You bet.

Every November during each of my past four years living and going to school in Poughkeepsie, N.Y. I have witnessed students who try to vote in the local community, but are denied the right. Year after year friends and classmates who try to vote are told that they cannot since they are not full-time residents in Poughkeepsie. This despite the fact that section 5-102 of the New York State Constitution says that an individual becomes a resident of an area after a stay of 30 days.

This year two students filed a lawsuit against the Dutchess County Board of Elections after their voter registrations were rejected. And they lost.

Even those of us who choose to vote by absentee ballot rarely get the chance to do so. Blame the post office or blame those who handle the ballots, but the unfortunate reality is that this election year, yet again, I do not get the opportunity to exercise my voting rights. (And probably won't receive my ballot for another few months.)

Hopefully next time, when I'm no longer a college student but an actual "resident" somewhere, I'll get the chance to vote.

Have a great week, and happy polling.

-Gabe

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- If the polls are accurate -- a very big "if" -- California will experience a profound political change as a result of the election this week: For the first time in more than two decades, Democrats may simultaneously control the state's top three offices -- the governorship and the two U.S. Senate seats. They also are likely to retain control of both houses of the Legislature.

It's difficult to predict how the change from a Republican to a Democratic administration will affect the average Californian. But there are some signals.

Presumably, given Gray Davis' public statements and the politics of Democrats generally, there will be increases in school funding, over and above what has already been approved. There are likely to be pay increases for state employees.

The biggest single difference, of course, is gubernatorial approval of a pro-Democratic reapportionment in 2000 for the Legislature and Congress, drawing new districts that maximize Democratic registration while minimizing GOP registration. This is a given, and this is the issue that has drawn -- rightly -- the greatest national attention. The state is expected to pick up at least five additional seats in Congress, raising the delegation to 57 or more, most of them Democratic, a shift that could affect the balance of power in the House of Representatives.

But other, less obvious changes are also possible.

For example, Davis' appointments on the Air Resources Board, a powerful state agency and one of the most influential pollution- fighting bodies in the nation, are likely to a reflect a more aggressive posture on such things as electric cars and sports utility vehicles. The decisions the board makes on these and other issues is certain to influence the decision-making of anti-pollution agencies in the Northeast and even of the federal Environmental Protection Agency.

The Agricultural Labor Relations Board, which has been all but moribund under the 16 years of Republican rule, is all but certain to gain new clout. Davis has heavy IOUs for organized labor, who backed his campaign with money and volunteers and who made the difference in his primary victory over Al Checchi and Jane Harman. Those IOUs will now become due.

When Davis was chief of staff to then-Gov. Jerry Brown, the formation of the ALRB was considered the landmark accomplishment of the era. Davis is likely to restore the ALRB to its former glory, a move that is sure to draw the wrath of California's powerful, pro-Republican agribusiness community who complained that the original ALRB was the handmaiden of the United Farm Workers union.

A Davis administration probably will have little immediate impact on the makeup of the state Supreme Court, whose members serve 12-year terms. But the governor has immense influence over the rank-and-file judiciary, with the power to appoint hundreds of judges to the Superior, Municipal and Justice courts. Presumably, Davis' appointees will be more liberal than those of either George Deukmejian or Pete Wilson. A supporter of the State Bar, Davis is likely to restore funding and dues-levying power to that beleaguered agency that was cut by Gov. Wilson.

Davis is a cautious, pragmatic politician, but in some respects he is a doctrinaire liberal, so the state is likely to provide more funding for job-training programs, welfare and an array of social services. He also is likely to approve new taxes far more readily than either Wilson or Deukmejian, although that could change if the economy goes south.

In fact, the economy may be his biggest worry: He is riding the crest of a good economy into the governor's office, but if the economy sours, the public is likely to take it out on a new Davis administration. A fickle economy surely is one of Davis' concerns as he looks to 1999.

That change is coming appears likely. But whether it will be for the better is the big question. And right now, the answer to that question is hidden in the future.

I'm for labor unions, but have a real problem with public employee unions. There's a "Catch-22" here, because public employees need some form of collective bargaining at times, but the power they exercise in the body politic has become a possibly terminal cancer in our society.

When they run their own candidates or push the election of others, they are cementing the status quo and bureaucratic inefficiency into the workings of the community and nation. See what a horrible price our children and wallets have paid for the power of the now well entrenched educational establishment!

One of Davis' ads sneers that his opponent has a "0" National Education Association rating. That, for those of us who hate socialism from the core of our beings, is the highest praise one could reap on a candidate. For the rest of you, cry for your beloved country for what you are doing to it!

-Gerald V. Todd

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