To Vote, to Vote, Perchance to Vote

 

 In just under two weeks, Americans will go to the polls (or will have mailed in or walked in their ballots) to vote for several candidates, most importantly for who will be the next President of the United States. It’s a heavy burden on each of us. Anyone who follows me on social media knows who I support, but this post is not about WHO – rather it is about YOU.

 

I recently posted the following on my Facebook page:
     I remember, in 1960, one of our neighbors sitting on the front stoop of the Bronx building she lived in and crying her eyes out. My parents stopped to speak to her to find out what was wrong... she wanted to vote for JFK but her husband told her that if she didn't vote for Nixon she had to leave their home.
     My dad told her "when you get into that polling booth, who you vote for is YOUR business, no one else's..."
     In 2016 I heard a father screaming at his daughter over a cell phone (standing in the center of CVS), apparently she made it known she wanted to vote for Clinton, he screamed at her that if she didn't vote for trump she could pack her bags that day.
     It truly doesn't matter who you vote for (well it does, but I am not trying to make THAT point), YOU have to vote for the candidate YOU choose.
     Whether you are in a booth or filling out a ballot, you have privacy and NO ONE has the right to tell you how to vote - certainly NO ONE HAS THE RIGHT TO THREATEN YOU IN ANY WAY.
     Even if your polling place has "observers", YOU NEED TO VOTE FOR WHO YOU WANT.

 

Your vote DOES count. A lot of folks cry that it doesn’t, that the Electoral College actually elects our president. There is SOME truth to that as we saw in 2016 when the Electoral College did NOT declare the popular vote winner as president. However each state is assigned a specific amount of electors (supposedly something to do with population) and the popular vote of each state decides WHICH electors will cast a vote. Even if the vote is close then the electors vote for the majority candidate. There are many arguments calling this system archaic, but for now it is what we are stuck with.

 

Understand though that the ONLY and very few times the Electoral College disagreed with the popular vote, the popular vote was CLOSE, VERY CLOSE (considering the percentage of votes against the people who voted). So your vote, along with others, DOES decide who the Electoral Collage from your state chooses. Unfortunately, especially in national elections, third party candidates have not historically shown enough strength. Those votes in effect do not help decide the Electoral College count. If 100 people vote and 46 vote for candidate A, 44 vote for candidate B, and 10 vote for candidate C (third party), then candidate A will receive the Electoral College. So even if 8 of those C votes were people who absolutely did not want A but thought B wasn’t perfect, A would win because those 8 votes weren’t enough to give any strength to C.

 

This year between the pandemic and fear of violence at the polls, as well as some areas closing polling places and creating longer lines, getting your vote in may seem more challenging. Remember though that whatever time you need to take to vote, or distance to drop your mail-in ballot at an authorized receptacle – well this vote will have a major impact on the next four years of your life. It is extremely important to make your voice heard.

 

YOUR VOTE IS IMPORTANT!

A state-by-state guide to voting in 2020

Oy, Politics ~ #MondayBlogs

Election time is coming and if you are on FaceBook that probably means you are about to change your buddy list; you’ll drop some people and others will drop you often without warning. Indeed here are those who post pleas not to discuss anything political and others who constantly post the latest email rumor that makes “the other guy” look bad.

I admit to enjoying political discussions and even engaging in some debating, I like to hear other viewpoints and I like doing the research to back up many of the issues I feel are important. While I don’t expect to change anyone’s mind ultimately I would like to hope that I encourage more discussion and thought.

While I enjoy a good thought-provoking debate, I don’t appreciate it when it becomes personal, I don’t like name calling and foul language, or having my intelligence questioned. And I do get offended when ethnic slurs and outright bigotry works its way into the post.

If you are going to be open to debating the political situation, here are a few tips: by all means THINK or as my dad always said “put brain in gear before engaging mouth”; read what the other person has to say and not just the highlights like they are planning to vote for your favorite candidate’s opponent; especially if they aren’t responding to something you’ve posted there is no way that anything they are saying is personal.

If you are scrolling through your newsfeed and see that oh so perfect post that totally casts the opposing candidate in a terrible and embarrassing light, don’t just repost without checking the veracity (I use Snopes.com a lot) even though it might be tempting. Be sure that you can back up whatever assertions you are making with verifiable sources. And refrain from generalizations about the “people who would vote for [the other guy]. Finally NEVER tell someone to shut up, give it up, or (my “favorite) go back to where you came from — everyone is entitled to an opinion whether you like it or not and they should be allowed to voice it politely.

If you want people to listen to you and think about the arguments you make, try to put it into their perspective. What is important to you may actually be in direct opposition to someone else’s political views. If you can point out the benefits that they would like such as increasing the school budget and adding after school programs (usually a liberal concern) would help lower crime rates (often a conservative concern) as the youngsters and teens would be kept too busy to hang out on the streets.

If the other person insists on nastiness, just back away even if your inclination is to swipe back. And yes there may even come a point where you don’t want or need someone’s malicious and thoughtless words on your page at any time, so unfriend that individual. On word of caution though, don’t unfriend just because you share different views and expect them to want to welcome you back after the election, they might not.

No matter what, if you have made one person really THINK, even if you haven’t swayed them, then you have accomplished something very important.

I’ll leave you with this thought, please VOTE. Yes I have a favorite candidate but I will respect the office and whoever winds up sitting in it — so long as I can believe that true majority rule made that final decision.

Why should you vote for the lesser of the evils? ~ #MondayBlogs

Like many, I haven't felt in recent years that there was a single candidate for President (or any political office for that matter) where I agreed 100% with his/her philosophies - but I did feel that there were some decidedly better than others.

I wouldn't expect any one candidate to make all of the decisions I would want, how could he? It would have to be ME making those decisions and hoping that I got it all right. So each year I go to the polls and vote for the candidate that I least disagree with... you may call it the lesser of the evils, I call it the best choice of what is available.

So far in my years of voting I haven't yet regretted the vote I cast and there have even been a few rare times where I begrudgingly have felt "hey this one isn't AS BAD as I thought he would be."

Every politician is a con-artist, he or she has to be to convince others to do his bidding; every politician is in it for the glory, why else would someone subject themselves to that punishment?; every politician (in America at least) is a puppet because no office truly gives full, unequivocable power to the person sitting there; and most importantly every politician is a human being and more than capable of screwing things up.

But if I don't cast a vote for the candidate I think would do the least damage then I am handing over my destiny to others who, just like a politician, don't necessarily think the way that I do — it would be simply handing over my life without a fight.

I know which candidate I will probably vote for in the next presidential election, from track records and speeches I know which candidate comes CLOSEST to who I want in office. Even with our confusing electoral college elections, I still believe that majority votes will more likely get us the candidate MOST of us want IF WE GET OUT AND VOTE.

Please don't sit back and let a few make this decision; if you don't trust or like any of the candidates at least cast your vote for the one you LEAST DISLIKE... someone is going to get in, give yourself a say in the decision.

The United States presidential election of 2016 is scheduled for Tuesday, November 8, 2016.

(2015 elections will be held November 3, 2015)

for information on registering to vote
visit www.vote411.org/