Election Day 2012

Graph of voter turnout percentage from 1824 to 2008

Now this graph came from Wikipedia, so be warned!

So I exercised my rights, and did my civic duty, and voted. I truly believe that both presidential candidates are good men of character, and equally deserving of the office. Both of their beliefs are valid for them. My job was to vote for the one who most closely reflected MY ideals and opinion of how best to solve the problems our country faces.

I voted for Governor Romney. I think that his view of America is the one I espouse. America is unique. Its system of government is one of a kind. Its economy and economic system make it the wonder of the world, because it took an upstart, rebellious nation from nothing and helped it become the world's leader in less than 200 years. I don't want America to look like the rest of the world. I'm not interested in "fitting in" with a European view. I want America to be liked, but public opinion polls in Greece (or wherever) don't make me miserable. Europeans don't like us because they don't understand us. And I'm OK with that. And I don't even want to get into the Middle and Far East. President Obama's world view is fine for him, and by definition, his supporters. Does that make them evil? Of course not. I prefer the smaller government view, too. Government in Obama's world is too intrusive for me.

Now understand, this doesn't mean I think Romney is perfect. Far be it. His concept of repealing the entire Health Care Reform Act is an example. There are some good things in it. His view (actually, his party's view) on Immigration Reform is unworkable. You ain't getting 2 million people to go back to Mexico and start the process over. Duh. He needs to look these situations and others over carefully himself and make decisions, not listen to some party hack.

Why does he choose these extreme positions? Why do any of them, for that matter? I've said for years that these elected federal officials don't have anything in common with me. Years ago, I was flabbergasted and disgusted with a Congressional press conference. They were working on a budget compromise, and to show how hard they were working, they stood up there and made this huge damn deal out of the fact that they were there on a Saturday. A Saturday! It's a wonder the Earth didn't swallow them up! I WORK EVERY SATURDAY (basically). And so do a lot of people I know. You ain't impressing me, fella.

Why are they so far removed? Voter Turn Out. Plain and simple. I looked up the statistics http://elections.gmu.edu/Turnout_2008G.html 


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The following is my takeaway from that page (2008 election):
Voting Age Population turn out 56.9% (of a rounded population of 230,800,000)
Voting Eligible Turnout 61.6% (of a rounded population of 213,300,000)
Hawaii  had the Lowest at 48.8% (I heard the other day that Hawaii is always low because they vote so far behind everyone else.) Continental U.S. is West Virginia at 49.9%
The highest is Minnesota at 77%.
And these turn out rates are higher than I expected.

OK, so what does this mean? The President is elected with 50% of the vote. That's only 65,696,400 people out of the ELIGIBLE voters, or 30.8%.  OR a mere 28.4% of Americans who are old enough to vote legally. You get to be President with only a quarter of the people wanting you to be President. So the candidate is campaigning to his base, the people who are WANTING to vote for him because he's in their party, but need to be assured that he believes like they do. If they had to appeal to a TRUE majority, their platforms would have to be much more broad-based and appealing to a wider audience. Like me.

Want to solve America's problems? In 2016, post on Facebook a bunch of ads about getting people registered, and then about getting them to vote. Not that Romney wants to fire Big Bird, or that Obama is reading the wrong kind of book.

Sorry if you think this got long. My promise to keep politics off my wall kinda built up! God bless America!