Writing an Endorsement

I have never voted before. I never paid attention to politics because from my perspective it seemed as if it was nothing but childish partisan bickering. To an extent, I think it still is. I viewed the one previous presidential election as a "lesser of two evils" proposition, rationalizing it as "neither of these men represent me, a middle-class white college kid, so why bother voting for either of them or some crackpot third party candidate?" Sometimes, I would just tell myself that I was doing the responsible thing by not voting. By not voting, I was keeping myself from making an uninformed choice based on something other than the issues that matter.

Then I was forced to research politics for this class. In all honesty, I was not happy about it. I watched the debates and could not focus on what they were saying. It was a real struggle.

Then we were told to write an endorsement. It was then I realized, I don't know what I believed. If I did manage to scrounge up the motivation do go and vote, I was slightly leaning towards voting for Senator Obama because he was younger and not a Republican. I think there are more than a few people I know who are going to vote for him simply because of that reasoning. That's irresponsible.

As cliche as they sound, the old adages are true. People died so you could have the freedom to vote. If you choose not to vote, you don't have much of a right to complain about the leadership. P. Diddy was a bit off in his Vote or Die campaign. Voting shouldn't be an ultimatum, but the point I'm trying to make is that a little bit of research goes a long way in determining who you would likely vote for.

In researching the topic of foreign policy, it came to my attention that Obama's stances on such pressing issues as Iraq, Iran, and Russia were far and away better than those of Senator McCain.
As I began to understand just what foreign policy entails and how important it was, it occurred to me that I didn't want to vote for Senator Obama, but based on what I believe, I need to vote for Senator Obama.

The bottom line is, endorsements serve a purpose. Even as I had to write a full one for myself, it became apparent that no matter what your beliefs are, whether you share mine or disagree, you really should vote on November 4th. This is your best opportunity to be represented and see the country go the way you think it should progress.