Go Vote!
By Sean McVeigh
It’s that scary time again. No, not Halloween. Next Tuesday, November 5, is Election Day. The sacred day — the first Tuesday after the first Monday of November — when we, the people, head to the polls and vote for our elected representatives at various levels of government. Well, that is unless you did early voting. I cannot comment from experience, but I have heard nothing but rave reviews about the early voting experience around here. I guess calling it Election Season would be more appropriate these days.
This year, on behalf of The Rockaway Times, I will be endorsing … gotcha! You should’ve seen the look on your face. We’ve never done endorsements here at The Rockaway Times and we don’t plan to start doing them now. I’ve always found newspaper endorsements interesting. Very rarely is the endorsement ever actually a surprise. More often, it is when a paper withholds an endorsement that eyebrows get raised. But why does any endorsement matter to you anyway? This Joe Shmoe and that Plain Jane don’t know what is going on in your life. The only endorsement that should matter is your own and I believe the technical term that political scientists use for that is “a vote.”
The October before an election always seems to bring out the worst in people. Everyone starts to get a little screwy with anticipation. This may be more obvious as a national phenomenon, but Rockaway is no exception. We are in for a few close elections and your vote matters. I hope everyone participates in their civic duty.
More importantly, our most burdensome plight is almost over. We can all thank the heavens that we will be able to watch TV without repeatedly hearing the same ominously voiced-over political ads. And we are in New York, not exactly a battleground state. Could you imagine what it’s like to watch Jeopardy! in Pennsylvania right now? If I were running, I’d pay to have my opponent’s ad run even more frequently. Wheel of Fortune fanatics would vote for me just for leaving them alone for that half hour they look forward to each weeknight.
In the end, I suppose someone has to represent us. It’s better to have someone on the inside in City Hall or Albany or the Capitol that can at least point Rockaway out on a map than to have no one. In fact, I think we fought a war based on that idea once. “No taxation without representation” and all that.
The hilarious libertarian humorist P.J. O’Rourke once said, “The U.S. Constitution is less than a quarter the length of the owner’s manual for a 1998 Toyota Camry, and yet it has managed to keep 300 million of the world’s most unruly, passionate and energetic people safe, prosperous and free.” I can’t say the Founding Fathers envisioned today’s political environment when they wrote down the rules of the game, but somehow it seems like they managed to account for any contingency.
Unfortunately, Washington, Adams, Jefferson and Madison are not on the ballot next Tuesday. There are, however, a cadre of candidates spanning the entire political spectrum vying for your vote. It’s your job to get out there next Tuesday (if you haven’t already) and make a decision about what’s in your best interest. You won’t find any endorsements here, but I will leave you with a piece of advice: good luck!
