Vote Early & Often: Part I

Does anyone really care about voting rights for emigrants?

Obviously the Irish Government doesn't. That much was obvious from the recent offer of a vote for the Seanad!

(And don't get me started on the Seanad. As one of those fortunate enough to have a third level education, I already have a vote in that particular institution. Why we tolerate a House where 60,000 odd graduates elect six members, 900 or so County Councillors and TDs elect another 43, and one man — the Taoiseach — selects 11, is beyond me. Especially, don't get me started on Shane Ross, who in the space of a week in 1995 made several statements about why emigrants shouldn't vote, while at the same time, sending me junk mail to my Chicago address asking for my Seanad vote next time out.)

But getting back to the real election, do we, the emigrants, really care ourselves that we're disenfranchised?

I know I occasionally see some particularly idiotic thing some politician has said or done, and I wish I had a vote the next time out, but most of the time I can live without it. I don't mind not being able to vote. I can live with it.

What annoys me is being told that I can't vote because I'm out of touch with the issues.

(Come to think of it, when was the last time a polling official asked you if you read a newspaper before giving you a ballot?)

Apart for the perspective that a little distance brings, it's not that hard to keep up with events in Ireland. Any Irish home I go into here had two or three well read Irish newspapers lying about somewhere, and a working telephone besides.

This article is written on a computer in Chicago and can be read by anyone world-wide with a modem, and the same technology can be used to check out the Irish Times, the Belfast Telegraph, and several other Irish newspapers every day. I can also download RTE Radio News Bulletins.

So give me a valid reason why I shouldn't have the right to vote. But don't tell me I'm out of touch.