Wrong! 👿 If you pay TAX, the lifeblood of the governments and authorities that [mostly] work in your interest, you have EVERY right to moan and bitch to your heart's content regardless of your voting habits. Voting is important but please don't trot out that old chestnut. Sometimes choosing not to vote is just as important a decision as placing your X in a box, especially if the choice is no choice at all.

But Darkone's main point is sound. If you vote, America, please vote well. The rest of the world have enjoyed some fairly tranquil times under Obama and we're not keen to see the Bush era of paranoia and raw power-and-fearmongering return any time soon. If you're going to give Republicans control of the senate you'd better be DAMNED sure that Bush III isn't waiting in the wings, or lurking behind the scenes...

True, but then you are letting others decide whom you will have speaking for you. Granted you can vote and your candidate looses but at least you helped in trying to put whom you wanted to speak for you in office. Yes, most everyone pays some sort of tax, so yes we all have the right to bitch about things we don't like. But do remember that if you don't pay your taxes in most countries you go to jail 🙂 So the government is going to get your money whether you like it or not, it's just our duty to make sure they spend it in our best interests and not theirs.

We had a couple up in NH about 1-2 yrs ago stopped paying taxes for 6+ yrs to protest the way the government and how it was ran. They barricaded themselves in their home and refused to leave, after a few month standoff they went in and got them and they are in jail. And if you don't pay your town taxes eventually the town can take your home from you.

So sometimes the only way to show the government officials that they are not all powerful is the ability for us to cast a vote.

Tranquil times? More US troops have died in the 20 months Obama has been in office than Bush first sent them in 2001 to 2008. Bush may have had some communication issues, but overall I think he did a good job protecting the country, there is a few policies I didn't care for. Most recent polls, people state that Bush was a better president than Obama.

This headline makes me laugh: http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/us-to ... isit-64106 that is a good use of our tax dollars 🙂 Mr Obama embrace technology and use video conferencing works great, use it a couple times a week 🙂

imagine a guy at the top of a hill throws a rock down that hill and, say, starts a rock-slide. Then, while the rock-slide is halfway down the hill, picking up more and more rocks and becoming more and more dangerous, the first guy leaves and is replaced by a second person, is it really fair to criticise the second person for the rock-slide eventually destroying the town below?

Polls (which are mostly rubbish anyway) claiming Bush was a more popular president probably don't take the recent recession into account. This will be seen as getting worse during Obama's term in office. I'd LOVE to know what criteria these opinions are based upon. Better in what way, exactly? Posturing on aircraft carriers? Playing golf? I'm not a Obama fan by any means (he's a politician just like the rest of them) but Bush is a War Criminal with the blood of tens of thousands on his hands and I won't see that forgotten just because there's a shiny new target in office on capitol hill.

The thing that frustrates me is that voting does not matter when all candidates represent the same set of problems.

The typical public debates over silly minutiae distract many folks from the more important issues, such as global overpopulation and erosion of the Middle Class.

I think there was a time when voting mattered... but it probably has not mattered much since Clinton took office, nearly two decades ago.

Voting would matter if we set term limits to two years on all offices but President and make all major legislation have to be voted on by the people and have their vote count for 51%+ of the vote. Thing is that most if not all politicians have other motives when they get to office.

And people always forget the precious Supreme Court this is one of the biggest rackets in government. I don't think anyone should ever get a life appointment to any job.

Sadly, I do not think that those things would help. The party system, campaign contributions, and the fact that it is nearly impossible for decent leaders to succeed are arguably more difficult problems. How would people know which way to vote, if the available information is slanted as it is now?

The biggest scam, as I see it, is that Democrats and Republicans are basically the same. Both parties are more interested in maintaining big government and in supporting special interest groups than they are in improving life for the average citizen. Like "professional" wrestling, they pretend to fight each other, but their only real goal is to entertain the masses while they profit from the experience.

And don't forget that the wealthy are a "special interest group"... the most powerful lobby of all.

The media plays right into the game... I am not sure whether they are stooges or part of the problem, but for sure most "news" only reports on trivial issues.

And, yeah, the Supreme Court is absurd.

In fact, most of the Constitution was written to prevent what has happened in our government. The original notion was that the federal government should uphold a dozen or two inalienable rights, and the rest should be determined by the states. The current government could not be further from the vision of our forefathers.

I am not sure what the solution will be, but I am pretty sure that it will not be peaceful. If there were ever a time to teach our children to defend themselves, now is the time. I doubt that they will enjoy the peace that we have enjoyed for the past few centuries.

I don't know how it works in the US but in the UK if you don't vote then you are by default voting to keep the current government as is. Your Vote is counted whether you put your tick in the box or not but by not putting the tick in the box you are voting to not change things

I am no expert on UK politics, but if I understand correctly, your system is intentionally antagonistic, right? I think it works differently than our system.

I am not convinced that our government can be changed at the voting booth anymore. The combination of two super-strong parties that both have the same agenda, with a media that cannot or will not report on things that matter, has resulted in a juggernaut with too much inertia to change. If President Obama has demonstrated anything it is that meaningful change in Washington is impossible.

You have the theory right, yes.

However, in practice, it does not matter which candidate wins, because elections are dominated by two parties that have the same major agendas, such as continued erosion of the Middle Class and redistribution of wealth to those who are already wealthy.

For example, whether one voted for Barack Obama or John McCain in the last presidential election, the results would be approximately the same -- real unemployment would still be in double digits (while "official" reports remain in or near single digits), and most of those unemployed people still would not be able to get decent health care.

This is an example of exactly the problem that I am trying to describe. Thank you, Aero. 🙂

The economy has been in trouble since May have 2000, and it has been getting progressively worse rather than better. We are not in trouble because of a single President or anything that has happened in the last couple of years. The more important causes go back at least a decade, and some of them go back 50 years.

The news media is extremely misleading. Yes, even BBC (who are frequently better than most).

McCain would have made a different set of mistakes; I have no argument there! But the bottom line is still the same... things are worse than they were during the GW Bush administration, rather than better. That would have happened under McCain, as well, because there are huge forces who profit from it -- the wealthy.

At least Obama tried to change some important things. The fact that he has not been able to do so, at a time when the public most wants change for the better, is a very good indication of the immense inertia in Washington.

And it is also a very good demonstration that voting for change does not really matter anymore. Those days are gone.

And that is precisely my point.

It does not matter who sits in the Oval Office... there are simply too many people -- in both parties -- giving poor advice.