The “Soldier Card”, and Voting
October 13, 2015 by Paul McKeever
In the coming days, the newspapers and others will start publishing the standard editorials about how if you don’t exercise your right to vote, you’re disrespecting the soldiers who fought for this country. Here’s my advice to you.
Soldiers of the West did not fight for elections, per se. They did not fight for democracy, per se. They fought for individual freedom, in the face of a collectivist dictator. Freedom is defended – only in part – by ensuring that the government remembers itself to be a servant, and not a master. Democracy – the idea that the government serves only the governed – is the reminder. Democracy is defended by placing limits on the term of office of all law-makers (i.e., by dissolving Parliament on a regular basis). Elections don’t “throw the bums out”: dissolution does that. Elections “put the bums (or non-bums) in”.
My point: those who tell you that, “If you don’t vote for one of the folks currently running for office, you are disrespecting the soldiers who fought for this country”, are wrong. More than that: they show that they are willing to use soldiers as pawns in a bid to do the very thing that those soldiers fought against (i.e., to make laws that violate your freedom).
Vote for a person who will vote, in Parliament, to make laws that defend your freedom. But, if there is no such person running in your riding, do not let the tyrants’ playing of the “soldier card” cause you even a millisecond of guilt. You are not guilty if you do not vote for a tyrant: you will be showing your respect to those soldiers.
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