The Wevils of Politics: A Question on the Election

There's a scene in the movie Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World in which Captain Jack poses a question to the ship's doctor. Two wevils were crawling on the doctor's plate, and Jack asks the doctor which one he would eat if he had to. The doctor is hesitant to reply, but is finally prodded into choosing the larger one. Captain Jack bursts into laughter when he tells the doc that he should have chosen the smaller one because it was "the lesser of two wevils."

In a way, that is bit how I felt about the election this year. This being my first election in the state of Ohio, I am not very familiar with the political background here. I do know that there have a number of political scandals in recent times. As I have been subjected to a constant barrage of political attack ads for the last 2 months, I have felt a little like the doctor in Master and Commander. All of the talking heads asking me to vote for them are the wevils and I must choose the ones who will represent me in local, state, and federal government. I don't really know if any of them truly take the stands I do. I don't really know if I can trust any of them--Democrat or Republican. It can be a bit discouraging.

With this in mind, I pose the following question to all of my readers and invite them to answer via the comment section. It is not a new question, to be sure, but one that can spark some lively conversation nonetheless. Here it is--Should we take a principled approach to our vote or a practical approach? In other words, do we vote only for those who truly agree with our values and positions, or do we choose those who come as close to our values as is possible because someone has to do the work and it might as well be a Republican (in my case)? I have known people who have cast their Presidential vote in favor of some publicly unknown person from some publicly unknown party who has no legitimate chance of winning. They voted this way because they could support every position their unknown candidate held. They couldn't in good conscience vote for a candidate who held even a few positions with which they could not agree. Is this just throwing your vote away, or is it doing the right thing by voicing your principles in the voting booth even though no one may be listening?

Post a comment, and let me know what you think.

See ya...

Indian Summer

(The following is my TWIRP for the weeks of October 15-November 4, 2006. Enjoy...)

It's cold in central Ohio today. Not as cold as it was yesterday, but..it's still cold. Every time we take Eldan out we bundle him up in his little "Eskimo"
outfit to keep him warm.

It hasn't been cold all week, however. Actually, we experienced a bit of "Indian Summer" earlier this week. It was significantly warmer than it is now. I guess when you get right down to it, it has been rather toasty for us all week. Let me explain...

It was about 11:30 on Thursday morning when I heard my name being called over the school public address system. I was wanted in the office. Okay, no big deal. I had no reason to think that there was any urgency about the matter, so...I took my time getting there. When I didn't come to the office right away, the secretary came into the gym to find me. She had a worried look on her face as she said, "You need to go home right away. Your wife called and she said that she just lit your kitchen stove on fire." I'm a pretty laid back kind of person most of the time so I said, "All right. I'll go get my jacket." The secretary looked at me and said bluntly, "The fire squad is already at your house." So, I decided to forego the jacket and just go straight home. Besides, the fire would probably keep me warm anyway.

I'll have to admit. As I drove the mile to my house, I did get a little worried. I wasn't sure what to expect when I got there. Visions of my wife and son crying hysterically as smoke billowed out of my house filled my mind as I rounded the curves at 50 miles per hour. When I arrived at the scene, there were two EMT Units and one large fire truck in front of my drive way. My wife wasn't crying, my son was nowhere to be seen (he was out of the cold wind with a neighbor), and there wasn't even a single billow of smoke. Apparently my wife had been baking a large pizza-sized cookie that morning when some of the dough oozed off of the cooking stone and onto the heating element below. This started a small blaze in our kitchen. My wife did the right thing and called 911. The fire department came as a precaution and both my family and my little home are okay (Although the oven needed a good cleaning when all was said and done.)

Once I knew that no real harm had been done I found the whole situation rather humorous. I even decided to snap some pictures in order to memorialize Eldan's first encounter with firemen. As you can see in the picture, he is quite fascinated with the men and my wife is just thrilled to be photographed in her pajamas with emergency workers! I have included a picture of the ill-fated cookie at the end of this post. By the way, it is still caked onto the cooking stone. If any of my readers have any suggestions about how to get the stone clean, please don't hesitate to offer them.

Other than that, our lives have been rather typical for the last two weeks. My mom was finally able to get back to Colorado with my dad after nearly 6 weeks of helping her kids with new and not so new babies. We really enjoyed her visit. These are some of the pictures we took with her camera several days before she left. School is busy, but not overly so. I started my inaugural year as the Junior High Basketball coach this past Monday. I have a team of 14 sixth through eighth graders. I am really excited about the season although coaching this group will definitely have its challenges. I am still on the lookout for a play to produce for our school next spring. I'm open to suggestions.

Eldan is on the verge of crawling. He has become quite mobile and it is amazing how quickly he can roll himself across the room. It seems as though we are having more fun with him with every passing week. He has a stubborn, sinful streak to be sure, but he seems to be a fairly easy going little kid.

We are just now coming into my favorite time of the year. The holidays are coming...including one of the year's most important--Danielle's birthday on November 11th. I love being married. I love being a father. And I love eating dinner--which is what I plan to go and do right now. That's all to report for now. The air is cold, our house is warm, and the weekend awaits...