Just a little over two weeks to go until the election, and locally it’s mostly a yawner.  In my neighborhood, there aren’t a lot of things to vote on. Thanks to the Republican shenanigans at the Legislature that forced the Summit County Council to be elected by districts instead of at lar ge, there are none to be voted on in my area.  I now get to vote on only one council member every four years instead of being able to vote on all five of them in a four-year cycle.  Somehow, this was supposed to improve representation. In reality, it means that four council members from the West Side will be making big decisions on things like the proposed new East Side towns of Lost Creek and West Hills. Those are largely the illegitimate spawn of the Legislature, but the County Council will have to deal with it.  If they had been required to campaign on the East Side while running at large, they might be up to speed on the issue. Now they don’t really need to be. And this was all to improve representation in some way. The complaint was that all the county elected officials were from the West Side.  That isn’t true. The sheriff, Kacey Bates, and Councilor Tonya Hansen are both deep-rooted East Siders. Other elected officials live on the East Side, too.    Republicans are having a hard time getting elected in Summit County. So they had to “fix” the process in hopes they could get a Republican elected from the eastern side of the county.  Of course, the odds of getting a Republican elected would be greatly increased if they actually nominated somebody. With the exception of the county clerk, the rest of the county officials, Democrats, are unopposed.   It’s like the man who prayed that God would help him win the lottery, to which God responded, “Meet me half way. Buy a ticket.” Districting won’t fix “unopposed.” I keep trying to get excited about the election. After all, Trump growled that he wants us all to pretend he is on the ballot. That’s motivating.   It doesn’t take a lot of imagination to decide that anybody running as a Republican while he is the leader of the party is unacceptable.  Others have described him as a “coin-operated” president, into which you insert your money and buy your regulations, policy outcomes or pardons.  If you like air pollution, that’s the way to vote — emissions standards rolled back, coal-fired power plants kept in operation, fuel economy standards rolled back. It’s a fossil fuel company’s dream come true.  It’s also one promise Trump actually kept. He told the oil companies to raise a billion dollars for his campaign PAC and they could have any policy they want. And he delivered.  I don’t think our U.S. House representative, Celeste Maloy, necessarily endorses Trump’s corrupt operation. But she’s never voted against him, either. I don’t know anything about the Democrat running against her, Kent Udell. But unlike the Summit County Republicans, the state Democrats were able to find a plausible candidate to run against her. Normally by this time in an election cycle, my mailbox is stuffed full of campaign material. This year, I’ve received exactly two pieces of campaign junk mail. One was supporting U.S. Rep. Mike Kennedy. I’m in that district now, but with the redrawn maps, I’m not after January.  Kennedy has distinguished himself in Congress by being completely invisible — an inert, empty suit. The postcard, which came from the ironically named “Integrity Trackers” in Lindon, portrays Kennedy as a pillar of fiscal responsibility who will reduce the $40 trillion national debt.  Somebody needs to, but Kennedy voted for the “One Big Beautiful Bill” that cut taxes and added to the debt. If he actually has an opinion on the debt, he’s kept it to himself.  But he’s not on my ballot, so that postcard was a waste. The other piece of campaign literature was from Americans for Prosperity in support of Constitutional Amendment B. That provision would make it much more difficult for a citizen sponsored ballot initiative to pass. It’s very hard to get an initiative on the ballot, but once it’s there, the present law says 50%+1 vote will enact a ballot initiative.  Amendment B would increase that to 60% for it to pass. This is really the Legislature throwing a tantrum over mere citizens fighting back on their efforts to undo the anti-gerrymandering initiative voters passed several years ago. They packed the State Supreme Court and now want to go after the voting requirements.  The postcard warns me to “slam the door on the tax monster.” I have no idea what that means, but I don’t think we will be deluged with citizen ballot initiatives to raise taxes.  Bottom line for me is that if our corrupt Legislature is for Amendment B, I have to vote against it.  Overall, looking at the actual ballot, I’m mostly disappointed. The Republicans have a lock on most offices. U.S. Rep. Celeste Maloy will be reelected in the newly drawn district and can reasonably expect to serve for life without ever having to raise significant campaign money. Same with Mike Kennedy. And these are the best they could come up with? Let’s just say that neither of them is House speaker material. Mail in your ballot early. Tom Clyde practiced law in Park City for many years. He lives on a working ranch in Woodland and has been writing this column since 1986. The post More Dogs on Main: The ballots are out appeared first on Park Record. ...read more read less