The biggest losers in the election last week are those people who decided not to vote.

Once again, we watched the returns last Tuesday night across our state to discover many people who are registered to vote but who did not exercise their freedom to vote. Often people tell me they do not vote as a protest against those who are already in office. That type of thinking makes no sense. There are other people who express their displeasure with all of the candidates by saying they do not like any of the people running, so therefore, they stay home and do not vote. Once again, that makes no sense to me.

The faulty reasoning of people around election time is interesting. One person told me they did not vote in Primary Elections because they had to call for a certain ballot of a political party to be able to vote, and they felt that was wrong, so they did not vote. The clue that should stand out in a Primary Election is the election process is set in order to determine the people who will be on the ballot for the General Election. That is what a Primary Election is all about — determining who will carry the party banner into the General Election. Whatever the excuse used for not voting, short of a major illness coming on suddenly, or some other personal or family disaster, just simply to say that you forgot it was Election Day is not acceptable to me. We still had 75 percent of registered voters not voting in our county.

Congratulations to the people who received the most votes, and thank you to each candidate. My respect is high for all the candidates. Yes, I have personal choices, and I vote my convictions and values, but that does not mean I have less respect for others who do not receive my vote. In other counties near us, there will be runoff elections Aug. 21. Following that election, we head toward Nov. 6, and the General Election. At that time, we will be voting for the person who will serve us as president of the United States for the four years beginning January 2013.

With free and open elections we must all decide now to be as informed as possible, learning as much as we can about the people, party and platform of each person running for president. Call me a dreamer, but I look forward to the day when we will see traffic jams as people line up outside their voting place to exercise one of the most cherished freedoms we have and that is to vote for the person of their choice. From where I stand, there is not a better time than now to begin to prepare for the next election by paying attention to what is going on in our culture and hearing the responses from the various candidates as to the solutions they offer on the issues.

Follow Ray Newman on Twitter — @RayNewmanSr.