The “Water Cooler” is a feature on Claycord.com where we ask you a question or provide a topic, and you talk about it.
The “Water Cooler” will be up Monday-Friday in the noon hour.
QUESTION: Do you think a majority of voters are informed about the propositions, people, etc. they’re voting for, or do you think most people just blindly vote down their party line?
Talk about it.
Depends how knowledgeable you are.
The electorate has been highly entrenched since at least 2016. Conservative and liberal media ecosystems feed fuel to this fire.
Propositions in California are an interesting situation. I am of the opinion that many people vote on propositions based upon television advertising, which is unfortunate because these ads largely rely on distortions if not outright lies. My default judgement is to vote ‘no’ on all propositions unless my research proves otherwise. This goes for bond measures as well.
I definitely think most democrats do.How can things be so bad and they keep voting for the same people and spending money like there is no tomorrow.
I think , obviously the majority of voters in this state blindly vote democrat without knowing any facts or truth or reality. That’s why the quality of life in this state is deteriorating without much hope for the future.
The only party line I would follow is a Conga
In California, it’s blind and stupid…
Take Prop 1 as an example, turnout for March election will be low and there is $14,723,362.13 to spend on advertising. As a side benefit newsom gets free TV face time as undeclared presidential candidate.
Too many have attention span of a Fungus Gnat and vote for whatever advertising they’ve seen.
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An after shiff for brains advertising we’ll probably be stuck with it.
O G, correct you are…
Prop 1 is another sham.
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Like Prop 47; people are being mislead with Prop 1…
Eye Candy, Soundbites, Political Photo Opp., another tax grab…
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Prop 1 is 69 pages of legalese that very few will actually read and most can’t comprehend.
Most Prop’s are the same and few read them.
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https://vig.cdn.sos.ca.gov/2024/primary/pdf/topl.pdf
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Who accepts the challenge? You better put on a huge pot of coffee…..
🙂
Have been voting each time since I was 22, so 44 years now.
Read all the details before voting and keep my fingers crossed that I made the best decision.
I know too many who vote blindly or don’t vote at All!
Try to share info with them, to hopefully get them to at least check it out pro & con.
Whether or not if they agree, I rather see them learn & vote.
Thank You for taking the time to be an informed voter.
Wish we had more like you.
I’ve been voting even longer but like you, read the details and there are times I will not vote for party preference. In those few cases I will vote for any other smaller party. Sometime wish CA had a “none of the above” option.
In each election cycle the Los Angeles Times publishes a thorough analysis of each ballot proposition. Though it is one of several of my sources, it is one of my first stops as I find it to be a solid source for beginning to understand each proposition.
Ballotpedia.org/california. Try this
Let me add my default source, Ballotpedia.
List of California ballot propositions, going way back.
https://ballotpedia.org/List_of_California_ballot_propositions
right up there with ya Roz, I read about every item I can vote on (unless the candidate provides no info, which happens once in a great while, a lot of time with judges-yes, I read about judges, school board members…if they had dog catcher, I would research that).
I think too many people get their information from talk shows, or cable news stations like MSNBC, CNN, and FOX, which to me, seems to be a huge mistake. They are all biased in their reporting and will embellish, and spin the story to make the other side look bad. The media has a strong influence on people, and can be an influence on how they vote. Even the most open-minded can be subconsciously influenced by what they hear and see on TV. I think the best way to be politically informed is to stop watching so much news, and when you do watch the news, don’t believe everything you hear or see. Video clips on the news can, and often times, are edited and altered, and taken out of context to make it seem to be something it isn’t.
One example of untruthful reporting, is telling us that everything and everybody is racist. Look around and see what’s happening in real life, we interact with people from different ethnicities every day, and nobody is being hateful towards other one another, we generally get along.
I’m not saying don’t watch MSNBC, CNN, or FOX, just be honest with yourself, and use your critical thinking skills. Be objective, and not subjective.
There’s more honest news out there, but it can be difficult to find. It’s even difficult to research political candidates on Google, because Google is extremely biased, and what you get may not be straightforward. C-SPAN is probably one of the most candid and impartial news reporting out there. It gives us an inside look on how our government works, and we can see first hand how and what our representatives believe in and what they have to say about it.
The majority of voters probably vote party line, but a good percentage of the minority of voters are well informed.
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This is why party affiliation and occupation of candidates shouldn’t appear on ballots. Voters would be more likely to know who and what they’re voting for.
People are so gullible and ignorant 🙄 and always think that their party is the best so they vote straight D or R. The fact is, the entire election process is completely rigged and nothing more than an illusion thus dog and pony show, so why vote anyway? Also, voting simply gives you a false reality where you literally are wasting your time picking what amounts to the lesser of two evils which is still evil. Get your collective heads out of the sand!
I believe that people vote for the candidate who says what they want to hear.
Or, whoever has the most signs up around town.
The overwhelming majority of voters have trouble pulling themselves away from their TV game shows long enough to open a ballot & fill in all the little ovals next to the names with a “D” alongside them, much less waste any time watching the news, reading or catching up with politics from any online sources to form an intelligent opinion on anything.
They don’t know anything and it does not matter because every idiot with a pulse is allowed to vote…. and they do.
