<p>I'm definitely voting!! How can you just be so apathetic?</p>
<p>Sure, it may not seem like your vote makes a difference, but think back to the 2004 election. In some places, the difference between a "red" state and a "blue" state was a mere 200 votes!!</p>
<p>Imagine if all the "lazy" people had actually participated. The outcome might have been entirely different.</p>
<p>You DO have a voice and as a citizen of this country it is your privilege and duty to vote. </p>
<p>I have been anxiously awaiting the day I turn 18 ever since I can remember...and will see me at the polls this year!</p>
<p>ALSO: To people who won't be 18 yet during the primaries-- as long as you are 18 during the general election, you can still vote in the primaries!!!! :)</p>
<p>i'm not voting because i choose not to. there's good reasons for this too. two main simple ones. first i am not going to vote between a giant douche or a turd sandwich (good episode in south park). that leads me into my second point which is that our 'democratic' system is mainly a two party system so third parties are irrelevant since the outcome will be either republican or democrat.</p>
<p>mairoula517, that logic works fine if you like a major candidate. But plenty of us won't. In that case, why bother? If both outcomes suck, as they undoubtedly will, with the main difference being the way in which government screws you over, how does participation matter? </p>
<p>You can cite 2004 as an example, but frankly, the alternative would have been as bad or worse. Both candidates held the Constitution just over a standard role of toilet paper in terms of importance. The same thing will essentially happen in 2008. The Democrats will send forth either Clinton or Obama, either of whom would be awful. And the GOP will probably give us either Mitt or Rudy. Neither are that much better. </p>
<p>At the end of the day, it isn't so much an issue of apathy for many of us, as much as it is a realization that any realistic outcome is bad.</p>
<p>Well BP and gprime, I agree with you that our government is basically just a two-party system now and that it's not encouraging if you don't like a "mainstream" candidate. </p>
<p>However, I think that it's especially important to vote in these cases because even though what you vote probably won't end up being the outcome, it is still good to support these other parties or candidates. </p>
<p>If you don't like the way the system is now, go out and vote to make a statement about it. If someone like Kucinich gets 15% of the vote, though he won't have won, it certainly makes a statement that some people are tired of the general BS. However, if 15% of the population supports someone like Kucinich but doesn't vote for him because they know he doesn't stand a chance, they are just reinforcing the system! Same goes for candidates like Paul.</p>
<p>how exactly would the system change if 15% voted for a third party candidate? more than anything i think it has to do with the two things. 1) the electoral system. as it is, there's just no chance a popular third party candidate would win. even if it did change to popular vote to determine the winner, the two party system might not change. Here are the results of the 2004 election:</p>
<p>Candidate and Votes
Bush 62,028,194
Kerry 59,027,612
Nader 465,150
Badnarik 397,260
Peroutka 143,587
Cobb 119,856
Outside of the two main candidates, there were 1,125,853 votes.</p>
<p>the other issue is that americans have been conditioned to believe there's only two candidates and that's it because that's all the media talks about. they're just used to two parties (one being liberal the other being conservative). the average american is uninformed about many things so their votes become a decision between the two popular candidates.</p>
<p>i don't see any of this changing anytime soon so it's pointless to vote. personally as long as there isn't a draft i don't care what happens in our government. the three branch system won't let this country become a dictatorship (no matter how much people scream this out). and as long as i make a decent salary to live i feel i'll go about my daily activities just fine.</p>
<p>"If you don't like the way the system is now, go out and vote to make a statement about it."</p>
<p>Interesting you should say that, since the original system of presidential selection, as established by the Constitution, was set up in a way designed to make the will of the voters irrelevant. In other words, we established a very non-Democratic (beyond the surface level) to mitigate the impact of fools. So voting doesn't really seem like the right way to get back to that system, which is what I want.</p>
<p>if i wanted to have a tangible impact on the country i would become a lobbyist, not cast one pitiful vote in a threadbare simulation of participatory democracy</p>
<p>vote plz people. this is our presdient for the next 4 +? years. If you want to complain about them at least you can say I voted for the other candidate. Im in AP Gov and all we talk about it the election</p>
<p>But Condi, you've not yet made a compelling case for voter participation. There are plenty of valid reasons not to vote, but no solid ones to vote, as far as I can tell. Make a reasonable, fact-based case for voting first, and then I'm sure some of us will actually consider doing so.</p>
<p>I also have never understood blanket "get out the vote" efforts. Frankly, if the would-be voter supports the candidate you didn't, have you only hurt your own cause? I mean really, while they might gain from it, what do the voting advocacy people get?</p>
<p>gprime, read my previous post in this thread. there's more to voting than determining the next president. politicians actually classify the votes to see which races/ages/genders participate the most and consequently cater to their needs with public policies.</p>
<p>I'm not voting. The chance that my single vote sways any election is far less than my chances of winning the lottery. Also, if my one vote did decide the election, chances are that there would be a recount, which would inevitably have mistakes anyways. If less people voted, my chances of voting would be higher.</p>
<p>Don't get me wrong; I love the fact that I can vote, but right now, I think abstaining is the best course of action. People always use the argument that "If everyone thought the way I do, then nobody would vote." In that case, I would vote. It's kind of like poker; you have to play opposite of everyone else.</p>
<p>
[quote]
politicians actually classify the votes to see which races/ages/genders participate the most and consequently cater to their needs with public policies.
[/quote]
That is the best pro-voting argument I have ever heard :)</p>
<p>im definetly going to vote in the election in november, but not in the primaries. i dont feel like i know enough about the candidates at this point to make a good decision. plus, i dont like that i have to bind myself to one party in order to vote in the primary. i consider myself a moderate and not sure whether i will vote democrat or republican</p>
<p>I'm disillusioned with both dems and GOP. but the dems are marginally better (for the sake of science), so I guess I would vote dem if my vote truly made a difference. but it doesn't so i'm abstaining</p>
<p>also i heard that lists of people eligible for jury duty comes from either driver's licenses or voting registration. so since i'm not registered nor do i have a license i don't have to do jury duty. :D</p>