partly

Before the rant: Please vote. You get a say in what happens. Go. Speak.

I've tried not to be too cynical this election season. I've tried not to get too pissed at the obvious scare tactics that everyone is using. I've fought against the feeling of being disenfranchised when few of the candidates addressed the issues that really affect my everyday life.

I did give up watching live TV so I could avoid the commercials that flooded the airways with more sewage than I had tolerance for. This was done mainly so I didn't have to watch the truly awful ads that occasionally supported candidates that I still had some respect for. But it also let me has some

If you really need an example of the stupidity of this election season here in Wisconsin, I give you the Governor's race:

With Gov. Doyle not seeking reelection, we have two brand new candidates. One was the Mayor of Milwaukee and one was the County Executive for the County of Milwaukee. Which probably plays well outside of the state where everyone thinks that Wisconsin consists only of Madison, Milwaukee and a few beer-drinking dairy farmers who where blaze orange and cheeseheads. In all fairness, it probably plays well in Madison and Milwaukee, too. After all, when there was a plan to improve the main north-south highway in the state many of state politicians said that it was a waste of money because it was a "road to nowhere" and there was "nothing of importance" in that part of the state. So good to know that 80% of the state is not of import. It's good to know that I really don't matter. Nope. No disenfranchisement here.

But I digress.

So we have the Milwaukee Mayor v. the Milwaukee County Executive running for Governor. In their political campaign ads they used virtually the same statistics to prove that their opponent was completely inept in their job. There was an ad that said: "Don't vote for him, he bankrupted Milwaukee County", followed immediately by an ad that said: "Don't vote for him [the other one], because he drove Milwaukee to become the fourth poorest city in the nation!". I swear to you that you couldn't tell which ad was for which candidate, without a magnifying glass to read the small print at the end -- and even them I'm not sure. Quite frankly, I don't think that running Milwaukee (either the county or the city) qualifies anyone to understand the complexity of the state at large. And none of the ads addressed any of the real issues we face -- you know out here in the majority of the state of Wisconsin. That whole unimportant part.

Don't misunderstand me. I know where the candidates stand on the issues that really matter to me. And I do vote issues -- my issues, mind, which may not be anyone else's, but they are what matter to me. I vote according to the candidates who support them. I don't vote on where they come from, or what college they went to or even what political party they belong to. I'm an independent for a reason. Hell, I'm the reason most national candidates stay away from Wisconsin, we're just too damn unpredictable.

It was just so painfully obvious this political season that most politicians think that we're idiots. Hell, it's painfully obvious that most of the so-called "politically active" people think the average Wisconsinite is an idiot. They fill their ads with fear and boogeymen. "If you elect X, then rapists will go free!", "If you elect Y, you are voting for the abuse of mental patients!", "If you vote for Z, you will vote yourself out of your job!", "Don't vote for V, if you do you will starve when you retire!". This isn't just a few candidates. This isn't just one party. And this is so far beyond "negative" and "attack" ads that it falls clearly into fear-mongering.

Yeah, I'm really glad the election is today. My fear is that tomorrow everyone is going to start campaigning again. You see, what the pundits are going to say is that [insert party/candidate that lost here] didn't start early enough, didn't get their message out to the people soon enough, that the average citizens out there are foolishly not paying attention to what is really best for them and that it's only through massive media propaganda that [insert party/candidate that lost here] will be able to win the next election.

I hope I'm wrong. But I don't think so. No one loses quite as poorly as political candidates.