Can you call a system a democracy when it limits the political expression of its people? Our political culture fosters a combative two party system situated on a binary which it purports can represent the diverse opinions of over 300 million people with two incredibly similar political parties. This system determines what issues “define” an election—which problems and solutions are worthy of discussion and which the public shouldn’t be bothered with. Stances codifying violence such as militarism and the death penalty are considered to be “moderate” on the political spectrum; that is to say, violence is the norm to which a politician’s views must be juxtaposed. Criticisms of the everyday violence which has become definitive of U.S. society and solutions favoring peace are denounced as delusional, unrealistic, or worse: weak. Peace has become unpatriotic.

There are certain viewpoints which must be held by a politician in order to be a serious contender for our highest office. In our land of individuality, a candidate must profess to be a strict Christian. While the Bible is a nuanced and deeply metaphorical text which can be interpreted to support a cornucopia of ideas, its one indelible truth is the importance of love above all else. Tolstoy outlines beautifully the inherit contradiction of the ability of a true Christian to also be the commander in chief of military forces: “Government is violence. Christianity is meekness, nonresistance, love. And therefore, government cannot be Christian, and a man who wishes to be Christian must not serve government nor swear official oaths…” Peace requires us to be able to see the inherit worth and dignity of all beings as equal to our own, yet to assume a foreign policy stance which does anything less than maintain U.S. domination over the rest of the world through suffocating trade and industrial barriers and perpetual military occupation is to commit political suicide. And thus every four years, regardless of whether NBC colors more states red or blue, we continue unabated in our cycle of isolating and devaluing other cultures and people in order to justify bombing their cities and barring their economies from self-sustainability. When the frustration this oppression engenders develops into anti-Western hatred, images of burning American towers in New York and burning American flags on Palestinian streets justify to the American people the need to protect ourselves from the faceless dark-skinned devils abroad by getting them first. Violence begets violence, and we cannot continue to use the same cowboy tactics and expect different results.

There is little substantive discussion of the corrupt and dehumanizing American prison industry which enslaves more of its citizens than any country or empire in modern history. There is no discussion of ending state-sponsored murder. Regardless of their personal convictions, neither Senator Obama nor Senator McCain could identify themselves as being against the death penalty without alienating incredible numbers of voters. The reality of the death penalty is that there are no evidence-based justifications which support its existence. Its continuance fosters the same short-sighted “eye for an eye” violent solutions to violence which plagues our foreign policy. Morally, we’re supporting cold-blooded murder. Most illegal murders are not pre-meditated, they occur as the tragic end-result of extreme and sudden anger. Persons living on death row are kept in cages, reminded each day of their impending destruction. Currently human rights groups are investigating how many innocent lives have been stolen by this atrocious practice, fallible as the humans who oversee it. We know that as of 2007, DNA evidence had exonerated 124 death row inmates. How can we justify supporting a system which has taken even one innocent life? Is the same otherism which allows us to indiscriminately bomb Iraqi and Somali and Colombian residences preventing us from feeling the deep injustice of a government-sponsored theft of a human life? Because the victim may not look like us, because their child might not go to our children’s schools, does that devalue the legacy of anguish left to the family in their loved one’s place? To respond to the truly cruel argument that a human life’s existence on this planet should be determined by an economic equation, it is more expensive to put a human to death than it is to pay for all their prison costs for their entire life. Yet due to fear and ignorance and our fatalist unwillingness to believe in human redemption, we continue as the only “developed” nation which puts our citizens to death, and a reevaluation of this cruel practice does not even enter the dual-party discussion.

It was not so long ago that women could not vote and black Americans were allocated their humanity in fractions of a whole. Today, convicted felons and immigrants cannot vote and residency requirements make it very difficult for homeless persons to do so. Our “democracy” labors on unquestioned because the voices of those most intimately acquainted with the social inequalities and injustices within our society are silenced. How can this be a democracy when so many voices are left out of the discourse?

The United States of America—a model for democracies everywhere and a symbol of freedom where anyone can achieve their dreams, where there is enough food at the table of opportunity for all to engorge themselves. How can the same nation condemn its disenfranchised citizens to silence and force all others to choose between one of two laundry lists of political viewpoints? How can we laud ourselves as a beacon of diversity while assuming that everyone who agrees with Obama regarding reproductive choice is in support of his plans for education or military intervention in Sudan? A true democracy would represent a wider breadth of viewpoints, and encourage legislative coalition-building instead of combative personality politics.

This year I’ve already cast my ballot, and I will continue to vote for as long as I possess this right. Much needs to change for our democracy to be worthy of that title, but to not vote is to give a mandate to those who continue to view violence and coercion as an acceptable means to an end, and as an end itself. What I ask is that you proceed critically and work towards developing an American democracy which honors the diversity of human thought and expression and works actively to promote peace within. Hold peace in your heart so that it may dwell in your home, your country, and your world.