I’m retired, so my week consists of six Saturdays and a Sunday, unless there is a holiday. I had dreams of all kinds of places to go and people to see. I’ve done a lot of that by going from here in the SCV to Virginia and back.

I’m told today is the “real” Saturday. Not sure what that means.

The weekend usually means we have two days when Congress, the courts, the president, governor, county supervisors and City Council can’t screw anything up … except in an election year.

Guess what? This is an election year. I know you’ve noticed. In fact the primary election is Tuesday. Hope you’re going to vote or already have voted by mail. I case you didn’t notice, if you’re registered to vote, you got your vote-by-mail ballot in the mail already. It wasn’t junk mail. If you don’t use it, that means you are being as wasteful as the government. So just go vote.

These are midterm elections. Sometimes that means you want to change the horse you’re riding about halfway across the stream. Other times it means you’ll keep riding the same horse – or elephant, or donkey, or…

This is an important election – like every other election. Can we get more than 14 percent of the voters to vote this time?

Once the primary is over, the number of informational mailings that get stuffed in your mailbox is reduced. I’ve come to believe the major industry that thrives on elections is the mass printing and mailing folks. Let’s face it: Some of those mailers are just plain funny.

Everyone wants the veterans to vote for them. “I support our veterans” and “Our veterans come first” – and once elected, they forget those promises. Right now, as a veteran, I can’t vote for any of them. They were speaking and writing, and thus they lie.

Please remember, these are the folks who gave us the “Unaffordable Care Act” and high-speed rail and VA hospital problems and the list goes on … for both sides of the aisle. Both sides of the aisle blame each other, or that last president-governor-whatever, and they do nothing. They swear a lot of oaths and promise accountability. Why, they even appoint their own attorney to investigate whether they broke a law. True story. Read the results on that one in a week or two, unless we don’t remember.

The same folks think they deserve a raise while stopping the raise that thousands in our military need. They already have the best retirement system in the world. A member of Congress can serve two years and retire at full pay. A soldier, sailor, Marine or airman serves 30 years and gets a maximum of 50 percent of his or her base pay. Why is that?

Why is it that many of the laws passed by Congress do not apply to the members of Congress or to their staff?

It used to be, you could tell which political party did what by looking at the past voting records. I see they all make sure business – BIG business – gets lots of perks while we, the little taxpayers, get screwed.

Maybe all lobbyists should be tried for treason, along with many elected folks, too. Then there are the appointed folks. Political appointments can scare me. Do they scare you, too?

I did know and was sure of my votes until the latest batch of election junk mail came to me, both as dead trees and on the Internet. I’m to the point that I’m tired of all of them. Time for us to shut them up – if only to save a tree and reduce junk mail.

Save a tree. Elect the other guy.

Above all, vote.

Darryl Manzer grew up in the Pico Canyon oil town of Mentryville in the 1960s and attended Hart High School. After a career in the U.S. Navy he returned to live in the Santa Clarita Valley. He can be reached at dmanzer@scvhistory.com and his commentaries are archived at DManzer.com. Watch his walking tour of Mentryville [here].