Sunday, August 20, 2006
Is Anyone Thinking?
The US population is 296,500,000.
67% are age 15-64: 198,655,000
12% are over 65: 35,580,000
Voting age adults: 221,285,000
Voting eligible adults
(sans people in prison and non-citizens): 202,746,000
Voting eligible adult turnout for elections: 61%: 123,675,000
How many of the 123,675,000 people who get off their asses and go to the polls actually think thoughts? Maybe half. That would be 61,837,500.
Okay. There’s hope.
59,439,413 people in the US did not vote for George W. Bush and elected Al Gore President of the United States.
Which clarifies the real challenges for Democrats: 1)Reduce the possibility of voter fraud and 2) increase the possibility of voters thinking thoughts.
Now the only problem inherent in mounting a campaign to get people to think about the issues and the candidates before going to the polls is that the plea would be going out to Republicans as well as Democrats.
But I don’t see that as a serious problem. Repubs are not likely to change their voting pattern of never listening, never thinking and just doing whatever the Bush administration tells them to do.
The first target for a THINK BEFORE YOU VOTE campaign is Connecticut. The Repubs say Lieberman is a shoe-in to win in November.
Is that possible? Not if Connecticut voters THINK about the people Lieberman owes favors to.
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3 comments:
Well, in terms of Lieberman, I'll ask the Republicans why he wasn't successful in winning his own primary if he is indeed a "shoe in" to win in November. I think he would have clearly defeated his opponent if that were the case. Then, again, as you said, Republicans aren't very well known for thinking thoughts or encouraging other people to do so.
Lieberman lost because Democrats hate America and want to give terrorists unconditional positive regard. Thus he deserves Bushist support.
OT: I wonder how George Lakoff works around the inconvenience that George W. Bush constantly promises to nurture and protect us, if only we’ll let him be dictator.
Quick answer: No, far too few people are thinking. Also the Democrats aren't challenging them to think. Even the most "radical" Democrats are only calling for "redeployment" of our troop, or saying Rumsfeld's tactics in Iraq are bad. No Democratic Party "leader" is saying that this was and is an illegal and immoral war and that it is part of a pattern of such activity under both parties for the last 50 years. So thinking is not happening and is not going to happen.
Certainly we would be better off if the winners of the last 2 elections had taken office, but we'd still have a long way to go before thinking was a part of national political life.
I have one recommendation for voters: If you see a candidate's ads over and over on TV in the months leading up to the election, DO NOT VOTE for that candidate. He or she is not going to serve your interests, they are going to serve the interests of the people who paid for those ads.
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