As you read this, you will no doubt be ruminating on the choice which awaits you.

To vote or not to vote is the first question you will be posing yourself, whether it is more noble to abstain, or whether it is incumbent on you to perform your democratic excretion?

To my mind, not voting, though I am contemplating not doing it in the Local Council election (it's different at that level, at that level they really are both useless, at least in my part of the world) is a bit of a cop-out. Many people who have publicly expressed their intention not to are either showing off or so disinterested in what's going on around them or, more precisely, only interested in their own little world, and that leads me to looking down my nose at them a bit. On the other hand, a protest is a protest, however it's expressed, so I suppose I'm being a bit pompous, to say nothing of inconsistent.

Having made up your mind to vote you have to decide whether it's going to be on party lines or whether you're going to try to choose the best representatives for the country. In an ideal world, you'd go for the latter course of action. In Malta, in 2009, it's a question of "yeah, right, pull the other one", so it's pretty much a given that we're all, or mostly, going to vote on party lines. Since the only two parties that matter in this country have turned this into a party thing anyway, there's not much different that anyone can imagine doing anyway.

So, which party is it going to be?

I won't try to persuade yoy that I'm neutral on this, even because the Lil'Elves seem to think I don't have a right to an opinion, so irritated do the poor little things get when I fail to acknowledge that their leader is the greatest thing since sliced bread and that he is going from strength to strength to even greater strength every time he makes a speech or keeps the Prime Minister waiting.

As far as I'm concerned, there are members of the Labour Party's crop that deserve to represent us in Europe but they're few and far between and their leader, who used to but doesn't any more, isn't one of them. You're not, technically, voting for him if you go for Labour's candidates, but you are, really, and how, in the name of all that's beautiful, can you contemplate voting for someone who actively and strenuously campaigned to keep us out of Europe in the first place? I can't understand the logic, but there you are, you have that choice.

I won't presume, of course, to tell you who amongst the Labour candidates deserves your vote. I'm so far detached from the mindset of a Labour voter that I'm sure to get it wrong if, say, I say that Louis Grech should get in. I used to think that Edward Scicluna and Marlene Mizzi wouldn't be bad for us, but they've had to twist and turn so much to get themselves out of the binds that their past policy and political statements have got them into that I'm not too sure about that anymore, so I suppose I should hope that John Attard Montalto gets a look in, despite the sniping that one hears is going on.

Still, they're better than Bedding of the Glenn Field or that Ellul Bonici person, to say nothing of E(manwel) Cuschieri's brother.

If, on the other hand, you're a Nationalist voter, you've got a decent enough field to choose from. For obvious reasons, I know more of that lot than I know of the other lot (the only two Labour people I can say I know, really, are Louis Grech and Marlene Mizzi) so musing on who is going to get on well or not is going to irritate people I bump into more often than not. Suffice it to say, then, that Simon Busuttil deserves to run away with it again, while I hear that people like Roberta Metsola Triccas and Edward Demicoli are making a good run too.

I'll leave it at that on the Nats' side and you can call me chicken all you like: the Lil'Elves will call me what they like.

You have the choice, of course, of scribbling your numbers against the names of the peripherals, in all senses of the word. Whether or not the Alternattiva, after next Saturday, will find themselves in this group remains to be seen. For the moment, let's say they stand between the peculiars and the mainstreams.

You can, for instance, vote for Norman Lowell, whose record speaks for itself and who is only contesting because of a quirk that allows people with a conviction (and I'm not talking about a political one, either) to take part. His campaign seems to have resolved itself into scraps of paper stuck to poles and balloons, which about sums up the man.

Alleanza Nazzjonali have proposed three candidates, and their billboard looks uncannily like an ad for Sergio Leone's masterpiece. I'm not sure if Malcolm Seychell, Malsey as was when he graced the pages of VivaMalta.org, or Josie Muscat have Clint Eastwood's role. I don't think too many people are going to be making their day, though, so that's enough about that particular motley crew.

Then there's that Gozitan lady, who seems to be a nice person: sorry about the faint praise, but I don't know enough about her.

Off you go, then, do your duty.