The Candidates

Last night Cherry and I went to a candidates forum. This forum had the hopefuls for school board on one side of the podium and the hopefuls for city council on the other. This politico shindig lasted 2 and a half hours. It was an open forum where you raised your hand to speak and a gentleman would bring a microphone to you. So after all the questions and all the protracted answers, what did I come away with? As there were only a couple of instances where the answers had any substantial difference, I'd have to say there wasn't a nickels worth a difference between the lot of them. One guy clearly had a good education and like to flaunt it with quotes from historical characters such a Shakespeare, Grant and I don't remember all the others. One guy is a complete political virgin and kinda aw shucked his way through it. I did come away with a sense that a couple of them may have more understanding of the needs of the time and had a distinct desire to better the school and or city. One question did raise my ire though. A question was raised to the city council candidates, would they support a city ordinance to ban smoking in all restaurants. Each and every one of them answered with resounding YES! I am not a smoker and have never been a smoker. I just have to wonder, with all the evidence that soda pop leads to dental decay, morbid obesity, contributes to diabetes and the artificial sweetened ones have lead to a host of medical issues, would they support a ban on soda pop in all restaurants, gas stations and grocery stores? See what I mean, this is the proverbial slippery slope. When ever you let any government decide what is good or bad for you in one instance then that opens the door to do so in all other instances. If a business wants to forbid smoking in their establishment that's their right. But to have government ban it is a direct cut at your freedoms. So what do you do? Hold you nose and pick the most favorable? In a few weeks we'll see how the newly elected want to change our lives,