feeling I'll be waiting until Nov. 2.