I think I know why the U.S. only has a 47% voting percentage: Negative political ads and mudslinging. It's always been pretty bad (as long as I can remember), but it's actually getting worse thanks to the viral nature of the Internet and 24-hour TV "news" channels. I'm so sick of political ads in general, but the over-the-top negative ones are really painful. If I'm watching TV, I just hit the mute button or turn the channel to get away from them. I don't need political ads to tell me who or what to vote for, and I'm sure most people are the same way. But you can't help but get turned off to the whole political process when you're being constantly inundated with negative ads coming at you 24/7. No wonder most eligible voters don't vote!

To a lesser degree, I think the electoral process has also harmed voting. I mean, shit. George W. Bush got fewer votes for president than Al Gore but he STILL won. That's fucked up.

End of rant! :)

No, state elections are actually what I'm talking about. I mean, there are negative ads for the presidential elections, too, but local races can be pretty vicious with the attack ads going back and forth on local TV and radio. It's gotten so bad that I don't even watch some of my favorite shows right now... or I just DVR them and fast-forward through all of the ads.

It won't keep me from voting, but like I said, I can see how it could turn a LOT of people off to our political process. And no doubt that could be a good reason why 53% of our population just says "fuck it."

I can't wait for election day to pass so we can get back to the same old boring male enhancement ads. ;)

It's simmilar in Europe, are the state elections any better than the general federal elections? I mean the states have more power over their citizens than federal government, some say even more than the member states of the EU than the Euro government.

Politics in the USA from this side of the pond looks totally fucked up (not that Europe or Britain are any better), just bizarre how money is so important that votes are almost bought and that it looks like a religion with people shouting in the street. It shows that there are about 53% of Americans who aren't political nutcases though.