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How Much is Your Right to Vote Worth?
Attila Dimedici writes "Two thirds of the students at NYU would give up their right to vote in the next election for a full scholarship. Some would be satisfied with an ipod. A few would be willing to give up the right for the rest of their lives for one million dollars."
According to our forefathers, the right to vote is worth your life.
Your forefathers had no such view, preferring that only landowners vote since managing to own land made them better people than the rest of the mob.
Wouldn't work, he would also have to start a war on some dumb pretext to keep the population subdued by clamp-down laws and remain in power long enough to strip all the assets of the country for his friends.
The Amercians would never fall for such a transparent ploy.
The voting paradox states that we should rationally not bother to vote. The chance of it making a difference are far outweighed by even the smallest cost that voting has. You are considerably more likely to get killed on the way to the polling station than for your vote to make a difference to the outcome of the election. Yes, you can certainly say "but what if everyone did that?", which brings us to the problem of public goods. There is an incentive to free-ride - others will do the voting for you. Similarly to taxes, where your own contribution makes no difference, so you have an incentive to not pay, some countries such as Australia make it mandatory to vote (you're allowed to just spoil your ballot). This implies that for many people, voting isn't even worth minus $100 AUD or whatever the fine is. Yeah, a degree in politics and economics did make me very cynical about the political process.
Yeah...well go check out India, Iraq, Iran, and all those other places that have been ruled by the good ol British Empire... Oh and by the way... don't forget Africa... They came out in wonderful shape...course they also came out in chains on boats and stuff...but they are doing much better now right?
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
Was Monday just another day off for you?
One vote does indeed make a difference. You might not think so, but the last time I checked, only 40% of Americans bothered to go out and vote last time. Do you have friends? Why not take them out voting next time? Have a voting party. Everyone goes out and votes, then you head back to your place with beer, nachos, and the TV results. People died to get you that vote. At least try to enjoy it.
Yes, I know that you're choosing between a giant douche and a turd sandwich. I've also got to choose between a bunch of clowns and some asswipes. (I'm Canadian. We have a multi-party system) If none of the choices are any good, go with the one that's the least bad. Sometimes that's the best you can hope for.
People like you are the same people who are letting a certain person run rampant in office. You're all such fucking pussies that you won't stand up to a bully and call him to task. Where are your balls, America? On Hillary? Really? That's the best you can do? Really? Nobody is standing up when your Constitution is destroyed, when the National Guard is absconded, when the Justice department is found to be corrupt, and your votes are being fucking tampered with? And not one person is willing to do a damned thing against it? Slacktivism doesn't count. GET OFF YOUR ASS.
If you think the votes are being stolen, why don't you escalate?
If that happened in Canada, I would steal an in-use voting machine on election night and reverse-engineer it. I'd report the findings to as many news agencies as I could find, knowing full well that I faced assassination or imprisonment. (Yeah, I know, Internet tough guy.) If you don't stand up for your rights and fight to defend them, people will take them away.
What fucking good is $1M if the government won't let you spend it? What about when they take $400k off the top for taxes?
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ECHELON is a government program to find words like bomb, jihad, plutonium, assassinate, and anarchy.
Heinlein's book portrayed a fascist utopia. The movie was a deliberate spoof of that. Check the DVD extras.
If we're ever threatened with extinction by giant space bugs, I'll keep your idea in mind. Meantime, our military is more like a set of toy soldiers for neocons to play with, and I'd rather not integrate them any more into the political process.
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.