Don’t rock the vote. Don’t get out the vote. Don’t vote or die. Simply put, don’t vote.

The amount of sheer ignorance supporters of both candidates have espoused during this campaign cycle is astounding.

On one side, you have fanatics hoping for change, because you have to hope for a change in failed policies. On the other side, you have supporters stating “McCain, at least he isn’t Obama.”

How has the decision to elect the leader of America boiled down to this?

Pew Research Center for the People and the Press recently concluded a nationwide survey to identify the average American’s political knowledge.

The results showed Americans are wholly uninformed about politics – only 18 percent of the population could state which party ruled Congress and who the Secretary of State is.

And given the poor statistics, the American population – on average – doesn’t deserve to vote.

Can you imagine if the Pew survey asked fairly harder questions like “Which candidate promised a $300 billion mortgage bailout,” or “Which candidate wants to give tax breaks to 45 percent of the working class who don’t pay taxes?”

Yet these are the issues the uneducated will vote for or against Nov. 4.

Citizens who don’t pay taxes will be voting for or against taxes – that should not be the case.

Similar to a corporation’s shareholder meeting, if you don’t have stock in the company, you are unable to vote for the board of directors or how the business is run.

It is not right for those who do not pay taxes to free-load off of those who do by determining how much the “wealthy” are to give to them.

And do people really think either candidate will bring about change?

Both are pro-war, albeit in different countries; both support endless spending; both support an increased deficit; both are enemies of a free-market and both candidates could care less about the American peoples’ civil liberties.

Even more, do people actually believe their vote counts any longer?

If the 2000 election taught us anything, it was that regardless of it being athematically impossible for one vote to make a difference, it is also politically impossible. Imagine the number of recounts, ballot dismissal claims, voter fraud charges and then the inevitable Supreme Court case to decide the election.

By voting, Americans are giving their consensus to those in power that they are still willing to play the government’s fixed game.

If you vote, you have no more right to complain about the outcome than those who didn’t; it will only make you a sore loser.

E-mail James Cannon at [email protected].