DON'T VOTE IF YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND - Daily News (Los Angeles, CA)

DON'T know? Don't vote! In most elections, once voters choose the'top of ticket' races for president and major candidates, roughly 20percent fail to vote for state measures and lesser political races.These people are often called lazy.

I stand in praise of drop-off voters. They are Ballot Box Grown-ups. They wouldn't dream of accidentally voting for a cause that, ifthey knew more, they would in fact hotly oppose. The real turkeysare the earnest types who complete their ballots, not knowing whatthey just voted for.

This befuddled bunch, out in force on Nov. 2, will exercise itsright to participate in ... God knows what. They are urged on bynoxious do-gooders who call such activity 'democracy.' No, it's not.It's dumb-ocracy.

California's 16 ballot measures, freighted with murky languageand unintended consequences, only encourage the Clueless Guessers.How about this: After you've voted for stuff you truly knowsomething about, resist being 'part of the process.'

Take Proposition 66. It would significantly roll back 'threestrikes, you're out.' It's a well-intended, popular measure that,upon closer examination, makes me exceedingly queasy. To crib a linefrom a well-known politician, I was going to vote for it before Idecided to vote against it.

Today, 42,000 people are locked away under 'three strikes.' Youcan be forgiven if you believe many committed petty theft. The mediahave turned the guy stealing socks into an emblem of the law'sinhumanity. You can Google all day long and find very few articlesabout the crime-infested neighborhoods that 'three strikes' hasscoured of many thousands of career criminals.

Just 357 of these 42,000 committed shoplifting or other pettycrimes. But our legislators (your legislators) were afraid to give'soft on crime' ammo to anyone running against them. So the gutlesswonders in Sacramento refused to fix 'three strikes.' They let 357people rot.

Attorney General Bill Lockyer, a liberal Democrat, saysProposition 66 takes a chain saw to a law that needed surgicalrepair.

Say a vicious criminal is doing life for burning down somebody'sstore, but an even worse disaster was averted when everybody got outsafely. Under Proposition 66, the vicious arsonist didn't maimanybody (not for lack of trying). So he's not violent!

Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley led a movementto fix 'three strikes' by never prosecuting on petty crime. Almostevery California D.A. now follows suit. As Cooley notes, Proposition66 releases vicious felons. 'Get ready for an unprecedented wave ofcrime in California,' says Cooley.

It may not even be the most misleading idea on the ballot. Thefine print in many incomprehensible measures will bring more miserythan solutions.

There's Proposition 72, to shift the health insurance crisis ontothe backs of schools and modest businesses. Watch for massive workerfirings as businesses try to cover stiff new costs. Expectwidespread job losses at restaurants, small factories andwarehouses. Schools will raid education funds to pay healthinsurance for irresponsible employees who dine out - but don't buyhealth insurance.

My insurance is a killer, costing more than my utilities, phonesand Internet bills combined. But I know the people I work for arenot my mommy. There's a good reason why only Hawaii has thisSocialism Lite plan: It's terrible public policy.

Then there's Proposition 63, the wildly popular tax onmillionaires, which extensively expands mental illness treatment.This massive new treatment bureaucracy will be wholly reliant onfunding by highly mobile millionaires. It's important to know thatbig chunks of millionaires disappear from California withoutwarning. When thousands vanished in 2001 and 2002, their departureremoved $16 billion, over two years, from California tax revenues -a little-reported but key cause of our tailspin.

When millionaires vanish again, who foots the bill for apermanent new treatment bureaucracy? One guess.

And look at Proposition 65 and Proposition 1A. They are supposedto stop Sacramento legislators from raiding city and countytreasuries. Yet not even somebody who reads Sanskrit for pleasurecan decipher them. I expect Prop. 1A to win, solely because it's atthe top of ballot. Clueless Guessers love to vote for the firstballot item.

I'm not suggesting anyone stay home Nov. 2. But when you get toitems you know diddly about, why not choose democracy and not dumb-ocracy? Spare us your need to feel 'involved.' If you don't know,don't vote.