Just how unpopular is President Barack Obama in some parts of the country? Enough that a man in prison in Texas got 4 out of 10 votes in West Virginia's Democratic presidential primary.

The inmate, Keith Judd, is serving time at the Federal Correctional Institution in Texarkana, Texas, for making threats at the University of New Mexico in 1999. Obama received 59 percent of the vote to Judd's 41 percent.

For some West Virginia Democrats, simply running against Obama is enough to get Judd votes.

"I voted against Obama," said Ronnie Brown, a 43-year-old electrician from Cross Lanes who called himself a conservative Democrat. "I don't like him. He didn't carry the state before and I'm not going to let him carry it again."

Keith Judd was arrested twice in my presence at the University of New Mexico in 1996 - both times armed - when he was running around free and unhinged.

First time, I was riding my bike to the school paper (where I wrote), and I saw him as he was tackled by university cops, walking through campus with no shirt on and carrying a rifle. I wrote it up (I was on the scene) and published an article in the Daily Lobo under a "staff reports" byline.

Two weeks or so later, while waiting in the rain for Al Gore to appear at the ASUNM to speak at a re-election event, I saw Judd about twenty feet from the stage, kind of off in a corner, and looking just as sketchy as the guy I'd seen parading through campus with his rifle - this time with a long coat on. Of course, I alerted the first Secret Service agent I saw, and Judd was immediately shuffled away by 6-8 very eager agents.

Didn't hear another thing about the incident until about three years later, when I read in the Albuquerque Journal that Judd had been imprisoned for 210 months in Texas on "firearms charges." The article mentioned that he'd been arrested twice at UNM, once at a Gore rally, carrying a gun.

That was my Forrest Gump moment. Who knows, if I hadn't been there, what would have happened (and I've had to consider the very real and macabre possibility that if I hadn't taken action that day, there may not have been an election debacle in 2000).

The Democratic, Mountain and Republican Parties allow any voter who is not registered with an official major party to request their ballot for the Primary Election, but you have to ask the poll workers for a particular party ballot.

A voter may change party affiliation by submitting a voter registration form showing the change to the County Clerk, or at any Motor Voter office. The registration change must be made at least 21 days before the Primary Election in order to vote in the new party at the polls in the Primary Election.

IMHO it comes from the last 20 years of Oxycontin abuse.

The feds are trying to shut down the pipeline and folks are pissed??? They know Rmoney supports businesses like helping drug manufactures sell billions of dollars of product. He'll open the American market to more addicting and more expensive pain killers.

Follow the Rmon errrr... Money....

Hail to the Chief (of parts of West Virginia)!:

Its West Virginia.....the heart of impoverished Appalachia, owned by big coal and motivated by racism.
A ray of Hope though - that inmate in Texas got more votes in the WV Dem. primary then Romney did in the Rep. primary, and Obama got more votes then both of them.

The people who voted for Keith Judd are not voting against the policies of Barack Obama like they claimed. They do not even understand most of the policies and issues, if I am being completely honest, and I know this because I spend entirely too much time explaining those issues and policies to ever believe otherwise.

<snip 2 para -- stating simply that they're racists>

The problem is not only racism, though. The real problem is that the vast majority of people in this state do not even realize that they are racists. They think that because they cheer on black athletes, it means they cannot be racists. They think that because they were fans of Michael Jackson when they were kids, it means they cannot be racists. They think that because they know someone who is black and they are not cruel to them, it means they cannot be racists.

See, the racism here is usually hidden beneath the surface. You see it when people talk about the drug problem, and blame African-Americans for it though the vast majority of the drug problem in West Virginia involves whites. You see it in the way they look at mothers with mixed-race children, and assume they are on welfare. You see it in the way they laugh at ethnic-sounding names, including that of the President of the United States. You see it in the way they claim Obama got to where he is today due to affirmative action. You see it in the way they claim that a member of Congress who happens to be African-American – but who also happens to be a Harvard-educated attorney and longtime Professor of Constitutional Law – is not qualified to be President of the United States.

You see it most clearly, however, when they give their vote for President of the United States to an insane federal prisoner with a white-sounding name, who they have never even heard of before in their entire life, when his opponent just happens to be African-American and has one of those ethnic-sounding names.