The end is nigh

It all comes down to Tuesday.

Months, perhaps years of careful planning. Hundreds of thousands of hours of long, hard work. Millions spent on TV ads, fliers and signs. Hundreds of miles walked in various neighborhoods, knuckles rubbed raw from knocking on doors and hands sore from shaking them with voters.

Running for political office is a grueling ordeal, one that often doesn’t get the respect it deserves. Most of the politicians whom I’ve met over the years — from both parties — do it for the right reasons: They generally want to make their city, their county, their state or their country a better place, to solve vexing problems.

Yes, there are egos involved — no one who puts themselves before the public is entirely free of hubris. But that’s all part of the process.

And now, it’s up to you.

Political humorist P.J. O’Rourke once wrote a book titled, “Don’t Vote: It Just Encourages the Bastards,” a lament on the frustrations of modern politics. The great irony is, there’s really only one way to change the frustration of modern politics. Can you guess what that is?

Some of you who haven’t turned out yet are procrastinators. Some are, like me, traditionalists who like to vote on Election Day proper.

Some just aren’t ready. There’s a lot of information out there to process. If you’re looking for help, try looking at the Review-Journal’s election tabloid or its Judging the Judges survey. Some of the higher-profile races were subject to debates over on VegasPBS (co-hosted by me and Elizabeth Thompson); they’re archived on the web at VegasPBS.org. Candidates also clashed on my colleague Jon Ralston’s KSNV-TV, Channel 3 show, “Ralston Reports.” And my colleagues over at 8NewsNow conducted a debate in the race for Clark County sheriff and also delved into the judicial races, and have posted that material online for your review. For those who find themselves in philosophical agreement with the Review-Journal or the Las Vegas Sun, both newspapers have published their endorsements. (The Review-Journal’s endorsements are the result of more than 200 interviews with candidates from governor all the way down to local offices.)

The resources are there. But it will take work. That’s why we call voting a civic duty. And sometimes, doing one’s duty is not convenient or easy.

As this is written, only 21.8 percent of all active registered voters had cast ballots during the two weeks of early voting. That’s 265,058 actual people, out of more than 1.2 million who could show up and vote if they so desired. That’s not nearly enough, but elections belong to those who show up. And the better organized, better planned and executed campaigns will be the ones that succeed.

All those efforts, those mailers, those in-person visits at the door, those campaign rallies and those advertisements, are designed to get you to come out and answer a simple question: What kind of a state should we have? Is the status quo acceptable, or do we need to go in a new direction? Have the people who have been working on our behalf downtown, in Carson City and in Washington, D.C., earned another two, four or six years in office? Or do we need different leaders? Who is the best person for the job, regardless of factors such as political party?

And your answers matter. Up and down the ballot, from the members of Congress to the ballot questions, you will determine whether the right people are in the right place at the right time. Make the wrong choice, and things could go horribly awry. Make the right choice, and things could be a little better for a lot of people.

But you have to choose. Most of us voters have had buyer’s remorse about certain elections, but it’s far worse for those who had an opportunity to lend their voice to the fray but did not. Don’t be one of those people. Because there are some in politics who count on apathy as part of their turnout model.

For those who’ve yet to do their duty, I have a pithy suggestion: Don’t not vote.

It just encourages the bastards.

Steve Sebelius is a Las Vegas Review-Journal political columnist who blogs at SlashPolitics.com. Follow him on Twitter (@SteveSebelius) or reach him at 702-387-5276 or ssebelius@reviewjournal.com.