It’s as predictable as rain in July and snow in January and the amount can seem equally as heavy.

I’m talking about election-related letters that I receive after the published deadline.

In the case of Tuesday’s primary election, we set a deadline for 5 p.m. Friday, July 23 to receive any letters of endorsement related to the primary election. We ran an information item on the Opinion Page every day for almost a week before deadline and we regularly ran the notice two or three times a week before that.

Readers should have seen it yet invariably, we always receive a number of letters after the deadline and they are usually accompanied by some consternation from the writers as to why they can’t still be published.

I try to explain the policy — sometimes I’m successful, sometimes I’m not.
As I’ve said before but it bares repeating, experience has taught us not to run letters closer than about a week before an election. We do this to be reasonable, fair and out of a sense of practicality.

The Oakland Press used to run letters even on the day of the election. But we found that people were waiting to submit their letters until just before election day hoping for publication on that day. The general theory was that the last letter read by people before voting would influence their selections. This created a flood of letters that logically were impossible to deal with because we just didn’t have the space to run them all.

So, by establishing deadlines, we allow our readers to express their opinions and get them published. It seems to be the fairest way to handle election-related letters.
Admittedly, particularly this year, we’ve had to bend our rule on running letters a week before the election.

Because of the last minute flood of correspondence, we ran election related letters through Thursday, although we had hoped to run them all by Tuesday. Logically, because of space limitations, we couldn’t do it. All the letters were received by the deadline but we missed our publication deadline. Was it fair to run the letters within a week of the election? We think it was but let me know how you feel.

In the meantime, remember that this Tuesday is just the first half of the election year. The general election on Nov. 2 is looming, set up by the results of Tuesday’s primary.

So, we’ll have a new deadline for election-related letters. Probably around Oct. 20 but that isn’t set yet, although readers will be fully informed after the primary. However, there is one condition. People must read the Opinion Page to see the notice. We haven’t figured out a better way of informing the public about our letter policy other than through notices on the Opinion Page. We can publish the notices but we can’t make people read them. However, I hope you do.

And, unless you’ve cast an absentee ballot, be sure to vote Tuesday.

The Oakland Press deadline for election-related letters to the editor was 5 p.m. Friday, July 23.

Loyal readers probably saw the notice we published regularly the past few weeks. We printed it every day last week — for good reason.

We wanted to make sure people understood that there was a deadline. Yet, as we could have predicted, I have been receiving phone calls all this week asking why they can’t submit an endorsement letter for the Aug. 3 primary election.

Some say they submitted a letter last week and why didn’t I get it? I don’t know. I can’t publish letters I don’t receive. That’s why people need to follow up after they send in a submission to make I got it.

Admittedly, some callers may be — shall we say fibbing (I don’t like to use the word lying unless it is absolutely accurate). But, generally, we trust our readers to be honest, as naive as that policy may be. However, we've found that most people usually do tell the truth when it comes to things like this.

We figure if they are conscientious enough to write a letter, they probably are telling the truth. Their mistake was not following through to make sure the letter was received.

It’s important to follow through with all correspondence but it is particularly critical when there are deadlines because pending events, such as the primary election.

We try to accommodate all letter writers and run their submissions as expediently as possible, although currently we have a good two week backlog. But some times we run out of time and that’s unfortunate, because all letter writers have a right to express their opinion and The Oakland Press works diligently to be their vehicle.

Remember, when submitting letters, do so to my e-mail address, which is allan.adler@oakpress.com. Don’t forget, if you’re one character off, it won’t get to me.

The Oakland Press plans to bring readers three hours of live primary election night coverage on Aug. 3.

It will be a first such event for the newspaper. Through a process called “livestreaming,” we’ll be appearing live on your computer screen from 9 p.m. to midnight. All you have to do is log on to our website at www.theoaklandpress.com to watch us as we monitor and report the latest election results.

I will be moderator for the evening, which will include visits from several local political figures. So far Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson is expected to drop by as are State Rep. Chuck Moss, R-Birmingham, and Rep. Tim Melton, D-Auburn Hills. In addition, we expect to have Oakland County Clerk Ruth Johnson stop in.

From time to time throughout the night we’ll have our local reporters sit in and discuss the results as they are tabulated. Staffers will also review the figures and give their analysis of why or why not an election went the way it did.

We’re cautiously excited about doing this. If the “dress rehearsal” conducted this past Tuesday is any indication, the election night programming should go very well because this week’s practice session was anything but smooth. We ended up actually going online for about 40 minutes — and that’s a problem when you have nothing prepared.

Executive Editor Glenn Gilbert, myself and Political Reporter Charlie Crumm drew deeply upon our political knowledge as we ad-libbed our way through the rehearsal while the technicians checked out the equipment and made sure everything was working.

As every “bad” dress rehearsal should do, it taught us a few things. Probably the biggest lesson is something we've always known but it was definitely reinforced this week — nothing beats advanced preparation and planning if you want something to go smoothly.

Former vice-presidential candidate and political activist Sarah Palin is being panned for urging Muslims in New York to “refudiate” their plans to build an Islamic community center and mosque two blocks from the 911 ground zero site of the twin towers.

