| Post a comment |
|
Hi.
Been a while. My bad, but things are busy busy. I'll try to be better about this as time goes forward and update more and more. the only major news in my life is Lily and I post images of her as i can on her site. If you don't know where it is, ask.
Anyway, I will be updating a few times in the next few weeks. There is an election coming up and I think it's important to discuss it a bit and get people thinking about it. Please don't immediately tune me out when i talk about this... I won't be telling you HOW to vote, but why it's important to vote. I will outline my own particular stance and intention to vote if i feel that it's appropriate, but I won't tell you how to vote.
These will be aimed mostly at people living in Wisconsin... we have a number of important elections coming up as well as several referendum questions, including one that has the potential to amend the constitution of the state.
With this entry I wanted to warn you of my intentions and to make an initial plea... I've talked to a few of the people here at UWM and elsewhere. They often tell me that they don't know enough about the various races to want to go and vote and that they'd feel dumb if they didn't vote for each race on the ballot.
On the first point, with the advent of the internet, virtually every race will have websites dedicated to the different candidates/sides of the questions at issue. If you're reading this, you're at least savvy enough to go to Google and type in a few search terms. To give you a starting point, here is a listing from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinal of all of the races that will be decided upon on November 7. If you don't know your district (for all the local races), that shouldn't be too hard to look up online, either.
There are a couple of minor referendum questions (referendum questions in Wisconsin are only advisory). There is also a question on the ballot about an amendment to the state constitution with respect to the definition of marriage. thie link takes you to a couple Journal Sentinal articles about the topic and also has a link to an acrobat file containing the actual language of the proposed amendment.
On the second topic of "I don't really know enough to vote on all the issues" or "I would feel funny only filling out part of the ballot." It's a secret ballot, no one will know but you what races or items you placed your vote on. And really, who cares? It's no one's business but your own. If you feel strongly about even one single issue, you should go and vote, make your opinion and voice heard. You only have to cast your opinion with regard to that one item and no other, if you wish. But at least you have contributed your opinion to the mix...
"But so many people vote, my one vote won't make a difference!" Maybe, but with enough people with that opinion, it can become a difference. A look at the last couple elections should suggest to you how important your vote can be... in 2000 Gore won the popular vote by slim enough a margin that the votes from the electoral college favored Bush. In 2004 Bush won by an incredibly narrow margin. I'm not trying to pick on Bush here... but you can see that if only 100 people from each county in Wisconsin had the same view and did not vote... that's 7800 people... more than the margin by which Kerry won Wisconsin in 2004.
Your vote can make a difference... I encourage you to get informed and to vote...
Next time, the Marriage Amendment to the Wisconsin State Constitution.I'm feelin' :  Pontificatory What's that I hear?: The Traveling Wilburys Like a Ship |
|
|
| Top of Page |
Powered by LiveJournal.com |
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
plenz's journal