Vote

Election Day. Hooray.

Thank God this will all be over by tomorrow. I can't imagine that this race will be close enough to warrant protestation of the results.

I've gotten a lot of flack at work for my insistence that I'm voting for Ron Paul. They're telling me that I'm throwing my vote away, which is an argument that I used way back in 2000 for those who voted for Nader.

Am I a hypocrite? Of course. And I've developed my worldview more through 7 years of college. I've always voted in nearly every election held since I've been old enough to vote. Except this one.

I could say that I'm ashamed. But I've abandoned my service to my country before, no matter how much I love her. I don't feel ashamed for not voting, I feel ashamed for lying that I did to my workmates. I didn't want to deal with that particular scorn. It's bad enough that they think that I'm throwing my vote away.

And this is the crux of my sorrow in this election. People are afraid that their vote won't count so instead of truly voting for a candidate that they believe in whose policies they agree with they sell out and pick the "lesser of two evils" instead.

Cowardice.

It is for this reason real change in the USA is stagnant and nearly unobtainable. In the primaries people wouldn't side with Ron Paul because his vision is too big.

"Get rid of the IRS? Pull out of foreign lands? Return to the gold standard? MADNESS!! We can't do that!"

What we can't do, it seems, is sacrifice our comfort for a few years to ensure the survival of our nation and the well-being of our children.

My country, my love, my homeland is dying. And we have the cure for the disease, but we're too afraid to take it.

Cowardice.

Since when are WE cowards? We're pioneers. We boldly go where none have before. We are the children of children who left their parents, their homes, their loves to pursue a free new world and a better life for their children.

And WE can't live without the newest iPhone?

I cry for what my love has become, and I sing because of what she still is.

I chose not to vote. It was my choice and it was a conscious one. And if I had voted I would have cast my ballot for a losing cause, standing against the tide of cowards who are afraid not to count for something.

Someday, I pray that God might use me in some capacity in the coming Reloveution. I see a day when our eyes are opened and we who have had to live with the mess that our parents have made of our nation decide to take a different path.

We can dream, can't we?