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I saw that many of these local elections had incumbents running without opposition. Many people think that would be easier than running against someone. I for one, would not be able to handle it.  Here’s why:

Many of these small town mayors and politicians had lopsided victories of about 95%. You’d think that would be nice. You are very wrong. Let me tell you why. The people who take the time to vote for someone other than the one person listed on the ballot have taken a very specific special amount of time to personally vote against them with what we all know as the write-in vote.

If you are the incumbent and you see the results, you know one thing about the write-in voters: those are the people that hate you. They really hate you. They hate you more than anyone. The people that voted for you may have just punched in your name because it’s the only one listed - this in no way means they love you. But those that did a write-in wanted to make sure that you got an extra special anonymous message from them: “You’re terrible! You’re awful. I’d rather waste my vote than let you taste my vote.”

If I was a mayor or a councilman, especially in a small-town, this write-in thing would drive me crazy. I like to think I’m a pretty secure person, but in this case - I’d be a basketcase. If 18 out 400 people in a town personally wrote-in against me, I would look extra hard at every face of everyone in town thinking to myself, “Was it you? Or was it you? Maybe it was you! Maybe it was all of you! Reveal yourselves you cowards! I must know the identity of my enemies! This isn’t fair! If you’re out to get me, just say you’re out to get me!”

Before you know it, I’d be sleeping with a shotgun under my pillow thinking that all 400 people in town were the 18 who were out to bring me down. That’s why I shouldn’t run for public office.