Voting and sympathy for the poor

I just had a two-hour argument with my roomates about welfare (and by welfare we were talking about a host of social security and other programs in this country designed to benefit the poor) in this country, in which I argued that not that many people get on welfare who don't need it, that welfare fraud doesn't cost taxpayers that much money, and that it is money well spent since people kicked off welfare would likely turn to crime, and it costs much more money to incarcerate someone than it does to just cut them a check every month.

Now, I believe in all those points. I believe that people on Welfare by and large don't want to be on it, and that they would get jobs if they could find jobs that paid a living wage and that they could execute. Many of them are mentally ill, or just plain stupid and illiterate. I have a lot of sympathy for such people. Not in the least because many of them came from families trapped in cyclical poverty, without any reasonable parents or guardians.

But there is one thing about poor people that pisses me off, and I'm not just talking about people on welfare. It pisses me off about black people, poor people, and a host of other groups that legitimately complain that they get the shaft in this country: They don't vote.

Less than half this country votes even in the most important elections. The national elections that determine much of this country's policy every four years, and its really the middle and upper classes, and old people, that determine the outcome of those polls.

And even among groups that do vote, and I'm thinking here of poor religous people, many don't vote in their actual interests. They vote on three social issues: Abortion Rights, Gay Marriage, and Stem Cell Research. So they vote Republican, even though on EVERY SINGLE OTHER ISSUE, they should be voting Democrat.

If every single person in this country voted, and voted according to what was actually in their overall interests, this country would experience a sea change overnight. We would take a gigantic leap to the left (although I hate even making left/right distinctions), and the politicians could finally stop pandering to a small group that actually votes and has all the money.

My point isn't that I hate poor people. It's not even that poor people need to "pull themselves up by the bootstraps" or some bullshit like that. It's just that voting is free. It costs nothing. It's hardly even an effort. So I get sick of defending people who are too apathetic even to do that.