Phil Reisman: Judging by the mail, there's no one worth voting for

If you believe the slick junk that's been jamming your mailbox in recent weeks, there's absolutely no one worth voting for.

It doesn't matter what office they're seeking, or what party they represent. All the candidates are of low character. Warning: Do not shake the hands of any of these charlatans without counting your fingers afterwards.

They can't be trusted. You may as well vote for yourself, or write in the name of somebody else — somebody like your cat.

It is astounding how terrible these people really are. This cannot be overstated.

Hey, I wouldn't question anything they say about each other. Would you?

Of course, there is no actual "they," only shadowy party surrogates and anonymous PACs and hacks who are throwing the mud. See, this gives the candidates plausible deniability.

Over the past week, I gathered 65 campaign mailers from my colleagues at The Journal News. Of those, a total of 38 could easily be classified as negative. (My little survey was hardly scientific, but according to various studies I've seen, the negativity rate of 68 percent is about par for the course.)

Out of my toxic batch, most of the positive mailers were from state Sen. Andrea Stewart-Cousins' campaign. That's to her credit, but then again the Yonkers Democrat's opponent is an inactive candidate.

Other than that, this has been a bumper year for eye gouging. That's largely owed to some tight legislative races and an especially nasty New York gubernatorial campaign between Andrew Cuomo and Rob Astorino.

Oddly, I have not seen any Astorino mailers as yet, but with his limited funds he may be keeping his powder dry until the Halloween weekend — then bang! He will unleash a torrent of invective accompanied by creepy black and white photos of Cuomo resembling Frankenfurter from "The Rocky Horror Picture Show."

Speaking of gunpowder, if Astorino "succeeds," he will arm mental defectives, domestic abusers and wait for it … children! Oh yes, he will. Cuomo's attack mailers say so. In fact, one of them includes a photo of a long corridor lined with school lockers and the scary words, "There's a gun down this hallway." Whoa, and here we thought Astorino loved kids.

The gubernatorial candidates in the Connecticut gubernatorial race are just as awful. Gov. Dannel Malloy, the Democratic incumbent, is a tax-raising maniac. According to his Republican opponent, Tom Foley, "Dannel even wanted to tax our haircuts."

This cannot stand. Next thing you know, Foley will impose a surtax on the bald.

On the other hand, Foley may be conspiring with a right-wing group to ban all abortions and stop gay marriage.

Sorry, Nutmeg state. You have only nuts from which to choose.

As a rule of thumb, the Republicans tend to smear the Democrats on tax matters and blame them for the scourge of Common Core, while the Democrats characterize Republicans as "extremists" and "ultra-conservatives" who embrace guns and hate women.

For example, look at the race in the 37th State Senate District, an oddly configured legislative sector that covers much of the territory below Interstate 287 that, frankly, appears to have been drawn up by a drunken chimpanzee on a unicycle.

George Latimer, the incumbent, is "Taxpayers' Public Enemy #1." That's like being Al Capone, isn't it?

Meanwhile, Latimer's GOP opponent, Joe Dillon, is "too extreme for Westchester." Yes, indeed, "our families can't afford a right-wing extremist … as our state Senator."

Since I believe everything I read, I must conclude that either one of these unaffordable gentlemen is fully capable of taking us down a path of ruin. Other than that, they're great guys and deserve a job in Albany.

And then there is the epic bash-a-thon going on in the 40th State between Terrence Murphy, a Yorktown chiropractor, and Justin Wagner, an attorney who lives in Cortlandt. Both men are accomplished liars. They lie about fracking, women's equality and I don't know what else.

"Are you tired of hearing Justin Wagner's lies?" says a Murphy flier. Another one says with Wagner "its one lie after another." Wagner wants to make life so comfy for illegal immigrants that he's rolled out a red carpet for them. We are to believe that Wagner is determined to create a Mexico North.

But then there's the Wagner flier that announces, "You can't trust anything Terrence Murphy says about the environment." This includes a photo of Murphy with a rather obscene Pinocchio nose.

Murphy is also determined to put women and children in jeopardy, or so it seems. He wants to put a broken pipeline under a playground, and he's so loose on gun control that he's willing to put guns in the hands of wife batterers. On the latter charge, Wagner's team issued a flier that showed a woman with black eyes and a bruised cheek.

One of the candidates called the other crazy.

I know I saw that, but I couldn't find it in my festering pile of mail. It doesn't matter.

Take your pick.

Reach Phil Reisman at preisman@lohud.com . Twitter: @philreisman.