How to Choose a President

Every four years Americans get the opportunity to vote for and choose the person with the highest authority in the land, President of the United States. This is a privilege that we sometimes take for granted, or even choose not to participate in. Some find that it's not worth it to vote, that perhaps none of the candidates even deserves to be in office. However, someone is going to take office, so we might as well have some say in who that someone is. So, how do you choose a President? This article will explore what factors to use to decide who you should vote for in the presidential election.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

How to Determine What's Important to You

1. The first step is to determine whether party affiliation matters to you. If you are a dedicated Republican, and will only vote for a Republican candidate, you won't have much of a choice in the general election.
2. Do financial policies matter to you? The next step is to determine what issues matter for you. Is universal healthcare big? How about gun control? Other issues might include views on gay marriage and abortion, war, stances on how Americans should be taxed, economic policies and more.
3. What qualities do you want the candidate to possess? Are you looking for someone who seems honest? Someone who has experience as a senator? Maybe someone who was a dedicated war veteran? Perhaps you are looking for a candidate with lots of conflict resolution skills.
4. Does it matter to you if someone's clock is ticking? What else matters to you? Should you consider a Presidential candidate's health? If someone recently had a heart attack, will you eliminate them from consideration? What about a President's age? Is 40 too young and 80 too old or does it not matter to you?
5. Does the candidate have a history of alcoholism? How deep into a candidate's past should you trace? Do you want to know if the candidate has ever even tried marijuana? What about the candidate ever cheating on a spouse?

How to Actually Choose a President

6. Once you decide what matters to you in a presidential candidate, you're ready to make your decision. Where do you go from here?
7. You could decide that you will not worry about what matters to you, and just go with the candidate you like for. Perhaps you like Barack Obama because he was more about public service in his career choice than just making money. Or maybe you like Hillary Clinton because of the added bonus, Bill Clinton, that comes with her.
8. Maybe you should just choose the candidate that you simply like best. Maybe you can't explain it, but you just like a certain one. He seems like a nice guy, so you're going to vote for him.
9. Perhaps you want to use the one factor that matters most to you. If you absolutely want a candidate who is for gay marriage, vote for that candidate.
10. Finally, you could go through a complicated scheme where you weigh each factor that matters to you and each issue, and determine where each candidate stands on those issues, and add up the scores to find out who you will vote for. This might be confusing, but in the end you will probably choose the candidate that really suits you best.
11. The most important thing is to actually vote. This right only matters if you exercise it.

Tips & Warnings

• If you don't like any of the candidates running, you can still vote. Just write in a candidate or write in 'None of the above.' At least you're still taking part in the democratic process then and voicing your opinion.
• Be careful to make sure you find out truthful information about each candidate on which to base your decision. There is a lot of gossip out there that has no factual basis!