Voters Shouldn’t Care
Thursday, January 31st, 2008Q. How do I know things are royally screwed up in the US political system?
A. Because the voters care.
Every election, things seem to get more shrill. More chicken-little screaming, uglier campaign ads, threats, accusations, and so on. The number of voters increases. Over 120,000,000 voted in 2004 for the president (but note, that figure includes duplicates, the deceased, non-citizens, and other fraudulent votes).
Elections mean more to people today than ever. That importance engenders a lot of anxiety and hostility. Voters fear the election of the candidate with opposing viewpoints. “My God, we’ll all die if X gets elected!” Certainly, the wrong president can make the difference between life and death. But I contend that we’ve already had that, not just with Bush but with virtually every modern president (and many more to boot). They’re all bad, and they’ve all caused unnecessary death and pain.
What if our federal government actually followed their own rules, ones they put in place a few hundred years ago? The president, as originally intended, wouldn’t be such a powerful bloke, nor would Congress or those in the supreme court. But power leads to excuses as to why those rules don’t apply to “us,” or why something is a special circumstance that requires us to break the rules.
If the president wasn’t so powerful, and couldn’t do things like send troops to foreign soil, spend billions on unconstitutional programs, usurp power from the states, voters really wouldn’t care so much.
Pitifully, however, far too many think that it’s government’s job to make sure their lives run smoothly. And thus they unwittingly grow government, and in turn care more when that government no longer meets all of their selfish demands.
To those who believe in democracy: understand that the act of voting itself is the source of your own pain.
