OK everyone, take a deep breath. The election is finally over. We can now return to normal TV commercials and less-crammed mailboxes, and the internet can go back to inundating us with the old, useless information it did prior to the election.
I can't help but laugh at the entire campaign process, though. Not only did I receive countless texts from both sides either pleading their case or slamming the other side's, in several instances I also personally received messages addressed to my kids! Honestly, if you want me to vote for you, you should probably have the correct contact info for your constituents.
But one of the things that has always confounded me is the plethora of yard signs that speckle the lawns of our fine town. I've always wondered, why does someone think I will vote for a candidate because they have a sign in their yard? I mean, I absolutely respect anyone's support of one candidate or another, but I'd like to think that we all have enough sense to base our decision on something other than how many more signs Candidate A has than Candidate B.
My favorite ones are those that support or refute a particular referendum on the ballot. I drove by a busy street corner in far western DuPage that must have had 30 alternating "Yes" and "No" signs lined up along the road! I have no idea what they were touting, but I couldn't help but chuckle at the irony. It definitely made me want to march right into the voting booth and vote yes. Or maybe no. I can't remember now.
In doing my research prior to the election, I found it very hard to find an independent resource that would just spell out the candidates' platforms (except for maybe The Hinsdalean). Every site that claimed it could help me decipher between candidates' policies was inevitably operated by one special interest or another.
I had to dig a little bit, but eventually I could find who was truly running the site. It really made it hard to know who to trust.
In the end, I was comfortable trusting my own instincts. I chose not to base my decisions on what the alternating TV commercials or yard signs told me to do. I hope you did the same.
And more importantly, I hope you voted. Unfortunately, I think many of us take voting for granted, and there is no greater right in our country. If you don't vote, you don't get to complain. That's a fact.
Which makes me wonder, instead of endorsing specific candidates, there should be a sign that just simply says, "VOTE"!
I think I have an idea for my yard in 2024.
- John Bourjaily of Golfview Hills is a contributing columnist. Readers can email him at [email protected].
