Election Day and die Deutschen

I spent the day with the German copyright lawyers today at the American German Copyright Summit held at Villa Aurora just above PCH off Sunset.  It is the second year in a row I have attended and I am scheduled to speak again this year.  Last year we were all abuzz about the presidential election and the Germans enjoyed partying into the wee hours in Century City after Obama was elected.   I left the Summit early that day to go watch the returns with my family.  This year I left early with a vague intention of voting in the local elections but never made it to the polls.  I tried to go this morning to my normal polling place but, although it was still a polling place, it had my address listed at a different location for this election. The peripatetic polling place.  I was already late for the Summit and the correct polling place was out of the way so I decided to forego voting at that time.  I must say that I was not particularly educated about the choices.  My only desire was to vote against a former neighbor who, in my opinion, would not make a good city councilman.  In particular I was offended by his telephone marketing campaign which smeared another member of the city counsel.  My son said there was a similar smear in poster form out on the main drag in our town.  But I did not do my civic duty and vote against the candidate not of my choice.

I always feel a bit bad when I do not vote.  I can only count a few times over the years when I have not.  One time I voted with almost no information about a local candidate and helped elect someone who I later discovered had very different views of the world than I.  Luckily there is not much harm that can come from what these local council people can do, as far as I can tell.  Conservative or liberal council members- the city seems to run about the same . . .until the next construction project to beautify Pier Avenue, which I understand starts in January.