Voting when you know the candidate personally

Parent Cafe
1

<p>This isn’t about partisan politics at all, so I hope it’s within the terms of service. Many of my local races are non-partisan anyway. For the first time ever, I know one of the people in a local race. We are not friends but we had some dealings a few years ago. I <em>think</em> this person might do a decent job in office. The problem is that this person also deliberately and knowingly caused some real strife to my family as part of a volunteer position. They never apologized and in fact stood by their actions, even as others called them on it.</p>

<p>I’m faced with having to vote for someone I think has some real issues of conscience versus someone without the experience needed and another I’d really have to hold my nose to vote for. What would you do? </p>

<p>Interesting thought experiment for me…</p>

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<p>One single vote is unlikely to change the result of the election. So, in your shoes, I wouldn’t worry too much about it.</p>

<p>That said, I’d vote for the one that has less experience. People who do not apologize when they did wrong might not acknowledge their mistakes and fix them while in office. Experience can be gained with time. But, as I said before, I wouldn’t sweat over the decision since one single vote is very unlikely to determine the outcome.</p>

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<p>I’d vote for the person with no experience. People who don’t apologize are unlikely to learn from their mistakes.</p>

4

<p>I’ve voted for and against plenty of people I personally know. </p>

<p>I wouldn’t vote for someone I think had a questionable character. Go with the other.</p>

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<p>Sounds like you feel the known person is less ethical than you wish. An important component to being able to “do a decent job.”</p>

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<p>One vote <em>can</em> change the outcome of an election, especially a local one. I would go with my gut feelings.</p>

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<p>Thanks for the input-I follow politics pretty closely, so it will be interesting to see how this all goes. And while I know one vote MAY not make a difference, we HAVE had some VERY close elections, both locally and up to the governor’s office, so I do take my one vote seriously. I’ll let you know if this person makes it to the general elections after the primary.</p>

<p>Salander, I keep meaning to ask if you’re from Seattle and post on an ed blog there. Same screen name.</p>

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<p>There was an election somewhere recently where only <em>one</em> vote was cast.</p>

<p>So your vote can matter!</p>

<p>I would vote for lack of experience over a toxic person every time. The job can be learned…</p>

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<p>I would not vote for someone whom I personally knew was dishonorable, having been on the receiving end of it. I’d vote for the non-experienced person, because anyways, sometimes in politics the experienced people are the most corrupt, useless people anyways. People have to start out somewhere. You may as well not vote for the person you KNOW has poor character.</p>

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<p>I pretty much always vote, but you can skip the election altogether or skip that one race. If you truly think neither is a good candidate and can’t pick one over the other, then just skip that race. It does not invalidate any other part of your ballot.</p>

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<p>How are they going to get experience as elected officials unless they are elected?</p>

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<p>I agree, everyone needs to start somewhere. But sometimes you need to start on a lower rung, KWIM? I’ll need to do more research on the newbie, though. They may turn out to be better prepared than I believe. In any case, good thoughts-and looking at it in black and white, I really do know what to do about the person I know.</p>