with the amount of media available nowadays it's really your own fault if you're not informed.
And what is it exactly that this media is informing you of? Things you need to know or things which are controversial and will grab the public attention. What you get is not an honest representation of today's realities but rather oversimplified manifestation on issues that are neither important nor objective enough to be called "news." I remember watching the 8pm Sunday night news a while ago. The leading story was Paris Hilton getting out of jail and selling the 1st interview rights for a million bucks. If that justifies as headline news.........But you're right, there is way too much of the media happening right now, finding the objective pieces that explain why this country is going down the crapper...well that's a different story.
About being informed to vote: Very few people vote and have actual facts to justify their decision. The vast majority look at the debates and make a judgment call. Which would've been fine if politicians were not the spineless lying bastards that they are, changing their opinions 3 times a day just to get your votes. Why do you think people are so apathetic towards voting? It is because they realize that the end result would be the same. You cannot fix the country and keep the public support because changes would undoubtedly have some negative impacts on society and we don't like stuff like that, especially when it affects us directly. As a result, no one even tries.
Just look at some of the "hot issues" that were discussed. Universal health care? Wonderful idea, why not ram the national debt some more and see where it takes us. Bringing the troops home? Outstanding! Never mind the fact that we basically rely on foreign oil to keep afloat. Think they'll keep the prices the same? No freaking way! Ever been to Europe? Go look at their gas prices and imagine what would happen if we had them. Why do you think we rely on oil so much? Well, two reasons really.
1) Because the government is full of pussies who can't tell the green planet hippies to piss off and build some nuclear power plants. Guess what people, nuclear power won't freaking kill the environment. If the French can do it, so can we.
2) The car industry is too damn greedy to move to electric cars. You know, GM did it a while back. They released a test batch that didn't run on oil. They were safe and fairly inexpensive. Except GM did not account for one small oversight: electrical motors are relatively simple to maintain and you lose on the entire service industry. So they recalled the cars.
Those hot issues not enough? How about securing the border! Well, sorry to say but we need the damn immigrants to work under the minimum wage in order to keep prices down. You can't secure the border without raising import taxes for all products by substantial amount because the US consumer does not care where the product is made. Secure the border, kick the immigrants out and leave imports the same, soon you'll have even the damn tomatoes made in China.
So no, I am not informed, but I also do not wish to be misinformed by the media or the politicians. Health care...man a lot of those people do not deserve health care. Them crackheads down in Oakland don't deserve health care or food stamps, they need to be euthanized. Politicians can all go to hell, I am not voting for any of those bastards.