What we were after now was the old surprise visit.

Canvassed for Obama with my oldest daughter this weekend.

We live in a moderately rural Oregon town of about 7,000 people. Roughly 15 minutes East of us is a city of 100,000 people. However if you head West up the mountain it's pretty much the boonies; farms, horse ranches and lots of single wides with trash on the lawn.

We drew a walking list a little West of town. Although there's lots of Obama support in that direction we did pass this sign that had been defaced on our way out.

I assume it was just kids but it's disconcerting just the same.

Canvassing works a little differently in Oregon because of vote by mail. What savvy campaigns try to do is identify their supporters and then make sure they get their ballots in. We can actually collect ballots while hitting these targeted voters. This is the biggest thing I don't like about vote by mail, btw.

It went pretty well overall. We had some healthy discussions with supporters of senator Clinton and senator Obama alike. The only bad exchange was with a guy that was pissed off we were bugging him about politics at all. Nobody forced you to register to vote and your certainly weren't forced to register as a Democrat, jerk.

I was so proud of my daughter. She had been up all night at an 8th grade graduation dance/ karaoke/ party thingy run by her school and I had offered to let her stay home and sleep but she really wanted to do this. She basically collapsed when we got home.

It also gave us a bunch of time to talk about the campaign and I did a lot of of listening. One of the things that impresses me about my daughter's view of politics is how mature it is. She realizes politicians aren't perfect. She brought up the fact that Obama himself mentions that fact repeatedly. She doesn't expect Obama is going to get elected and fix everything magically.

The other thing that repeatedly impresses me about her is that even though she's grown up in this rural town which is sorely lacking in diversity, she still has her head on right when it comes to this stuff. Most of her friends support McCain.

I'm so proud of her.

Admit so, sir. This is some new form of torture. Say it, Brother Sir.

A friend recently asked me who I thought would take the Democratic nomination in '08. I haven't the foggiest. If you believe the press then it'll be Hillary or Obama. Yawn. Here's my personal take on the candidates and potential candidates so far...

Hillary Clinton - No, no, just NO. The appeal seems to be her profile, her enormous campaign war chest with would presumably give her an advantage in the general, and the "two-fer" we'd get from having Bill Clinton back in the Whitehouse as the First Spouse. So what?

Hillary has been a huge disappointment as a Senator. She represents a solidly blue state yet has continued to put her national political ambitions ahead of what's good for the country or what's good for the Democratic party. Her support for the war or, at the very least, her failure to criticize it's prosecution, should automatically disqualify her from the nomination as demonstratably lacking the judgment necessary to be President.

Barack Obama - Look, I loved his keynote speech at the convention, although it was delivered before the the wrong audience. Democrats aren't the ones pushing the red/ blue America meme.

Putting that aside the guy just hasn't lived up to the hype. There was a particularly memorable moment when he got Pwned by John McCain over torture that comes to mind. He just comes across as too nice a guy to deal realistically with Republicans who favor eliminationist policies towards Democrats.

John Edwards - I like the populist message and like seeing someone focus on economic concerns but the fact is he did very poorly in his debate with V.P. Yosemite Sam. If you can't face down the Prince of Darkness, who can you face down.

Dennis Kucinich - Love his policitics but don't think he has a serious chance at fundraising and the nomination. Would love to be wrong on this.

John Kerry and Al Gore - I'm lumping these guys together not just because they share the dubious honor of already having been the Democratic candidate for the Presidency but they also both failed to understand the depths Republicans would go to to steal the Presidency nor be willing to put up a real fight. Kerry sins on this issue are particularly unforgivable.

I know I left a ton of potential candidates off this list the whole exercise is beginning to leave me depressed. I'm really hoping for a white horse this year to come in and shake things up.