I swear to God, three weeks ago I heard a man standing outside a Rite-Aid tell another man that he didn’t like Mitt Romney, but would still vote against President Obama, because “my uncle told me Obama set up Obamacare, so he’d make a big profit from it and send the money to his family in Kenya.” I felt almost grateful to the other man, who told Rite-Aid Guy, “Huh? I’ve never heard that. That can’t be right.”
That exchange came within a couple of days of a friend’s co-worker telling him that Jim Pendergraph wouldn’t get his vote in the congressional race because, “He says he’ll raise everybody’s taxes” — which was pretty much the exact opposite of Pendergraph’s position.
Those two incidents (in addition to insert-your-own-dumb-voter-tale here) remind us that many of our fellow citizens live in abysmal ignorance of even the most basic facts about how government works. All of which makes me believe it’s time to reconsider a question I asked in this column five years ago: Are some people just too damned ignorant to be allowed to vote? Or, posed perhaps more gently, how should we deal with the fact that America has some of the dumbest voters in the world?
We’ve all read or heard the sad tales:
More than half of Americans can’t name the three branches of the U.S. government. Some college students think the U.S. fought on Germany’s side against Russia in World War II. Over 75 percent of Americans can name at least two of the seven dwarves from Snow White, but only 25 percent can name two Supreme Court justices. On a typical election day, according to Pew Research Center, about 60 percent of Americans can’t name a single candidate in their own district, for any office. And, incredibly, recent polls showed that nearly half of American adults don’t know that the Supreme Court upheld the healthcare reform law — mind you, they didn’t agree or disagree with the decision; they didn’t even know it had happened. Sad to say, but it’s no longer all that surprising when you run into someone like Rite-Aid Guy and his Obama myth-making uncle.
By the way, in case you think you’re immune, take this quick quiz: Who is your representative in the North Carolina House? How about the Senate? I only knew one of the two; how’d you do?
I hesitate to bring up the issue again, as the last time I was blasted from left and right for being “elitist.” I hardly think it’s elitist to think that the nation and our common good is ill-served, to put it mildly, by letting uninformed dummies have a big impact on important political decisions.
At the same time, the notion of taking away anyone’s right to vote, no matter how dumb or misinformed, is out of the question. Every adult American’s right to vote is sacrosanct, and that goes for the apathetic as well as the news hounds, Einsteins as well as doofuses, billionaires along with the unemployed — everybody.
And yet … It’s also undeniably unjust — not to mention bad for the country — for ignoramuses to have the same say as vigilant, committed citizens. I’ve always agreed with the progressive view of democracy — one person/one vote — but I’ve gradually started wondering whether that can really work in a country where voter ignorance is so widespread. Here’s my idea, as imperfect as it is. I suggest some kind of voter test, maybe a combination of the basics-of-government exam taken by would-be naturalized citizens, and a current-events quiz. Results could determine how much your vote counts. Fail the test and you still get to vote, and that vote counts once. Ace the test and your vote would count as, say, three votes. Details could be worked out on the gradations of votes, how to implement such a system and so forth. Hey, it’s a preliminary idea, not a formal proposal.
Such a system wouldn’t be perfect, and you’d have to put measures in place to ensure it wasn’t abused. But, to my mind, almost anything would be preferable to a system that deems informed citizens’ input equal to that of the Rite-Aid guy. Because that, in essence, is the system we have now.
An earlier, different version of this column appeared in 2007, and is included in the author’s book Deliver Us From Weasels. For more information on the issue of voter ignorance, see Just How Stupid Are We? by Rick Shenkman.
This article appears in Jul 25-31, 2012.
A similar test should be issued to those who wish to run for public office. Too many Bachmanns out there.
It’s definitely not a left or right problem. While a significant percentage of self-described “conservatives” still believe Obama is Muslim, a comparable percentage of African-American voters believed in ’08 that if Obama was elected all of their loans – including mortgages – would be wiped clean (polls show that the percentage on that has stayed pretty much the same as they believe it hasn’t happened because Republicans have blocked him). Ed identified one reason why it would never happen. Obama has demonstrated a striking and discomforting failure to grasp many fundamental economic concepts on the micro- and macro- scales. So those in office would never agree to being vetted so plainly. But a bigger reason is that both parties rely on “useful idiots” to ensure they can always rely on a base level of support – whether it’s voters in their party who only need a few keywords from a couple of speeches to be good to go for that cycle, or the ones on the other side (who are typically the loudest) who will scare their base with the content and volume of their rhetoric. The modern calculus of elections can be quite depressing.
If you honestly think that a group of people, Dem or Rep, are willing to put a person in office, at the expense of millions, if not billions of dollars, for a job that pays roughly 200K a year, and that there is NOT something shady going on… you are too dumb to vote. If you honestly think politicians represent “the people” and not corporate interest, I have some bad news for you as well. Democrat and Republican are just two sides of the same corrupt, criminal empire. The only real choice was Ron Paul, 4 years ago, before he tried to be a Republican. Now the only real choice will be a revolution or a tyranny. American’s are too busy watching American Idol or Dancing with the stars for a revolution, so you can guess where we are heading.
I think a great start would be the elimination of any hint of party membership on the ballot, much like they do with judges.
Then if we could get people to stop listening to what politicians say about each other and listen to what they say about themselves and their plans if elected.
I am so tired of campaign ads that say “vote for me because the other guy is a crook”.