[Vision2020] Youth and discernment

[Joan Opyr]

Pat writes:

"I have come to the conclusion that people shouldn't be allowed to vote until they are 30 and have finished serious classes about the two parties and the candidates. AND about our history and what the
different parts of our government actually do. I really am coming to believe that some people just shouldn't have the vote. All these kids that Ophra and others are getting registered only know what people are telling them. They have not yet paid enough taxes, tried to start a business or gone far enough in life to learn who they really are and what they really think. I know that because I was one of them. When I talk to people about our history and form of government I am well aware that too many people weren't listening in History classes."


While the young arguably lack experience and occasionally wisdom, it's also the case that there's no fool like an old fool.  Those 18 year-olds that Oprah and others are registering to vote represent our primary supply of warm, willing bodies for the war in Iraq.  It's not the old white farts of Congress -- or of Latah County -- who are out there patrolling the sands of Samarra.  And it's not the wrinkled and arthritic who will be paying off our national debt.  No, it's those poor benighted young people, the ones Pat thinks ought to be disenfranchised who will be (and are) saddled with our burdens.  If anyone should be denied the vote, perhaps it's those of us who are sitting here at home on our ignorant fat asses, watching reruns of "Murder She Wrote," racking up debt, and blowing out smoke about wolves and terrorists, snipe hunts and tax cuts.  Youth doesn't make you stupid and age doesn't make you smart.  Not only is discernment hard to measure, it's damned hard to find -- kind of like a fart in a Jacuzzi.

You see, I did listen in history class, and what I learned is that the old bitch tends to repeat herself.   

Joan Opyr/Auntie Establishment   Get more from the Web.  FREE MSN Explorer download : http://explorer.msn.com
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