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Are you voting?

Are you going to vote?

  • Yes, I'm eager to vote

  • Probably, but it's not that important to me

  • No, I choose not to vote

  • Maybe, I'm not sure yet

  • I honestly didn't know about the election


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Im_A

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I consider openly declaring my refusal to participate in a political system which I find to be morally repugnant to be pretty "active". In fact, I think I accomplish more toward my goals by doing so than any 100 voters will accomplish toward theirs.
To be fair...
Voting got the first black man as president and the most liberal president that we could have imagined before him as president. All through the American electoral method. Not some other method but through the American electoral method alone.

No matter if you agree with the man's policies or not, and no matter of the fact of if that is good to you or anyone else or not...that feat alone outweighs being an internet political complainer who doesn't vote.

I actually have no problems with people not voting. Yet attitudes like the one above are nothing but childish.
 
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MacFall

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I don't consider becoming the Criminal in Chief of one of the most violent nation-states on Earth to be anything to brag about.

And I discuss politics on the internet because it is fun. You have no idea what I do in terms of actual activism. But either way, I don't see how you can call adherence to moral principle in the face of constant attack every election season (such as yours, though it was pretty lame compared to what I get in real life) to be "childish". In my estimation, it would be awfully childish of me to go crawling to Daddy Government to beg for a little more freedom, in effect giving my moral sanction to something that I believe to be immoral.

The thing is, political action is the least effective type of action. For every person that I convince not to spend their money and their time trying to throw the old bastards out only to put new bastards in, I help to make that person more effective in whatever it is they choose to do thereafter, whether it's pennies to dollars, seconds to hours, or just not investing their emotions in a dirty, rigged game. And I have convinced a few. I accomplish my goals in doing so, and I don't have to do anything as pointless and slavish as supporting a "lesser evil" to accomplish them.
 
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Im_A

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I don't consider becoming the Criminal in Chief of one of the most violent nation-states on Earth to be anything to brag about.
One reason to cross out future discussion about American politics with you after this discourse. The President is an integral part of our government. Now I support the right for you to say whatever you want about any function of our government, but I also support the right for me to ignore your points on this one so thanks for explaining this because it will help direct future discussions.
And I discuss politics on the internet because it is fun. You have no idea what I do in terms of actual activism. But either way, I don't see how you can call adherence to moral principle in the face of constant attack every election season (such as yours, though it was pretty lame compared to what I get in real life) to be "childish". In my estimation, it would be awfully childish of me to go crawling to Daddy Government to beg for a little more freedom, in effect giving my moral sanction to something that I believe to be immoral.
Ok so tell us what you do then. What is your 'activism'? I sure hope it is something beyond so called enlightening through protests. Because all I see are childish anarchist pedantic ramblings coming from a citizen who got so fed up with our troubled government that he's lost his rational thinking.

Until the world fits your perspective, who does the governing? The people vote the people in correct? Even with special interest groups, banks, Wall Streets etc. all having a play with how elections end up, the people still vote in the politicians. They thus make the legislation they want etc. So no matter how much you don't like it...you will be begging the government for more freedoms if your freedoms are taken away. I would also love to see what freedoms are being taken away from you.
The thing is, political action is the least effective type of action. For every person that I convince not to spend their money and their time trying to throw the old bastards out only to put new bastards in, I help to make that person more effective in whatever it is they choose to do thereafter, whether it's pennies to dollars, seconds to hours, or just not investing their emotions in a dirty, rigged game. And I have convinced a few. I accomplish my goals in doing so, and I don't have to do anything as pointless and slavish as supporting a "lesser evil" to accomplish them.
Wow...you have turned a few heads to your thinking. Religious people do that and the world stays the same. Non-believers do that and the world stays the same. If you want to compare between voting and what you do, I and others here at least contributed to society(regardless of who we voted for) instead of only winning arguments with a few weak minded political folk.

Always remember...if we are a government of the people...the fault doesn't fall on the politicians, but the people for making idiotic choices who they vote for and then the politicians that lie are always second. The people fool themselves that problems can be fixed with one vote...as if there will be 'real change' with the next vote. Real change takes time and the American people need to know this.

So what do you actually argue for? Are you just the antagonist in Atlas Shrugged? Are you John Galt and nothing more?
 
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TanteBelle

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For Americans this coming Tuesday is election day.

So it's a simple question. Are you voting? Answering yes or no is enough, but it would be interesting to get a sense of what percentage of you are voting considering this is an important election (nationally as well as in many states) and because most of us are younger and generally young people are considered apathetic when it comes to the voting process.

Here in Auz, it's mandatory to vote, so yeah, I vote! And not just because I have to but because it's an opportunity! You actually get a say as to who becomes the leader of your country! It's a freedom and a privilage that it seems a lot of Americans don't realize!!
 
