Bullshit. If both Slappy and Booger are poor choices, and I choose not to vote for either, I get the option to complain about who ever wins.
Soldiers fought for my right not to vote. Don’t get me wrong, I’m voting this year as I have every election. But I support someones right not to vote, and their right to complain when the masses voted in people that were never in the non-voters interest to begin with.
I read this as (and the majority of posts in this thread); it is your civic duty to vote, no matter the principals or ethics of the candidates. Just vote! Candidate A wants to invade every country to spread democracy. Candidate B wants GPS chips installed in every new born. Just vote! It doesn’t matter, you just have to do it! You have to! Otherwise your opinion doesn’t matter! Even after you have informed yourself of the positions of candidates A & B, you must choose one of them! Reasonable concern about both candidates is not in the best interests of your civic duties! Wait… you don’t want GPS chips in humans? You don’t want the spread of democracy around the world via force? Your opinion is shit, you have to vote!
Write somebody in if you find the other options distasteful.
Your foaming-at-the-mouth mentality regarding voting, no matter how bad someone might be repelled by any candidate on any ballot this year is strident at best and an ignorant way to express someone’s views on the current political state of this country. It’s like saying, “I am appalled by every single choice on the ticket this year, but I’ll vote for the lesser of two evils even though this lesser of two evils is someone I wouldn’t trust to walk my f@cking dog.”
This reasoning resides at the apex of the depths of the comatose, and it serves only to render the power of each vote as flaccid. If everyone in this country decided not to vote, it might very well make these self-obsessed yahoos take a long hard look at the process. At the very least it would send a signal that these empty candidates are only in office because every election interval we have to pick one.
I don’t care that you don’t care about my misgivings about voting this election. And your rabid views on this subject will not only galvanize my resolve, but may very well motivate me to vote for McCain just to thumb my nose at the fanatical board collective.
Christ, calm down. I am in no way obligated to cast a vote for anyone, ever. If it were an obligation or a real “duty”, then it would be required by law for this nation’s citizens to vote.
And no matter who wins the election this year, you can count on me to rail against their actions and their policies like a rabid, pregnant wolverine when the step out of line, and I won’t bother with so much as a fleeting moment to consider what you think about my rights to do so.
This is silly.
I’m rabid and foaming at the mouth because I pointed out that voting is the civic responsibility of the citizenry? Cripes.
Like I just said, if you hate the candidates on the ballot that much, write somebody in. And I never said you didn’t have the right to complain, anyway.
ETA: And why would I care if you give McCain a “spite vote”? I certainly didn’t intend to give the impression with my prior post that I only think people should vote if they’re going to vote for the same guy I am. 
No. You need to read your post again, and this time objectively. You sound like you were about to have a stroke.
Yeah, that’ll show 'em. :rolleyes:
Ditto that. It’s fine if someone doesn’t want to vote, but then they lose the right to have you listen to them complain about politics.
Er, okay. I hate to think what would have happened if I’d used italics or perhaps an exclamation point.
Of course not, you’re rabid and foaming at the mouth because you pointed out that voting is a civic responsibility of the citizenry at ALL COSTS. If 90% of the time you have the choice between a golden nugget and a piece of crap, you may be right that most people should flock for the gold. But what you’re saying is if we have AIDs one ticket and cancer on the other, that we should still vote. And please don’t come back with the “write in” example. No write in has a chance at actually winning (sorry herpes).
Out of all the comments so far, I’ve picked this one to show why the vote-or-shut-up crowd is ridiculous. First off, voting is not something we “can do to improve how our country operates”, at least not in the eyes of us nonvoters. It’s a useless, futile gesture. “What if everyone thought that way?” Then I’d vote. Further, you’re wrong in saying we end up with a certain government “as a result” of not voting. We’d have gotten the same gov’t anyway. There’s no cause-effect there. I could understand the “because you didn’t try to change things” argument if only they could prove why they think voting changes things.
Why is it that people think voting is a civic duty? It’s not! Nowhere does it say that in any document our forefathers wrote. Sure, the right to vote is important. It doesn’t mean I have to do it. Taxes, jury duty, and -god forbid- conscription compliance are our civic duties. Not voting. For all those, another citizen’s wellbeing depends on your action/nonaction. Election results, however, are decided way before election day.
Someone please tell me the difference between novote=nocomplain and:
Didn’t write to your congressman? No complaining.
Don’t own a gun? No complaining.
Never been in a appealed for a lack of speedy trial? No complaining.
Never challenged an illegal search and seizure? No complaining.
After all, if you chooes not exercise your right, then you can’t complain about the way this country operates. When I get this bullshit line from “Vote or die” types, I always respond the same way. On election day, I actually do vote. I go to the store and buy a chicken breast. I take it in the backyard and toss it across my lawn. Then I build a big bonfire and put ashes on my nose. I dance around it whie Gregorian chanting my favorite Billy Joel songs. Somewhere between songs, I shout the name of the candidate I want elected. And it influences the election just as much as your lever-pull does.
If that doesn’t work, I throw down my civic trump card: I fought in a war and don’t vote. You vote and don’t fight wars. Who, again, has a right to complain about our leaders? Naturally, I think my own argument is bullshit but it always gets them to shut the hell up.
FWIW, the voter turnout in the 1824 election (the earliest one I can find data for) was 26.9%. So apparently the founding fathers and their kids didn’t think much of their civic duty either.
“My friend can’t be arsed to vote.”
Arsed?
Arse= ass. but I can’t think of how that applies here?
English (British) idiom. “Bothered”.
Many politicians would love it if less people voted. The “signal” would be that they only need to spend a few buck, get a few cronies to vote, and they’re in.
The way to change the behavior of these “self-obsessed yahoos” is to vote for the other guy. Or the other other guy. If you think they all suck, then vote for a third party candidate. Politicians listen to the votes. (And the money that can help them get votes.)
They certainly would not love it if no one voted. If by some run of magic we were able to convince the entire country to quit the polls November 4th. That was my meaning.
So the politicians themselves don’t bother to vote? As long as you’re asking for miracles, why don’t you just have your dream candidate automatically win. 
Did you not notice the “if” before my statement you quoted previously? Did I fail in making my point clear, that I was merely making a point opposite that of everyone voting? Must I teach reading comprehension as well?
Yes, yes, it’s always the reader who’s the problem. And you’re mad at others for foaming-at-the-mouth.
You know what’s funny? That people still actually believe that voting *does * anything. That’s the premise everyone here seems to be going on, and in my view it couldn’t be farther from the truth. Could it have been more blatant than 2000 and 2004, when the people voted in one guy, yet another one took office by some legal wrangling? And even if by some chance presidential elections are not directly stolen, the entire crop of contenders is nothing but a bunch of outright liars. Remember Bill “health care for everyone” Clinton? Instead of helping our chronically ill citizens, he actually took Disability payments away from huge swathes of the citizenry, including my then infant daughter. No difference between his lying ass and the republican stooge he ran against, in my opinion.
I don’t blame your friend. I have voted every year since I turned 18, and this year I’m thinking… why do I keep wasting my time? It’s just plain not worth it.
I don’t think anyone is saying that. I’ve posted a few links saying it doesn’t.
And yet you bring up 2000, where a few hundred votes in Florida decided the election. You undermine your own argument with this example.