Major contentious midterm elections take place the nation over today.
Despite the enthusiasm, I’m the reason why getting 60 percent of 170 million registered U.S. voters out there would be a triumph.
I’m fairly politically aware — even my interests are more in local policy than national — and have been involved in government and campaigning in the past. But, like most Americans, I have an excuse.
I spend most of the time leading up to an election pondering the journalism around it, listening and debating both sides — in short, seeing the election through my own prism (in my case, that means something of a balanced journalist).
I feel like most do just that: see the election as an abstract in one’s own sense of self. So the activism, it seems, is someone else’s work.
I do vote, though not in many primaries because I am registered independent, and I do follow the discourse and prepare ahead of time, but much of my preparation is, like most swing voters like myself, very last minute.
So I decided, if only for me, I’d get together the voting resources I use most and usually spend the Monday before Election Day searching for.
In Philadelphia, the four resources I share with friends the most often and a new one:
- Find your elected officials here — This is for finding out who is marginally affecting your life by voting on legislation that someone else writes.
- Find your polling place here — This is for when you don’t where you even go to vote.
- Register to vote here — This is for coming into a new state or changing an address or party affiliation.
- Find your registration status here — This is for young people who have moved so often in recent years that they don’t even know where they last registered.
- Google Elections here — This is trying to cover all the above information.
- Voting Totals here — Information and links on voting results in Philadelphia from the Committee of Seventy.