This Vote's for You!

Article Tools

Print

E-mail

Comments

RSS

You don't have to be a dark cynic or a die-hard Marxist anymore to feel that something is tragically wrong with our political system. A near majority of citizens seem to agree, as witnessed by their conspicuous absence from polling places on election day. If present trends continue, voting will soon take its place next to baking bread and writing letters longhand as an activity that most Americans admire but rarely participate in.

With this year shaping up as the most decisive election in seven decades -- a pivotal moment offering us the choice between two very different paths into the future -- you would think that people's interest in politics would be almost electric. By autumn that may be true. I hope so. But right now, with literally thousands of key congressional and state campaigns facing us, as well the presidential contest, the mood of the electorate still seems weary and disillusioned.

What's the reason for this apparent apathy? One answer, voiced surprisingly often by progressives who otherwise see themselves as champions of the people, is that many Americans are either lazy or dense. But is that really true? We're the world leader in technological innovation, business entrepreneurship, and pop culture. Kids in the ghetto create fashions imitated around the world. Worldwide movements for ecology, civil rights, gay rights, and women's issues were born on American soil, even if they've taken root more firmly in other lands. It just doesn't ring true that Americans are too dull-minded to understand the importance of democratic participation.

Right-wing observers, on the other hand, give ordinary Americans credit for figuring out that politics, government, and all other forms of collaborative action are dusty remnants of the past: Tomorrow belongs to bold business executives, fueled by technology and unregulated markets, who will rule the world. This point of view puts a nice populist spin on Americans' seeming indifference to politics, but what conservative apologists don't say is that these non-voters are the same people who get screwed by bold corporate executives every day of the week and twice on Sunday. The right looks on average Americans as even dumber than the left does.

The media add to our apathy with a keen focus on certain swing voters, who usually turn out to be some privileged sector of the electorate such as soccer moms or high-tech professionals. Lower-income households, young people, immigrants, rural folks, single women, blue-collar suburbanites (see accompanying articles about the people who are the real swing voters) don't find themselves portrayed as players in the political contest. Their votes don't seem to count because reporters and news teams spend their days in upscale suburbs clamoring to interview the "important" voters who will "decide" the election.

RSS | Comments | E-mail | Print