Candidates

State prosecutors have filed criminal charges against 77 political candidates - including former Baltimore mayoral candidate Andrey Bundley - accusing them of violating election laws regarding campaign finance reports, according to the state prosecutor's office. Bundley; Scott Rolle, who ran for attorney general; city liquor board commissioner Elizabeth C. Smith; and Del. Jill P. Carter are among those facing charges, which could carry up to a year in jail and a $25,000 fine. Prosecutors said the alleged violators received criminal summonses, not warrants, charging them with failure to file campaign finance reports on time.

If becoming an informed voter were easy, everyone would do it. It's not, of course. When it comes to choosing our next president, there's no shortage of information about the candidates. Some is critical, some interesting, some salacious, some irrelevant. All we can predict is that you won't learn enough about the major party nominees if we hold to the series of heavily scripted, play-not-to-lose, watch-what-you-say debates. Despite many good intentions, presidential debates offer little more than bland recitations of carefully calibrated positions and the occasional sound bite from a gaffe or putdown.

The Carroll County Board of Education will meet at 1:30 p.m. tomorrow at the board offices, 125 N. Court St., Westminster, to interview 22 candidates for a board seat left vacant by the resignation of Thomas G. Hiltz. The candidates are: Diana L. Bennett, Valerie Murphy Hickey, Maureen Norton, Xiomara Pierre, Finksburg; John Carr, Linwood; Michele Kraus Carroll, Debra L. Cromwell, Marriottsville; Stephanie Dahlquist, Tom Rhoads, Manchester; Barbara A. Gunther, David H. Roush, Timothy Schlauch, Jeff Sheehan, Debra J. Tervala, Westminster; Virginia Harrison, Michele Hughes, Sykesville; Lee Ann Leshko-Lindsay, Mount Airy; George E. Maloney, New Windsor; Jeffrey L. Morse, Taneytown; George Potter, Union Bridge; Stanley Prouser, Eldersburg; C. Scott Stone, Hampstead.

They set alarm clocks to stake out early risers on street corners and at subway stops. They waved and paced and gripped the hands of people on their way to work. They pressed stickers onto work shirts and marched signs around busy lunchrooms. They wiped sweat from their faces over the long, humid afternoon and then chugged caffeinated beverages, hoping to keep it up as long as they needed to - because it was all the time they had left. Candidates hoping to attract Baltimore's vote in today's city primary wrung everything possible from the waning hours of the campaign yesterday.

What's the sound of one Republican debating? No, that's not a cocktail party joke. It's a sad reality for Univision, which hopes to host Spanish-language debates for presidential hopefuls in each party. The Spanish-language television network invited Democrats to debate Sept. 9 and the Republicans a week later. So far only a single GOP candidate has agreed. Good thing "no" means "no" in both Spanish and English. That is the reply most candidates are giving (although, as this column went to press, the darlings of the race were equivocating, and if one agrees, others will surely follow)

WASHINGTON -- Maryland is fertile territory for presidential candidates in need of cash for the costliest presidential campaign ever, with lawyers, business leaders and political activists delivering sums out of proportion to the state's size. Marylanders gave a combined $6 million to presidential candidates through June, federal elections records show. Just 19th in population, Maryland ranks 11th among the 50 states and the District of Columbia in donations to presidential candidates.

Democrats condemned divisive immigration rhetoric and promoted issues important to Hispanics during a televised debate last night on a leading Spanish-language network. The debate, in which the presidential candidates' remarks were translated live from English, was billed as a historic first and provided the candidates an opportunity to address America's estimated 17 million Hispanics of voting age in what for many is their native language. Seven of the eight Democratic candidates participated in the Univision debate at the University of Miami, eager to court a Hispanic constituency that many believe could play a pivotal role in battleground states such as Florida.

WASHINGTON -- One-third of Americans surveyed want to deprive illegal immigrants of social services, including public schooling and emergency room health care, a new Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg Poll finds. Even among Democrats, traditionally a party more welcoming of immigrants, 22 percent of voters surveyed would deny illegal immigrants access to services even as basic as emergency health care and public education. Still, in a sign of the ambivalence among voters about the emotionally charged issue, a strong bipartisan majority - 60 percent - favors allowing illegal immigrants who have not committed crimes to become citizens if they pay fines, learn English and meet other requirements.

Washington -- Mike Huckabee, a former conservative governor from the largely Democratic state of Arkansas, will launch his bid today for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination, opening an exploratory committee to raise money. Acknowledging that he will be a tough sell against better-known conservative candidates for the White House, Huckabee said yesterday that "America loves an underdog." He also pointed to his ability as a two-term governor to please liberals, noting that he raised taxes for education and poverty programs.

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton is seeking advice on "one of the most important issues" of her presidential campaign: picking a campaign theme song. More than 100,000 Americans have responded to her lighthearted call for help. Some have been inspired to compose original tunes. The reaction is another example of the Internet's growing role in politics. More than 500,000 people have watched Clinton's videotaped appeal on YouTube or her campaign Web site since the campaign posted it Wednesday.

