Convincing evidence that US citizens vote for the President like it's a high school yearbook superlative...

This, courtesy of my good friend Becky:
...............................................................................................

Interesting fact as our election approaches:

Since 1956, no newspaper, network, or news agency has been able to correctly predict the outcome of all 13 presidential elections—except for one group. Every four years for a half century, the quarter million children who vote in the Weekly Reader Presidential poll have been right every time.


~So if you want to know who will win the election ask a kid!
Becky
..............................................................................................

Kids don't think about the issues. They don't look at voting history in office. They are 100% convinced that if you call someone a flip-flopper, you're saying they're a person wearing the sandals that have one strap over your big toe and another over the rest. They vote based on who they think looks like a president, or who they think is cooler. It's sad that the way kids pick who will be president so accurately mirrors how voting adults pick who will be president. When are we going to start taking our right to vote seriously?!? When are we going to really show our appreciation for the thousands of American men and women who died to give us the right to vote by exercising that right after serious consideration and evaluation of the issues?!?

The men and women of my grandfather's generation knew more about how our government operates and more about what the Constitution actually says than the average so-called pundit on either side of the aisle these days. The vast majority of US citizens these days can't even tell you what rights each amendment of the Bill of Rights provides (fyi, there is no Constitutional Right to Privacy as it pertains to private individuals -- the Constitution only protects you from state actions, contrary to popular belief). The main difference between that generation and my own? Ownership. Men and women of my grandfather's generation felt a sense of ownership in the state and federal government. They knew that the power of any free nation comes from its people. People of my generation treat state and federal government like nothing more than a nanny. It's time we started owning our government again.

It's time we stopped whining about what our government does when most of the whiners don't even bother to vote -- or if they do, they only vote in the presidential election, but not their municipal, county, state or federal elections. Most people think that what a city counselman or county commissioner does doesn't actually affect them. They're wrong. These are the people whose actions affect you most dearly on a day-to-day basis. Your state legislators are the people who create the state laws by which you must abide (else you may end up a guest of your local Sheriff, or worse, the State). Your federal legislators are the ones responsible for creating and maintaining the numerous federal programs that directly affect the amount of the federal taxes you pay. These offices are important. They do not need to be filled haphazardly. Pay attention, people! We have no one else to blame but ourselves for the state of our state and federal governments. We have no one else to blame but ourselves for the state of our economy. We have no one else to blame but ourselves for the state of our foreign policy. Many people say our system is broken. It's because WE broke it. We broke it when we became apathetic about owning our own country.

We need to be more like the Martin Luther Kings of our country; more like the Abraham Lincolns of our country; more like the Susan B. Anthonys of our country. If we see a problem, we shouldn't simply whine about it -- we should take action and DO something about it! Man up, people. Don't let the kids keep predicting who we vote into office with such accuracy. We're talking about the offices of our governing bodies, not the yearbook superlatives. Elections should not simply be a popularity contest. They should be the means by which we interview the people competing for those jobs.