It’s going to rain on Tuesday. It’s going to rain all day long. This means water backing up because of all the leaves not collected and blocking storm sewer intakes, wet kids waiting for the bus, a run on hot coffee and chocolate, and a dismal showing at the voting booth. Of course, that last holds true even if the sun is shining, and rainbows sparkle overhead.
People are protesting and dying for the right to vote in other countries, while we can’t be bothered to show up at the polls. We’re losing our easy access to the voting booth with all the new voter restrictions, aided and abetted by our Supreme Court, but we don’t seem to care. Someday I expect we’ll wake up and found out that our right to vote has been gradually restricted until it no longer exists in many of our states…and no one will notice.
Maybe we won’t notice because we all know that it’s all a fake, a fraud, and none of them damn idiots is worth our time. After all, why vote, we ask ourselves. What’s the point? They’re all corrupt., we say, thereby ensuring that our belief becomes fact.
Negative hyperbole aside, it does seem as if there isn’t much to choose from. I’m about as lefty/progressive as you can get, but I’m not enamored with Missouri’s Democrats. We only have to look at how poorly Ferguson has been handled to see why local rap artist Tef Poe exclaimed The Democrats are Failing Us.
Too bad Tef Poe didn’t take an interest in the election before the primaries. The one person who has made most of us unhappy about how the Mike Brown shooting is being handled, our St. Louis County prosecutor-for-life, Bob McCullough, actually had a Democratic challenger: a black woman by the name of Leslie Broadnax. I have to think that Ms. Broadnax wouldn’t have been the lightning rod of distrust that McCullough has been.
If only more than 9% of Ferguson residents had showed up for the primary, we may be looking at a far different outlook related to the Mike Brown shooting today.
If elected, Broadnax says she wants to look into why some county arrest warrants can take years to process and why the county hasn’t done more with drug courts.
Strikes me that Ms. Broadnax would have been a breath of fresh air in the St. Louis area. Too bad no one showed up to vote for her.
We don’t have an “important” election in Missouri this year. We don’t have a senate seat up for grabs, or even a fight for governor. We have House of Representative elections, of course, but Missouri GOP incumbents are so sure they’ll win again, many aren’t even bothering to run an election. Heck, we even have one representative playing his own version of Where’s Waldo?
Then there’s the St. Louis County executive race, which became a little more exciting because of recent events. And our state legislature has several positions up for grabs. But who cares about state legislatures.
State politics…nothing to see here.
Jumping Jacks, anyone?
We do have more state Constitutional Amendments to vote on, but in Missouri, that’s the same as saying the sun rises in the morning and yes, that house in the woods in the Ozarks with the 500 “Do not trezpas or u’ll be Shot!” signs is a meth lab. Missouri has one of the most bloated state Constitutions, being 10 times the size of the one that seems to work for the entire United States of America. We also have one of the biggest state legislatures, third largest number of counties, and 92 separate dinky little townships in the St. Louis region, alone. Most with their own miniscule court system, police and fire departments.
I live in Shrewsbury, one of those 92 separate communities. We have a population of 6000, and the town council’s next meeting is to discuss adding a new assistant Fire Chief position, because the existing Fire Chief needs help with his 19 member department. However, the police department has 20 members, so fair’s fair. Last month the council voted to hire a chief financial officer, because the town Administrator just can’t manage all those town employees and handle all that fiscal stuff too. There’s a new Wal-Mart going up, you know. Puts us on the map.
There is no such thing as an unimportant election. Vote, and earn the right to bitch about the government. Continue to vote, and maybe someday we’ll have a government we won’t need to bitch about.