...In the best of my knowledge, to lower the voting age would make the percentage of participation decrease. If so many eightteen year olds are not voting now, how do we think that lowering the age would be anymore affective. The low percentages we have for voting now would greatly decline and we would eventually have no more of age people voting. Instead, I feel that we should be explaining the importance of this issue to the generations to come. To further let them know that to make America great again, the issue lies within the countries youth, not with the current president. Knowledge is the greatest known power in the world. Knowledge brought us to the democracy we have for the Unied States today. Voting is our chance to exercise those freedoms and powers of the people, so why do so many teens refuse to vote? Maybe we're scared to make the wrong decision and have that weight on our shoulders, but i know that without a voice, you are speechless. Everyone with such a big responsibility should take the time to really know what each canidate is promising. We need to explain this to our youth so they understand that this is their country too....
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...Megan Mahan Mrs. Keeth English II 1 November, 2017 Title The voting age in the United States should be lowered from eighteen to sixteen years of age. Lowering the voting age can increase the turnout of citizens who participate in electing officials. Once a teenager turns eighteen, they usually do not vote because they are off to college. Chris Lee states that eighteen year-olds do not have the time to vote because they are too busy in college, so they are less likely to vote when they get older (par. 7). If a teen does not vote until eighteen, though, it lowers the rate of voting because they are most likely not to vote ever or consistently. In the article “Lowering Voting Age could Increase Turnout” states “Many college-age students don’t pick up that habit because they live far from where they might be eligible to vote” (par. 8). Therefore, lowering the voting age can help get more people voting the older they get....
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...lowered. The current voting age is adequate although changes can be made. Well informed, mature voters are the key to making good choices when election time comes around. Lowering the voting age would create problems that America does not need to deal with. The main reason the voting age should not be lowered is there is an excessive amount of people below the age of 18 are not responsible enough to vote. Voting should be taken very seriously, since it decides who holds office in America. A great deal of young students do not grasp the gravity of casting a ballot. Is every single high school student fit to vote? Of course not. Can they become adequate voters as time passes? Absolutely. Trusting 16 year old trouble makers and class clowns to make a mature decision is not a great idea. These same kids, however, may grow up to be productive, mature citizens. Any age less than 18 is simply too low to allow to vote....
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...In the United States of America voting is a part of the U.S.’s freedom. In the USA may states are making it so not all the US citizens can't vote. These who can not vote have committed a crime. Either if it was a big crime a small crime the can't vote in some states. Many people are very anger by this because they simply made a dumb mistake as a teenager. Now they are having part of their freedom taken away even tho they have moved on and have a better life now. Voting should have restrictions but not taken away altogether. Out of 50 states only 2 have given the right to vote to every us citizen in the state. Even if they have committed a crime or not. Only Maine and Vermont are the only states in the USA to have all us citizens. Fourteen...
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...authentication for the voters are not provided in a proper manner. The integration of biometric in the electronic voting machine undoubtedly requires less manpower and it also saves much time of the voter and it also eliminates rigging and it also ensures accuracy, transparency for faster result and accurate result during the election. Hence a framework for electronic voting machine based on biometric identification to authenticate and voting can be used. The candidate’s identity shall be verified through this process by comparing the fingerprint of the...
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...to form a government, therefore a coalition was formed between the Conservative Party and the Liberal Democrats Party. I will be discussing two short term factors and two long term factors in my essay. The short term factors which I will be discussing are; the influence of the media and the election campaigns. The long term factors I will be discussing are; social class and the location of where the person lives. I believe that the influence on the media is the most important factor because the media influence so much of our lives nowadays and it is so easy to access all parts of the media through our phone. Therefore when a major newspaper is bias towards one they get more media coverage and the therefore it sways people’s opinions as all the positives about that political party are shown. Firstly, the influence of the media. The media nowadays comes in all different forms for example; newspapers, magazines, television and radio. The media is where people can form their opinions on the ability of political leaders and whether the government is doing a good job or not. The media determines what people see and what people hear, if they want to cover something up then they have the ability to do so as they decide what goes in to the public eye. In the dominant ideology model of voting behaviour its argued that the mass media has traditionally been supportive of the conservative party opinion and due to this it has persuaded a large number of the working class voters to vote in...
