Voter Responsibility by Susan Haley

THE ‘UNKNOWN’ FACTOR

WHAT IS A VOTER’S RESPONSIBILITY?

By: Susan Haley

Yesterday, my attention was called to a “Letter to the Editor” in my local paper. The writer was a woman, “a life-long Democrat”, who was most adamant that under no circumstances, would she vote for Barack Obama. If Hillary Clinton was not awarded the nomination she would either stay home or vote for John McCain. Why? Because Mr. Obama was “scary” and she knew nothing about him.

Okay, that’s fair enough, I suppose, IF she had stopped having made that point. But, she conflicted her own statement that she ‘knew nothing’ about him when she proceeded to detail a list of every affront that had been uttered against Mr. Obama from his being a Muslim, a foreigner, an undercover terrorist, to a lengthy diatribe about Jeremiah Wright. I didn’t realize Mr. Wright was running for office, but she sure was quite ‘knowledgeable’ about him! I did question her knowledge of ‘Civics’ as most of us know that a ‘foreigner’ is not eligible to run for the highest office in the land. Seems she had forgotten that Hawaii has achieved statehood.

Upon more reflection of this woman’s letter, I started wondering. Just what is the responsibility of a registered voter? Perhaps, there should be some kind of oath included in the registration process requiring educating one’s self on all candidates and their positions. Before undertaking such a serious task as casting a ballot that could affect the direction of the entire world, this seems a reasonable prerequisite.. It would truly be a travesty if the next president of land was determined by the votes or non-votes of the “I don’t know anything about him/hers”.

We could simply depend on the media. In its myriad of editions, both broadcast and print, a vast array of political pundits who seem to propagate out of the hedges beat every bush in the row. No potential nuance is left unexamined from every possible angle. We could rely on the plethora of video snippets with content taken out of context or splicing thirty years of oratory into a compact two minute sound byte. If you happen to miss one broadcast you can rest assured it will be played again no less than 2,376 times on 42 channels. As a last resort, there’s always U-tube which can be fit into your own schedule as well as online editions of every newspaper on the globe.

But, there is a difference between fact and hype. The miracle of Google makes it possible to fact-check just about every tidbit of information put ‘out there’. Some things are valid reporting of the news and can be trusted, but if something is brought to our attention that seems questionable or of an opinionated or ‘hearsay’ nature, it’s only logical to check its validity before making a decision. Snippet quotes taken out of context usually fall into this category. We all know the often less than ethical ploys used in political campaigns.

The world, both politically and environmentally, is facing some crucial problems. It is imperative that the citizens of nations fortunate enough to live under democratic forms of government take it upon themselves to put old ideas and old loyalties aside. It is has never been more vital that those electing the people that will lead us be well informed.

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