New Ballot Option: “I choose not to vote”
If you choose to vote in the elections, you should have a candidate in mind by the time you get to the ballot box, preferably much sooner. However, Sen. Mike Bennett believes that some people do not want to vote for any of the candidates, but want to vote anyway. His solution is a bill he convinced the Senate Ethics and Elections committee to approve, which requires another option to be included on ballots - “I choose not to vote.” Personally I find this a bit stupid, since if someone doesn’t want to vote they aren’t going to spend the time to go to a polling place for the sole sake of voting for not voting. Not to mention anyone who checks that box is contradicting themselves, since by doing so they are in fact voting.
Bennett thinks the option would allow voters to make a clear statement that they don’t want to vote for a candidate. I think our low voter turnout compared to some countries is statement enough, and all in all this seems pretty pointless.
masterledz
April 25, 2007 @ 9:07 pm
I choose not to comment on this article.
Dexter345
April 25, 2007 @ 9:42 pm
I dunno, if they had that during the 2004 elections, I might have voted. Actually that’s not true. If I had voted, I would have voted Libertarian. Which is just as good as choosing not to vote, I guess.
Brandon Undead
April 25, 2007 @ 10:35 pm
People are gonna keep playing around with paradoxes until someone opens a temporal vortex through which escapes an extra-planar being that tentacle-rapes every living thing on the planet before pulling it apart and eating it alive. Then we’ll be sorry.
Napuja
April 26, 2007 @ 9:44 am
I think that I understand what they’re trying to get at. If they changed the wording (yeah, ‘I choose not to vote’ is a pretty go-tard move) to something that emphasizes peoples’ disdain for the actual candidates while still keeping them involved in the electoral process, then some interesting results may follow…
Brandon Undead
April 26, 2007 @ 11:39 am
Seriously, I would say that you are casting your ballot, but you’re not “voting”. I would try to explain it, but it’s murky, and someone could easily counterpoint me.