Wild, wacky #NY26 special election nearly over

With one week to go in the race to see who will take over the 26th Congressional District from the guy who took his shirt off, there is seemingly no end in sight to the silliness that encompasses the special election.

Last week, we saw Jack Davis mug some poor kid — or so it appeared. Jane Corwin, meanwhile got the key endorsement of 20 Republicans you’ve never heard of, who all just happened to be military veterans. And one faction of the Tea Party claimed that the other faction of the Tea Party was fake. Oh, and Kathy Hochul did something, although, to be honest, I can’t remember what. Ian Murphy, meanwhile, was declared irrelevant by Channel 2, and apparently, 98 percent of those taking polls in this race.

I can only imagine how sick you all must be of watching the television ads for this race, with each candidate saying that the others want to maim old people, eat children, raise taxes, shackle pregnant women and bring Stalin back to life.

I’m sick of the commercials and I don’t even watch much television. Just be thankful you don’t get the direct emails from the campaigns like I do. One day last week, I swear I got 192 emails from the Hochul camp. One email every 15 minutes. All day long. By the time I was done reading one, another popped into my inbox.

OK, so maybe I’m exaggerating just slightly. A little hyperbole never hurt anyone. Or that would be what these campaigns are indicating, at least.

I’ve gone back and forth during this race from “This is the best thing ever” to “can this be over yesterday, please?” A friend of mine who makes a career out of politics told me “in the world of politics, we call that love.”

I can tell you that I spent far too much time over the weekend checking in on the race to see who did what, who said something stupid, and how the Internet had reacted to whatever had been done and said. I even forced my kids to watch the news Saturday just in case something important happened. It hadn’t. Poor kids were forced to learn current affairs for no reason.

As a warning, things will get worse before they get better. The campaigns with the money (all of them except Murphy’s) still have a lot to spend and only seven days to do it in. That means more television commercials, more direct mails, more candidate events and more emails.

Also, don’t think for a second that “video-gate” was the last big surprise in this race. I’m sure that someone will announce Friday or over the weekend that the other candidates idolize Lee Iacocca — or were the second gunman on the grassy knoll — or something.

Take solace in knowing that one week from today it will all be over, at least until the next election.

To my readers in the Lockport City School District, don’t forget to vote today. There are some big issues on that ballot and it’s up to you, but if you don’t vote, you’re leaving it up to someone else. And, frankly, it’s all too important to leave up to someone else.