With the Nov. 2 elections fast-approaching, I’d originally thought to title this week’s column “cynical-and-sarcastic-musings-on-the-ridiculous-and-potentially-destructive-rantings-and-political-rhetoric-of-various-candidates.”

In the end, I decided that was just a touch long-winded, even for me.

I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m getting just a little sick and tired of the casual (and not so casual) mudslinging which seems to accompany each and every election, on nearly every level, year after year. If nothing else it’s become pathetically predictable, morally ambiguous (at best) and downright pointless. It accomplishes nothing.

The majority of my friends and acquaintances are fed up with it as well and if you’re not, I don’t know what I could possibly say to convince you otherwise. It’s no wonder other countries find us laughable, especially when election time rolls around. All you have to do is look at many of our political leaders, the ways in which some came to power and what, if anything, they’ve actually accomplished.

To put it simply, much of their behavior, especially leading up to Election Day, is quite childish.

In fact, the mudslinging, name-calling and distortion of facts by Republicans and Democrats alike reminds me of two young children who hatch a plan to sneak their way into the proverbial cookie jar atop the refrigerator. While one steadies a rickety chair, the other climbs atop it and reaches to pilfer the out-of-reach prize. The first child gets distracted, causing the chair to wobble precipitously, the second looks down to chastise the first’s inattention, following which the cookie jar crashes to the floor and shatters. Both children then begin to point fingers, one blaming the other for the mishap, and neither have the common sense to realize they shouldn’t have been trying to sneak the cookies in the first place.

That comparison may be a bit simplistic, but that’s how it seems to me lately.

And then there’s the oft-maligned Tea Party Patriots.