I had the pleasure of meeting several Democratic women candidates from Lake County during the Illinois State Fair last summer. Senator Melinda Bush (D-Grayslake) was showing them around town and brought them to a reception I was attending. We chatted for a while before they went on their merry way.

“Merry” is actually an understatement. Those candidates were positively joyful. They seemed genuinely thrilled to be running for office. Only one had ever run for something before. The rest felt compelled to get involved after the 2016 election.

The last column I write before an election day is always the toughest because some papers will publish this before election day and others will publish it after. So today you get a yard-sign story.

“I’ll be a check on the Pritzker/Madigan agenda,” Republican attorney-general candidate Erika Harold says in her latest TV ad about Democratic gubernatorial frontrunner JB Pritzker and Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan.

Dear JB Pritzker,

I totally understand the campaign politics of not wanting to say what you think the income-tax rates should be under a graduated tax structure. I also get why you won’t say what ought to be the income level at which people will begin paying a higher income-tax rate than they do now.

Actually, nearly everyone understands your political calculation. It’s elementary. You don’t want to give the other side any ammunition to attack you.