Plugging the Poll

I know that 2025 is an “off year” in terms of national races — U.S. Representative, Senator, President — but there are still general elections next Tuesday. Not just that newsy mayoral one and the couple of gubernatorial contests, either.

Pennsylvania, for instance, has open seats on the Commonwealth and Superior Courts as well as retention elections for Supreme Court. It’s a state in which judges/justices first run under a party affiliation but then are up for retention or rejection thereafter until retirement (with subsequent primary and general elections for any seats vacated). The importance of certain issues likely to come before such courts is nearly impossible to overstate.

I hope you’ll vote. Even those of you whose sociopolitical views don’t tend to align
with mine, although perhaps not quite so much if you’re completely uninformed and pick names on a whim. Government could well be as frustrating — seem as useless or, in some regards, outright terrifying — as it’s ever been in my lifetime, yet simply writing in “None of them!” or “Mickey Mouse!” or “Let’s rethink everything!” is fathoms more constructive in the aggregate than choosing not to take part.

I also hope you’re fortunate enough to have a local newspaper or public-media outfit that can point you towards sample ballots, endorsements, mission statements, and the like to help you prepare for Tuesday, particularly in regards to municipal offices, but at least some local candidates are findable at Ballotpedia and you can view local races with supplementary info where available on Vote Save America (which is more comprehensive but despite being nonpartisan may be objectionable to certain folks given its Crooked Media origins). Access, child care, and paid leave to vote are sadly not universally guaranteed.

You might feel that Uncle Sam in the above page from Harvey’s 1952 giveaway Your Vote Is Vital!, which can be read free at Comic-Book Plus, sounds awfully quaint. The fascists or the oligarchs or the whomevers only get countered by us all buying into representational democracy. Maybe through other avenues too, sure, demonstration and collective debate and the kind of influence that’s inequitably amplified by money money money, especially when it comes to making our democracy as representational as possible, but in addition to and not instead of your ballot.