Efforts to reduce the influence of big-money special interests in state elections suffered a setback late last week with the decision of a federal judge to throw out Connecticut's landmark campaign finance law on the grounds it put third-party candidates at a disadvantage. The ruling has significant implications for Maryland, where legislators have been seriously considering a similar approach to publicly financed state-level political campaigns for the past five years. The proposal has won support in the House of Delegates and has gotten as far as the floor of the Maryland Senate - until a procedural move late in this year's legislative session forced it back into committee.

State prosecutors have filed criminal charges against 77 political candidates - including former Baltimore mayoral candidate Andrey Bundley - accusing them of violating election laws regarding campaign finance reports, according to the state prosecutor's office. Bundley; Scott Rolle, who ran for attorney general; city liquor board commissioner Elizabeth C. Smith; and Del. Jill P. Carter are among those facing charges, which could carry up to a year in jail and a $25,000 fine. Prosecutors said the alleged violators received criminal summonses, not warrants, charging them with failure to file campaign finance reports on time.

The election's over; should political parties be over too? Is it time to junk the D's and the R's after politicians' names, and all the baggage that comes with them? How meaningful and relevant are candidates' political parties anymore? When a New England Republican can be more progressive than a Texas Democrat, when millions regard themselves as independents and occupy the takeout-menu middle on political issues, why do we need to belong to parties? Barack Obama is in the Democratic Party but in some ways seems not to be of it. He built his own political operation and fundraising mechanisms, and so - unlike Bill Clinton, who constructed his political machine within the party framework - owes less to the Democratic edifice than he does to the support of an even bigger tent full of Americans.

Anirban Basu, a regional economist, used the top presidential candidates' own words to highlight significant differences in their economic and tax policies before an audience of more than 300 Baltimore-area business leaders yesterday. In a follow-up presentation before members of the Greater Baltimore Committee, Richard M. Cripps, a financial markets expert with Stifel, Nicolaus & Co., struck an optimistic note by noting how the U.S. investment markets have rebounded over the long term since the Depression.

Maryland's not an island, but it seems one this fall: virtually surrounded by fierce presidential campaigning and all but ignored by the candidates. In the final hours before the election, Barack Obama, John McCain and their running mates are flooding neighboring states with in-person appearances and campaign commercials. TV and radio signals from next-door are hitting much of Maryland. And everyone could see Obama's infomercial or national cable ads. But thinking you're in the middle of a presidential contest isn't the same as being there.

This year may turn out to be the year of the voter. The political stars have had their moment, and now it's our turn. Seldom has there been more keen motivation to cast a ballot. An amalgam of hope, fear and anger drives us to the polls. We're at war in Iraq, apparently having been lied to about why. Our president, George W. Bush, stands accused of blithely presiding over economic calamity, allowing a web of complicated investment practices to choke the worldwide financial system. We've sent a bunch of unbelievers to Washington, people who ran against and ridiculed government and then failed to manage it. What we got was Katrina, foreclosures and the 401(k)

You are an undecided voter. In eight days, you go to the polls to vote for the next president of the United States. But you still can't make up your mind. The pollsters come knocking at your door. Or call you on the phone. "Barack Obama or John McCain?" they ask. "Gee, I don't know," you say. "It's so hard to choose." Really? Can I be honest here? You scare the rest of us. You really do. The polls say you represent between 5 percent and 12 percent of the electorate. The pundits say you could have a major impact on the election.

Last month, Sen. Barack Obama took in an amazing $150 million in campaign contributions - a number that increased his fundraising total to $600 million for the primaries and general election, topping the combined amount raised by President Bush and Democrat John Kerry in 2004. It's an extraordinary achievement, but one that offers sad evidence of the futility of a decades-long effort to limit the influence of money in American politics. Sen. John McCain, Mr. Obama's Republican opponent, chose to participate in the public financing program, which gave him $84 million to spend from Sept.

Now that we're about a month from the presidential election, most astute voters are doing some research. They're watching the debates; scouring newspapers, magazines and blogs for facts about the candidates' positions, talking with respected friends or colleagues and consulting their local humor columnist. Actually, nix that last one. No one really wants to know how I'm voting, or the reasons for my decision. Readers turn to this column to escape the barrage of anti-Obama, anti-McCain, anti-Biden and anti-Palin vitriol.

The presidential election could well turn on a factor that has gotten virtually no discussion this year - the votes drawn by Libertarian Bob Barr, Green Cynthia McKinney and independent Ralph Nader. The most recent polls show a race too tight to call: Gallup tracking from Sept. 23 showed Sen. Barack Obama with 47 percent to Sen. John McCain's 44 percent. More interesting is a CNN/Opinion Research poll released Sept. 22 that included all five candidates for president. Mr. Obama was at 48 percent, Mr. McCain was at 45 percent, and Mr. Barr, Ms. McKinney and Mr. Nader were polling a combined 6 percent of the vote.