I want to take this space to talk about a relatively unknown political character. His name is John McCain. You may have heard of him, although I don't blame you if you haven't. He's running for president of the United States of America. Politically, he's slightly between Bob Barr and Barack Obama, though probably a bit closer to Obama. I'm going to make a point to explain some things about him now, because you may not hear anything like this again before you vote (if you haven't already).
You see, I am voting for Obama, and you probably are too. But I want to let you know about this would-be political figure because I'm appalled to think that people just jumped to one conclusion without weighing all the options. And how can we know all the options, when some campaigns just refuse to waste their time and money on us?
Here's the breakdown: To date, I have seen only two campaign ads for this man: one from my girlfriend's roommate (a staunch Republican), and one hanging from Kappa Alpha Order's section (I'm not even gonna touch that one). Sure, McCain runs campaign ads on television from time to time, but they're generally not geared toward telling you where he stands on the issues. His main opponent has a cadre of committed undergrads who have been campaigning for him around the clock since school started. They painted the bridge, they brought in Kal Penn, they dormstormed, they knocked on every door on Central Campus and even brought in top North Carolina Democrats to lead the charge to the early voting stations.
I hate to use the word marginalizes. but this imbalanced attack marginalizes us.
Allow me to explain.
Democrats come out in force in order to get out the vote. They're investing time in simply getting students to register because, well, students are all Democrats (duh). As much as the Republican candidate (that's the McCain guy I mentioned earlier. You remember him, don't you?) has negative attack ads that ignore policy discussions, I'd say that Obama's ads reference policy even less. Polls disagree with me, but they're overlooking the countless online Obama ads simply asking you to register. He's not asking you to register and then vote for him because he doesn't have to. It's a foregone conclusion. You're a student, so you're a Democrat. Case closed.
Republicans don't waste their time on us, because, again, we're all Democrats. Rather than trying to woo us with pro-nuclear energy policy or reduced taxes on the highest-paying jobs (you know, the ones that we want), Republicans simply sit and hope to God that we don't vote.
The only Republican candidate to penetrate the thick smog of liberalism that apparently engulfs our campus is one William (B.J.) Lawson. His campaign literature, distributed liberally (pun intended) near the entrance to the early voting stations, reads, in part, as follows:
"Are you voting for change? Vote for William (B.J.) Lawson. David Price is a career politician and has been in office for 20 years. Voting for Price is not a vote for change."
In other words, the one Republican with the guts to enter the gauntlet of bleeding heart liberals decided, probably along with a team of well-versed strategists, that the best way to reach us was to show he was like Obama because he has no experience.
That blows. That's treating us like we're idiots, and I don't appreciate it.
But maybe I'm not being cynical enough. I know a student voter who picked judicial candidates based on the degree of their suffixes (so rest easy, Sam J. Ervin, IV). In an Oct. 17 article, The Chronicle asked a number of students what they thought about the Food Tax Referendum and none of the respondents had even heard of it. And when they did hear about it, they summarily denounced it. I can only assume they voted against tax-levying Democrats, right?
I know it's extremely important that we exercise our right and go out to vote, and I'm inclined to agree except for one caveat. Don't vote if you're only listening to your friends, your teachers or the one-sided ads that manage to reach you. Go to elizabethdole.org and find out exactly what it is that makes her less preferable to Kay Hagan. Go to price.house.gov, and figure out if our representative is the same guy who helped send the Rays to the World Series. Most importantly, go to www.sboe.state.nc.us to check out your sample ballot, and make sure you know enough about every candidate in every race before you vote for Obama.
Danny Lewin is a Trinity junior. His column runs every other Wednesday.
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.