In a series of tweets she asked “peaceful” New Yorkers and “peace-seeking” Muslims to oppose the plans. One of her tweets reportedly asked Muslims to “refudiate" their plans.

“Refudiate” is not a word, at least according to Webster’s New World Dictionary, third college edition. Maybe she meant “repudiate,” which means to “refuse to have anything to do with..” among other definitions.

But I’m not going to try to second guess Ms. Palin. In fact, I’m not going to even weigh in on the community center and mosque controversy.

But there is a very simple lesson to be learned from her misuse of the English language. We have more than enough high tech devices today to help us communicate with each other — from cell phones to computers to whatever. But many people seem to forget a very old-fashioned yet extremely useful tool that can help all writers and public officials.

If Ms. Palin had only taken a few minutes to look up “refudiate” in a dictionary, she might have saved herself days of embarrassment. Journalists still use this well-established and very informative book — at least they should. It can and has saved considerable angst and distress when their stories get published.

In this fast-paced world, sometimes it is wise to slow down and double check your information.

We try to run every letter to the editor we receive, as I’ve stated in past blogs. But some letters, for varying reasons, must be rejected.

One of those instances is when a letter becomes too personal.

The Opinion Page is meant as a means for The Oakland Press readers to express their views. Some times their opinions can be based on personal experiences and that’s just fine. But other times, personal accounts aren’t appropriate.

For example, we received a letter from man who supported the Wall Street reform bills in Congress. One of the reasons he said he was for the legislation was that he had lost $160,000 in retirement funds because of the stock market crash a few years ago. He was upset that while average citizens, like himself, saw their modest retirement nest eggs vanish, top executives in the banks and mortgage companies were receiving million-dollar bonuses.

Although he was relating a personal experience, what happened to him was similar to what happened to millions of Americans, including thousands right here in Oakland County. And, he was commenting on a spending political issue. So, his personal story and lettered expressed views that probably thousands of residents hold. Also, he was urging passage of the bills, so he didn’t keep the letter completely personal. Consequently, it was appropriate for us to run.

However, some letters focus too much on the writer. For example, there was a letter from a man who had lost his job and eventually was evicted from his apartment. The man was basically issuing a plea for help.

While we sympathized with him, the letter was not suitable for the Opinion Page. He had made it too personal. All we could do was suggest he contact social services.
Admittedly, it’s a judgment call. Some people may feel we should have published the letter highlighting this man’s plight. But sometimes its better to allow an individual some privacy, even if they don’t initially seem to want it.
Remember, often letters get responses — and sometimes not very positive ones. To publish the man’s letter and name would have put him up for not only sympathy but also scrutiny and possible scorn.

Like I said, it’s a judgment call.

As the primary election battles heat up, many of us are finding that our telephones are ringing much more often than we would like.

They are the automated phone calls — often called robo calls — urging you to vote for a particular candidate. Now if the candidate were truly on the other line, then maybe the call might be worth taking. But listening to a political recording is just a waste of our valuable time. The calls are in intrusion into our homes and our private lives and people have a right to be upset about them.

Unfortunately, there’s not a lot we can do. A recent letter to the editor suggested an interesting solution to the bombardment of political phone calls. The letter writer, rightly aggravated by the calls, suggested that recipients vote against any candidate whose campaign includes these irritating and pesky campaign tools.

At first, it sounds like quite a reasonable reaction to protest the disruptions of your household — at almost all hours of the night.

But the plan runs into a snag if both or all of the candidates in a race call you. Maybe a Plan B in such cases would be to vote for the candidate who called you the least number of times.

However, that would also involve keeping track of how many times each candidate called, which could result in extensive extra work for you.

Consequently, the best alternative is just be to hang up.

What’s fair? That’s the overriding question we ask when it comes to The Oakland Press Opinion Page.

What is fair to the readers? What is a fair policy concerning letters to the editor and guest opinions? What qualifies as a letter, which is limited to 250 words and what qualifies as guest opinion, which can run up to 600 words?
There are no definite answers but we’ve established some guidelines that help us decide.

For example, during the election season, which we are fully into, candidates are constantly wanting us to run guest opinions from them about a certain topic or issue. But usually the opinions are geared to “voting for me” type writing. That’s OK but if we run one such guest opinion, we have to run them all — and space is at a premium. We just don’t have it.

So, loosely, when it comes to guest opinions from political candidates, we put them online. We believe they have something to say and as potential law makers and leaders, our readers might want to hear more detail about their plans — more than what the news side profiles can offer.

But space is limited, as I’ve said.

We make exceptions for candidates if they are incumbent officials and write about a topic related to their work for the general public. For example, the treasurer writing about finances or the sheriff writing about law enforcement are guest opinions that we would try to get on the Opinion Page, provided they stick to one topic and don’t throw in a “vote for me” sentence. When the guest opinion becomes a plea to win votes, it has to go online — to be fair.

We are constantly reviewing this policy and we admit, sometimes a guest opinion gets placed online that should go in the regular edition and one gets placed on the Opinion Page that might have been more of an online piece.

Over-all, we do the best we can to be fair.