Politics is a very divisive topic, therefore I hesitate to even talk about my political career. But it is Election Week in America, and so it feels like an appropriate time to share what I learned during my time in office.
It all began in sixth grade. I was running for student council and gave a rousing speech about why I deserved the position, explaining with passion how I would fight for longer recesses and better cafeteria pizza. I was followed by Holly Colburn who gave a similar speech with one key difference. At the end of hers, she opened her backpack and threw candy to the entire class. They cheered and I lost in a landslide.
Political Lesson #1: Voters Love Free Stuff.
By the time I ran for student body president in 8th grade, the administration had barred outright bribery. Bummer. But the battle scars from my previous attempt taught me to avoid trying win on logic or merit. Instead, I leveraged all my hopes on another tactic: Having a good tagline.
You don’t lead with a tagline, of course, you must build to it. Therefore I had to fill a few minutes of my big speech with a list of impossible-to-keep campaign promises. “Milli Vanilli in concert!” “Laser tag in the gym!” “Mountain Dew in the vending machines!” And once I had my pubescent peers worked into a lather, I dropped a catchphrase they couldn’t forget:
“Don’t Be Snobby, Vote for Bobby.”
In all honesty, I only picked it because it rhymed. But it worked on a deeper level. Despite being an upper-middle-class kid, suddenly every voter saw me as an everyman. Sure, my dad was a judge who may have thrown Uncle T.J. in prison, but wait till you see the new basketballs I’m going to get us for the blacktop!
Riding an anti-snobbery populist wave, I finally made it. Bobby Smiley was elected president.
Or so I thought.
Because, as I would soon learn, the girl who came in second place had a trick up her sleeve: her mom was the superintendent of schools.
And so somewhere between election day and inauguration day, there was a backroom negotiation. And when the principal’s door finally swung opened, I was informed that despite a decisive victory, our middle school would have co-presidents.
Political Lesson #2: Who You Know Beats Who You Are.
Thankfully, in 9th grade my co-president split for another high school, and it looked like my political career might finally take flight.
But I was not about to rush into things. No, sir. This time I paused, built relationships with fellow students, and made sure that none of them were related to people whose names regularly appeared on yard signs. Confident that my time had come, I updated my campaign promises and my tagline—“Don’t Be a Snob, Vote for Bob”—and was duly elected sophomore class president.
Unfortunately, it turned out there aren’t many responsibilities for a sophomore class president. Just one, in fact. Planning the big fall dance. I was excited. I named it the “Fall Frenzy.” It was going to be leaf-themed. Yes, leaves.
You’ll be shocked to know that no one in the school wanted to go. And facing the real possibility of losing a serious chunk of change, our vice principal pulled the plug on the dance without giving me any warning.
Political Lesson #3: It’s Always About Money.
Political Lesson #4: Don’t Use Leaves as a High School Dance Theme.
Despite all this pain and heartache, I arrived at college still knowing exactly what I wanted to do with my life:
I was going to major in politics.
And I was going to return home and become mayor of my little town that didn’t like leaves.
And when I did, all those classmates who didn’t vote for me in sixth grade and the superintendent who divided my power in 8th grade and my high school vice principal who didn’t want to lose gobs of money would finally see the greatness that had been hiding right in front of their eyes all those years.
Then I took my first politics class.
I hated it.
I hated reading Aristotle. I hated discussing Hobbes. I hated debating policy. I hated long meetings where you have to say things like, “I motion that we move to order to close the new business on the old business regarding blah blah blah…” I hated the thought of wearing a suit every day. And I hated the idea of having to beg friends for money every few years to keep my job.
Frankly, I hated the whole dumb enterprise.
And I had no backup plan.
But in between hating my politics classes, I kept my sanity by writing for my college’s legendary humor magazine.
Compared to parliamentary procedure, our creative process was beautifully chaotic. Typically, once a month we stayed up for two days straight pitching ideas and telling jokes and laughing and then about six hours before the issue had to be at the printer, we buckled down and put together 20 pages of the funniest material I’d ever read in my life.
It was my favorite thing about college.
While I had no clue how to begin a career in comedy writing, I knew I couldn’t keep pursuing politics. And when I returned to school after winter break of my sophomore year, I walked to the registrar’s office and switched my major to English.
Not long after this, I went to our magazine’s office to do some work and saw that we had a voicemail. I hit play. It was a message from a Hollywood literary agent named Norman Kurland. Mr. Kurland was an alumni and former magazine staffer who had gone on to great success, selling scripts like The Big Chill, Romancing the Stone, and many others. He said he was calling to see if any undergrads would ever want to write for TV or film and left his phone number.
I wrote down the number and nervously gave Mr. Kurland a call. I’ll never forget the conversation. I told him that I had received his voicemail and wanted to be a writer in Hollywood. There was a long silence. And then, finally, he replied. “I’ve been leaving messages on that answering machine for twenty years and you’re the first person to ever call me back.”
There is a hard to explain clarity when God breaks through. It grabs hold of a deeper place than the affirmation of the masses or a landslide electoral victory ever could. What seemed impossible to envision two minutes earlier suddenly became the most obvious path in the world.
But the political lessons I learned from that season of life are just as true as ever. Speaking of which, I have a new book called DEAD MEAT coming out this month. If you like heartwarming stories and good laughs, don’t be snobby, buy a copy for Bobby!
My new book DEAD MEAT lands NOVEMBER 17th! Check out the trailer!
No kidding. I just this minute finished reading The Silver Cord when this pops up.
If you read for a hobby
Buy a book from Bobby
My son has spent the last several days writing a speech, doing an interview, and building posters for his sixth-grade student body VP. I share your view of politics. Glad you went with writing.