Thursday, May 31, 2012

Rock The Vote Redux

"Liberal strategists have convinced themselves that if we just got everyone to vote, the people would force through policies held at bay by our antiquated and undemocratic system.  Hence the various schemes to return the franchise to felons, lower the voting age, or let people vote online.   Not surprisingly, these efforts are invariably aimed at constituencies they have good reason to believe will vote Democratic.  What it says about the Democratic Party that boosting the ballots of the criminal, the less educated, and the lazy will deliver liberal policy victories is something to ponder.
[..]
But at a broader level this obsession with expanding democracy by making it easier to vote is deeply unhealthy.  Making voting easier is synonymous with making voting cheaper.  Do we really think the level of democratic discourse would be greatly improved if people who could not otherwise be bothered to vote are afforded the opportunity to do so on their iPhones during a commercial break of Jersey Shore?"  - Jonah Goldberg, The Tyranny of Cliches

5 comments:

jeffmon said...

I might have said this before, but I'd go a bit further. If you can't hold an office, you shouldn't be able to vote for it.

There's a reason we prevent eighteen-year-olds from running for president. They're idiots. I know, I was one. If you can't be trusted to responsibly preserve and protect the constitution, you can't be trusted to vote for someone who will.

philmon said...

True, dat.

Kind of like "Do Dat", only true.

tim said...

“If you can't be trusted to responsibly preserve and protect the constitution, you can't be trusted to vote for someone who will.”

Err, hang on a second…

“I, (name), do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God."

I’ll put forth that anyone in uniform can vote ( and drink for that matter), the rest…not so much. If you are willing to take a bullet for me, this country, than yessiree, you can vote.

Also, if you don’t vote for three consecutive presidential elections, you lose the right to ever vote again, for anything…school board, dog catcher…

philmon said...

Yeah, I'm for raising it back to 21, unless you join the service. That's been my position for many years now. :-)

jeffmon said...

Yup, Tim, I thought of that when I was driving in to work. They lowered the voting age to 18 to address the "if they can fight and die for the country, they should be able to vote" issue. The sensible solution would have been to allow active duty military (at least) to vote. Naturally, they didn't do the sensible thing.