{"id":5598,"date":"2011-01-22T19:48:40","date_gmt":"2011-01-23T02:48:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cityofsmoke.com\/?p=5598"},"modified":"2011-02-11T20:02:39","modified_gmt":"2011-02-12T03:02:39","slug":"my-neighbors-got-it-wrong","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cityofsmoke.com\/archives\/5598","title":{"rendered":"My Neighbors Got It Wrong"},"content":{"rendered":"

Back on October 30, 2010, I announced my intention to vote for Tom Vendittelli, the Libertarian candidate for U.S. Representative from the 13<\/span><\/span>th<\/span><\/span><\/sup> District of New York. http:\/\/www.cityofsmoke.com\/archives\/5585<\/a> My motives were simple (although I admit a general sympathy for political independents and insurgents of all kinds). The Establishment party opponents, Democratic Congressman Michael E. McMahon and Republican challenger Michael G. Grimm, had harassed my wife and me with up to ten telephone calls a day. Mr. Venditelli and his friends had not.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I find such interruptions extremely annoying at the best of times. I was enraged when the candidates\u2019 volunteer callers began arguing with my wife about why she should listen to them. As I knew neither McMahon nor Grimm, I took their measure from the people who supported them. Hence Tom Vendittelli. At least his followers weren\u2019t harassing me in my home.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/a> I thought my readers and neighbors here in Bay Ridge, some of whom had also complained to me about the calls and the empty glossy mailings jamming their mailboxes, might join me in protesting this abuse by voting for Mr. Vendittelli. I knew nothing about him beyond the materials on his website. But Tom was clearly sincere about his libertarianism. He\u2019d left me alone.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

My neighbors apparently didn\u2019t share my concerns. The New York State Board of Elections\u2019 official results were: Grimm, 65,024; McMahon, 60,773; Vendittelli, 929. Out of 126,726 votes, Tom had polled less than one percent. As he noted on Facebook, \u201cWe lost by a nose.\u201d <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

While my neighbors clearly disagree with me, I can only note that next year, the politicians will be back, harassing me in party games. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Back on October 30, 2010, I announced my intention to vote for Tom Vendittelli, the Libertarian candidate for U.S. Representative from the 13th District of New York. http:\/\/www.cityofsmoke.com\/archives\/5585 My motives were simple (although I admit a general sympathy for political independents and insurgents of all kinds). The Establishment party opponents, Democratic Congressman Michael E. McMahon … Continue reading “My Neighbors Got It Wrong”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[193],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cityofsmoke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5598"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cityofsmoke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cityofsmoke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cityofsmoke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cityofsmoke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5598"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.cityofsmoke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5598\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5601,"href":"https:\/\/www.cityofsmoke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5598\/revisions\/5601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cityofsmoke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5598"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cityofsmoke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5598"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cityofsmoke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5598"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}