Thursday, January 01, 2004

To Party or Not to Party

A few months ago, I was visiting the Neal Boortz site (http://boortz.com/) and no, you don’t have to type the www in front) and found a link to the world’s smallest political quiz (see link below). It is a series of 10 questions on personal and economic issues. Your answers tell you where you stand in your political views (just in case you don’t know or, like me, are having an identity crisis).

I’ve always felt that you have to vote in elections to have the right to complain about what those rascals in Washington (or Tallahassee or City Hall) were doing with your tax money. And to vote, you have to be informed and understand what you were voting for.

When I first registered to vote, I registered as a Democrat. Then, when I moved to Kansas, I decided that I didn’t want to be affiliated with a specific party, so I registered as an Independent. When I moved back to Florida, I registered again as a Democrat. And, finally, a few years ago, I had had it with the Democrats and re-registered as an Independent. I wasn’t happy about it because it took away my privilege to vote in primary elections, but I couldn’t allow myself to be associated with the antics going on in Washington at the time. I got very tired of explaining to people that just because some Democrats were doing this or that, not all Democrats were guilty of the same thing. And I couldn’t bring myself to embrace all that the Republicans were doing, either.

I just couldn’t find a place where I felt comfortable. It was about this time that I first took that little political quiz and found that I was more Libertarian than anything else. I want government and politicians to stay out of my bank account and out of my private affairs. I honestly believe that I know what is best for me, not some politician in Washington or Tallahassee who doesn’t know me.

I’ve spent more time learning about the Libertarian party and found that I agree with a lot of their foundation. I’m not ready to change affiliations yet again, but I will be doing some more study on the matter. Since the US is basically a two-party system I will have to give up my primary election privileges. No, I haven’t forgotten that there are other political parties out there, but let’s face it, they just aren’t powerful enough to play in the same sandbox with the Republicans and Democrats.

But in the meantime, I will be studying the Libertarian party and those rascals who want the White House so that I can make an informed, educated decision next November.

http://www.self-gov.org/quiz.html

Once again, if you have trouble with either link, please do yourself a favor and either copy and paste it into your browser or type it in. The quiz is fun if nothing else. And you might learn somthing about yourself.

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