I admit, I should know better than to become, or to have remained, ignorant of my states senators and the presidential candidates. Perhaps starting when I reached the legal voting age I should have been more aware of the United States' politics in general. Until recently, I did not really know too much about them.

Americans should become aware of and at least get to know the corner of planet earth in which their country resides. This awareness begins with each person’s immediate world: their home, community, state or province, region, country, etcetera.

And, this understanding should go deeper than one’s recognition or affiliation to a similar ethnic background and gender. Decision making of this kind bases itself upon the apparent and outward characteristics of a person. Decisions made like this are immediate because of personal attachments a person might not even be aware of.

 For the sake of impartial, truthful decision-making of the highest quality, shouldn’t each person weigh and balance what personal attachments are kept in the decision-making process?

<pre>If one has taken the time to think about what attachments we project onto the decisions we make throughout daily life, one may see that it is a process. We need to recognize what personal attachments we project towards another’s outward appearance, their behavior, physical appearance, gender and cultural background. We then need to recognize how this affects how we feel about that person and why. Decision-making of this kind needs to be more meditative, thoughtful or honest than deciding weather to stop or go when nearing an intersection as the traffic light has turns yellow.</pre>

The gut-feelings of intuition may help us make decisions in many instances. The influence of intuition may feel like a lingering yet ever-present truth, sprinkled upon us like fairy dust. However, when the rest of the world is watching and when our country tries to understand how to decide what person should be dubbed as the next president, we need some serious, logical thoughts to turn-up on our minds’ surfaces as well. Americans forget that the president is the figure-head, every American’s leader, the person that decides who goes to war, when, why and for how long. The president can and does change lives, laws and futures.

But, I am like many Americans. It is not that I do not care. I’m busy and I’m tired, and things are realatively comfortable after a long day. Giving my worries over to polititions that show up on T.V. in back of a Microphone only to falsely say that they will fight for our every wish and want is not one of my priorities.  And, like me, many Americans and perhaps polititions strive to keep away from true confrontation and conflict. We do not challenge the words that many leaders and want-to-be leaders give us. We accept a politicians talk as truth. Many times we forget that they are polititions, and that it is very difficult to become liked by a large group of people unless the politition says whatever people want to hear. The idea of flatering and giving the consumer whatever they want has spilled into various places within American Society. Political business is like that of commercialization.

The ads on the back of cereal boxes, billboards along the highway and customer rewards cards that clerks and cashiers try to sell me at coffee shop chains and bookstores take the pizzazz right out of my efforts to understand the community and cultural life happening around me.

The current news events are like the fine print at the bottom of your cell phone contract. Who has time to keep track of it all? If you miss a part of it, you have missed all of it, right? And sometimes I think "Of what benefit is it to take the time and energy to listen to these people of propaganda? It’s all going to happen regardless of what I think or do. Of what benefit is it for me and my life? The cost of gas constantly changes. Is a simple vote going to significantly change how much I am going to pay for gas each week?"

Like the procrastination that happens when one plans to start a diet or exercise, many Americans, including myself, put-off involvement in their country’s political issues.

And no, it’s not that I, and maybe you, think that political issues are not of great importance. Maybe it is because you find them too important and those that are involved in them will take care of them. But, this is diffusion of responsibility. We feel life is too full of things that we need to remember and do, so certainly someone else can handle what we should think about the next president. Or, maybe we should just choose to side with a candidate, quick.

There is not enough time in the day, or at least there are a lot of other things that need to be done before paying attention to all of the new nonsense that is going on in the news. When we hear about an issue that is not life-threatening or does not relate to immediate life, most of us would rather go take a nap. We want to hear about something that actually matters. Crazy things happen every day, but they usually do not relate to immediate life.

Yet, each American gets just one vote. I get one vote, the Mayor of my town gets one vote. Each of us is allowed this privilege and responsibility as an American. The rest of the world is watching you and me. Maybe not you or me individually, but as a whole, the world is watching what together, we will decide. What will we decide?

Will women vote for a candidate simply because she is a woman? I think she deserves more credit than that. Every candidate deserves more credit than to be judged by information found on a simple survey form: name, gender, birth date or age, ethnicity. They have worked too hard to be compared and contrasted in this way.

One may think that all of the presidential candidates have worked hard, maybe they all deserve to become president. In this case, voting could be a random act. However, it is what these individual democratic and republican candidates work towards. What candidate works with the mind of a president? What is a president? Who would make a good president? They are simple questions, but I am sure that not many have thought of answers.

As Aristotle writes, “All human actions have one or more of these seven causes: chance, nature, compulsion, habit, reason, passion, and desire.”