Dear Editor,

I went and did advance voting this morning. I’ve been stewing about it for weeks, since I have a problem seeing any good changes coming regardless of who wins the presidential contest.

This last three weeks has been a complete eye opener for me regarding how badly our government has been run, not just during the last eight years but for the last 20-plus years. When you look at the issues in this perspective, you realize that the blame can’t be heaped upon just one party in our country, but on both parties. In Washington, partisanship and greed rules, irrespective of what the country needs. “It’s their fault” is the spin from both sides when they are confronted with the issues, which neither party has any intention of fixing. In the meantime, me and millions like me lose their shirts on their retirement accounts, which we have to depend on because the government run program we have paid into for our entire lives goes down the drain. At the same time, the local politicians are running up our taxes like there is no tomorrow, basing it on fictitious evaluations of our properties that are so far out they aren’t even in the atmosphere anymore, and building grandiose structures for everything from unneeded courthouses to prisons.

If these guys worked in the industry I work in, they would be out on their butt for this kind of performance.

This is what has been bugging me — how do we as individuals send a message that we’re tired of this crap?

What I did was, this morning when I went into the voting booth, I voted against every incumbent, regardless of party, who was on the ballot, both national and local. I couldn’t do it for president, but everyone else, from Congress to dog catcher, if they were incumbents and running opposed — they took the hit. Didn’t matter if I had supported them in the past, didn’t matter which party — they don’t get my vote anymore. My vote is the single and most powerful thing I have to send these incompetent idiots a message — and so is yours and the millions of us who do vote. If the guy you vote in screws up, get rid of (him) the next time and keep going until there is someone in that office you can follow.

This is a personal thing with me, and I know it won’t amount to much by itself. But if millions of us did it from now on — so much for the polls and so much for the pundits, so much for the “strategies” and the spin. It would certainly change the paradigm and reshuffle the deck as far as politics are concerned. It would also send the message; “Enough is enough — Get rid of them all.” It’s time to start over.

Finally, it made me feel great, even if it was just for a minute. Try it — you’ll like it, too.
 
Michael Eddy