I am trying to exclude an input by name (it is a hidden input holding my nonce)
The following question is almost what I am looking for:
How do I use jQuery
You don't need the :, because input is an element not a pseudo selector. Secondly you cannot use an object and a text string like that in your selector. You instead need to supply this as the scope argument to $():
$('#ofform').live('submit', function(e) {
e.preventDefault();
var serializedReturn = $('input[name!=security]', this).serialize();
});