Normally, a site like this one isn't a place you visit to be confronted by issues, but because it's Election Day, I'm making a special exception.

I'm not political by any means, but I'm voting today and strongly suggest you do, too.

If the campaigns in your state have been anything like ours here in Iowa (bitter, name-calling diatribes equivalent to 5th grade hair-pulling), you might be turned off to the concept of voting altogether. But in the face of the alternative, democracy is an institution worth taking a few moments out of your day for.

This year, each political seat is being hotly contested. I plan on voting for the corporate-sponsored whore who ran the less offensive campaign. For me, 9 times out of 10 it's a Democrat. That's not an endorsement, but in my experience, I can't shake the stereotype that most Republicans are greedy, old white men who don't live anywhere near the tax-bracket or planet I come from.

I find the attachment of the Christian-right to the Republican party particularly scary. I'm often offended that Republicans use "family values" as an issue when attacking their rivals. I can't tell you how many ads I've seen where an ominous voice-over declares "Candidate X doesn't represent Iowa values". As if we all shared the same brain, or something. I know what's good for my own family, thank you. I don't need your mandate to make these choices for me. I can't find myself voting for a party that believes we should all behave like some homogenized 1950's nuclear family. Life is more complex than that.

Not that the Democrats don't have their share of faults. More often than not, they seem to think throwing money at a problem will make it go away. It usually makes it more difficult for those who really need help to actually get any.

In the end, it all comes down to money. I guess the Democratic attitude towards it just offends me less.

I'm not trying to piss off anyone who is a die-hard, card-carrying member of either party. I'm just extolling a preference. So please redirect any energy you would misspend sending me hate mail and use it for getting your lazy 20-something brethren to go out and vote. That was the point of this blog all along.

I don't vote because I believe in the candidates. I vote because I believe in the system the allowed these chuckleheads to get into power in the first place. If you cast aside your right to vote, you run the risk of losing it altogether. The best you can do is to mark your ballot and hope the guy you picked won't screw as hard as the other guy would have.