To Vote or Not Vote?

The question that has persisted in me since the latter part of my junior year in college has been how to engage in the political process. First and foremost the question has always been what is the lowest level of political activity I can engage in while getting the biggest bang for my buck(i.e. time + my standards for ethical human behavior). Seeing actual advocacy of an individual politician as being much better than parties, which in America have few principles and even less integrity, I've consistently been on the lookout for individuals who I'd be willing to vote for.

Sophomore year of college, before the 2004 elections and as a part of my job requirement as an RA, I put on a (poorly attended) speaker panel where students and professors at the school spoke on the question of "Should You Vote." Although sparsely attended due to my lack of planning, I thought the panel involved some of the most interesting discussion about the role of voting in a democracy that I've ever seen. Since then, I've been incredibly conflicted about when, how, and who I should vote for in any year.

Therefore, I'm here to announce that at this moment I have found a politician I feel slightly(and this is me going out on a limb) willing to support....Adrian Fenty. While I believe that Fenty knows pretty little about the ways to stimulate the DC economy and even less about why the size of government can probably be attributed to the complete poverty that many of his constituents live in, I also note that most mayors don't have to contend with the U.S. Congress when it comes to their budget. All that aside, the one area that I could not give Fenty more credit for is with respect to is taking control of DC Public Schools away from the school board and choosing Michelle Rhee to be school Chancelor. His unflinching support of her and her work in DCPS is nothing short of a miracle in the politics of public education. Articles abound about her and him, but this video does a nice job of summarizing what's currently going on. Needless to say, this blogger thinks MR is very platinum and arguably one of the most skilled politicians I've ever seen.

Alas, Fenty is not up for re-election and I live in VA. The previous paragraph was pretty much a waste of your time in that case. I apologize.

In the end, I'm really not sure if I will vote, or if I do vote will I just leave that box blank. I suppose the only real thing left to do is learn more about the local elections where I live. Does anyone have anything helpful to say about any of this? Is there ANY real platinum political activity?