Mike Maddock I sure will be glad when this political campaign season is over. In the past, I wished SC was a battleground state so we could get a little more attention from the presidential candidates and the national news media. I wished all those advertising dollars could have found their way into some of our pockets instead of a few cowboys and several thousand armadillos somewhere in New Mexico. But that was all before I realized we were going to have to endure 600 debates between Inez Tenenbaum and Jim DeMint.

More importantly, it was also before I realized the profound impact all this exposure to campaigning national or otherwise is having on our kids. By our kids, I don’t mean my own three children. Fortunately, my kids’ only exposure to the voting process to date is chocolate chip or vanilla, and the only campaigning they know is their own lobbying to push back bed time. No, I’m talking about all our kids.

I was recently in one of the more prominent middle schools in the greater Columbia metropolitan area and witnessed first–hand the damage inflicted on our children. The ugliness and divisiveness of the campaign season has trickled down to the once great and proud tradition of student government.

Scare campaigns and voter confusion are not just tactics reserved for Democrats and Republicans anymore. I’m afraid to say we’ve lost our innocence, America.

Lots of things have crept into our schools and our kids just keep growing up faster and faster. I don’t know if our society can withstand the degradation of political ugliness running rampant throughout the seventh grade.

Sixth graders should be singing Britney Spears not partisan rhetoric. Eighth graders should be worrying about zits and awkward growth spurts, not fundraising and spin rooms. But as I strolled the halls of this middle school, I knew life as we knew it had changed. No one, not even our most innocent, are safe from the sins of politics.

Take this run for student body vice president from a beautiful and once pure, sweet little girl. She could have chosen a message of hope and optimism, but under the spell of today’s political world, she chose a campaign of fear and divisiveness. Her posters plastered throughout the school’s hallways say this, “If you want to par–tay, vote for Dar–say!!”

I’m sure her opponent is all for a good time, but her scare tactics have got the entire school (especially the birthday voters) thinking life without her at the helm would be dull and cupcake–less. I hear her opponent has had to smash several of his piggy banks just to combat her distorted, yet powerful message.

His milk money has gone to fight his party–pooping image, and he has been completely knocked off the important lunch–line issues like more pizza days in the cafeteria and putting an end to sloppy Joes forever.

I ask you, is this healthy America? The run for student body president is no less frightening. One candidate who I’m sure is a very intelligent and thoughtful young lady has chosen to confuse and befuddle the voters, therefore leaving her opponent to pander what in the world she is talking about. Her campaign slogan is, “Pop it like it’s hot!” How does one respond to that? She’s got her answer for everything, and she’s impossible to challenge.

“Madame candidate, how do you plan to address the need for doors on the bathroom stalls?”

“Hey man, pop it like it’s hot!”

“Ah, I see...pop it like it’s hot...I have no idea what that means, but it sure sounds good! I’m voting for her!”

Her opponent is so desperate he’s given up Coke machine funding and the common sense bubble gum initiative, and resorted to this bizarre campaign theme, “Open for new ideas.”

Well, aren’t we all? Please bring this political season to an end before it’s too late. Our children are our most valuable asset, and we as a society cannot afford to let them continue down this path of destruction. Watch for the signs. Ask your children to clean their rooms. If they say yes, then we’re OK, but if they say “Mom, I have a plan to clean my room. It’s a good plan...a smarter plan. And I’m going to get the help of our friends to clean this room...not like my brother the previous occupant,” then it’s worse than I thought and we’re all in very serious trouble.