The CCO has been curious about the nearly 100 Million eligible voters who did not vote since that fact was disclosed. After all it seems as though 30% of eligible voters re-elected the President while 29% voted for Mitt Romney and another 0.7% went for Libertarian Gary Johnson. That means that just over 40% of eligible voters for some reason voted “none of the above”. Here are some excerpts and a link from a very telling article about who stayed home and why. Our warning is that this is not kind to either political party but is particularly harsh on Republicans.
Excerpts:
“But the story is not about who voted; it is about who didn’t vote. In truth, millions of Americans have decided that Republicans are not a viable alternative because they are already too much like Democrats. They are Washington. With no hope that a Romney administration or more Republicans in Congress would change this sad state of affairs, these voters shrugged their shoulders and became non-voters.”
“The country yawned. About 11 million fewer Americans voted for the two major-party candidates in 2012 — 119 million, down from 130 million in 2008. In fact, even though our population has steadily increased in the last eight years (adding 16 million to the 2004 estimate of 293 million Americans), about 2 million fewer Americans pulled the lever for Obama and Romney than for George W. Bush and John Kerry.”
“Obama lost an incredible 9 million voters from his 2008 haul. If told on Monday that fully 13 percent of the president’s support would vanish, the GOP establishment would have stocked up on champagne and confetti.”
“if there is any silver lining for conservatives here, it’s that Obama was hurt more by the decrease in his level of support from this demographic — down six points from the 66 percent he claimed in 2008 — than by the marginal drop in total youth participation. It seems to be dawning on at least some young adults that Obamaville is a bleak place to build a future.”
“The brute fact is: There are many people in the country who believe it makes no difference which party wins these elections. Obama Democrats are the hard Left, but Washington’s Republican establishment is progressive, not conservative. This has solidified statism as the bipartisan mainstream. Republicans may want to run Leviathan — many are actually perfectly happy in the minority — but they have no real interest in dismantling Leviathan. They are simply not about transferring power out of Washington, not in a material way.”
“Yes, Democrats are reckless in refusing to acknowledge the suicidal costs of their cradle-to-grave nanny state, but the Republican campaign called for enlarging a military our current spending on which dwarfs the combined defense budgets of the next several highest-spending nations. When was the last time you heard a Republican explain what departments and entitlements he’d slash to pay for that?”
“Our bipartisan ruling class is obtuse when it comes to the cliff we’re falling off — and I don’t mean January’s so-called “Taxmageddon,†which is a day at the beach compared to what’s coming.”
“What happens, moreover, when we have a truly egregious Washington scandal, like the terrorist murder of Americans in Benghazi? What do Republicans do? The party’s nominee decides the issue is not worth engaging on — cutting the legs out from under Americans who see Benghazi as a debacle worse than Watergate, as the logical end of the Beltway’s pro-Islamist delirium.”
“Republicans talk about limited central government, but they do not believe in it — or, if they do, they lack confidence that they can explain its benefits compellingly. They’ve bought the Democrats’ core conceit that the modern world is just too complicated for ordinary people to make their way without bureaucratic instruction. They look at a money-hemorrhaging disaster like Medicare, whose unsustainability is precisely caused by the intrusion of government, and they say, “Let’s preserve it — in fact, let’s make its preservation the centerpiece of our campaign.â€
“Republicans lack the courage to argue from conviction that health care would work better without federal mandates and control — that safety nets are best designed by the states, the people, and local conditions, not Washington diktat. In their paralysis, we are left with a system that will soon implode, a system that will not provide care for the people being coerced to pay in.”
“Truth be told, most of today’s GOP does not believe Washington makes things worse. Republicans think the federal government — by confiscating, borrowing, and printing money — is the answer to every problem, rather than the source of most. That is why those running the party today, when they ran Washington during the Bush years, orchestrated an expansion of government size, scope, and spending that would still boggle the mind had Obama not come along.”
“That is not materially different from what the Democrats believe. It’s certainly not an alternative. For Americans who think elections can make a real difference, Tuesday pitted proud progressives against reticent progressives; slightly more preferred the true-believers. For Americans who don’t see much daylight between the two parties — one led by the president who keeps spending money we don’t have and the other by congressional Republicans who keep writing the checks and extending the credit line — voting wasn’t worth the effort.
Those millions of Americans need a new choice. We all do.”
http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/333135/voters-who-stayed-home-andrew-c-mccarthy?pg=1
It’s nothing new that people didn’t go to the polls. About 60% voted in 1960. It has never reached those numbers since then. This election was better than 1996, which was the low since 1960. I think the reasoning is flawed to assume that voters don’t see a difference between the two major parties. Most of the industrialized world has a significantly greater turn out than in the U.S. and the same could be said for many of those countries as to the major parties. This country has never promoted voting for everyone. Most groups outside of landed, white males have fought to be included. Voter suppression is alive and well today. From the registration process to the ease of voting, the process is set up to discourage the voting of many. No other industrialized country makes it so hard. There is a reason that the U.S. will not allow international observers in to watch. We are a disgrace to democracy and a contradiction in terms.
Well said
“From the registration process to the ease of voting, the process is set up to discourage the voting of many. No other industrialized country makes it so hard. There is a reason that the U.S. will not allow international observers in to watch. We are a disgrace to democracy and a contradiction in terms.”
You must not live in Vanderburgh County or you totally do not know what your talking–the above statement is total BS.
You are absolutely correct, and I have the proof: My wife saw a man vote using one of his relative’s ID at the Central Library. God only knows how many times he voted with other peoples’ ID.
But don’t be dismayed by our corruption: Last week it was determined that there was Massive vote fraud in Port St. Lucie, Florida. You might recall that Obama carried Florida by a razor-thin margin.
We might as well be living in Zimbabwae.
It’s telling that you did not compare local voting practices to those in some other continent than Africa. Your repeated and overt ethnic slurs are becoming putrid.
or Mexico.
I would also like to remind you that if you or your wife really have legitimate evidence of voter fraud, it is your civic duty to report it to the appropriate authorities. Otherwise, I think readers should file your allegation in the hogwash file.
There is an Election Commission meeting this Friday at 1 PM in room #214. Any election corruption anyone preceives to have occured should be reported.
The Vanderburgh County Election Board is made up from one political appointment from each party chairperson, the County Clerk, and an attorney. Members of the Vanderburgh County Election Board are:
Thomas A. Massey, Election Board President
David Shaw, Election Board Member
Doug Briody, Election Board Attorney
Susan K. Kirk, Secretary
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Wait a minute, didn’t that last person on the list just run for office?
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I was inside every single vote center on Election Day this year and saw nothing remotely inappropriate. I saw several people however exit and re-enter after forgeting their identification. I have complete confidence in the process.
As a general rule, I do not believe it is a good idea to have politicians who run for office every 4 years, for years on end, also serving on the election board for years on end. It does not look good.
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