The Answer is 4

OK friends, here's what you get when Amy insists that I blog something. Antiestablishmentarianistic rants. And yes, I just used a 27 letter word.

The Answer is 4

Have you ever been to a sporting event and seen a wave start in the stands? All waves begin with a single individual. If that person’s lucky, a few more courageous folks will join in. It usually dies out after 10 or so people. Then, if that first person is willing to risk looking foolish, they’ll begin again. This time 20-30 new people join in. The others, cautiously pessimistic towards the idea that this small group will actually mobilize an entire stadium, remain glued to their seats. Each of them thinking, “As soon as there’s a majority, I’ll join in.” Once a few hundred people have taken the plunge, the numbers multiply exponentially, and thousands sit anxiously awaiting their turn. At this point, everyone joins in.

There seem to be two schools of thought on who to vote for.
A: The candidate that best represents your views.
B: The lesser of 2 evils with a realistic chance of winning.

In my experience, most Americans fall into category B. The most common reason given: “A vote for candidate A is essentially throwing my vote away, and making it more likely that my least favorite candidate will get elected.” A rational argument, no doubt. But is it the right decision? Wouldn’t it be interesting if everyone went to the polls to vote their conscience, regardless of what they thought the masses would do?

2+2 = 4. Most Americans know it. Yet many of us will vote 5 this year. We will debate and slander our opponent, who we feel is so far off the mark, that their politics would be likened to 2+2 = 13. Out of the many candidates running for office, there’s likely a candidate whose views almost exactly reflect yours. A candidate who believes 2+2 = 4 if you will. Yet politics have become so corrupt, that you’ll feel (with the help of the media), that said individual has no chance of winning. So rather than throw your vote away, you’ll follow the masses, and vote for 5. Now, 5’s pretty close to the correct answer. And certainly better than 13. But what if that 1 number inaccuracy happens to represent an issue as important as abortion? Or gun control? Or war? Can you rest comfortably knowing that you abandoned your principles on a key issue, because you feared how the masses would vote?

If you’re the smartest student in the class, you wouldn’t copy your neighbor’s paper. If you’re an educated voter, please don’t copy your neighbor’s ballot.

The term “electability” is thrown out a lot. Who decides whose electable? TV Networks. The same networks we ridicule for being immoral, biased, and unscrupulous are the ones we look to for our political marching orders. Long before anyone’s cast a ballot, the television anoints 2 or 3 “front-runners.” In a cyclical self-fulfilling prophecy of ignorance, Americans vote for who the TV tells them will win. Consequently they do well. Which validates the TV’s original opinion, which leads to more mindless votes, and so forth.

A common question I ask my LDS friends, is whether they would’ve voted for Joseph Smith during his 1844 Presidential Campaign, when clearly he had no chance of winning. A man who, long before Lincoln, stated in his campaign platform:

“Petition, also, ye goodly inhabitants of the slave states, your legislators to abolish slavery by the year 1850, or now, and save the abolitionist from reproach and ruin, infamy and shame. Pray Congress to pay every man a reasonable price for his slaves out of the surplus revenue arising from the sale of public lands, and from the deduction of pay from the members of Congress. Break off the shackles from the poor black man, and hire him to labor like other human beings; for ‘an hour of virtuous liberty on earth, is worth a whole eternity of bondage!’” http://www.bycommonconsent.com/2007/12/joseph-smiths-views/

Would you have voted for this man? Or for the status quo? Could your descendants look back at your 1844 journal, and see that you stood against slavery when that position garnered 2% of the vote? Or did you vote with the 98% who squabbled over Polk and Clay as the lesser of 2 evils? History honors those who stand for correct values, not those who block a slightly worse individual from power. If something was right yesterday, shouldn’t it be right, today, tomorrow, and forever? If ignoring “electability” and voting your conscience in an 1844 election was the right thing to do, should we not follow this pattern today?

I don’t condemn anyone for who they feel will best represent them. Everyone’s entitled to his/her beliefs. But what I can’t understand, is defying what you believe in, and casting a ballot for someone you don’t fully support.

2+2 = 4. And yet we’ll vote 5, because it’s more likely to win. Let us be the individuals to start the wave. If there’s one thing politics have proven, it’s that idiocy is contagious. But so is common sense. People are sheep. All it takes are a few bold citizens to stand up and begin a wave of common sense. If the underdog never won, there’d be no point in playing the game. If citizens always voted for the likely victor, we’d still be British.