Vote Wisely

                    We strengthen our families, communities, and nation when we teach the rising generation that the right to vote carries the responsibility to be well-informed and wise voters.   We carry a great responsibility to discuss with our children and grandchildren the great importance of exercising our right to vote as well as of explaining the essentials about voting responsibly and wisely.  We can ensure that our family members are good citizens when we teach by example how to be knowledgeable and wise voters.

                    In order to be wise and responsible voters, we must do our own homework to learn as much truth as we can possibly find.  We must study history to know what happened in past years, and we must study current events in order to know what is happening today.  We cannot bury our heads in the sand and hope that all is well.  When we study both history and current events, we can see how human beings are basically the same; we come to understand that we make many of the same mistakes as the people who lived many years ago.  Since history tends to repeat itself, we have to learn for ourselves those policies that did not work in past years and then develop different ways to solve our problems.

                    Will Durant described many Americans when he said, "We Americans are the best informed people on earth as to the events of the last twenty-four hours; we are not the best informed as the events of the last sixty centuries."

                    I am not a fan of President Franklin D. Roosevelt because he established many government policies that do not work in a free republic; however, I believe he was right when he said, "The only sure bulwark of continuing liberty is a government strong enough to protect the interests of the people, and a people strong enough and well enough informed to maintain its sovereign control over the government."  

                    Senator Jim DeMint is a current leader of the conservative movement, and he also agreed with FDR:  "I just want people to know that if they want to change the direction of the country, they can do it, but only if they're active, informed, and engaged."

                    President Ronald Reagan understood the importance of parents teaching patriotism in their homes, "All great change in America begins at the dinner table."  He also said, "Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction.  We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream.  It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free."

                    I do not want to ever be in the position where I must explain to my grandchildren or great-grandchildren what it means to be free.  I believe that I have the duty to teach my posterity the importance of being responsible citizens and exercising the right to vote.  I know that we can strengthen our homes, communities and nation by helping our children to develop the habit of informing themselves and then voting wisely.