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Why I’m Not Voting

This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Miami (OH) chapter.

People laud Mitt Romney for wanting to support states’ rights and to lessen big government. Others support Obama for being pro-planned parenthood and social equality. The Iraq war policies are thrown around and since everyone thinks they belong to the middle class, both republicans and democrats promise to support that “important” part of our “great nation.” This is the same crap that is said every four years. The Republican platform has been trying to lessen big government and to cut federal spending on social systems for decades. Democrats are always pro-equality and that’s why they’ve earned the name “bleeding hearts.” Voters claim that one side or the other bases their ideologies on the “freedoms” that this country was built upon. Do these people really know what the h-ll they’re talking about?

Republicans: black Americans were slaves until the 1860s and persecuted until the 1960s (if not still now), women couldn’t vote until almost the 1920s and could legally be raped by their husbands until Nebraska started the trend to make it illegal in 1978, homosexuals today cannot get married nationally in an apparently secular country, but your party is worried about the rights of an UNBORN child? Are you serious? There are tons of people alive and struggling that need your help before you need to infringe on Roe v. Wade. Let it go.

Democrats: you’ve had four years. You’ve done some stuff, fantastic, but how much of it has really changed? You can spin the “new jobs” numbers all you want, but people are still without jobs, people are still losing their jobs. Reading your platform (http://www.democrats.org/democratic-national-platform#rebuild-middle-class) and its fire hose of rhetoric aimed at getting my pity vote for the “crisis” the Bush administration dropped on your feet makes me simply wonder: so what? If you did so much, why is this going to be such a contested election? Franklin D Roosevelt was still in the midst of the Great Depression (maybe you’ve heard of it, since you keep referencing it) in 1936 and he won in one of the biggest landslides EVER, but this is going to be neck and neck, that should tell you something about your “accomplishments.”

I’m not voting for either candidate because I can’t justify supporting the “lesser of two evils” idea. I feel Romney is suddenly so much more conservative than he was in the 2008 primary. Republicans thought he was far too moderate, so I wonder, are they voting FOR Romney, or against Obama? I’ll guess the latter. I also feel that Obama has had a fair shake and hasn’t won over the crowd. I respect that some things take time and even FDR needed a number of terms for any kind of success, but in this day and age, society has no patience and he knew that going in. You can’t start something in your first term banking on finishing it in your second, that’s just poor planning and I can’t support that.

It should be noted though that as a non-voter, I forfeit my right to complain either way. I will not whine about Romney spitting in the face of the older generations in our country, just as I won’t cry about Obama’s idea that strong education equates to more math and science teachers. Neither cares for the environment beyond “carbon emissions” and I don’t think either have the fortitude that Bush did in regard to military and foreign affairs. What I think though won’t matter after November 6th.

I just hope that one-way or the other, I’m not right. *

* Hint: I usually am.

 

Josh is a graduate student pursuing his Master's degree in History. He has Bachelors degrees in both History and Creative Writing.