The other side of the issue, of course, is that perhaps everyone should be required to earn their citizenship like an immigrant. Kids don't learn squat about civics, politics, or current affairs these days, especially if their school is in a mandatory-testing area. It's all about the test, and only the test, because everybody has to "excel" and what they have to "excel" at is that bloody test. Now, the American citizenry has always a significant component that votes because they like the sound of a candidate's name, or because they're Republocrats and daddy was a Republocrat and granpappy was a Republocrat...but I suspect that that component's proportion in the voting pool has grown while the size of the active pool has shrunk. So if we deliberately add a bunch of vastly uninformed voters, how is that an improvement? Do you really think allowing people to vote necessarily results in them either knowing how or wanting to vote? What was the result of lowering the voting age from 21 to 18 (an exercise for the reader)?
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Date: 2007-01-16 06:35 pm (UTC)shrunk. So if we deliberately add a bunch of vastly uninformed voters, how is that an improvement? Do you really think allowing people to vote necessarily results in them either knowing how or wanting to vote? What was the result of lowering the voting age from 21 to 18 (an exercise for the reader)?