EDITORIAL: Don’t think of excuses, just vote

The country will elect a president in November. Whether you are part of this game or not, the score will affect you.

According to an exit poll analysis released by CIRCLE, a research center at Tufts University, between 22 million and 24 million young Americans aged 18-29 voted in the 2008 presidential election.

It was between 49.3 percent and 54.5 percent of the youth voter turnout – 66 percent of those college-aged voters supported Barack Obama.

Hefty numbers make us proud, especially when those numbers mean young students are taking advantage of their citizenship rights that others cannot even fathom of having so painlessly.

Let us consider the Arab Spring for a second. According to a report by Amnesty International, 840 people died and a little over 6,000 were injured during Egypt’s revolution as former president Hosni Mubarak – president for 30 years, mind you – latched on to his seat and brutally murdered protesters in the congested streets.

In Libya, they are counting between 30,000 to 50,000 people who have died fighting against the regime of Muammar el-Qaddafi.

But what about the 2012 elections here in the United States?

At Biscayne Bay Campus, we noticed the hot and sweating volunteers of Organizing for America, standing in the sun asking every passerby, “are you registered to vote?” while still managing to muster a smile in the brutal early semester heat. And most students, from what we notice, say they are already registered or rush by, late for class. At Modesto Maidique Campus, they register around 30 students a day, according to Leonardo Curiel, president of FIU’s College Democrats.

You have a voice, dear students, speak. Participate because we are tired of these dramatic, voluntary mutes in the sickening form of students who choose not to vote because they feel their vote does not make a difference. It does.

Let us go back to our reliable world of numbers, math and logic. Take one student who doesn’t think they matter and add in all of the other hundreds of thousands of students who are just as “insecure,” “sad,” or better yet, careless. Then, we have a staggering number that would’ve made a world of a difference at the polls for one of the candidates.

And if you’re still not sure if your vote counts, and if this damp heat does not remind you, colleagues, you live in the good, old sunshine state. Florida, with 29 electoral votes, is one of the most important swing states.

Only one time has a president won without Florida’s vote and that was in 1992.

Florida is one of the most decisive states on any presidential election and you live here. You are the one that says where those 29 votes are going.

So if you still think your vote doesn’t count or it’s a waste of time, you are wrong.

If you’re not registered, there’s no excuse not to take advantage of the University’s Organizing for America. They stop everyone. They are everywhere.  They are right outside your classrooms, take a few footsteps and do it.

Enlarge the number of the youth vote for this coming election. If you can’t register yet, no fear or insecurity, you still have a mind, therefore, speak out and campaign. Just please, make a difference.

Go out and vote in November. Trust us, it won’t kill you.