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Qyöt27

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Have limits on how long someone can serve in the house/senate. They are the ones that have the true power yet we have people who have been in there for decades, that needs to stop.
Actually, term limits have been and are known to be a really double-edged sword. Florida's House of Representatives has such a system in place, and corruption only got worse because of it. They don't spend enough time there to really care what happens or be held accountable, and therefore have no problem taking kickbacks and lucrative corporate deals to sell out the public. To really cut the head off that snake there need to be revisions from the House or Senate ethics guidelines to prohibit such behavior and enforce strict penalties for violating it, including immediate disbarment. I seriously doubt that would occur from within the House/Senate themselves, but it might be do-able as a constitutional amendment or Executive Order, with the latter being restricted by the Governor's/President's time in office - if it gets proven to work, then there would be a lot more weight behind an Amendment solidifying the measure.

Even though my political stance falls into the populist area (Classical/Bull Moose Progressivism), that doesn't mean everything should be molded to fit some populist über-system. That would end up degenerating to essentially mob rule.
 
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mjmcmillan

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I've already said I'm sitting this one out, none of the candidates energise me enough to make it worthwhile. My choice for Congress will win by a healthy margin anyway, and as for the rest--- whooo boy.

The Democratic Party has been doing their best to get me enraged, they do this by robo-calls from "private" numbers. I've had the pleasure of hanging up on "Jesse Jackson" and "Danny K Davis". I can tell they never come here because if they did and saw the political icon I display here the very last thing they would do is try to get me out to vote, because I'd probably vote for the Republican. Or, maybe a conservative independent. Certainly not a liberal Democrat.

I've come down a bit, a few electoral seasons back I hung up on "George Bush". While he was President. It was a robo-call, of course, and not the real GWB. Trying to get me to vote for the republican candidates, which I was already inclined to do anyway. So, this season I wonder if I get to hang up on the "Barack Obama" robo-call. Might as well keep "Hanging Up on Presidents" going, eh?

Maybe next season.......
 
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Deacon

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To be fair...
Voting got the first black man as president and the most liberal president that we could have imagined before him as president. All through the American electoral method. Not some other method but through the American electoral method alone.

No matter if you agree with the man's policies or not, and no matter of the fact of if that is good to you or anyone else or not...that feat alone outweighs being an internet political complainer who doesn't vote.

I actually have no problems with people not voting. Yet attitudes like the one above are nothing but childish.


Bush was a Liberal? :scratch:
 
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MacFall

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One reason to cross out future discussion about American politics with you after this discourse. The President is an integral part of our government.

It's not "my government". If you believe it is "your government", then have at it - but don't include me. I do not believe in the involuntary "WE".

Ok so tell us what you do then. What is your 'activism'?

I encourage people to find nonpolitical solutions to their problems. The precise methods I use are not a matter for discussion on a public forum, but you can get the general idea from the fact that I am an agorist.

I sure hope it is something beyond so called enlightening through protests.

No, I think protests are fairly useless beyond meeting likeminded people, and not the best way to do that, either.

Because all I see are childish

"Childish", meaning, "not in agreement with the majority"? Or what else do you mean? Because as far as I can see you're just engaging in namecalling against someone who disagrees with you, something which you should have grown out of in elementary school.

anarchist

Yes, I am an anarchist. Are you trying to insult me by using a word that I use to describe myself? Try calling me a "Christian" next. Maybe I'll cry.


Wow, three nasty names in a row.

Something else I've noticed on the internet - people tend to call arguments from their opponents "pedantic" and then refuse to address the contents of the actual arguments. That is called ad hominem, and it's usually considered very bad form. But apparently it's all you have, since you've done nothing to address the points I have been making. What you've said boils down in essence to "you're welcome to your own opinion, but you're [insert bad name here] for having it". That is nothing resembling mature, rational discussion.

ramblings coming from a citizen

I'm not a citizen. A citizen (according to Brown's law dictionary) is a person who owes a debt of allegiance to a state in exchange for a responsibility by the state to protect him. But my allegiance is to Christ alone, and even the government's own Supreme Court has admitted that they have no responsibility to protect their so-called "citizens".

who got so fed up with our troubled government that he's lost his rational thinking.

Namecalling again. Show me where anything that I have said is irrational. I suggest that what is irrational is the belief that winning a popularity contest gives anyone the right to do things which, when done by anyone else, would justly be considered a crime.

So no matter how much you don't like it...you will be begging the government for more freedoms if your freedoms are taken away.

No, I won't. I refuse to grovel before false gods.

I would also love to see what freedoms are being taken away from you.

Let's start here: I believe that the wars waged by the U.S. military are completely immoral. I believe that what the state calls "collateral damage" is nothing but mass murder. Am I free to withhold from the state they money that they use to pay for those wars? Am I free to disagree in action, or am I free only to voice my objections while I am forced, under the threat of violence against me, to finance murder?

That's just one of many examples.

Wow...you have turned a few heads to your thinking. Religious people do that and the world stays the same. Non-believers do that and the world stays the same. If you want to compare between voting and what you do, I and others here at least contributed to society(regardless of who we voted for) instead of only winning arguments with a few weak minded political folk.

