Ladies and gentlemen, start your engines … if you can find the ignition, that is.

It’s Student Government election time again, the two days of the year when student apathy reigns supreme. Every April the Election Commission runs itself ragged trying to encourage students to stop by the polls and give Student Government pieces of their minds.

And every April, the voter numbers are only slightly short of pathetic.

Last year, 1,180 students voted in the Student Senate elections, and that was down from the year before. That’s about 10 percent of the students enrolled here.

Tongues were clucked in November when “only” 50 percent of the nation turned out for the presidential election. Election officials around here couldn’t get 5,000 people to vote if they had kegs at each polling place.

It’s understandable (sort of) that students don’t want to vote for the mayor of a city they don’t call home, or for a president they feel is out of touch with their generation. But the Student Senate makes decisions that affect the student body directly and immediately.

The polling places are even located conveniently – it’s near impossible to walk around campus for two days without strolling past one.

But I don’t think the problem is the average student. I think the problem is the average senate candidate and the average senate election.

I’m not going to name names or make specific accusations or criticisms. But it isn’t hard to see that, when you look at platforms and qualifications and experience, that some people are not only in over their heads, but they can no longer even see the surface.

At the debate Thursday night, some things became painfully apparent. One candidate had to leave because he had an emergency at his fraternity. It leads one to wonder what he would do if there was a fraternity emergency during, say, a Student Senate meeting.

Before the debate, each executive candidate from all three parties was asked to name the five executive administrators on campus by position. One party went 0 for 5. None of them could associate Carol Surles, Lou Hencken, Lida Wall, Jill Nilsen and Jeff Cooley with the titles they hold.

Some platform ideas are a little far-fetched, too. One candidate wants to push for the auditorium mentioned in the Campus Master Plan to be built as soon as possible. Say what?

Students don’t care about a 20,000-seat fantasy. They want to be able to park within a half-mile radius of their residence halls.

There are candidates who haven’t been within throwing distance of a Student Senate meetings, and others who don’t seem to have any clue about how the Student Senate is run.

This is nothing new, and not necessarily bad. Students need a wide range of candidates, and they are all well within their rights to enter their names in a political race. But across the board, competence (or the appearance of competence), probably the most important aspect of a political candidate, seems to be a little thin.

And Student Government knows it. It stages two informational meetings after the petition deadline for the candidates to learn about the positions they’re running for. Candidates must attend at least one of those meetings.

Am I the only one who thinks that’s bass ackwards? I want a candidate who knows what he or she’s supposed to be doing before they get on the ballot. Essentially, you can apply for the job without knowing a thing about it, and Student Government would cater to you by teaching what it is you’re supposed to be doing.

I won’t even get into the ethical quandary that presents.

These meetings took place sometime between last Wednesday and tonight. Our candidates got six days to learn how to lead this campus, with its 10,000-plus students, nearly 2,000 employees, budgets in the hundreds of millions and 100 years of history.

And people wonder why we’re apathetic.