I don't know what to vote for

[jethrien]

I made my decision for the presidential vote months ago. I'll sit down this weekend and do a little research and confirm my intentions for Senate and the House. And apparently I only have one choice for Freeholder.

It's the propositions that have me totally confused.

I spent about twenty minutes last night trying to tease apart the actual statements and the descriptive text to understand what they mean. Not only is it difficult to understand what the underlying issue is, they're written with so many twists that it's hard to tell what the "yes" or "no" means, even if you know where you stand on the issue. (I want bonds? I want to be able to vote whether to create bonds? I want the state to be able to create bonds, which will then be subject to vote? I want to create an amendment which will allow the state to be able to create bonds, which will then be subject to vote? I want Cthulhu to eat the legislators who want an amendment which will allow the state to be able to create bonds, which will then be subject to vote?)

And the worst part is, in all the questions, I suspect that simply understanding the issue wouldn't help. They sound to me like the opening salvoes of someone else's political battle - that is, these votes are intended to create the opportunity for someone to do something that is not referred to at any point in this statement. None of them are about issues - they're all about tinkering with the proper way to do things (who can create bonds, how judges are chosen, who chooses the school board). Because I don't know anything about the internal manuvering, I have no idea what real world impact any of this will have.

Some thoughts:
1) I'm an Ivy League grad who interned in fixed income, and I can't figure out what any of this actually means. Which means that 99% of the voters will probably also not be able to understand this. And because of the way the question's worded, I suspect a large percentage will end up voting for the opposite of what they think they are voting for. I'm still not positive that I'm not in both groups.
2) I'm living in a heavily democratic-leaning district. These are the one place where my vote might actually matter.
3) Because I'm guessing most people will vote randomly or incorrectly, any vote I make will probably get completely lost in the random static.

Cheerful, no?

Comments

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

I tend to see any votes in local NJ politics as not between Democrat and Republican but between corrupt and corrupt. I hate NJ politics.

[cubby-t-bear.livejournal.com]

Somebody once explained to me that New Jersey politics is institutional, not issues-based. What that means is, you swear fealty to some political figure, and vote the way he wants you to, and in turn he takes care of you. Very Godfather-esque.

I don't know how accurate this is, but ...

[jethrien.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that sounds about right.

[jeths-mom.livejournal.com]

I think that may be true of North Jersey. I'm 100% sure it's true of Rhode Island. At least there, you know what you have to do to get what you want. As long as you don't wake up with the horse head...

[jethrien.livejournal.com]

I think there was a recent statistic saying that I live in one of the most corrupt cities in the country. Yay!

Incidentally, the school board question is on the ballot because we haven't had one in ten years. Apparently we're getting to take control back from the state this year. ...Yay?

[fyrna.livejournal.com]

I skipped those questions. I had no clue, and there were no analyses on the internet to shed any light on them. :/

[xannoside.livejournal.com]

I'm not happy with Sires because he voted in favor of FISA, but since his opponent has gone on record that he can't be bothered to leave the office to campaign and hasn't taken a stand on anything, I don't feel like he deserves my vote.

So I'll either hold my nose and vote for Sires, or just not vote for the House rep.

Between Lautenberg and Zimmer in the Senate, I am somewhat torn.

I'm only lukewarm on Lautenberg. He and I agree more than disagree, but I'm concerned that he's just too old to effectively be Senator (he's 84), and he pretty much didn't do anything in his last term, at all.

I disagree a lot with Zimmer, but I generally like his strong stance again government waste. He's a bit too much "free market fixes everything" and Bush-policy-supporter for me, though.

[lithoglyphic.livejournal.com]

At least you've remembered to look over the propositions. For the last two elections I've gotten deer-in-the-headlightsed by them at the voting machine.

[beastin.livejournal.com]

I generally go check the summaries provided by the league of women voters, but I just looked and it seems that they don't have summaries for New Jersey. Curious...

When in doubt (or in anything less than conviction) I typically vote no on propositions on the grounds that somebody is probably trying to game the system.