EDITORIAL: Little excuse for failing to cast a ballot

   Next Tuesday, Oct. 14, is the deadline for New Jersey residents to register to vote in the Nov. 4 election.
   All across the country, millions of citizens have been energized by the presidential race to sign up to vote for the first time. But millions of others have not — falling back on a litany of tired old excuses for failing to exercise their most fundamental democratic right.
   Let’s debunk these excuses, one by one.
   My vote won’t make a difference. It’s hard to believe, after the cliffhanger elections the nation experienced in 2000 and 2004, anyone might still think his or her vote doesn’t make a difference. In a tight race, every vote matters. And one of the beauties of democracy is that Election Day is the great equalizer; everyone’s ballot — from the governor’s right down to yours — counts the same.
   I’m too busy to vote. In today’s economy, with many people working two or more jobs to put food on the table, it may well be that some are too busy to get to the polls between 6 a.m. and 8 p.m. on Election Day. But in New Jersey, any voter can vote by absentee ballot in any election for any reason — or no reason at all. Voting by mail is an easy, available option.
   There’s no difference between the candidates; they’re just typical politicians who’ll promise everything but deliver nothing. Some elections in the past may have fit this cynical description — but not this one. Yes, John McCain and Barack Obama are politicians; both are U.S. senators and, given the current condition of the economy, both are promising more than they can likely deliver. But for the first time in 56 years, neither candidate is a sitting president or vice president, wedded to the politics of the past or the policies of an incumbent administration. Instead, both are campaigning as agents of change, and the nature of the change they are advocating is starkly different — making this a true watershed election.
   If I register to vote, I’ll be called for jury duty. There was a time when prospective jurors were drawn from voter registration lists. Not anymore. Over the years, as voter participation dropped and more and more eligible voters stopped registering, the counties got wise to this ploy people were using to escape another of their civic responsibilities and started using motor-vehicle licenses and registrations, as well as other forms of identification, to draw up jury pools.
   I don’t know enough about the candidates and the issues to make an informed decision. We just don’t believe this one anymore. Again, it may have been true back in the days when television offered half an hour a day of national news, at dinnertime, on three commercial networks, and newspapers didn’t provide much in the way of national political coverage. Today, it’s virtually impossible to escape the nonstop coverage of the presidential race — and, in this particular election, the vice presidential contest, as well. To borrow a well-worn phrase from law enforcement, in today’s world of the 24/7 news cycle, ignorance of the candidates and the issues is no excuse.
   In the presidential election of 1876, the nation’s centennial year, voter turnout hit an all-time high of 81.8 percent. Since then, it has dropped steadily, to a low of 49 percent in 1996. Encouragingly, it rebounded slightly in 2000 and 2004, to 51.3 and 55.3 percent, respectively. There are hopeful signs that the 2008 election might continue this recent turnaround — but only if eligible voters keep registering right up to next Tuesday’s deadline, then exercise their franchise three weeks later. This seems an appropriate occasion to remind them of an unpleasant but inescapable truth: Those who allow the leaders of their government to be chosen by others have no one to blame but themselves.