Who would've thought the world's cheesiest attack ad would go forth and multiply?

David Goodman isn't the only one who thinks that missing an election makes you ineligible to represent your neighbors. Joy Padgett, in the US House district next door, has begun airing ads that tell the public about elections that Zack Space, the Democrat who is polling well ahead of her, didn't vote in during a period spanning from his eighteenth birthday in the '70s to when he turned 26, almost twenty years ago. The implication is that a twenty year record of voting in every general election, every primary election, and every special election, is not good enough for a U.S. Congressman, in the opinion of Ohio Republicans.

Normally I don't talk about races that are not on the ballot in Bexley, but this has a direct link. Joy Padgett is currently working through a bankruptcy, resulting in the default of a large SBA loan, and preventing her creditors from collecting assets by transferring them to family members (possibly legally).

But as far as we know, she's been a continuous voter She considers her own spotty voting record to be superior to Mr. Space's. So she has seized the lifeline thrown to her by fellow Republican David Goodman, the idea that voting is not just a right and a privilege, but that the voting booth is like a confessional, where all of your worldly sins are forgiven and stricken from the record.

74% of registered Franklin County voters missed the 2003 election. I don't know how many Central Ohio residents have failed to pay back a Seven Hundred and Thirty Seven Thousand dollar loan from the government, but my guess is that it's less than 74% of us. I don't know how many folks in Central Ohio think that members of the state legislature should be able to take unlimited contributions, because no matter how much money they get from special interests, it never influences them. But I would guess that it's not 74% of us.

People like David Goodman and Joy Padgett don't pretend to represent most of us.

I do agree with them on the simple point that everyone should vote in this election. If we do, these two will certainly wish we hadn't.