LaughAtlantis

I like voting. There's just something magical about going into the polling place and announcing, "Hello, I am here to perform my civic duty, that privilege given to me by the founding fathers, that vital brick in the great wall of democracy... I am here to cast my VOTE!!"

Not that I did that. I didn't. But I kind of felt like it as I marched into the local school this morning to vote. Especially in local elections, there's a certain feeling of power when you go cast a ballot, because you feel like you actually matter in the grand scheme - because the scheme locally isn't so grand!

I did a whole lot of research recently trying to get behind a candidate in the Somerville mayoral race. What it came down to in the end for me was partially information, partially lack of information. While Joe Curtatone did in fact get me a recycle bin, his website didn't have a whole lot of information on it. In fact, it only had about three paragraphs of info that were not handed to me in leaflet form by a Curtatone campaign worker. Most of the info there was about the school system - I don't have kids - and about this 311 non-emergency line which worked wonders for the city of Baltimore. Mayhap Joe has not noticed, but Somerville ain't Baltimore.

In the end, the recycle bin didn't earn my vote. I felt like Lafuente had a lot more to say about the issues that actually interested me while the Curtatone campaign seemed to just be spinning its wheels (and hemorrhaging money, which doesn't bode well for any administration that might follow from it).

Also, from my standpoint, any man who claims to want to do all he can to make Someville schools a better place to be "for the sake of his newborn son Cosmo" needs to realize that Somerville schools - ANY schools - are going to be really fuckin' difficult for a kid whose name is Cosmo. That boy is going to be abused.

Keepin' my fingers crossed for Lafuente.

See, here's the ugly down side of voting... sometimes your candidate doesn't win.

And in my case, that seems to be the norm.

I think I've voted for a winning candidate once... Bill Clinton. Even in primaries, my luck has been pretty darn poor. I liked Bill Bradley over Al Gore and woulda picked John McCain over Bush if I were a Republican. I voted Gore in the last Presidential election. I voted Myrth York for governor twice in Rhode Island. She ran three times, never got elected. And now Curtatone beats Lafuente... and even the woman I voted for in the school committe race got defeated. Sheesh. I just have a really bad track record.

I'm beginning to think I ought to rethink my voting strategy. Maybe I'm just the kiss of death for politicians, and I ought to vote for the folks I'm not actually supporting. Or maybe I ought not to vote at all.

Nah, I just like voting too much. Plus, the machine only works if you use it right. You might not like the way it works... and this morning I don't because I really would have liked Lafuente to get elected... but by and large, the system does work. Supposedly.

I don't know though. I think I may reserve final judgment on that until the results of next year's Presidential election. Then, we'll just see.

I took an eighties music quiz online. It was downright frightening how many songs I remembered the lyrics to, so much so that I managed to get this "award" for my score: