The election angered me. Don’t get me wrong, there were some high points, but not many. We did manage to get more people to vote than ever before in U.S. politics, and hooray for us on that one. There’s only one problem with that: When we were all out doing our level best to “get out the vote,” we never thought for one second that we just might be getting stupid people to vote.
What we really wanted was to get more voters from that mystical 18-24-year-old crowd. These guys were the ones that were promised to swing this election, just like they have been promised to swing every election in modern memory. This time, though, it would be different, this time they would actually go out and vote. They were so pissed off about George W. Bush that they were going to go out and vote in huge numbers.
So what did they do? Did they change the face of politics? Did they elect the donkey from Massachusetts? No, the young voter stayed home and played X-Box on Election Day, again. Only 18 percent of the voters on election night were from the 18-24 crowd, just like the last election and the one before that. The young voters screamed and ranted the loudest, they marched and paraded their indignation and then were too lazy to vote.
The question should not be “Why?” but “Are any of you really surprised?”
I don’t trust the future of my country to the young voter. If they can’t be bothered to vote, then fine, take away their right to vote. If I had my way, if you haven’t voted in the last two elections that you were eligible to vote in, you don’t get to vote anymore. You don’t care about voting so let me save you the trouble of feeling guilty about not doing it. While we’re at it, bring back the poll tax. Let’s see who’s really exited about voting. “You want to vote? Give me five bucks.” Now that will separate the wheat from the chaff.
Wanting more people to vote is a noble idea, but come on, I wouldn’t trust most people in this country to guard a fire hydrant, so why do I want them guarding my democracy? It’s time to instigate a new plan for voters. From now on, you need to take an IQ test before you get to vote. I’ll go ahead and make the test and administer the damn thing. If you fail, you don’t get to vote. Besides, in my book, voting isn’t a right anyway; it’s a privilege, one that I really want to take away from nearly all of you.
If this election cycle has shown me anything, it’s that not only does the Electoral College not work, neither does democracy. You see, “W” won, he won huge. More votes than any president in history, first majority of the popular vote since 1988. He won big, but guess what – if 51 percent of voters chose him, that means that 49 percent of the people just got shafted. How is that fair or just? Direct democracy doesn’t work. I’m not smart enough to figure out a better system but, for God’s sake, somebody has to. I mean, come on, Puff Daddy is disenfranchised. Can any of you live with that? I know I can’t.
Last week, British newspaper the Daily Mirror asked how fifty-nine some odd million people could be so stupid. Britain, I give to you the United States of America, home of baggy jeans, fast food and morons who think that “Gladiator” was historically accurate and Warhol was an artist and not a hack. I don’t want you guys voting anymore, all it does is make half of us mad at the other half, and that solves nothing. It just makes me cantankerous, and no one wants that.
Oh, by the way, the next time you think you can make a difference, that you can change the world. just don’t, all right? You have no idea what you are doing.
Jason Germany can be reached at thiscorrosion@dailyvanguard.com