[FridayoLeary]

I feel that forcing people to vote is more authoritarian than democratic. Places like North Korea have something like 99.5% turnouts for elections. One of the advantages of living in a democratic society is the freedom to choose not to participate in it, so long as this doesn't affect others.

The idea just rubs me the wrong way.

I understand America is somewhat unusual among most Western nations that lots of people don't have passports. A driving license should serve as a good ID card but lots of people don't have one of those either. As a Brit the idea of an ID card also feels undemocratic to me. In the UK we have inexpensive passports and a national voter registration database, with signatures and adresses recorded, why would that not work in the US?

[nobody9999]

>As a Brit the idea of an ID card also feels undemocratic to me. In the UK we have inexpensive passports and a national voter registration database, with signatures and adresses recorded, why would that not work in the US?

In the US, we also have county (and state) voter registration databases with signatures and addresses recorded. And they do work in the US. The only real difference is that those practices are determined at the county and state levels and not at the national level. That's not a bug. In fact, it's required by our Constitution.

That some places abuse that really sucks. For me at least, that doesn't happen where I live.

[platevoltage]

I think in any compulsary voting system, you should be allowed to select "none of the above". That would be fine with me.

I fear that uninformed people will just fill in the bubbles though, and then you start getting votes based on name recognition only, and thats already a big enough issue.