I post some variation on this most election years, and here we are again. No without further ado, here are Steve’s Simple Rules of Thumb for Voting Mostly Safely Without Knowing Much.
• Vote against retaining judges. They almost never get voted out, and the ones that do really deserve it, so it’s almost impossible to be on the wrong side of this one. Also, enough “NO” votes might convince them that people are actually paying attention.
• Vote against the incumbent, unless they’ve really, really earned re-election. We have no shortage of dunderheads willing and ready to run for office. And it’s usually difficult to do worse than the guy who’s already there (with notable exceptions). And don’t you believe in equality of opportunity for dunderheads?
• If you live in a heavily Democratic area, vote for Republicans for all your local offices. If your area is heavily GOP, vote for Democrats. Don’t give the dunderheads one vote they don’t absolutely need. Also, shrinking margins of victory might convince some of them that people are paying attention.
• When your second choice major-party candidate looks likely to win, vote for your first-choice third-party candidate.
• Vote against ballot measures. Was there ever one you were really excited about? If so, did it lose by your one vote? That’s what I thought.
• Finally, if you live in California and it’s at all possible, vote twice against ballot measures. You people get some really crazy crap on there.
And there you have it. It takes, what, a good 30 minutes to read your state’s ballot guide? That’s time you can now spend doing something less predictable and awful, like watching Gilligan’s Island.
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