Old news, but still rather disconcerting...

[ramblin_rosie]

A 2008 Intercollegiate Studies Institute study found that elected officials generally score worse on a civic literacy exam than does the general public. (You can take the exam yourself here. I didn't think it was all that hard--got 32 of 33 right myself.)
Makes you wonder why we're voting for people who don't know how American government is supposed to work, doesn't it?

Comments

[ramblin_rosie]

Not disagreeing! And it's also not like you're proposing a literacy test to be able to register to vote (also a wise idea, IMO, but harder to sell when people claim requiring photo ID to be able to vote somehow constitutes a poll tax). I've just learned not to underestimate the ability of the perpetually aggrieved to throw the race card at any and every proposal they don't like, even when it makes absolutely no sense to do so.

[hoppytoad79.livejournal.com]

I'd never back literacy tests to be able to vote because that would clearly disenfranchise a disproportionate percentage of non-Whites of voting age, especially in urban areas and from lower socioeconomic classes, skewing the vote in favor of middle- to upper class Whites from the 'burbs.

I'll support efforts to require photo ID to vote when I can see data from a non-partisan third party that shows voter fraud is common and/or prevalent enough photo ID is needed. I've read some opinions on why requiring voter ID hinders certain demographics from voting that make excellent points, and I've read about voter ID laws that are on the books (or were at the time the piece was written) that definitely smack of being written with the intention of making it difficult for certain people to vote.

On a different politics-related topic, I think what America needs right now is for millions of citizens to converge on Capitol Hill and the Congressional office buildings and confront all the Congress(wo)men who have done nothing for years except sit there and put playing politics over representing their constituents and actually getting down to the business of legislating. It's clear any voice we might have when we vote isn't loud and strong enough that they care to heed it, so I think it's time we showed up in person and sat in the waiting areas of their offices and clogged the halls and generally got in their faces and demanded answers and accountability. Accountability is long, long, long overdue.