In a Representative Democracy, the people of the state elect their leaders for a short term. In place those leaders are expected to govern on behalf of their constituents. But what happens when the majority of people become disinterested in the process? What happens when the people are too busy to research the issues? What happens when the attitude of the people is that politics is boring?

What happens is that we the people are abrogating our own voice. In the 2004 presidential race approximately 72 percent of eligible voters registered to vote and out of the entire voting population about 64% voted (U.S. Bureau of Census http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/voting/004986.html) . During that time 31% were registered Republicans, 34% were registered Democrats, and 24% were independent. At the same time 36% identified themselves as conservative, 18% as liberal, and 41% as moderate (The Harris Poll #19, March 9, 2005 http://www.harrisinteractive.com/, faithful/index.asp?PID=548).

If you figure that some of the registered Republicans and Democrats are moderates that could be swayed to vote either way, I think you could safely say that about 30 - 35 % of the voters are in play in an election year. That means that roughly 19 - 23 % of eligible voters actually decide who wins. It is a lot easier for a candidate to go after and persuade that 19-23% than it would be to have to get 50 % of the population to win. Now of that 19-23% of actual voters, how many of them take the time to study the facts? And how many of them are swayed by slick ads and public opinion polls? What if only half of these moderate voters actually researched their decision? That would mean that only 9-12% of the critical voting population is making a serious educated decision!

Now the last paragraph is not scientific, it is just my supposition but it points out the fact of just how few voters are making the decisions on who gets elected. For the majority of voters, they are following the party line and are easily swayed by campaign slogans, "Bush lied and people died", "Kerry is a flip-flopper! Flip-flop, flip-flop!" I think that most of these types of campaign slogans are designed to keep the party faithful faithful. The real trick is how to sway the emotions of the undecided. That is why the candidates take great pains to hide there extreme positions and try to appear middle of the road. Slick ad campaigns and very carefully worded position papers are designed to appeal to the emotions and offer little of substance. That is why I think that we have a Manipulative Democracy. When you ad to that mix the influence of motivated special interests groups, you get the government that we have today.

In order for our country to reach our full potential, we need to have engaged citizens that are willing to take the time to look behind the curtain and take a good look at the man turning the gears. In a democracy, it is your responsibility to stay informed so you can make an educated decision. That is the only way to turn our manipulative democracy into a true representative democracy.

- Thomas Paine 2

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