Sorry to interrupt national news for a down home post. Please forgive me. However, some of you might find the description of the Republican voting tactic of "plunking" (after the fold) interesting.
Kossacks in Alexandria, VA, PLEASE vote today for City Council. Turnout this morning was very light. This hurts our Democratic candidates. Polls close at 7 PM.
Other Kossacks - If you know ANY voters in Alexandria, VA, please call, email, IM, Text, Facebook, Myspace, etc. to tell them to vote today.
There are six city council seats up for grabs. There are six Democrats running, two Republicans, and two Independents (one of whom is a closet Republican).
The Republicans in town have been running a campaign featuring "Plunkee the Elephant." "Plunking" is a voting tactic whereby you encourage voters in an election where there are multiple seats up for grabs to vote only for their candidates, and throw away their other votes. So, for example, in this case, a Republican would vote only for the Republican candidates (and the one Independent who joined them in the plunking campaign), and no one else, effectively disenfranchising themselves of three votes. This artificially deflates the total number of votes and inflates the number of votes for Republican candidates against the total number of actual voters.
More information can be found here:
Alexandria Gazette Packet
Washington Post on Plunking in Alexandria