Do you know what everyone cares about? Small-town politics. Participants brandish political statements in the form of lawn ornaments, and the local park district has its voting booth somewhere in a dusty old room, usually furnished with gym mats.

At Easter, I was walking only to notice that Forest Park (my hometown) is currently alight with red, white, blue, and sometimes (to many people's chagrin) green signs. The mayoral race is heating up here, and everyone's lawn ornaments are taking sides.

What town would be a town without a Boss-Mayor? The Boss-Mayor must be a man who's lived in the town all his life, went to all its grade schools (the two rival junior highs claim him as their own, of course), knows all the cops, and carries a holdout pistol to debates.

Next Tuesday, AKA April 17th, is the date of this election, and the town is abuzz. The two mayoral candidates left, after the electoral drubbing in the primary of real estate agent, councilmember, and local weasel Patrick Doolin, are Terry Steinbach and the Boss-Mayor, Anthony Calderone. As irony and fate would have it, these two candidates live next door to each other. They are physically neighbors, not just neighbors based on the town motto, so you can imagine how the last few months have been. They each have a huge sign advertising their candidacies and creating looming shadows, so the yard work each needs to do is probably not pleasant.

Calderone: It's a beautiful day!
Steinbach [brightly but accusingly]: To break into my campaign headquarters! And to graffiti my sign to say "Steinbach for Mayor McSleaze!"
Calderone: Or to use one's leverage in the newspaper to openly slander the noble mayor as having given town funds to operate a casino out of the library!
Steinbach: But you did!
Calderone: And the commissioners went with it -- say, weren't you a commissioner then?
The Next Morning
Calderone: You destroyed my hedges!
Steinbach: You put a knot in my garden hose!
Calderone: You ripped out all my tulip bulbs!
Steinbach: You salted the earth in my garden!
Calderone: You can't prove I used salt!

In a rare touch of insight, humor, and journalism, the local paper The Forest Park Review noted that signs supporting Calderone's campaign were going up in surrounding suburbs such as Oak Park*. Why would a man campaigning in Forest Park, no less a two-term incumbent, want to garner support in an outlying town?

Why not? Anthony Calderone's the Boss-Mayor, with the pistol to back that up.

Though we know plenty of the police force, my dad and I became acquainted with an FP cop in the past year. When I met the guy, Italian as can be, all he could say was, "You're election age, right? Vote for Tony!" Oh, and because I neglected to mention I lived in Chicago and not really Forest Park, I was reassured by him that he wouldn't bust up any of my parties. Probably only if I voted for Tony, though.

As for Terry Steinbach, all I know about her is that she's... Oh, right. I know nothing about her. I think she's sort of a politician. She also has a less flashy (literally, "Flash-y," and if you got that, congratulations, nerd) website than Tony.

I haven't spent much time finding out anything about the candidates and elections so far, mostly because I'm not much for research, being a journalist. However, the opportunity knocked to do some real investigation, so I had to check all my sources. I went straight to the campaign websites. Perusing each candidate's, the two's platforms look completely different, but only because Steinbach uses complete sentences. See for yourself (all quoted without permission):

Steinbach:
Roosevelt Road Corridor. Roosevelt Road is a tremendously underutilized asset. Forest Park should partner with neighboring communities to cohesively develop this prime retail street.
Calderone:
Redevelopment of Roosevelt Road business corridor

Steinbach:
Madison Street. Part of Madison Street has seen success, but now we need to extend the "look and feel" of this street west to Altenheim by creating a natural connection to the new development occurring in that area.
Calderone:
Continue working closely with Oak Park and River Forest to enhance Harlem Avenue and West Madison Street

Steinbach:
Harlem Avenue. As our eastern gateway, this street presents an opportunity to collaborate with our neighbor to make it a vibrant and valuable asset for our community.
Calderone:
(See above.)

Can you take any more of this? I'd imagine not. Small-town politics haven't been this boring since Clint Eastwood started directing and not acting.

I think I've given you all a pretty good idea of what's up in the little village I call home. Calderone the Bullet-Pointed versus Steinbach the Long-Winded, winner takes Forest Park. Now the question is, will I bother to go vote? It's a long trip to that dilapidated park district voting hovel.

And for further droll information:
Mrs. Steinbach's Site
Tony's Site

* - Oh crap. I gave too much credit to The Review: it was a letter, one from a Mrs. Plona (an excellent journalist!).