I’m sitting near the magazine section at Border’s Bookstore right now and I’m noticing how important it is to be liked by a large numbers of people who don’t really know you. It’s not important in any real sense, but in the world of magazines, entertainment and politics it is very important.

I have a few friends who say that they have already decided on who they are voting for in November’s presidential election. When I dig a little deeper to find out why, I discover that they simply “like” one candidate more than another.

A survey I recently heard about asked which candidate would be more enjoyable to hang out with at a bar-b-que. What a ridiculous question! When voting for a person to be the new leader of the most powerful free country on Earth, it is important to have more reason than the question of who would be nicer to hang out with on July Fourth.

This won’t be the first time our country has turned the presidential election into a likeability contest and it won’t be the last. Perhaps we could begin to turn the tide by examining what we believe about how our country was founded and how it should run. Likeability contests are fine in high school, but for a presidential election they just won’t cut it.

(For the record, I’m not sure I “like” either of the two major candidates.)

whether it be Barack Obama or John McCain