As we turn the calendar to September, there are only 18 days until the Democratic primary here in Massachusetts, and I have no idea who I am going to vote for at the top of the ticket. The choices are:

Tom Reilly, current state attorney general. He was the leader out of the gate, and it was his race to lose, a position he's lived up to in screwing up his choice for a running mate, losing the party endorsement, and admitting that he's not particularly political (although I admit that I find that kind of endearing).

Reilly's campaign has been the most traditional, with ads comparing his record to that of the Romney/Healey administration. He's also started the in-fighting, calling for an immediate rollback of the state income tax, which neither opponent favors.

Deval Patrick is running a more grassroots campaign, which is interesting given that he's got some national notice from his time as an assistant AG during Clinton's term in office. He clearly has some party cachet, as he won the state party endorsement at their convention.

Based on his ads, all I can tell about Patrick is that he grew up poor, got himself into Harvard, wants to improve education and create jobs, and has the tacit support of Barack Obama (he appears in one ad where Patrick is making a speech). A Reilly ad notes that Patrick wants to keep the state income tax at its current level, a stand Patrick defends by arguing that a lower income tax would lead to cuts in local aid, which would require increases in local (mostly property) taxes. Patrick had also put forward the idea that localities could increase the meal tax to raise funds.

Chris Gabrieli is the most visible candidate, given that he's bankrolled an ad push that's lasted most of the summer. The ads tout his experience in creating jobs in the private sector, and his role in improving education through after school programs. He's recently taken on all the major candidates over taxes, calling for a reduction plan that uses a percentage of surplus tax revenue to fund the next year's cut. He's also backing the Cape Wind project, but is for any idea that gets results. In fact, "getting results" is pretty much the theme of his campaign.

I'd also like to note that he has one entertaining ad where he's having a mock press conference on education where he's fielding questions from his five kids. Let's just say the idea of longer school days doesn't appeal. His wife then interrupts and says she wants to get results in Gabrieli taking out the garbage.

I suppose the biggest problem with any of these guys is that they've not taken too much time to differentiate themselves from each other. Only the tax issue has done that, and even then that's only flared up this week. I'd expect more differences to come out as election day nears, but this may be muted by a desire not to give Kerry Healey, the current lieutenant governor and putative Republican nominee (she's running unopposed), too much ammo for later.

Anyway, I'm pretty firmly undecided. And this hasn't helped at all. Great.