Vote! Whenever You Get the Chance

My nephew turned 18 last week. I made him a card that said "Yippee you're 18!" on the outside flap. Lifting the next flap revealed the message... "You can vote." And lifting the final flap revealed some cash and the message "So, can a buy yours?" The fact that I should be inspired to give him such a card is a sad commentary on the state of our political system. We talk about clean elections and claim that other countries have more corruption than we do, when the sad fact is, we have simply institutionalized corruption and bribery through our campaign finance laws and supreme court rulings. Perhaps even sadder though was his reaction, and that of his mother. He said "I'm not going to vote," and she said "I'm not voting in national elections anymore." Both feel that they can't make a difference and there is no point in voting. Too many people feel this way now, and perhaps with good reason. 

So how do we change this trend? And how do we change the system so that people feel empowered rather than disenfranchised? Well I'm not going to lie to you. It's going to take a lot of hard work from a lot of people. It is going to take every single one of us getting really and truly involved in the political process, The first thing we need to do is to remember that ultimately the government answers to We The People.  Next we must take up our right and RESPONSIBILITY as citizens to vote at every opportunity, and to be an educated and informed electorate. We need to ignore the TV ads and look at voting records. We need to vote based on what we know is right not just for this minute and ourselves, but for the future and for everyone. 

More people need to start voting with their conscience than their pocket books. We need to be writing to our elected officials and telling them exactly why we are voting for or against them. Perhaps some of those letters should even be shared with the press.   We need to push for congressional term limits to reduce cronyism & the power of wealthy special interest groups. We urgently need to pass a law that will overturn citizens united.. Perhaps we need a constitutional amendment that states the corporations are NOT people and they cannot donate to campaigns. 

I think that only citizens should be permitted to donate and that candidates should be prohibited from know who donated to their campaign.  Any time that a politician is placed in a position to feel beholden to any group other than the citizen constituents of his home district, there is a chance that his policy decisions will be influenced more by the wants of big corporate donors than the needs of his constituents and the nation as a whole.  I suspect we are a long way off from getting these reforms put through. Perhaps many feel that we can never achieve these goals. What I know is that we can never achieve what we never attempt. And these goals are certainly worth working for. 

Most importantly if we want our government to be accountable then we need to hold ourselves accountable for our political action or lack thereof, and then we need to hold our elected officials accountable by exercising our right to vote! If government does not serve the people then it must be served notice by the people. If our elected officials will not exercise the will of the people, then the will of the people must be exercised through their votes to elect new officials!