Facebook and Elections

I've seen a lot of stuff lately that says,

And while that may be true for the big national elections, at least two of my votes were directly influenced by information that I learned on Ye Ol' Facebook.

#1 - I voted for Glenda Ritz for Grand Poobah of Public Instruction because every single teacher I know on FB in Indiana told me to.  And I figure if all my rocket scientist friends were telling me to vote for Dr. Soandso for head of NASA (not that that's an elected position, but stay with me), they know what they're talking about better than I do, and I should listen to them.  Same with teachers and public school policy.  So that's what I did.  And she won.  And I'll bet my vote was not the only one influenced by Facebook in this case, because the teachers of Indiana were all over Facebook in the days leading up to the election saying, "For real, y'all, vote for Glenda Ritz."

#2 - I voted not to retain some judge with two first names (Steven David) because he is the guy that legislated from the bench that the police can basically come in your house whenever they want without a warrant or probable cause.  (Thankful for Wikipedia - "A majority opinion in 'Barnes vs. Indiana', justice David is infamous for writing the controversial majority opinion stating: 'We hold that there is no right to reasonably resist unlawful entry by police officers.'")  And while I cheerfully invite police officers into my home all the time and have nothing to hide, I don't think that the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution ("The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.") is something that we should just go mucking around with.

So while Facebook posts may not have enough sway with most of us to change our political party, in some more local elections where word of mouth is critical, and where we may not be getting as much info from the traditional media as we may like, I think Facebook can be very influential.  And those local elections results often have more of an impact on our day to day lives than who is sitting in the White House a thousand miles away.

And that's all I have to say about that.