From Chris Barnett @ the Secretary of State’s Office

You know that one of Secretary Mollis’ priorities since taking office
has been a push to get younger voters to the polls in 2008. We plan to
hold voter-registration drives at every Rhode Island high school and
college leading up to the 2008 elections. With Rhode Island’s March 4
presidential primary little more than a month away, today we visited
Central High School in Providence. In addition to registering students,
we staged a mock presidential primary. Obama and McCain were the
winners. Channel 6 was there to cover it. Here is a link to one of the
stories.

Barack Obama and John McCain won this morning’s mock presidential
primary at Central High School in Providence. Using an official voting
machine and ballots we prepared, 197 students voted. Here are the results:

DEMOCRATS
Obama - 78
Clinton - 57
Edwards - 27
Kucinich - 1

REPUBLICANS
McCain - 20
Romney - 6
Huckabee - 4
Giuliani - 2
Hunter - 1
Thompson - 1

 Don’t Forget that Saturday Feb. 2nd is the last day to register to vote in the Rhode Island Presidential Primary on March 4th.

Got News If You Want It

• Bush begs for the oils, H-Clint: “Pathetic…”
• McCain v. Romney= much bitchslappery.
• Rush Limbaugh deftly incorporates the words ’spade’ and ‘hoe’ into discussion about Obama and Clinton. Stay classy Rush!
• Those damn gay hackers!
• Actor Brad Renfro dead at 25

Thanks to Chris Barnett at the Secretary of State’s Office for this update.

Mollis Announces Final R.I. Presidential Primary Field

13 candidates make the ballot; 7 with more than 2,000 signatures compared to 1 in 2004.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (Jan. 10, 2008) – Thirteen presidential candidates will be on Rhode Island’s March 4 primary ballot, Secretary of State A. Ralph Mollis announced today.

Today was the deadline for the secretary of state’s office to certify that presidential hopefuls had collected the signatures of at least 1,000 eligible Rhode Island voters that they needed in order to qualify for the primary.

“One sign that Rhode Islanders are taking this primary very seriously is the number of signatures they submitted. In 2004, only President Bush collected more than 2,000. This year, seven candidates exceeded that mark,” said Mollis. “We certified more than 25,000 signatures in all.” (more…)

that local politico and RIFuture blogmaster Matt Jerzyk announced yesterday that he’s endorsing Obama for Prez.

RIFuture also has hopeful stats on Obama’s electibility, courtesy of USA Today:

• Barack Obama - 51% — Rudy Giuliani - 45%
• Barack Obama - 53% — Mike Huckabee - 42%
• Barack Obama - 57% — Mitt Romney - 39%

Chris Barnett from the Secretary of State’s Office would like you to know:

Rhode Islanders will have a lot of choices when it comes to the state’s March 4 presidential primary. Ten Democrats and 10 Republicans filed Statements of Intent to compete for their party’s nomination by today’s 4 p.m. deadline.

The Republicans are Hugh Cort, Rudy Giuliani, Mike Huckabee, Duncan Hunter, Alan Keyes, John McCain, Ron Paul, Mitt Romney, Tom Tancredo and Fred Thompson.

The Democrats are Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, Chris Dodd, John Edwards, Mike Gravel, Dennis Kucinich, Barack Obama, Bill Richardson, Ray Stebbins and Rosemary Turner.

This is the first time since 1952 that there isn’t an incumbent president or vice president in the race. That makes the 2008 primary more wide open than usual.

With 20 candidates in the mix, we should see a bump in turnout. After all, with this many names on the ballot, there ought be no shortage of candidates for Rhode Islanders to get excited about.

There is more info on the RI Secretary of State website.

 Chris Barnett from the Secretary of State’s Office wants you to know:

The first 10 days of December hold critical deadlines for presidential candidates and Rhode
Islanders who plan to run for delegate to one of the national political
conventions. For example, Dec. 10 is a crucial date for would-be
delegates. Your readers can find more details on the Secretary State website.