People vote for a variety of reasons. They don’t vote for just one.

People don’t vote because they think that their vote doesn’t matter. How can one person make much of a difference, they ask themselves, ignoring the history that shows that one vote has made a difference thousands of times.

I live in the District of Columbia, so in all likelihood my vote doesn’t really matter. But I wrote in Adrian Fenty, just because, who knows, he might win in a write-in campaign.

People vote because they are mad. That has certainly been the case lately. Barack Obama won because people were mad at Republicans, and especially President Bush.

My, how the worm has turned! Today, people are voting because they are mad at President Obama. In fact, some polls show that the unpopular George W. Bush would beat the more unpopular Barack Obama in a face to face matchup.

Many people vote because they are inspired. That certainly was the case with John Kennedy, Ronald Reagan, and yes Barack Obama. But inspiration is one thing. Perspiration is another.

In long run, people are more impressed with hard work leading to results than they are with lofty words that don’t actually make things better.  Read more...