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...‘The election campaign is more important than long-term factors in shaping voting behaviour.’ Discuss. There are many different factors which effect voting behaviour, both long and short term, and in this essay I will be discussing whether I believe the more short-term election campaign, or long term factors have more influence on the way people vote. The region in which you live has a huge impact as to the way you are predicted to vote. In the north, especially in industrial areas, you would be much more likely to vote labour. This is because in these industrial areas there are incredibly high numbers of working class people who work in factories and mines for example and labour has many more policies put in place to help people who are of a lower class. An example of these policies is lower taxes which means working class people will have more money than they would otherwise have should the Tories be in power. In post war 2/3 of the working class population in Britain voted labour, and 4/5 of middle class voting Torie. ‘Class is the basis of British politics, all else is embellishment.’ -Pelzer (1967). This would suggest that 50 years ago many people believed that partisan alignment was purely based on class. This would suggest that purely based on partisan alignment, long term factors are more important in shaping voting behaviour. Ethnicity is also a factor in shaping voting behaviour. 80% of people from black and Asian origins living in the UK have voted labour since...
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...Assess the various measures, other than electoral reform, that have been suggested to improve democracy in the UK. The other measures to improve democracy in the UK are: having more referendums, lowering the voting age, making voting compulsory and finally the use of digital democracy. And this essay will assess all the measures and also it will determine which measure is the best to improve democracy in the UK. The first measure, which has been suggested to improve democracy in the UK, is the use of more referendums. A referendum is a popular vote where the people are asked to determine an important political or constitutional issue directly. A referendum has pros and cons. Firstly referendums are a device of direct democracy, which gives the general public direct and unmediated control over the governments decision making, this ensures that the public’s views and interests are always taken account of and are not distorted by politicians who claim to “represent them”. Another advantage is that referendums actually help to create a better informed, more educated and more politically engaged electorate, which gives the members of the public a strong incentive to cast there vote. Also another advantage is that referendums reduce the power of the government, because the government has less control over their outcome than it does over parliament, and therefore citizens are protected against the danger of over mighty government. And a final advantage to referendums is that there...
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...No Casinos Toronto Campaign Student’s Name Institution No Casinos Toronto Campaign Conflict expansion is the incorporated use of advocacy and lobbying, in an attempt to influence legislation changes. In the No Casinos Toronto Campaign, the advocacy groups employed conflict expansion to carry out the course. The groups ensured that most individuals in Toronto are aware of the campaign, and what it entails. They also coerced councilors to make legislation in opposition of the intended casino in the city. In their campaign, the advocacy groups ensured that councilors did not have a wide room for voting in favor of the casino. Conflict expansion is the rigorous use of lobbying and advocacy to manipulate legislation, without giving legislators much of a choice. This essay will evaluate the efficacy of conflict expansion, in regard to No Casinos Toronto Campaign. The advocacy groups in the “No Casinos Toronto Campaign” first contacted the legislators in the city regarding their opposing views on the proposed mega-casino. They wrote to the relevant authorities, regarding the upcoming effects of the casino on the public, the businesses and the Toronto society in general. They tried to convince the councilors to legislate in opposition of the mega-casino proposition (TogetherToronto, 2013). After communicating their stand with the legislators, the advocacy groups then launched and online campaign. The online campaign was to...
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...Argumentative Essay Should all citizens be required by law to vote in Australia? All citizens should be compelled by law to vote in Australia. In Australia today it is mandatory to be on the electoral roll and to vote at federal and state elections for all citizens over eighteen years of age. However, it has not always been the case. At the beginning of the 20th century most men and women were eligible to vote except for indigenous people who were excluded. Following poor voter turnout in a previous election, compulsory voting was introduced in 1924. In 1962 Indigenous people gained the right to vote and it was made compulsory for them in 1984. In 1973 the voting age was changed from twenty-one to eighteen (Skwirk , 2014). The following discussion will argue that the benefits of compulsory voting far outweigh the disadvantages. In our society we have certain obligations like paying taxes, compulsory education and jury duty. Compulsory voting is just another civic duty much less onerous than any of the above. Australia is one of only eleven countries to enforce participation in elections. A 94% voter turnout for the last federal election compared favourably to 65% in the 2010 United Kingdom election and 57% in the 2012 United States presidential election (Padmanabhan, 2015). The argument that compulsory voting is incompatible with democratic government obviously does not apply to Australia that is considered one of the most transparent, representative and least corrupt...
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...the trash. In the case of a tie, the results of the presidential election is placed into the hands of the House of Representative in which every state casts one vote. “Because each state only casts one vote,” says Bradford Plumer, “the single representative from Wyoming, representing 500,000 voters, would have as much say as the 55 representatives from California, who represent 35 million voters.” (Doc F) This shows that smaller states have more influence over the outcome of the presidential election and thus, the Electoral College promotes political inequality. Furthermore, this stage in the process throws the electorate’s votes into the trash because the states’ representatives can decide without any influence from the public (Background Essay). This indicates that the population’s opinion is no longer of value and therefore terminates democracy, the principle that declares that people rule in a democratic government. As a consequence of promoting political inequality through overcompensating smaller states in its decision-making and terminating the value of the popular vote through its tiebreaker strategy, the Electoral College is undemocratic and should thus be abolished. Not only are small states overrepresented during a tiebreaker, they are also overrepresented in the Electoral College in general. A combination of the electoral votes of the 12 smallest states and D.C. would generally sound as if it is very large in comparison to Illinois’ electoral votes, which is true as...
