Friday, July 28, 2006

Turn elections into a lottery?

An Arizona politician has a referendum on the ballot calling for a 'lottery' to be attached to the voting process - you vote, you are entered for the chance to win a $1M! - or something like that. I agree with Jonah Goldberg:
"The push to make voting much easier has been considerably less controversial. Weekend voting, voting by mail and online voting are constantly greeted as vital reforms of our electoral system. And although some of these reforms are probably benign, all assume that even the slightest inconvenience in voting is an outrage because democratic health is purely a numbers game: More voters equals a healthier society. My own view is that voting should be more difficult because things of value usually require a little work. That goes for citizenship too."
Let's not turn our election process into some online, popularity poll. What's next, a rip-off of "American Idol": "American President" where we have a bunch of teenie-boppers on cells phones hitting re-dial for their favorite candidate? Yeah. That'll work.

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