Tuesday, November 2, 2010

Civic Duty

I don't pretend to be in to politics. I almost didn't even go vote today, but after the eighth text from my dad telling me to "Vote early and vote often" I went. As I was waiting to get my identity verified, I overheard a poll worker telling some guy that he had to register ahead of time, he can't just show up and vote. She wasn't especially nice or understanding with him, but I think she was a lot nicer than those senior citizens that run the polls in Satellite Beach would've been.

I won't lie, I went in pretty blind. As I was walking up, I felt ill-prepared as I saw other voters studying their ballots like it was their final exam, but I just picked the next available booth and started winging it. I started to see a pattern as I filled in more and more bubbles as dark as I could.

When I was finished, I called my parents to tell them my strategy. I still think it's comical, if not clever.

*If there was a political party listed, I chose the republican candidate. For the record, had I had some sort of aversion to the republican candidate prior, I would've voted for someone of a different party, but the bridge never appeared so I didn't have to cross it.
*If it said "Shall so-and-so remain as..." I voted no. My grandfather thinks that getting new blood in office as frequently as possible is the way to go and that sounds good to me, too.
*If there was no party listed, I chose the most American name listed. I'm not racist, I just like the idea of Americans running America.
*If there was any sort of money that they were looking to get from the citizen, I voted against it. I'm short enough on cash without having to give any more away.

The one "issue" that stuck out to me was about class size. They were looking to increase the number of students a teacher can have in each classroom. While I don't have (and won't for a while) kids in school, I felt like the kids should get as much attention as possible and the teachers need less stress. I can hardly handle six to twelve 16- and 17-year-olds once a week. Having double (at least) that number, of any age range, five days a week would send me to the looney bin.

I probably shouldn't put my business out in public like this, but this is my blog. If you don't like my choices, oh well.

So now we just have to wait and see what happens. Not that I'll even notice.