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...Compulsory Voting? Not so Fast A critical review of political scholarship regarding compulsory voting Word Count: 1644 Compulsory voting has been a hotly debated topic in the political realm over the past few decades, with supporters on both sides bringing up a wide variety of arguments and beliefs for support. The proposed idea of compulsory voting is the idea that would make voting in a democratic parliamentary election mandatory for all citizens who meet the age requirement; failure to do so will result in a form of minor punishment such as a small fine. The theory behind compulsory voting is that it will increase participation in parliamentary election, thus creating a more legitimate representative democratic system. Current major democratic countries that currently employ an enforced compulsory voting system include Australia, Argentina, and Brazil. This paper will argue that voting should not be made compulsory in Canada, on the principles that there is no proof that increasing voter turnout will legitimize our representational democracy, and that we have the right to abstention. I will prove this argument by examining the political scholarship produced by Sara Birch, Justine Lacroix, and Annabelle Lever. The first academic journal I will be examining will be that of Sara Birch in her 2009 paper The Case for Compulsory Voting. In this paper, Birch is advocating that all democratic countries should implement a compulsory voting system. Birch’s primary point...
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...Analytic Essay The political documentaries, Street Fight and Last Man Standing, portrayed elections that in an overall situational view were very similar. Both elections had a younger challenger than the incumbent; they also had one member that was from the area and one who grew up elsewhere, and like most elections they both had a central theme. Ethics, though, was the determinative factor for both. Street Fight showed the 2002 Newark, New Jersey non-partisan mayoral election between the longtime Democrat incumbent Sharpe James and Cory Booker. The old joke “the only way an incumbent leaves office is death or conviction” held true for this election as Sharpe James blatantly abused the power of his office to disrupt Cory Booker’s campaign, having the housing authority prevent Booker from canvasing buildings, sending code enforcement to threaten or shut down businesses for supporting Booker and having the police department tear down campaign signs on the day of the election. (Curry, 2005) Last Man Standing on the other hand had been about a rural Texas state legislature election in 2002 between the Republican incumbent, Rick Green and a Democrat challenger, Patrick Rose. With the number of ethical conflicts that had arisen for Green he was forced to acknowledge Rose and challenge him to several debates, backlashing, giving Rose even more of an opportunity to strike against Green’s ethics while in office and have more media face time within the district. The only thing working...
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...FA13 SOCI-101-1099 Prin. of Sociology -Online- Essay Why is United States Voter Turn-out so Low Question 4) What are some explanations for why voter turnout is so low in the U.S. compared to other wealthy, literate and democratic countries? INTRODUCTION Voter turnout is the rate by which people vote in elections. The simplest way to calculate a given election's turnout rate is to compare the actual number of voters with the voting-age population. “Voter turnout in the United States is among the worlds’ lowest.” (E.S. 371) The graph below taken from an article written for the Huffington Post in 2012, illustrates how poor United States voter turnout has been as compared to other industrialized nations. Our voter turnout is less than half of the turnout in Belgium and Australia for example and it is getting worse. "Starting in the early 60's, the proportion of the population that turns out to vote in the U.S. steadily decreased, to the point where only slightly more than half the electorate voted in presidential elections in the last three decades of the 20th century" (E.S. 370) [pic] Although there are several factors that contribute to low voter turnout in the United States, three factors appear to have the most direct influence. • Voter Registration and Voting Processes in the United States make it more difficult to vote as compared to other nations. • The Decline of Social Capital in the United States • The decline in the strength...
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...addressed. His language lacks meaning and is not informative as is he is deflecting the question at hand. Instead, he redirects the question towards the media and thus, misguiding the voters. The uses of phrases such as “If we don’t…” and “Then we have…” (NBC News, 2018) cause for the belief that there are only two options to be able to deal with immigration. This causes for the reader to believe there is an ultimatum. Trump fails to address how the exit and entry into the country will work and what will happen to those overstaying their visa’s due to his vagueness. In addition to this, during the presidential elections in 2016, Trump used the catch phrase, “Make America Great Again” (The Odyssey Online). Orwell presents a translation in his essay, “Politics and Language” regarding the existence...
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