Showing Up to Vote

Here in the Northwest, as well as California, whether candidates showed up to vote has become an issue. One candidate for Seattle mayor and another one for county executive missed some elections. Meg Whitman, the former CEO of eBay didn't register to vote until 2002, and now she is running for governor of California (like many women, perhaps she didn't want to admit she was eighteen until 2002).

This is really a bogus issue. While it says, perhaps, something about busy schedules, complicated lives, and probably more about the complexities of voting in this country, it doesn't say anything about whether one candidate is qualified to be mayor or not. Certainly our democratic ideals are offended when someone wants to be elected and yet hasn't managed to vote in every election. But then what does it say about the guy (and of course there is one in this election) who has wanted to be mayor ever since he was in high school? Of course, he is the guy who hasn't missed voting in an election. Do we really want to elect someone who is that hard wired to get "one office?"

Certainly voting is important. It's an amazing privilege not many people in this world get to experience. Being committed to democracy is the first required qualification in running for office in America. But, whether you voted doesn't qualify you for an elected office.

And, by the way, what ever happened to keeping these things confidential anyway?