“You don’t get to vote, You have to” – Ken Gordon

Ken Gordon’s term as Majority Leader of the Colorado Senate is coming to an end. I still receive his email updates even though I no longer live in his district. Sen. Gordon brings humor and simplicity to complicated and oftentimes, humorless topics. Here are some excerpts from his most recent email.

I think the American people have forgotten how to tell a good candidate from a bad one. The worse candidate with more money almost always wins. Mindless name-recognition television ads work. Cheap-shot ads work. Negative campaigning works. These work because many of the American people don’t pay attention to substance, or they can’t recognize it.

I admit that I am a Democrat and have attitudes about this that may be conditioned by that fact, but I don’t believe that an electorate that was paying attention would have re-elected George Bush. Democrats who don’t deserve to win have benefitted by this attention gap as well.

As someone who pays attention to policy discussions, I watched the 2004 election results in horror. The decision we make in a Presidential election, is a life and death matter to thousands of Americans in the armed forces and hundreds of thousands of people in the Middle East. It is crucial to whether we are able to preserve the earth and whether people get to see a doctor when they are ill. There could not be a bigger decision that an American makes than who they elect to public office and yet so many people treat this decision as though it is less important than shopping or going to a movie.

They act as if participating as a citizen in the goals and values of our country, a right for which over a million American soldiers have died, is someone else’s job.

Americans misunderstand the right to vote. They think they “get to vote.” They don’t “get to.” They “have to.” Democracy is not just a benefit. It is a responsibility.

We are a prosperous and powerful nation but primarily that is because of the work of previous generations from which we benefit. My father grew up during the Depression and fought in the Second World War. He kept up with current events and he never missed an election. He knew that prosperity and peace did not just happen.

I’m afraid it is going to take another major crisis to teach contemporary Americans that lack of attention to government can result in a terrible misery. Help show me that this fear is not justified.

We all need to be advocates for the deep-seated values that created this country. Justice, freedom, equality and prosperity do not just happen. If we think that they do, if we think that somehow they are here as a gift, rather than as the compensation for sustained endeavor we will lose them.

Don’t hesitate to write back to me with your comments.  Ken Gordon is currently the Majority Leader in the Colorado Senate. He can be reached at ken@kengordon.com.