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My family and I did a stint of phone bank work for a candidate friend of ours (who shall remain nameless) and found an interesting statistic. Of the numbers we called -- nearly 400 registered voters -- almost 40% had their answering machines pick up. This was independent of time of day -- mid-morning, evenings, late afternoon.

Frankly, I can't say I blame them. With a close gubernatorial race in both parties and the ongoing saga with the Democratic presidential campaign, I don't doubt if some folks are tired of picking up the phone. It did make our job a little faster, I'll admit.