Choosing from the litter of this year’s batch of Student Association candidates is like asking whether one would want to be governed by Adolf Hitler, Ivan the Terrible or David Duke.

The editorial board cannot recall an election in which the choices for students are so poor. After all, whoever is elected will be representing NIU students’ concerns to the administration next year.

Therefore, in the race for SA President, The Northern Star Editorial Board only can endorse a candidate with severe reservations. Our choice is Jodie English. English, who is a last-minute write-in candidate, is obviously the most qualified out of the bunch.

English has been battling the administration for three years during her involvement with the SA and knows the ins and outs of NIU bureaucracy. English is by far the most experienced candidate, and she is the students’ only prayer.

However, English is not an angel, either—she’s far from it. She was involved in a bribe scandal over a landlord case against NIU Student Regent James Mertes.

When questioned by the editorial board, Maurice Thomas was not aware who top members of the NIU administration were, and his responses showed a great lack of knowledge about issues affecting students.

What’s more, Thomas hides the truth. He has told several different versions of why he made almost $100 in personal phone calls at the SA office. Thomas even initially said the calls were business-related. In addition, Thomas had numerous campaign violations which were so major that he was banned from campaigning during the last 48 hours. NIU students do not need someone without integrity representing them to an already skeptical administration.

Gino Barrto and Daniel Bryant spent most of the campaign defaming each other. Of course, that’s because neither of them have much experience, knowledge of how the NIU bureaucracy works nor any of their own ideas. Barrto turned his campaign into a crusade against the other candidates, even using profanity to describe Bryant.

Bryant’s campaign has essentially been invisible, which certainly doesn’t show anyone a lot of drive to become elected to office in the first place.

Timothy Dinan, the other candidate, is a decent choice with student government experience at his old school, but unfortunately does not have the experience needed to represent NIU students against a well-schooled administration.

In the race for SA vice president, our pick is Jennifer Sarro, but again with extreme reservations. Sarro and fellow-candidate Matthew Schmidt did not display knowledge of issues affecting students, did not know who members of the administration were and did not present a plan of what they would do if elected.

Sarro gets the nod simply because of her dedication and experience garnered on the SA this year. Stacy Beck, the other candidate, did not even bother to meet with us and has little experience.

Our pick for SA treasurer was simple—Tony Lopykinski. Lopykinski is the understudy of current SA Treasurer Joe Kolerich and has essentially learned the job while serving on the SA Finance Committee. The other two candidates did not return repeated phone requests to meet with us and have done little campaigning.