Here's the vote: Encourage registration, responsibility

The new push is to make it easier for potential voters to get their registrations in and to make them easily ready to cast their ballots.

And that's fine. People should vote. It is a right and a responsibility of every citizen.

But as we push more people to register, we should also push them to learn to vote responsibly, to research the candidates and to make their own decisions. We should not want people who cast votes blindly -- on either side.

What bothers people about the mass registration push and the removal of checks and balances is that the vote will be cheapened, as more people cheat and don't even care enough to learn for whom they are voting.

And that is not what this should be about -- not if voting really means something.

There is nothing wrong with demanding a certain level of competence and thoughtful reflection from a voter. We want quality, not quantity. That's how the best decisions are made.

Published in Editorials on September 21, 2012 10:27 AM