Silly people, thinking that Democracy is for you! There are two things everyone should want in a democratic election. 1. As many people as possible voting to get a true reflection of the beliefs and viewpoints of the populace, and 2. Everyone who votes to be as well-informed as possible.

Currently, there's a push against both of these things. By changing voter laws in Florida, Texas, Wisconsin, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, by requiring ID and changing the hours people can vote, you limit the people taking place in the election and disenfranchise thousands of people. Apart from the fact that voter ID fraud is minimal (check out www.truchtaboutfraud.org for the statistics), surely you want to give people as much opportunity to vote as possible? I mean, the damned election has been going on for two years! You can't tell me they get two years to posture, blather, skirt the issue, and lie, and then we get almost no time whatsoever in which to cast our vote? If you want voter ID laws, then fine, require voter ID. BUT if that's the case, then it should be the state's responsibility (and financial burden) to provide voter ID to everyone eligible to vote.

Second, we're not well-informed. If Romney can put out a performance that is all presentation and no substance, and be declared the winner of a debate, then we're done. Yes, one of the skills of debating is the presentation. But I don't blame Obama for not having the best responses, rebuttals, comebacks. It's hard to debate when the person you're debating all of a sudden seems to have a completely different point of view from the one you expected. According to Romney, he is FOR financial regulation. He is FOR increasing taxes on the wealthiest members of society. he is FOR medical coverage for people with pre-existing conditions. But the debate is the first time he was for any of those things.

And as long as people argue about 'who won the debate,' and base that determination on delivery, we won't have an educated populace. As long as candidates can go out there with their pre-prepared soundbytes, and don't have to have any accountability to what they're actually saying, the debates are a waste of time. They aren't about informing the populace any more; they're about giving the 24-hour news machines fodder to chew up, regurgitate, digest, and any other food metaphor you wish to use.

Elections are about the Super-PACs. They're about the money that TV stations and websites and (decreasingly) print media stand to make off the election. They're about who can shout longer and louder and get people to believe them, because as long as the delivery is good, that's all people seem to care about any more.

Basically, we all like polished shit. We don't care that it's shit any more. And that makes me want to not bother with part one of what it takes to make democracy work. I'm almost looking forward to moving away, to not having to listen to two-year campaigns, to people who vote based on crap and falsehoods someone with a nice delivery told them.

I'm looking forward to not voting. But not just yet. I'm still going to fulfill my obligation to be as informed, educated a voter as I can be.