A California Democrat on Facebook posted a link to “College students say they can’t send in their absentee ballots because they don’t know where to buy stamps” (Business Insider) and added the following:
Post Office policy is to deliver your ballot whether it’s stamped or not – so don’t let your lack of a stamp stop you from voting.
He is well beyond college age so I’m not sure how many of these stamp-ignorant Millennials might be reached by his post.
My response:
It will be awesome to see these folks, who are unable to find a post office, denounce Trump voters as “stupid.”
Happy Election Day to everyone! My ballot here in Massachusetts is nearly all candidates running unopposed, but I would be interested to hear from readers in states where not everyone agrees on the One True Path.
[My Facebook feed today is filled with friends bragging that they voted, often complete with a photo of an “I voted” sticker as proof. Most of these folks live in states such as Massachusetts or California where the outcome of the election is not in doubt, but these folks often describe their actions in heroic terms and add some trash talk about how people in other countries don’t get to vote (where is that true?). My Facebook friends are living through (and heroically acting in) dramatic times:
It is not the Democratic Party on the ballot today, but democracy itself.
More than perhaps ever before, your vote matters a great deal
Probably more is at stake, then, than during the 1860 election in which Abraham Lincoln ran as an anti-slavery Republican?]
As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.
H. L. Mencken
This is one of the funniest post I read in a while. It shows how disconnected some voters are.
To be fair, the Business Insider article does not say how large or random the focus group is. Furthermore, I would expect the same result from a Republican focus group if the same study was done.
That said, I’m not surprised. Today’s generation are so “connected” to the point they know less because they have a short time span. Not only that, they have not seen any hard-times like we had in the 20’s, 40’s, 60’s or even 80’s. Many would end up in a hospital, with a mental breakdown, if they lose their cell phone for few hours or cannot find a Starbucks.
George: Your point makes me think that very few people suffer from this lack of knowledge. If a young person doesn’t know where to buy stamps, why wouldn’t he just pull out his phone and ask Siri?
Most of the world lives in Calif*. Jury duty seemed to go down after I stopped voting, years ago. Voting is quite meaningless in Calif*, anyways. The most influential laws have lately been enacted by the governor, regardless of voters. The legalese of the hundreds of propositions is completely undecipherable.
I’ve not been in California since 2012, but, in 2012 when I was in San Diego I needed to mail my US taxes. Google had a very hard time finding a real post office which as a non US resident is important since I wanted registered etc mail.
The article is about students in Virginia, in California our mail in ballots come with a postage paid envelope.