The right to vote should be lowered to 16 years of age (#4424)

      As myself as an example, I was ready to vote even before I was 16. As well I cannot say that I was smarter or more intelligent than anyone else who went to school with me except in specific areas where we all had advantages of interest. Mine was above all political. I loved math and science as a rule and letters and art less so but nonetheless I could hold my own on all subjects. Yet back when I was a younger I was well aware of the differences in the political parties and how they affected society. Granted, I was born 1955, before I was aware of Eisenhower's mix of progressive and conservative politics. But I was aware of the stout liberalism of Kennedy/Johnson and then the stark difference with nixon.
     I railed against nixon even at 13 years of age because he was anti working class. He did give us the EPA but that is all the positive I can ever accede to him. I found out later that he lied and thwarted us democrats around Vietnam causing tens of thousands of unnecessary American deaths just so he could get elected. And so it has been since nixon that republicans for the most part will do anything to have power. But back to me being aware of the circumstances of my political growth. The liberal/progressive vision for America has always been centered on the working middle poor class. The improving of life from the bottom up and not the top down. At 16 I wanted to vote so badly that I talked about it at school in our class elections and school student body meetings.
     The thing is that there were others along with me who knew the differences in parties and what they would mean to our future. We were all involved in school elections and taking civics and history classes to sharpen our understanding. We were ready for the challenges that were coming our way because our generation was going to inherent the problems within it soon enough. We were ripe for being involved in the decisions of our nation and although some policies were complex, the voting for representatives who could easily explain them was not complicated. We were deprived of that opportunity to be part of our electorate and for that I have held a grudge against those who thought we were too young to understand our own futures. Shame on them, let 16 year old citizens vote now!