Should an uninformed person abstain from voting?

[Graham Kennedy]

20/20s John Stossel says that if you are uninformed about politics, then you should not vote :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvl0lqhCVio

What do you think? I can see the argument that you shouldn't vote if you don't know what you are on about... but should we really be encouraging people not to take part in the democratic process?

[Sionnach Glic]

I think it'd be better to encourage people to get informed about it.

[Graham Kennedy]

Robert Heinlein once suggested you should have to solve a quadratic equation before you were allowed to vote. How about you have to answer five simple questions about the candidate's policies?

[Captain Picard's Hair]

I think it'd be better to encourage people to get informed about it.

These are people you're talking about. They'd rather be informed about the personal lives of celebrities.

[Graham Kennedy]

In the interview they show a woman who cannot identify Judge Ginsberg from a photo. But she has no trouble at all identifying Judge Judy.

[Sionnach Glic]

And that one example pretty much sums up everything wrong with the human race.

Robert Heinlein once suggested you should have to solve a quadratic equation before you were allowed to vote. How about you have to answer five simple questions about the candidate's policies?

Not a half bad idea. I've said it before and I'll say it again: "one vote per person" was a bad idea.

[Captain Picard's Hair]

Yes, that is certainly quite reasonable as far as voting tests go.

[Graham Kennedy]

Trouble is, who gets to write the questions...

VOTER TEST :

1) Palin and McCain want to protect children. Obama votes for infanticide legislation. Which one agrees with that constitutional protection of the right to life?

2) Obama associates with terrorists. Does this make him more or less qualified to be president?


And so on.

[Mark]

Obama admits to have tried cocaine. McCain denies everything.

Who do you trust?

[stitch626]

They should also have a presidential test. That way, Bush would have never made it.

[Teaos]

Robert Heinlein once suggested you should have to solve a quadratic equation before you were allowed to vote. How about you have to answer five simple questions about the candidate's policies?

Impossible really as it would be very hard to define what they think as they are usually pretty vage and such answers would need someone to interperate them... someone with a political opinion of their own. Sounds like a good way to corrupt the system.

I've always thought that not voting is a perfectly acceptable form of social protest.

[Sionnach Glic]

They should also have a presidential test. That way, Bush would have never made it.

Give all the presidential candidates an IQ test, and then a test on general stuff that will see how good they are on world affairs, human rights, environmental issues, etc. If they fail either test they don't get to be president.

[IanKennedy]

I've always thought that not voting is a perfectly acceptable form of social protest.

It's not so much a protest as a sign of apathy. If you want to protest a vote there should be an option on the ballot that offers 'none of the above'. If it gets enough votes then all candidates should be bard from the election and other candidates should be required.

[Sionnach Glic]

I agree. Having an option to show that you protest the election of any of the candidates would be a damn good idea.

[Grundig]

Logistically speaking though, what a nightmare. And what about the $600 bjillion from Obama's donors? They'd have a thing or two to say about that.