Is it Your Civic Duty to Not Vote?

A common phrase I always heard growing up about voting is that if you don't vote you have no right to complain. I have begun to question this assumption, and it's good to question assumptions. We all grow up assuming that certain things about America are true as if questioning the magnificence of the country or thinking of another system of government is simply not an option.

Just as you have a right to vote, you also have a write to not vote. And not participating in what could be a broken, non-democratic process that is dysfunctional could be seen as a vote in itself. After all, let's face it, both Republicans and Democrats are basically cut from the same cloth. They do what they have to do to get elected and achieve a certain level of celebrity. Once they get in the power circle of Washington, all they have to do is cooperate, get along, and ensure that the richer candidates stay there so they can all share in the pot and mutually benefit from the massive connections to corrupt, and sometimes criminal corporate lobbyists. Besides, what motivation do they have to change or work harder to fix things.

We live in the highest producing country in the world, where people work harder and produce more than they did 20 years ago, yet the standard of living is falling dramatically, putting America near the bottom of the heap amongst developed nations in several standard of living categories. If they actually fixed the problems, ended imperialism, followed the constitution, and basically did their job like employees, than they'd be no different than the lowly 9 to 5 working class that pays their salaries so they can screw things up so so they can have a constant throng of people yearning for change and wanting to go to the polls to "do something about it" by empowering the very people who caused the problems in the first place.

With a general populace that is too busy, tired, apathetic, or ignorant in regards to the political process, why would they want to spoil the party for themselves by rocking the boat to do what is right by the United States constitution, which is a document that protects the people, but restrains the government; it was written to ruin there free ride and put a crimp on narcissistic gas bag "leaders" with grandiose fantasies about power and changing the world while they bankrupt the people they're supposed to serve.

So, if you decide to pull that lever in November to participate and be counted, what you're really doing is empowering a system that has tested the waters of breaking constitutional boundaries with an undeclared, unconstitutional war, a suspension of constitutional rights including habeaus corpus, and allowing the process to continue on its current trend of moving further and further away from being a constitituional republic to a gang of corrupt, self aggrandizing globalists who are quite comfortable having their cocktail party lifestyle funded by the shrinking middle class which loves to believe in their government and politics. They've gotten away with it. There was no military coup, no revolution. So like serial criminals, their confidence grows as they think, let's see what else we can get away with.

So, rather than have two choices of the same, or vote for an unelectable third party, you could have another choice to stay home and cast a vote in the form of a non-vote to show that you do not support a system, or a game, that is rigged just as a slot machine is rigged so the house always wins. As the Libertarian Jesse Ventura said in a recent interview: "People should have the choice to give a vote of 'no confidence' in their government and if enough people did that the system might change."

However, as long as people still buy into the festivities and carnival atmosphere of the elections, and listen the word "change" repeated so many times that it's embedded hypnotically into their subconscious to the point that they believe it, there will be no change and the only work politicians will have to do to continue to take millions more than they earn or produce is to put on their dog and pony show every four years, and then do what they want with our tax dollars as an ignorant and apathetic public that is used to the abuse just moves on, only to be captivated four years later hoping against hope that a politician will rise up to actually enact real change.

However, as Thomas Paine once elequently wrote, "even governments at their best are evil." That's why the founding fathers of America wanted an experiment with a government by the people for the people, not a government by the government, paid for by the people, for the government.

So, in November, I plan to do what George Carlin once said he does, stay home on the day that everyone else is lining up at the poles like cattle to pull their lever to perform "civic duty." However, as Carlin said, I will have a right to complain, since I chose to not empower a system that has become undemocratic, corrupt, and rigged to make the only electable candidates people who will continue to pontificate, bicker, and blow smoke to there hearts content all while saving money on toilet paper as our constitutional documents and Declaration of Independence will more than suffice.