Today marks the two year mark of a day where change was brought to America. Change that a lot of us were excited about when it was talked about. I use "us" and "were" as key words in that sentence, because, yes I too was convinced of this "change". However, in these past two years, I cannot tell you of any change that has occurred (except for maybe healthcare) that is phenominal enough to say that this change is what we needed. I wouldn't go so far as to say that I regret any decision to vote for this said change or to say that if I could go back that I would vote for the other candidate, because I wouldn't. I just feel like elections and election campaigns are nothing but empty promises and selling of oneself to people who do not know what to think or believe (the people who do know what to believe for the most part cannot be convinced to vote in a different direction). Campaign commercials are the PERFECT example of selling oneself while doing nothing but putting down your opponent in the process. Why, oh why can't we all just get along??
Off Soapbox.
On a similar note. I DID NOT vote today, but not by choice. I do not read directions all the time, and evidently the State of Tennessee has a solid process to weed out the idiots that live here who do not read directions from voting. Evidently when I attempted to register to vote I checked a box that indicated that I fully admit that I had been convicted of a felony without pardon. So, the lovely state of TN does not actually run a background check on their residents, instead they take my word for it and tell me that I am not allowed to vote because I have been convicted of a felony without pardon. Imagine my thought process when I opened a letter (fully expecting it to be my voter registration confirmation) to find out that I cannot vote because I am a felon. (when was I arrested? was jail so fun that I don't remember it? what did I do? was that so much fun that I don't remember it? boy, I sure hope this is a big mistake!) So, I call the office of voter registration to find out when I was convicted of a felony and why I did not know about this, and they have one thing to say to me..."When you were filling out the form, you indicated that you had been convicted of a felony, the only way to fix this is to come to the Downtown Memphis office during regular hours to re-register." Well, that would be great if I lived in Memphis to fix this, since I do not, I was unable to fix it and vote in this election. Now that everyone knows that the State of TN is awesome at checking backgrounds of voters, if you live here and have been convicted of a felony but still feel like your voice should be heard, check "no" on the form. Simple, right?
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