Crossovers and Operation Chaos

In talking to a number of precinct inspectors  and election officials today, it seems pretty clear there's a whole lot of crossover voting going on across Jackson County.

Nearly every precinct has ran out of Democratic ballots, Carolyn Hurt of the Voter Registration Office said just after 5 p.m. Polls close at 6 p.m.

From what I'm hearing, those crossover Republicans are likely voting heavily for New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton in the Democratic presidential primary and against Illinois Sen. Barack Obama.

But it'll be interesting to see if the crossovers go deeper into the Democratic ballot and try to get Republican Mike Sodrel a weaker candidate for the fall election in Indiana's 9th District congressional race. I'm also hearing that Republicans are crossing over in the New Albany-Jeffersonville area.

Incumbent Democrat Baron Hill is opposed by three primary challengers, Gretchen Clearwater of Bloomington, John Bottorff of Jasper and Lendall Terry of Versailles. With the power of incumbency and strong name recognition, you'd think Hill wouldn't have much of a problem today, just as he had little problem with three opponents in the 2006 Democratic primary.

But it could be interesting to see how much mischief Republicans attempted to do beyond Rush Limbaugh's call for Operation Chaos, where he's encouraged the GOP faithful to vote for Clinton on the premise that she's easier for Arizona Republican John McCain to beat this fall.

We'll see what happens

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Dan Davis is editor of The Tribune. You may contact him at (812) 523-7051 or by e-mail at ddavis@tribtown.com.