Reading another editorial the other day by a writer who did not understand the subject tends to lower one’s opinion of editorial writers. We might be better off if we just stop reading those fillers. Imagine if you will an editor shouting out to a writer who he thinks has nothing to do: “Harry, give me 800 words on why the numbers of people voting in elections is falling off.”
Harry, who normally writes obituaries, is challenged. He can look up the subject on the Internet and Google will turn up 500,000 citations in a couple seconds. He is fascinated by the people who blame the first-past-the-post voting system. The stories tell him that people feel cheated by the present system and he builds his story on that premise.
And another editorial writer takes the easy way out and fails to challenge, check and critique. It is all hokum. People who do not vote in elections always have plausible excuses. And they are not all uncaring or stupid. A brain surgeon in the midst of a delicate 12-hour operation can hardly take some time off to go vote. There are many distractions in today’s society and voting is not high on some peoples’ to-do list.
And, at the same time, you wish that radio personalities and editorial writers would stop telling people it does not matter how they vote but they should vote. Frankly there is no need for stupid people to vote for stupid politicians. We will get enough of those elected in any event.
With the distractions of today, we should consider ourselves lucky to get a turnout over 60 per cent of eligible voters. These voters also had other things to do. They came to vote because they have an objective. They came to elect someone. We hardly want people coming out to vote who are going to stand behind that tiny screen and go “eeny, meeny, miny, moe” down the list of candidates on the ballot.
You best leave sleeping dogs and reluctant voters lie. The fact that we do get as high a vote as we do in Canadian elections is to the credit of the political parties. Identifying and getting out your vote has become an advanced science in this country. And it is often the party with the most, best organized workers that carries the day.
The only thing that is not the case is the stupid suggestion that people do not vote because of the first-past-the-post voting system. The problem all the so-called ‘experts’ have with this premise is that they have never come up with a system that is better. The only way you can really make sure that the winner is the majority choice is with run-off elections.
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Copyright 2015 © Peter Lowry
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