if you dont have your voter stub then you dont get paid for that day...
(as a penalty for not doing your civic duty)?
2006-08-24 06:49:11 · 20 answers · asked by friskygimp 5 in Politics & Government ➔ Civic Participation
Great idea!!! I love it. Anything to increase voter turnout!!
2006-08-24 06:50:04 · answer #1 · answered by Leah 6 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Polls are open 7am to 7pm. Very few people work those particular 12 hours a day. There is NO excuse not to vote. Most employers will even allow people to be late or leave early or vote on their lunch. It is NOT the governments job to tell employers which days to pay their workers for FREE. And you can ALWAYS use an absentee ballot and vote by mail without ever leaving the comfort of your home.
If someone chooses not to participate, that is their RIGHT. It is not anyone's place to tell someone that they must vote.
And why would you want the uninformed, uneducated to cast votes anyway?
2006-08-24 15:50:47 · answer #2 · answered by Goose&Tonic 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
No. You're already entitled to take time off work in order to vote. Making it a holiday would probably reduce voter turn out.
I think promoting mail-in ballots would be a better way to increase participation.
2006-08-24 14:04:02 · answer #3 · answered by lee m 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Nice idea.
But take a look at what most Americans do on nearly every federal holiday: we go out, get drunk and eat too much.
Wait...many of us do that every day.
But you get my point, right?
The sad truth is many Americans take the freedom to vote for granted...and they have the ill-conceived thought that their vote doesn't count.
If we switched from the Electoral vote to the Popular vote, I think you could get more people out to vote.
I really, really like your idea about a non-voter penalty!
I'd advocate something like that.
A long time ago, people had to pay a poll tax to vote.
Maybe we could get Congress to flip that idea and make people pay a poll tax for NOT voting.
2006-08-24 14:44:56 · answer #4 · answered by docscholl 6 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Interesting idea, but morons who are not interested in voting for the RIGHT person for the RIGHT reasons shouldn't vote at all.
Maybe we should have a TV show like American Idol where the candidates could show us what they've got and we could call in and vote. Hey, being on Arsenio Hall's show playing the sax is one of the things that got Clinton elected.
2006-08-24 13:57:05 · answer #5 · answered by Danger, Will Robinson! 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
No... why? If its your civic duty, you should find a way to fulfill that duty. There are plenty of ways to vote w/out having to take the day off. In most cases I vote by absentee/mail in ballot. If I'm lazy (late) in filling it out and mailing, in some cases I've gone to the ballot location, bypassed the line and dropped it in the absentee ballot box. there is at least one state where the only option is by mail in ballot (Washington or orgegon I think). If you're registered, you automatically get one.
2006-08-24 13:54:00 · answer #6 · answered by dapixelator 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
I'll buy that for a dollar, let's show em a 'day without an american', EVERYTHING closed, EVERYONE at the polls. Put gramma in the wheelchair and drag her down to the polling station too. Put the 'populi' back in the 'vox populi' instead of just substituting 'vox corporatis' or whatever...Exxon's run the country long enough, it's the american voter's turn, again. I think it always was our turn, just everyone kind of went on a long coffee break...
2006-08-24 13:52:50 · answer #7 · answered by gokart121 6 · 0⤊ 1⤋
And what makes you think people will show up at the polls? You can give them the day off, with pay and all, but many will just sleep late and never vote! Sounds like your party is out of power this may work to get them in then people will go back to their lazy ways and never show up again!
http://www.total-knowledge.com/~willyblues/
2006-08-24 13:55:29 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
I'm skeptical of voting incentives. I think we should spend more time, effort and money making people understand that the results of the election will make a difference to them personally so that they will WANT to vote. I'm not sure I want people voting if they're only there to get paid and are unaware of the issues.
2006-08-24 13:59:10 · answer #9 · answered by Danaerys 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
I think it would decrease voter turn out. If you can make time to go to the polls before or after work when you are already out, why would you do any better if you don't have to be out at all?
2006-08-24 21:18:47 · answer #10 · answered by STEVEN F 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
If you watch only one conspiracy documentary ever, make it this one. This just might be the best introductory video out there. Understand that every claim made in this is fact, not opinion, no matter how wild it sounds. It's all easily verifiable through mainstream news archives and public documents.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7048572757566726569&q=Alex+Jones
2006-08-24 21:32:08 · answer #11 · answered by Sugi 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