What are your thoughts about tomorrow’s election in the United States?
Let me start off by saying that I have already voted. I have been a fan of Early Voting for the last few Presidential elections. It started when I was unable to vote one year due to incredibly long lines, and that night was a family dinner night for a family member’s birthday. All of my other family members had participated in Early Voting. Lesson learned!
I highly dislike discussing politics with anyone, with the occasional exception of my husband. I admittedly do not follow news and politics closely, therefore I never feel very confident that I know enough to bring much to the discussion. Also, it seems that most political discussions end up being more about one person trying to convince the other that their beliefs are the right one and often shaming others who don’t agree. This always seems worse in the 3-6 months before a Presidential election, and it gets so ugly. I try to refrain from making political statements or remarks among friends and social media, but every once in a while I regrettably slip up.
With all that said, I do believe in exercising your right to vote. It doesn’t matter if the candidate you feel is best is the one your parents, spouse, friends, enemies support. It’s your decision! It’s also your decision to share who you voted for, as well. I didn’t share my 2008 Presidential choice with anyone until just recently when I slipped up and told my husband. I have told a few people this time around who I voted for but mostly I’ve kept it to myself.
I think the whole election process needs an overhaul. Do we really need a dual party system? Shouldn’t we take a serious look at those other non-Republican/Democrat candidates? Don’t even get me started on the Electoral College!
Do you vote? Are you in favor of the same candidate as most of the people you’re around most often?
During the month of November, I am participating in the National Blog Posting Month, also known as NaBloPoMo, hosted by BlogHer. Most likely I am following these suggested prompts, but I might just get crazy and change things up every once in a while. I’m one wild and crazy gal!
Frogdiva Dot Com 
We are pretty similar in this area as well Tonya . I used to hate getting much involved in politics in my younger years. This year Matt has been watching all of the presidential debates and has also turned in to a “news” watcher. We used to both hate the news. So I have gotten sucked in to watching it more this year, which is out of the norm for me. Typically I don’t discuss much either, because I don’t like watching news and politics a lot so I don’t have lots to say on it. I DO have a lot to say on causes and issues that I support though, so it’s not that I don’t believe in advocacy. I hate this time of year to be honest (on an election year) because people get down right ridiculous with their views. They try to get you to tell them what you think, and if you do share your opinion, some of them get so mad if you don’t want to vote for the same party as they do. I am able to be neutral in conversation and not get upset, but usually the other people get very heated with their beliefs and so I tend to avoid the topic altogether-unless it comes to standing up for my values. Case in point- I have seen stuff on FB before where people say they will “defriend” someone who supports the candidate they can’t stand. Interesting idea on getting rid of the 2 parties…I am inclined to agree some. Mostly because it gets in to this war on republicans versus democrats and it would be nice to feel that other people could have more of a chance. Then there is all the money involved in campaigns as well. I dunno,but I will be glad when it’s a couple of weeks from now and the emotions of either gloating on who won or being angry that someone’s party didn’t win…die down 🙂 That being said, I believe that exercising the right to vote is important for many reasons and I see an importance for it as a woman also , since there was a time when women weren’t allowed to. I tend to not tell too many people who I would vote for….makes for less drama!
I’ve been fairly passive regarding politics since forever, but this year I did get slightly more involved after I took the quiz on http://www.isidewith.com/. I knew this time around that I didn’t really feel strongly about the Democratic of Republican candidate. The quiz helped me understand why! Who knew that something as simple as an online quiz would help with that? Of course, the quiz isn’t some silly 5-question quiz or anything. It’s pretty in-depth.
The craziness on Facebook this election has gotten out of hand. I hope it smoothes out soon.
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