How is anything supposed to change & get better when complete morons are allowed to determine our future?
Voters should be required to be licensed to vote just like drivers are licensed to drive.
Proof of citizenship, residence & age, a basic civics test and all of it in ENGLISH!
If you can’t speak and read our language then you can’t possibly have any idea what’s going on here and your input isn’t worth spit.
You make it sound like no people were pulling themselves away from Fox News and filling out the little oval next to names with an ‘R’. But you’re right, that probably never happens. 😉
Nobody uses Fox news. It’s time to retire that talking point. You sound out of touch. Like a troll from the 90s
Due to Cnn and msnbc failing so hard. It doesn’t mean anything. I know numbers are white supremacy but at least try. Critical thinking is a lost art apparently. Have fun in fantasy land, or clown world whatever you prefer to call it
JWB…. Whoops! I mean Atticus….I know there are some neanderthals on both Red Team & Blue Team, but I would just encourage those on the left to watch FOX News for one hour & then watch CNN or MSNBC for an hour & then ask themselves why FOX shows more news stories (and all the details) while the others omit them?
Poison is poison Jelly. Just cause you slightly prefer the taste of some over the others don’t make it wise to ingest any of it.
Fox has said in court they are not a news channel. The are an entertainment channel.
DOH,
CNN, and MSNBC, would say the same thing to cover their a$$.
The people in the United States who do vote, tend to remain very loyal to either the Republican or the Democratic Party, a loyalty based primarily on emotional ties formed during the earlier socialization process. Most people do not choose a party based on the basis of political opinions, usually because they are not well informed about political issues. Instead they affiliate with a party and then are educated by the party’s stand on the issues. Because they are loyalto their party, they accept the stand of the party. People usually have strong moral issues, and they will leave their party and will not vote or vote for the other party if they disagree with their own party’s stand. Some groups outside the major political parties attempt to bring moral issues into politics. They recognize that a large minority of people can often be easily influenced by emotional issues, and they have used these issues to attract followers. They cannot however, attract the majority of voters. If a certain number of the majority of voters agreed upon a certain issue, then the major political parties would also express that belief. What we see now; i.e. protests, ect. My question to them. DO YOU VOTE?
I don’t vote anymore. 44 years of mostly frustration and I finally got the hint. But here’s the God’s honest truth, even if every single vote was counted absolutely accurately, despite the impossibility of that ever happening anywhere, the results in this state would not change. Same with New York, Same with Texas. Same with Arizona. Sometimes things are exactly as they appear.
And you don’t even vote. Wow good
“You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time.”
― Abraham Lincoln
I have always been of the opinion that if you don’t vote you lose your moral authority to complain. If you have a chance to voice your position on a matter or candidate at the ballot box and don’t use that chance, then you’ve done nothing to help change the situation.
After many posts on this subject in another forum – by far – the majority of people blindly vote for incumbents without doing research
Considering all that is wrong with our State and the Democratic Supermajority. the Dem’s are not thinking just voting the straight party line. And don’t forget it was the Democrats behind “The Top Two Primary” that pretty much precludes any Republican for Statewide Office unless they have tons of Name Recognition. And don’t ever allow “Ranked Choice Voting” or there will never be a Republican elected.
Are there Republicans in Congress famous for voting with the Democrats?
Chuq—-Mitch McConnell, Liz Chaney, Lindsey Graham, and many other Republicans have voted with the Democrats to get a bill passed.
I see Mark Desaulnier signs everywhere so I guess I’m going to vote for him! 🙄
You mean I missed a few?
Can someone get the one on the fence across from the light as you are leaving Martinez Walmart?
The left would vote for pee wee Herman “as long as it’s not Trump’
Paul Reubens passed away last year but he would have been a better president than Donald Trump.
Yeah…. for people like CHUQ.
I’m voting for Trump (third time); because, nobody more qualified is stepping forward. I mean, Trump leaves a lot to be desired, but at least he loves America, as much as he loves himself…..and that’s good enough for me.
@Whenwilltheylearn, Chuq just proved your point.
🤣💀
I Like Ike! Reagan was good but Ike was better.
I only vote for right handed people. Or is it left handed. I can’t remember now.
I am of the opinion a large majority do vote party line, particularly in this state. Supporting this opinion this primary election cycle, as a perfect example, is schiffless’ ad. His entire argument to vote for him is that Steve Garvey said he voted for or would vote for President Trump, and he is a “MAGA Republican.” That makes sense, to a degree, because it is unlikely schiff has done ANYTHING in Congress, beside lie, lie and lie, so he has little else to campaign on. And this line of promotion is enough for 60% of californians to vote him into the Senate.
Testing a theory: who was the last Democrat you voted for?
Testing a theory: who is taylor swift voting for?
There’s a lot of “Oh those Democrats only vote party line” in here so I’d love to hear what Democrats the “I don’t always vote party line” have voted for in their lives.
Democrats shouldn’t trust themselves to vote. They should realize by now they don’t make good decisions in life and refrain from passing on their poor life choices to other people who just wanna MAGA. Take up another hobby, politics is for people who have critical thinking skills.
I voted for Tulsi Gabbard, in the 2020 primaries, but the idiot establishment wanted Biden, so I voted for Trump a second time. All of the good Democrats have jumped ship.