EDITORIAL

The Advocate-Messenger

If you are among the small minority of Boyle County residents who are still not registered to vote, you still have time to change that. If you’re reading this paper before 4 p.m., you can head to the Boyle County Courthouse and register; or you can register online at govoteky.com until midnight.

But registering does not mean you have done your duty as a U.S. citizen. Registering means you’ve signed up to support democracy — but you still have to show up on Nov. 6 and vote for that support to mean anything.

Registering to vote is like checking the “I’m Interested” button on a social-media event invitation. Lots of people do it, but not nearly as many people follow through.

That analogy only takes you so far, however — it’s understandable when people say they might attend a social gathering and then find something better to do or just don’t feel like it. It is in no way understandable or justifiable not to vote because you don’t feel like it. And you’ve literally got nothing better to do, because there is nothing more important to the survival of our freedom than the concerted effort of all us to maintain it.

Not showing up to vote on election day is like buying a new car by picking a couple strangers off the street and asking them to buy a car for you without setting any parameters. Will you get a brand new Audi when you needed a used Rav-4? Will you get a motorcycle when you needed a minivan? Will you be paying $150 or $600 a month? You won’t know, because you left it up to someone else to decide. That’s not just apathetic, that’s just crazy. And it’s not how you or anyone should try to run a representative democracy.

Voter turnout this general election will be much better than turnout in an off-year or a primary — not that we’re excusing low turnouts in those elections. But it still probably won’t be anywhere near 100 percent, which means our democracy won’t be 100-percent as good as it could be.

Claims about one vote not making a difference or the candidates all being the same are old hat and just throwaway excuses used by people who would rather be lazy than vote. The truth is you live in a country based at its core on the idea that The People as a whole should hold and control their own destiny.  You are a part of The People and you owe it to everyone else to help hold and control that destiny. Go vote on Nov. 6.