Posted on 10/29/2008 7:03:37 AM PDT by Kaslin
I keep hearing how important it is for everyone to vote.
Let me be politically incorrect and say that maybe some people shouldn't vote.
I know I'm swimming against the tide. Get-out the-vote groups now register young people at rock concerts. HeadCount cofounder Andy Bernstein told me: "We registered over a 100,000 people. It is so imperative that this generation's voice is heard."
But wait. Is that really a good idea? Many kids don't know much. At a HeadCount concert, "20/20" asked some future voters, "How many senators are there?" One said 12, another 16, and another 64. One girl guessed, "50 per state."
Most kids didn't know what Roe v. Wade was about. "Roe vs. Wayne?" asked one. "Segregation, maybe?" "Where we declared bankruptcy?"
Headcount's Marc Brownstein concedes, "there's a lot of uninformed voters out there." But he argued:
"Democracy is not about taking the most educated portion of the society and having them decide who's going to run the entire society. Democracy is about every individual having a voice."
I suggested that when people don't know anything, maybe it's their civic duty not to vote.
"It's an argument that really, really smacks against everything we hold dear as Americans," Bernstein replied.
Maybe it was unfair to pick on kids at a rock concert. I went to Washington, D.C., and showed people pictures of prominent Americans. I'm happy to say that everyone recognized Barack Obama and John McCain.
But only about half recognized Sarah Palin, and most didn't know Joe Biden. Few people recognized Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, but everyone quickly identified TV's Judge Judy.
Economist Bryan Caplan, author of "The Myth of the Rational Voter", points out, "the public's knowledge of politics is shockingly low."
He scoffs at the idea that "it's everyone's civic duty to vote."
"This is very much like saying, it's our civic duty to give surgery advice," Caplan said. "We like to think that political issues are much less complicated than brain surgery, but many of them are pretty hard. If someone doesn't know what he's talking about, it really is better if they say, look, I'm going to leave this in wiser hands."
Isn't it elitist to say only some people should vote?
"Is it elitist to say only some people should do brain surgery? If you don't know what you're doing, you are not doing the country a favor by voting."
My ABC "20/20" segment about this enraged some viewers.
"That was a shameful piece you put together about youth voting. ... I wonder if the quality of the information in our society has anything to do with hackery like yours infesting the airwaves and drowning out reasonable discussion."
Another wrote: "You are a decrepit journalist and a poor excuse of a patriot."
And still another: "Democracy is defined by citizen participation. So you are undermining democracy. Thanks."
Someone even made a video parody mocking my story.
Clearly, not everyone understood what I was saying.
"You sit there on television and ignorantly say that all youth should not vote . . . wow."
That's not what I said. I hope that informed young people do vote.
I just don't think it's so wonderful when famous people drag uninformed and uninterested people to the polls.
One viewer raised a fair point: "You simply cannot create a litmus test for voters. At what point does a voter become satisfactorily 'informed'? Do they have to know the name of the president, vice president, both their senators? This is the problem with your argument; you don't state how informed a voter should be, just that they should be. This is a very slippery slope."
But I'm not saying that the government should impose a litmus test. God forbid. I just want clueless people to find something else to do on Nov. 4.
Voting is serious business. It works best when people educate themselves.
If uninformed people stay home on Election Day, good.
That doesn't include you.
I agree not everyone should vote. Some people don’t follow the news or political issues. These people should not vote because they aren’t thinking about candidates and issues.
Think about this — If you support McCain, for example, your vote is cancelled out if some person ignorant of the issues votes for Obama.
My view: Anyone who has not filed an IRS 1040 showing earned income for at least one year (preferably past 3 years) previous to a federal election should not be allowed to vote - period. If you don’t earn money legally, you should not have a say in how anyone elses’s money shall be redistributed, nor in how this country is run. If you don’t have sufficient gumption to get out and work - at any job - you have no business voting.
Yes, I was considering putting up a site advising people not to vote if they haven’t done the research.
A mindless vote is worse than no vote!
McCain/Palin ‘08!
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Stossel speaks a truth that most only whisper these days. Uninformed, ignorant voters impose the worst possible government on our society. We largely have our politicized public education system to thank for the problem IMO.
So are you saying we should just stay home? You might want to give up and throw the towel in, but I don't, and btw I already voted
If you draw more in government benefits or compensation than you pay in taxes, you should not be permitted to vote.
You are ridiculous.
I’m pretty confident my 26-year old daughter and her pothead friends will be too hung over or stoned to get off their asses and find the polls.
Post # 9 is also for you.
No of course I’m not saying we should just stay home. All of us who know the issues and care about the issues and the future of the country should vote. I meant to say, maybe not expressed too well, that some of these people who don’t give a darn about issues and candidate should not vote.
Those who don’t show a positive number on their “tax” line (44) of their 1040 should not vote.
Exactly. It’s easy to get these types to sign up. VERY few will make any attempt to get to the polls.
I wasn’t registered to vote till I decided that I wanted to vote. No one came to me to register me and no one offered to take me to the polls. It required desire and a litte effort on my part. Able bodied people who can’t do that much really shouldn’t be voting.
The ACORN line of crap that they register homeless and low income people to vote is a pile of bull puckey meant to convince people that they can’t vote otherwise.
Congressman Billybob
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The Declaration, the Constitution, parts of the Federalist, and America's Owner's Manual, here.
“Exactly. It’s easy to get these types to sign up. VERY few will make any attempt to get to the polls.”
Well, then, thank goodness for stoned kids.
BTW, if we told these kids they could get high smoking kudzu, we could solve our kudzu problem in the south ‘cause it would all be gone in short order.
IT is just as bad when they do follow the issues but get their information from the leftist MSM.
ping
Okay, that is much better.
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