I swore that I’d not post any politically oriented blogs. After all, I want you as readers of my books and do not want anything to taint your inclination to consider reading them. But I will overcome my squeamishness to talk about politics in public, if you’ll forgive me. As a naturalized citizen it really bugs me to see our democratic privilege of voting so underused.

Once again in my voting history I voted for a loser. Well, not a loser if you care about the popular vote, but a loser nevertheless. Why is my vote important anyway? Because I did vote. I chose to participate, to engage with the electoral process as all citizens should, but about 117 million people eligible to vote did not. We are one of the least engaged democracies in the world because we take our democracy for granted. As the election results clearly show, we shouldn’t. Yes, even though I (we) lost, I’m glad to have done my part. I was happy to read that just in the first two quarters of 2016 naturalization rates increased by twenty one percent, the highest level in four years. And if these new Americans voted, as I suspect they had, I am proud to have stood with them in discharging the number one citizenship duty.