Comments on: Eliminating Voter Apathy

By: dan

dan — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 04:18:30 +0000

What difference would my vote make?
Whoever I vote for I end up with the same hacks who are bought and paid for buy the oil industry.
The election process is broken

By: Jerry Aulenbach, REALTOR®, BEd

Jerry Aulenbach, REALTOR®, BEd — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 18:32:16 +0000

I’m always curious to know why any government could be blamed for low voter turn out. Could it be that Albertans are comfortable with the economy and didn’t feel compelled to vote because they didn’t think they needed a change? Probably. Could it be that Liberals saw that their party was weakening and didn’t think that their vote would be significant enough to fight against the PCs? Maybe.
I would submit that the government’s new http://mypcmla.ca/ site might help a bit in the voter turnout by making MLAs more accessible and perhaps (not holding my breath) more accountable.

If you’ve ever participated in any campaign for any party at any level of government, you will know that on election day, gettign people out to vote is the biggest challenge there is. Perhaps the campaign volunteers (or lack thereof) are to blame. If you’re passionate about a party, volunteer for it and join the board of directors. It will only cost you $5 and a few hours a month, plus campaign time.

-Jerry

By: Bob

Bob — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 18:28:53 +0000

I wonder if the lack of response to partisan politics is because the frames don’t work anymore. I have voted in every municipal, provincial, and federal election that I could since 1972 but it is becoming increasingly difficult to find a party to support. My value set agrees with pieces of Conservative’s, Liberals, Greens platform but also disagrees with much of what I am expected to accept. I refuse to march lockstep behind policies and platforms that do not reflect my positions on issues. I have swallowed and held my nose and voted in the past but wonder if others, with less invested in this system (my 36 years as a voter), don’t bother. I suspect that the next generation will be more likely to think for themselves and wrestle with issues that do not fall easily in dogmatic political camps.
Maybe we need 83 idependent MLAs who vote with their brains and their conscience rather than MLAs from a variety of parties who are really just spouting party line and casting their ballot where they are told.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 02:15:50 +0000

The big turn out is because albertans don’t believe what politicians say anymore.
Another reason is also generation X do not get the influence from the candidates to vote, for instance why they should vote for that individual,
and so on.

There are more low and middle income families then those making 100k-500k dollars a year and most of the topic that middle and low income families would definitely vote for are: Schools, healthcares,
politician like the conservatives targets the rich people more than the working poor canadians.