Sunday, November 02, 2008

None of Your Business

With the election only a couple of days away, it seems there's just no getting away from it. Trust me, I've tried. So, I decided to ask the one person whose opinion I trust, my two-year-old daughter, who she is voting for this time around. It went like this:

Me: So, who are you voting for in the presidential election?
GK: None of your business.

Short and sweet, and spoken with all the passion of someone not yet old enough to vote. And so very true. As a kid, I'd ask my parents that very question and I always got a very similar answer . I'm not sure when it became okay to ask someone who they're voting for, but it ranks right up there in impoliteness, for me, with asking someone how much money they make.

And, I believe, it's the height of arrogance to think that anyone would care who you're voting for. Or that you could possibly change someone's ideology simply because you watched an extra half hour of Fox News or took one more directive from The Oprah.

Having said that, I spent most of last week trying to get people to talk to me about the election for a story that should run in tomorrow's Commercial Appeal. And on Election Tuesday, I'll spend the entire day at as many polling places as possible to ask people who they're voting for and why, so if you see me, say hello and tell me why you feel compelled to stand in line for so long. These little stories will be found updated all day on the CA's website.

So it seems that I don't care who you're voting for unless I'm paid to care, which may be indicative of a particular party or ideology, but who's to say which one?