See how they run

I suppose if I had bothered to watch the selectmen's meeting Monday night, I would have something more tangible to write about. Nonetheless, there is a lesson to be learned from this piece folks.

Since we are in silly season, tangible is seldom going to apply.

Oh well.

People can certainly become obsessed about things in this town. Buildings, pieces of molded wood, bricks, parks, bike ways, and certainly politics, are matters that wrap some of us up very tightly.

Is an obsession a good or bad thing? I suppose it depends on your perspective.  What some of us see as something of interest or importance, others might see as our obsession. What seems to be an obsession for some, might not even be a thought for others.

Anyway ...

I had a couple of interesting conversations the other day. You guessed it, revolving around the early five. Strengths,weaknesses, assessment of chances,etc.  What will or will not be issues in the campaign, and what should or should not be an issue. there are certainly plenty of talking points.

One point I will disagree with which someone made, being the fact that each candidate has as good a chance as any other candidate.  Too early to assess actual odds.  That is a given.

Present name recognition and past laurels are not going to be enough, not in a filed of five, or four or three. Not this year. No one can truly claim the outsider role, although experience levels certainly differ.

Any candidate's chances are going to be greatly enhanced by the effort put out there during this race though, i.e. you are going to have to work at it, and hard.

Big fields tend to generate big turnouts. As long as the filed stays big, it is way too early to handicap the odds. So perhaps there is a bit of truth in the "any one of them" has a chance.  But in reality, even this early, this isn't a filed of every candidate starting at even money.

Was also interesting to hear who other's considered to be in their top two.

Anyway ...

We are off and running, well some out there are running, into the future.

From the pundits perspective, hopefully the future will get a bit of a boost from the three candidate's nights.  Lots of self inflicted wounds occur at these things. If the filed doesn't thin itself out before the nights commence, you pretty much can count on the candidates themselves culling the heard.

These nights do matter.  If you disagree, that is fine. But from the views appearing in my cracked crystal ball, and the tea leaves in my cup the morning after, one does tend to get a clearer read of just what the immediate future holds after these nights.

We are jumping months in advance, aren't we.  See what early announcements do to get the brain wheels spinning.

But while the wheels turn, might as well have them roll over some things.

First,what are you going to do? Get use to hearing that question.

When there is an open seat, you might get by convincing people to vote for you based on buzz words. Speaking in generalities rather than specifics. Heck the choir you preach to may be big enough to carry you in this large a filed.

What we will certainly hear is a lot of hindsight. Some of it relevant. Probably more than some think. Three of the candidates have been actively involved in the recent attempts to change government. The incumbent of course has to stand by his actions during his term in office. One of the challengers also has been and currently is an elected official on another board (actually are two challengers who are also elected officials,but one is also tied to the "three").

The past is relevant, as is the present.

Grumblings on the street are that one little group in town is rather upset at the large field.  They feel the incumbent should not have won.  There was an intent to run one challenger to unseat the incumbent to correct past election results. Sources indicate at least two challengers were told they should not run.  Seems the group is worried that its hand chosen candidate won't be able to stand out in a crowded field.

Now granted, much of this would fall under the category of hearsay.  Your hear the same story from enough sources though, coupled with where the information is coming from, and one can connect certain dots.

We will be connecting a whole lot of dots as time goes on.  When we are done, it may not be the prettiest picture, but in will give you a picture you should be able to easily recognize.

From that you may get a certain impression of what you can also expect to be reading about. If so, you would be right.

With that noted, I have to go.  Until next time.