Squid braces for a season of campaigning in the post-truth era.

Measure for Measure…Squid has never outgrown Squid’s appreciation of a full mailbox. Back when Squid was a Squidlet, Squid had a humpback whale penpal who would send postcards from a migratory route. Now, the quality of the contents of Squid’s mailbox has been significantly downgraded: bills, catalogues for furniture that won’t fit in Squid’s lair, more bills. At least things in Squid’s mailbox are getting more colorful this election season—but they’re also getting more misleading.

While Squid loves that the ballot measure for a feasibility study and potential buyout of California American Water is called Measure J—it’s shaped like a piece of water pipe!—Squid spit out some water while reading the latest effort to dissuade Squid from voting for it.

The puns are endless and vaguely amusing (“It’s money down the drain,” the No on J mailer reports) but also misleading. Squid saw former two-term Monterey City Councilman Frank Sollecito’s face on a recent mailer, and Squid was confused; Sollecito hasn’t been on council for a few years, and he’s not running this time. No, he was there as a picture of “a force for good,” a civically engaged citizen and a retired police officer. “Measure J could cut millions of dollars from public safety services,” the mailer states.

The gist of their reasoning is this: Cal Am, a private company, pays $6 million in taxes every year. Without Cal Am, those revenues go away. It makes it sound like Squid can help local cities buy new fire trucks and hire new beat cops by letting the tap run. Squid gets a bit teary-eyed over such patriotic appeals. Then Squid remembered: It’s never so easy. And those $6 million in taxes are not all earmarked for public safety.

Speaking of businesses that would prefer not to be shut down: In Pacific Grove, the heat is up in a battle over Measure M, which would prohibit short-term rentals for residentially zoned neighborhoods except in the coastal zone. Squid’s aquatic lair is in the coastal zone, so Squid knows there are residential areas in the coastal zone—Measure M wouldn’t ban all short-term rentals, but it would ban them from a significant swatch of P.G.

So Squid was confused to get a call from a pollster asking Squid about Squid’s opinions on a ballot measure that would “ban” short-term rentals in P.G. Squid was slightly less confused to receive a press release with the results: “The responses show 46 percent oppose the ban, 39 percent were in favor and 15 percent were unsure.”

“This is huge. Locals don’t want the ban,” Josh Ohanian of Sanctuary Vacation Rentals is quoted as saying.

Only problem with the data: There is no ban on the ballot! Restrictions (major ones) yes, but it’s the kind of half-truth that’s become popular in this post-truth era.

Squid is about tapped out.