Is the election over in Prince William County, Virginia? To size things up I visited the Virginia Public Access Project (vpap.org). About 57 percent of all registered voters have voted (See Early Voting in Prince William County (vpap.org)). That’s extraordinary, but lots of people still seem to be waiting until election day (see the chart below).

Who will show up on Election Day? Following the example of reporters and pundits we like to spend lots of time trying to characterize each other, but most likely just a lot of ordinary people will show up. Many of these will probably be people who respect tradition, people who still think the time to vote is on Election Day.

What do “we” think of ordinary people? Some of us think of ourselves as ordinary. Others think of ourselves as being a cut above the common man. That sort pride is difficult to avoid, but unwise. Consider a story about John Bradford (en.wikipedia.org), a Christian martyr.

Who shows up on Election Day? Who shows up to vote? Hopefully, the people who show up are people who care about their family, friends, neighbors, and countrymen.

Sometimes, when those who serve as our aristocracy — those with platforms that enable them to speak as statesmen, respected reporters, popular pundits, and learned academics — speak of us ordinary folk, they call us the great unwashed, deplorables, rabble, and other such sordid names. At other times, when we allow them to do as they wish, our aristocrats will speak of the wisdom of the People.

What should we make of our aristocrats derogatory remarks and flattery? Not much, but their careless words and sometime hypocritical statements do prove our aristocrats are just as human as the rest of us.

When we vote the way we should, we should do so in the expectation we will help elect another ordinary person. Because ordinary people run our government, government cannot fix us. Those who run our government can try to make us conform to the dreams of some “great” leader who would be our god, but such pride always leads to ruin. Instead of would be gods, we need leaders who respect the laws of God, people who know God is God, not “me”.

Unfortunately, because we are fallen and all sinners, every election is a desperate battle. Always there are many of us who would use our government to force our causes and our beliefs upon those we view as the ignorant masses. At the same time — because we are fallen and all sinners — we rarely have good choice. Because every candidate is an ordinary soul like us — each in his or her own way fallen and flawed –all we can do is make the best choices we can.

What does making the best choices require? Research and commonsense.

In this era when there are so many highly educated people, we can be tempted to believe our own opinions don’t matter. Not true! What matters is why we vote. If we are voting for the good of our family, friends, neighbors, and countrymen, then we can vote with wisdom. We have just have to take the time to study the candidates and the issues.

Consider. With respect to moral issues, is it truly a great advantage to be well educated? Doesn’t what we believe often depend upon who taught us and what we were taught?

With respect to moral issues, the best educated may not be the best educated, but they may be the most deeply indoctrinated. Ronald Reagan put it this way.

It is a great disadvantage to heartily believe great untruths about important matters. That is one reason we cannot depend upon those who consider themselves “experts” to run our country. Therefore, we each must take the time to be study up and restrain the “experts” from abusing the rights of our family, friends, neighbors, and countrymen. Otherwise, we will be guilty of surrendering our family, friends, neighbors, and countrymen to haughty, arrogant people, people who may refused to understand or even care about the consequences of their policies.

Check Out Our

VOTER GUIDES!

We have two pages listing voter guides.

• THE PRINCE WILLIAM-MANASSAS FAMILY ALLIANCE’S 2020 VOTER GUIDES contains the voter guides we produced for the Senate and the Congressional races in which the citizens of Prince William County participate.
• ADDITIONAL VOTER GUIDES FOR THE 2020 GENERAL ELECTION contains a list of Christian voter guides. These guides include information on the presidential/vice presidential races as well as Senate and Congressional races. Note that The Family Foundation endorses the Million Voices Presidential Voter Guide (here).