Fuck everyone of yyou who didn’t get out and vote. Everyone of you. Especially Mark in my office, the guy who, every year as myself and others come back with our “I voted” stickers says words to the effect of, “Oh you voted, how cute!”
There are people DYING in other countries for the right that you would rather sit at home with a remote control glued to your hands and a bag of Cheetos within reach than excercise.
People died IN THIS COUNTRY so you could choose your leaders. And you think it’s a big joke. Got beter things to do. It’s so inconvenient. It doesn’t make a difference…
Well, in the closest election in memory, it DID make a difference. And you didn’t care. So go fuck yourself.
And if I hear you bitch about a single thing having even a remote connection with politics, forgive me if, in my mind, I am mentally shoving a marked in ballot up your ass.
*TIME ELAPSED SINCE I QUIT SMOKING:
Six months, four weeks, two days, 6 hours, 10 minutes and 24 seconds.
8530 cigarettes not smoked, saving $1,066.28.
Extra time with Drain Bead: 4 weeks, 1 day, 14 hours, 50 minutes.
I don’t agree with Satan all that often, but here I concur wholeheartedly. There is no excuse not to vote! People bitch and moan and then don’t do the one thing in their power to make a change.
Like Brian, there is a guy in my office (we share an office, actually) who asked me today, and I kid you not, what the positions of the candidates were. He didn’t even know who the VP candidates were. I had to explain to him the basic difference between Republican and Democratic philosophy (at least my takke on it). He was clueless.
I guess it’s good for the integrity of the system that he didn’t vote.
Damn straight, Satan. I was never overly concerned over who won the election, I just took pride in knowing I did my fucking duty and filled out a ballot. And I also take pride in knowing that I was relatively educated about what I was voting for.
I’m keeping my “I Voted!” sticker (along with my ballot stub) on my wall, because I fucking love this country. (Cue “Glory Glory Hallejujah”)
I agree that people should vote, but I don’t think that the apathetic swine should be encouraged to vote. If they don’t care enough to vote, how could they make an informed choice anyway? I agree with Andy Rooney’s statement, “If they don’t want to vote, to hell with them! They’re not smart enough anyway, and I don’t want one of their votes cancelling out mine.” If people don’t understand the issues, they should just sit at home and get dumber.
In fact, I want to get a bumper sticker that says DON’T VOTE in big letters. And if I was rich enough, I would run commercials telling people not to vote. I see this as only doing good for America. Intelligent, informed voters would be uninfluenced by my ads, because they understand the issues and want to vote. Meanwhile, all the stupid people who are only going to vote because of some big-budget commercial that they saw will be discouraged from voting. With all the meaningless votes of the stupid removed, the votes of those that actually care will count for more.
I have to dispute this statement. At least in my district. The electronic voting machines did not afford me the opportunity to vote for whom I wanted, or Batman would have been one step closer to ruling the free world.
Personally, I’ve got no problem if someone doesn’t want to vote. It’s a free country, right? I think everyone has the right to vote or not vote, much as they should have the right to burn a flag or not burn a flag. Just because I don’t agree with it, doesn’t mean they shouldn’t have the right.
The thing that does cheese my dick is when these same people who haven’t voted bitch and moan about the person who made it into office.
No, fuck you, people-who-care. (And I mean that in the nicest possible way.) If I wanted to vote, I would, but I don’t, and as long as we don’t move to an Australian system where people are required by law to vote, not voting is my right. If there is no major canidate who represents my views, why should I vote for someone I can’t stomach? I’ll concede I might have been able to write someone in, I’m not sure about that (all the ballots are electronically counted and there are no pens in the voting booth, but they might furnish you with one if you ask), but even 30 minutes out of my not so busy schedule for that kind of pointlessness is too much. You could pick a name out of a hat among the choices of Bush, Gore, Nader, Buchcanan, and Browne, and it would mean as much to me as yesterday’s election.
And just who was that moderator complaining about debates in the Pit again?
Couple of points, and it might behoove anyone interested enough to read this thread to look into what their state does, and write one of those nice little constituent letters to their state representatives about it if applicable:
In many states, getting on the ballot is akin to walking a tightrope in a strong wind, juggling old-time bank safes, while an elephant and a donkey stand at each end of the rope shaking it. Here in North Carolina, to run for statewide office or to get the party of your choice on the ballot requires signatures from 2% of the voters in the last presidential or gubernatorial election agreeing, not just that you deserve a ballot line, but that they intend to campaign for you. And some low but significant percentage of the state’s voters must support your party’s candidate for president or governor to retain the ballot line.
Beyond which, in order to be a valid write-in candidate, you must have gotten some significant number of signatures on petitions. In other words, while I was not in favor of Ralph Nader, I was not only denied the right to vote for him as a ballot candidate, but if I had felt strongly enough about him to write him in, my ballot would have been voided, since he was “not a valid write-in candidate.”
Other states have similarly strict ballot access. While I rarely support third-party candidates, I feel that I want to preserve that choice, and that they have a right to run, and get the 836 votes or whatever that they might get.
Anyway, AMOK stated exactly how I feel. Why should I waste my precious time when, really, all the alternatives are just as bad? I feel worse for the people who got wrapped up in the whole thing and were cheering or upset or whatever because they thought their vote “made a difference”. How much different do you think the next four years will be because Bush got elected over Gore? Please. And to just vote for someone “because it is your duty?” All this goes to prove is how brainwashed you are.
I didn’t vote. With both of the main candidates staking out the same political territory, I didn’t see any particular reason to bestir myself and rush down to the polls to defend democracy from one or the other of them.
Besides, when a right becomes a “duty,” I suspect that it’s no longer truly a right anymore.
OK, maybe I’m not a great example. I’m a serious voting spazz. I LOVE to vote. I’m out there every year even if the only office on the ballot is Dog Catcher and a proposition to raise the pet license from $5 to $6. I research the positions, research the candidates, read over the party platform - I can’t help myself.
They didn’t give out sickers at my polling place so I didn’t get a sticker - I want a sticker, dammit!
I know that there are a great number of people who don’t get out and vote, but I was really taken aback by my coworkers. They showed not just apathy for voting, but derision for anyone who did vote. Two of them (there were six or seven of us having the conversation) didn’t even know who was running. Obviously, they knew Bush/Gore, but they didn’t know the other candidates, and they didn’t know ANY of the State or local offices that were up (Oh, wait, one of them did say, “Isn’t Hillary up for something or other?”). This drives me crazy, because they are the first to complain about everything. I haven’t seen them yet today, but if I hear one complaint about who won there’s going to be hell to pay.
People who just vote along party lines (like my ex-husband, the fastest voter in the East - run in, yank the REP tag, done) USED to drive me nuts. After what I’ve seen this year, I have a bit more respect for them, at least they’re getting out there. It’s not the best way, but at least it’s something.
