It's Almost Over

Don’t look now but in a few days all those bloviating politicians and their incredibly annoying ads will disappear from your television and radio. Within days the sights and sounds of the 2008 campaign will be replaced by Christmas music and pitches from desperate retailers. Then again, I’ll take Bing Crosby and Rosemary Clooney over Kirsten Gillibrand and Sandy Treadwell any day.
No more incumbents telling you what a fabulous job they’ve been doing cutting taxes, helping seniors and improving education. The obvious question there is if these folks are kicking tail and taking names in D.C. and Albany, why do my taxes go up every year, test scores for kids continue to decline and more and more seniors are forced to sell their homes because property and school taxes are killing them.
Then there are the challengers. In every race the incumbent is characterized as an ineffective idiot who has voted 10,000 times to raise our taxes. The challengers portray themselves as altruistic citizen candidates who spend every waking moment worrying about our future. Additionally only they have figured out how to solve all the problems in Washington and New York.
The solutions break along party and ideological lines. Republicans preach lower taxes arguing you are a better judge of your priorities than the government. Democrats espouse middle class tax cuts which is code for taxing the productive and redistributing the wealth. Given the latter is essentially free money for poor people; it usually attracts a crowd on Election Day.
Now I’m going to go way out on a limb here and predict November 4th is going to be a pretty good day if you’re a democrat. There’s no question in my mind that Barack Obama is going to smoke John McCain. Obama has run a superb campaign and McCain has been unable to escape the shadow of George Bush and his failed presidency.
The only real drama is just how long Obama’s coattails are. My guess is there’re going to be plenty long particularly in some of the national races. My personal barometer is the apparent looming victory of the insufferable Al Franken for Senator in Minnesota. Talk about a joke!
Locally the most contentious race is for the 102nd Assembly seat. Challenger Jonathon Smith is opposing republican incumbent Joel Miller in one of the nastiest campaigns in memory. Miller has portrayed Smith as a political dilettante and carpetbagger while Smith has parsed Miller’s record to the point the only thing I think I know for certain is Miller was not in Dallas on November 22, 1963. Smith is reportedly outspending Miller by a 4-1 margin and is running more ads than Macys. It will be interesting to see if the democratic tide and a lot of money can upset the entrenched Miller.
Another nasty race is in the 99th Assembly district with incumbent Republican Greg Ball being hotly opposed by former Brewster Mayor John Degnan. Ball beat Degnan in the primary but Degnan is back on the democratic line. Charges of sexual harassment and stalking have been leveled by Degnan and denied by Ball. Whoever wins this one might want to have someone start their car the morning after the election.
So hang in there. It’s almost over and these people will now leave you alone…until the next time they need your vote or your money. Enjoy.