Today’s Muncie Star-Press carried a sad but rather entertaining article about Republicans in Delaware County who are opposed to putting an early-voting site at Ball State University. (Mind you, Indiana University, Purdue University and Indiana State University all had early-voting sites on campus for the May primary.)

Their rationale?

[Delaware County Republican Chair Kaye] Whitehead said she was worried that early voting on campus would encourage uninformed students to cast ballots.

Such uninformed students, she said, would be more vulnerable to a concerted effort to buy votes with freebies, such as hot dogs.

“This is a serious election,” she said. “You need voters who are informed.”

Newsflash: Young voters aren’t attracted to Barack Obama because they’re uninformed or because someone hands them a hot dog. They’re attracted to his message of changing a system that’s run by people like you who’d rather make it harder for Hoosiers to vote because you’re scared that the college kids might just flex their muscle and turn out for someone who’s inspired them to get involved in politics.

Can’t have the kiddies engaged in our system of government, can we? We need “informed” voters like the people who forward hateful messages about Obama’s faith or mutter racial slurs under their breath. Those are the kind of voters America counts on to elect its leaders, and by God, we’re going to fight to keep it that way!

I see Abdul already has posted a link to this video, but here’s the embedded version. Totally hot. Totally hilarious.

A new survey out today from the Mike Downs Center for Indiana Politics calculates how much respect certain Hoosier pols get on a scale from 1 to 10. (You can check out the news release and cross-tabs here.)

Here’s a chart showing how Indiana’s elected officials and candidates stack up with the likes of George W. Bush, Tony Dungy, Oprah and Mother Teresa:

Here’s what I want to know: How did Mother Teresa only wind up with an 8.5? We’re talking about Mother Teresa, people, the worldwide gold standard for charity and goodness, but apparently that’s just not good enough for some of you.

Did Jon Elrod blow two races for the Republicans when he made his stunning withdrawal from the 7th District Congressional race on Wednesday?  His pull-out leaves the party with no candidate in the race against rookie Democrat Andre Carson.  Elrod seemed to be saying he couldn’t win that race, calling it a “long shot.”  But could anybody else do any better, given the late start on both name recognition and fund-raising?

Of course, if a really big GOP name could be induced to enter the race, that might change.  But the name many party leaders are hoping for, Marion County Prosecutor Carl Brizzi, sent word through an aide that he won’t be a candidate.  And with many Republicans hunkering down to ride out what they fear is a coming Democratic tidal wave, finding a replacement who could introduce himself to voters in less than four and a half months won’t be easy.

The other race in peril is the 97th District state House race, which Elrod technically still holds.  Having abandoned his Congressional ambitions, Elrod is seeking to get back into the contest for his legislative district.  Technically, it won’t be hard, since nobody ran and the slot is vacant.

  But Elrod faces this teeny-tiny problem:  He’s already told those constituents he doesn’t want the job anymore.  And no amount of rationalizing about how he relishes the challenges facing the upcoming General Assembly is likely to make them forget that. 

His Democratic opponent, Mary Ann Sullivan, has been working hard for months and is rated a strong contender.  And she’s already challenging Elrod to make a pledge that he will serve the entire two-year term.  Since Elrod is a first-termer who won his normally Democratic district by less than a dozen votes in 2006, none of this bodes well for him to hold that seat for Republicans.