I was given a pen yesterday. It was from a certain SGA party that seems to appreciate the value of fast-food advertising. Its intention was to secure my vote, but their flashy, delicious logo and promotional, small, future-pens distracted my ability to reason. After its pitch, I picked up my netbook and clicked “abstain” on the ballot. I really didn’t care. For all I knew, the party originally disguised as hard liquor was just as qualified as the rest.

What I experienced is something most students would agree with: a general disregard for Student Government Association politics. Maybe you’d expect a columnist to be somewhat familiar with this kind of stuff, but the truth is, it’s all a bunch of insignificant microcosmic politics. Don’t get me wrong, without the voice of the SGA, students would trot around numbly without representation. However, the matters dealt with in this political sphere are far more trivial than what you’d find on Fox News.

Wait. On second thought, it’s probably not a large discrepancy.

The point I am trying to make is that I pay attention to the things that matter most to me. Things such as international affairs, domestic policy and most importantly, my new netbook. If someone asked me to use my “give-a-shit” meter and rate the level of importance between news of Max Jacobs trying to “unify the student voice” and Goldman Sachs defrauding its investors in some Enron-esque scam, I would pay strict attention to the latter.

Now, I danced my way through student goverment back in high school, so I know a thing or two about campaigning, even if it was just passing out candy in the hallway and making sexy posters. From what I see today, student politicians are not a whole lot more clever. Why else do they feel the need to wear matching shirts and hand out stylish pens? They have to entice and confuse the careless students somehow.

My decision-making process of who to vote for in the SGA elections is pretty analytical. If a candidate has impacted my social life in a positive manner, I vote. If they didn’t, I vote for their opponent. Really, the only two cases of this actually happening was when my roommate ran for residential representative and when I thought SGA President Steve Glickman was trying really hard to scheme on my girlfriend. Other than that, my vote flew around more aimlessly than a drunken pub chick.

However, I always lean towards the more radical of the student groups. It’s not necessarily their politics or spray painted shirts of armor I agreed with, but their organized effort to increase the presence of the student voice within the administration is really appealing. The more progressive change they seek, the more significance we students have.

Seriously, we’re all trying to have a good time, get good grades and save some money — could our political platforms be that different?  Sure, you can call the Student Power Party’s run for office last year a radical front, but they — and others like them — fight for a larger student voice.

But whatever, I still don’t care.  

Jason Kramer is a junior American studies major. He can be reached at kramer at umdbk dot com.