Does anybody read these?

Election day...

I promised a post on election day, although it wasn't nearly as exciting as I thought. I don't recommend the early shift at the polls. First of all, I LOVE sleep, especially when it's still dark out. Secondly, I ached from my four-hour shift yesterday. I woke up in the middle of the night with leg cramps. Do I miss politics or not?!?

For those of you who may not know, I have a degree in Political Science, and my concentration is in campaigns and elections. You'll remember I started college to be a real, live, hard-hitting journalist, traveling the globe covering political strife and other fun things. Obviously, my career path has changed.

About half-way through my freshman year of college, I got involved in a big way working on the student financial-aid issue. I wrote letters, attended rallies, protested outside representatives' offices. This was when I realized that people like you and me can truly make a difference. I got involved with campus causes and fought the good fight. I also realized that I was hardly a hard-hitting, unbiased newsman anymore. I switched my journalism major to Public Relations, and I decided to focus on the behind-the-scenes fun of politics. This was mostly inspired by meeting David Wilhelm, who became one of my mentors.

I've pissed a lot of people off with my politics, and all through college I was very actively involved in the Democratic party. I worked on all kinds of campaigns, from City Council to U.S. President and I met all kinds of people. I worked for a U.S. Congressman and attended a presidential inauguration. I've met the Clintons and the Gores and I used to be on the White House Christmas-card list. (My card seems to have gotten lost in the mail for several years now.) I was a young, idealistic go-getter, just like all of my friends.

And when I graduated from college, I was burned out. I took a break. I really haven't been involved like I used to. I got involved in the Kerry campaign in 2004 because I couldn't stand another Catholic getting attacked by the church. That campaign left me with a lot of hurt feelings, because the Archdiocese of Detroit had an obvious agenda that seemed to veer so far from "What Would Jesus Do?"

I'm not involved like I used to be. I'd probably be more involved had my uncle decided to run for Congress again. If he had, he'd have won last night and he'd probably have won in November. Oh well. But this is an exciting time in Ohio politics. My former boss most likely will be our next governor. My cousin got 1,120 (she needed 50) write-in votes to be the candidate for County Auditor. Charlie Wilson and Sherrod Brown will both make strong showings and probably win and head to Washington. (Well, Sherrod is already there. Unfortuately, so is Mike DeWine.) I will miss this stuff when I move.

What I won't miss is the bullshit. I won't miss the former, slightly incompetent state chair (probably the reason Ohio Dems have so much digging out to do) who lets his personal vendettas get in the way of what's best for the party. I won't miss Democrats fighting Democrats over stupid things instead of fighting Republicans and winning elections. Just yesterday, we were harrassed by the poll workers for being on the wrong side of the flags, when I'd already gone in twice to make sure we weren't on the wrong side. This is in a Democratic primary, and I'm pretty damn sure that the person who complained was a Democrat who just wasn't smart enough to get out there and promote his candidate.

I keep telling everyone the next campaign that I will go all-out and immerse myself in will be McGraw for Governor. Seriously, I'm not joking. I think that's just about the only thing that would make me want to do this full-time ever again. And if I didn't believe in Tim and his politics, that wouldn't even make me blink an eye.

One of my favorite quotes of all time and one that was used more than once in my political science classes:

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. -- Lord Acton

Nine times out of 10, it's six of one, half-dozen of the other in politics. So hard to tell the good guys from the bad.

posted by Laura at 5:55 PM