MADRAS — The Madras Senior Center served up pork tenderloin, strawberry shortcake — and a side of politics last week.

The pork was a little tough, but better than the shortcake, the lunchtime crowd agreed. Worst of all, though, are the television ads airing in the U.S. Senate race between Democrat Jeff Merkley and incumbent Republican Sen. Gordon Smith.

Everything else was up for debate.

Fanny Fuller, 79, farmed north of Madras on Agency Plains for years. She said she trusts the Oregon Farm Bureau’s endorsement of the 56-year-old Smith.

Said Fuller of Merkley: “He’s not for the farmers. He’s from the city.”

Effie Montee, 93, said she hasn’t paid much attention to the race before. But she questioned Ful-ler’s assumption, after Fuller said Merkley is “a big tax man.”

“Smith’s for the little guy?” Montee asked.

But everyone agreed with Madras resident Carolyn Northup, 83, who said attack ads have ruined it for her.

“Who are you supposed to believe?” Northup said. “They’re terrible.”

‘Who are you supposed to believe?’

Vivian Ferguson, 72, had a typical reaction. Ferguson said she hasn’t decided who she’ll vote for. Smith, a Pendleton business owner finishing his second Senate term, “hasn’t done all he could,” she said.

“He doesn’t seem to be for the folks he should,” meaning working families, Ferguson said.

But she doesn’t like Merkley, who has represented a Portland House district since 1998, either.

“I don’t really know him, but I don’t think we need any more taxes, and that’s what they say about him,” Ferguson said.

Through his television ads, Smith has tried hard to paint the 51-year-old Merkley as a tax-raiser, although Merkley has endorsed Barack Obama’s tax plan, which would cut taxes for most people who make less than $250,000.

Making the choice harder, said Mary Ramsey, 78, who also farmed north of Madras, are the negative television ads. The spots, by both candidates and outside political groups, have painted Merkley as a friend to rapists and Smith as a President Bush-loving, Social Security-privatizing fat cat.

“I don’t think they should bad-mouth people like that,” Ramsey said.

Fuller said whoever is elected should try to bring down energy prices, which have driven up prices for farmers’ fertilizer and fuel.

“The fuel’s just killing them,” Fuller said. “Drill, drill, drill.”

Montee said she’s concerned about how politicians will handle the financial crisis. She hated that senators attached about $140 billion in tax breaks — including $2 million for wood arrows — to the bailout bill that passed last week.

“I just thought that was absolutely terrible,” Montee said. “Here they are saving them arrows, wood arrows.”

Since she was old enough to vote, the 93-year-old Montee had never missed an election. But after moving to Madras a year ago from Montana, Montee didn’t know her way around town.

“I know where my hairdresser is and where my doctor is,” Montee said.

So this week, Montee called her son Dick.

“I said this is the first time in my life I haven’t voted,” Montee said. “So we went to get registered.”

Taxes are a concern for businesses, too

An hour and a half drive away, at the MacKenzie Trading Co. in Sisters, owner Terry James said visitors to his shop won’t stop talking about politics.

“It’s on everyone’s mind,” James said.

The issues are so hot, James said, he didn’t want to talk about his own political views. Business is at an all-time high, but James said he doesn’t want to alienate any of his customers.

When asked how the U.S. Senate could help his business, however, James was quick to answer.

“Just leave me alone,” James said. “Get the deficit back in line.”

Sisters Bakery owner Melissa Ward said business has stayed strong at her shop, even as the economy declines.

“We haven’t really been hit by the recession,” Ward said. “Doughnuts are cheap thrills.”

Her costs have gone up, though, as demand for corn-based bio- fuels has triggered an increase in wheat prices, Ward said.

Ward, who describes herself a liberal, said her top issue is fairness in taxes. The next senator should look out for regular people, Ward said.

“The politicians see a re-election, and then they drop the people,” Ward said.

Ward said she hasn’t seen any of the ads between Smith and Merkley because she doesn’t own a television.

Garden of Eden gift shop owner Jeff Haken is a conservative who will vote for Smith, even if he has problems with the incumbent, he said.

“We’re sort of unhappy about him, but there’s no way we’d ever vote for Merkley,” Haken said.

Accusations that illegal immigrants have worked at Smith’s business, Weston-based Smith Frozen Foods, were upsetting, Haken said. That company has never been fined for employing illegal immigrants, but a series in Willamette Week found a handful of illegal immigrants who said they worked at the plant.

Haken said energy costs have hurt his gift shop sales, which are down 20 to 30 percent this year. “The gas prices just slammed the tourism over here,” Haken said.

As for the ads, Haken said he doesn’t mind them.

“Personally, I like ads that hit hard,” Haken said. “Politics should be tough, not a bunch of guys trying to be nice.”

‘Fed up’

Although the ads are unpopular, they’re a necessarily evil, said Bev Clarno, a former Oregon House speaker, Republican leader of the Oregon Senate and unsuccessful candidate for state treasurer in 1996. “I think we all dislike negative ads, but you know mud’s being thrown both ways,” said Clarno, who is chairwoman of Smith’s Deschutes County campaign. “As far as consultants tell you, negative ads really work.”

Clarno said this year’s race is even dirtier than the 1996 contest between Smith and U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, when they sought to replace Sen. Bob Packwood in a special election. Wyden won that race after he pulled his negative ads near the end of the campaign.

Even if negative ads usually work, this year’s onslaught of televised muck is going too far, said Deschutes County League of Women Voters Program Chairwoman Marie Gibson.

“I think the public is pretty fed up this time with the intensity of the ads on both sides,” she said.

If it keeps up, the candidates will alienate voters. “My main concern would be that you end up really turning off the public,” Gibson said.

“Maybe these people who say the insulting ads work are going to be finding that maybe they didn’t work so well this time.”

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Elections on the Web Election registration deadline

• The Bulletin’s voter guide. See ballot measures, candidates’ positions and more. www.bendbulletin.com/vote

• Complete coverage.www.bendbulletin.com/elections

This week, The Bulletin spoke with voters from two groups that have gotten a lot of attention from the candidates: seniors and small-business owners. They have said they’re worried about energy prices and the economy. Many are dissatisfied with Republican Sen. Gordon Smith, pictured left. And most don’t know much about Democrat Jeff Merkley, the speaker of the Oregon House, who lives in Portland.

Tuesday is the deadline to register for the Nov. 4 election.

To find out if you are registered or to learn how to register, go to www.sos.state.or.us/elections.