You have merely agreed with a system that has the power to force its way on people. Anyone can go along to get along with a bully. That is not an accomplishment. Convincing someone to stand up for their principles even when it puts them against an entire political apparatus and its mass of supporters takes a bit more effort.

Always remember...if we are a government of the people

Bull. Do you have the power to throw your neighbors in cages for not doing what you consider to be "moral"? Do you have the power to commit murder and excuse it as "collateral damage"? Do you have the power to counterfeit money? Do you have the power to take money by force to fund whatever you think justifies it? Do you have the power to create territorial monopolies and throw people in cages for competing with them without permission?

No, you don't. But the political class does, and they exercise those powers as a matter of course. The political class is quite distinct from the people, in that they act under a sense of self-righteous moral superiority that permits them to do things which are, by the morals of individual people, criminal.

Real change takes time and the American people need to know this.

Real change requires people to make different assumptions about what is moral and what is not. Until people stop believing that criminals turn into heroes when they win popularity contests (which is just as silly as believing they become heroes when they wear crowns and sit on thrones), NOTHING will change.

So what do you actually argue for?

Liberty. Solutions to the worlds problems that are based in love and mutual respect instead of violence and threats. An end to the idea that anyone could possibly be wise enough or moral enough to make decisions that affect millions of other people, and that enforcing those decisions through violence against the will of many of those millions could ever be moral.

Are you just the antagonist in Atlas Shrugged?

No, that would be the government.

Are you John Galt and nothing more?

No, John Galt cared only for himself to the exclusion of all others. My political philosophy is based upon the words of Jesus Christ, who was quite different to say the least.
 
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Singermom

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I'm kind of odd re: voting and the elections.

Both of my parents were (are) both very active politically; my father was even City Alderman for a few years. They were always very supportive of the Democratic party: as a pre-teen, I even sang the National Anthem at a local Democratic gathering, played over the radio.

That said, I can't stand politics. I will not "stump", hand out fliers, go to any gathering where a politico is making a public appearance, etc.

Both my WH & I are registered Independent, with very conservative leanings.

However, I DO vote. I've voted at every election since I came of age, except for 2002...but I had an excuse. My daughter was born on Election Day that year, and I never thought to get an absentee ballot.

My WH and I read up on the candidates and make an informed decision. We do NOT discuss anything political, or who we vote for, outside of the 2 of us (and sometimes, not even then). It's none of anyone's business who I vote for...but vote, I do.

I also firmly believe that, if you don't vote, you have no right to complain. You had your chance to say something. If you don't choose to make a difference (and believe me: sometimes one vote CAN make a difference), you should take what is handed to you. Of course, there are grey areas; one previous poster mentioned just moving into an area...but other than that, everyone should exercise their right to be heard.
 
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MacFall

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I also firmly believe that, if you don't vote, you have no right to complain.

Suppose one night when you're home alone, a gang of burglars came into your house to steal your television. But instead of just taking it, they propose a vote. There's four of them, and one of you.

If you refuse to play along with their stupid, pointless little game (and in the process, implicitly consent to the system under which they are operating), do you have no right to complain? If you don't raise your hand and say "no, please Mr. Burglar, don't steal my stuff", are you somehow, for some reason, obligated not to have a moral objection to their blatantly immoral behavior?
 
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Apollo Celestio

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If it's not experience, it's consensus that dictates things, and they don't understand how anyone else can think differently. Hmm.

In other news, the whole "if you don't play, you can't talk about it" is stupid, especially if you're in it whether you want to play or not.
 
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Qyöt27

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In other news, the whole "if you don't play, you can't talk about it" is stupid, especially if you're in it whether you want to play or not.
'None of the above' is a valid vote too. But considering they don't put that option on a ballot there's no other option than abstention (or writing in a facetious nominee; I'm pretty tempted to put down 'Colonel Sanders' for the gubernatorial race - I'm sick to death of both of the main candidates, and I wouldn't complain if government hand-outs came in the form of potato wedges and honey-dipped biscuits).

I mean, facetiously voting for an icon of fried chicken is no less a mockery of the electoral process than what the real candidates have made of it.
 
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Singermom

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Suppose one night when you're home alone, a gang of burglars came into your house to steal your television. But instead of just taking it, they propose a vote. There's four of them, and one of you.

If you refuse to play along with their stupid, pointless little game (and in the process, implicitly consent to the system under which they are operating), do you have no right to complain? If you don't raise your hand and say "no, please Mr. Burglar, don't steal my stuff", are you somehow, for some reason, obligated not to have a moral objection to their blatantly immoral behavior?

Speaking of stupid and pointless, your analogy is lacking. However, if you want to play this way...

Say that some burglars were breaking into your house, and there is a way - not a sure-fire way, but a way - that you can stop them...will you just sit there and do nothing, and then complain about how they ripped you off afterwards?
 
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MacFall

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Sure, I will act to protect myself, but I'm not going to play by their rules in doing so. Your original statement which I quoted implies that by not playing by their rules, we lose the right to complain. I call bull on that, especially since it is not the likely outcome of the system, but the system itself, to which I object.
 
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