Trending
Today, October 17th, there are thousands of rallies and marches taking place across our nation declaring we are a country of No Kings and that we want to remain a country with No Kings. The rallies and marches today will focus on voting; urging our citizens to exercise this right in the upcoming mid-term elections. Specifically No Kings is about the wealthy, and the power they claim, when they use their wealth to influence elections and even outright purchase the outcomes they want. Elections are supposed to be for the people, by the people. "We the people" means all of us, not just the few of us who have financial means.
The No Kings movement stimulates reflection on how a single person, or a small group of people, can dictate outcomes for the many by infusing unlimited amounts of money into elections. In thinking on that, does our town have a King or a couple of Kings?
Do we have a King(s) in our town that will use wealth to remake our public school board in their own vision? Did they use their wealth to finance a malicious mailable flyer in order to have undue influence in the upcoming school board election? Did they use their extreme wealth to drown out the voices of over 4300 voters who signed petitions in a school board recall initiative?
We, the people, have the power to say "No" to all of this by voting for school board candidates who are conducting their campaigns on a nonpartisan platform. All of that to mean, they aren't beholden to the powerful wealthy in this community. In this election, vote for Evan Carlson, Sarah Fritz, Claire Kipfmiller and Kayla Ratz for school board. Our voices matter. Our votes count. WE are the people.
Diane O'Connor
Alpena