In our current national climate of persistent political prognostication through polls, the general consensus is that Barack Obama will be the next president of the United States. According to CNN, only six states — Nevada, Colorado, Missouri, Ohio, North Carolina, and Florida — are tossups, at this point.

One could definitely argue this claim, but the polls don’t (always) lie. What they do is much worse than lying. It is worse, even, than the feeling that we Cyclone football fans have when realizing that the last two losses have been by a combined score of 73-17. What do they do? They confirm the citizenry’s mindset that their vote will not count come Nov. 4.

Republican or Democrat, if you live in one of the 22 red or blue states that CNN refers to as “safe” for either McCain or Obama, but would like to help make the losing candidate in your state the next president, you might very rationally perceive your vote as pointless. As a result, you might not go to the polls.

Conversely, if you live in one of these states and you do support the candidate who is leading in it, you might very rationally think that you have no need to vote, as the candidate will assuredly win a “safe” state, such as yours.

The Electoral College system does lead to many votes that are virtually valueless, but a citizen should never feel that their vote does not matter in a democracy.

But since it seems the Electoral College isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, I would love to see an end to polling. Would this make things tougher on the candidates? Sure it would — they wouldn’t know where to campaign hard and where to campaign soft. But this would be great, as every American has just as much at stake in this country and its next president as any other.

I regretfully recognize, however, that polling is not going anywhere.

Yet, I optimistically recognize that this election holds a great deal of potential to cause citizens to disregard both where their state is in the polls as well as that little voice in their heads that is telling them not to bother voting.

I know, I know, you have heard it all before. Record numbers of young voters were supposed to respond to “Choose or Lose” and “Vote or Die” campaigns and turn up at the polls in record numbers in both 2000 and 2004.

It didn’t happen.

But this year there is so much at stake that even Kim Smith, a professor in the Greenlee School of Journalism and Communication, who has studied elections for a few decades, says youth might actually vote in the numbers that have always been expected of them but in which they always fall thoroughly short.

Why?

First, this election has no incumbent up for reelection, nor does it have a vice president in the running. This has not been the case since 1976, when Jimmy Carter defeated Gerald Ford by 57 electoral votes but only a million popular votes. If history is an omen, election 2008 is far from a lock, and our votes will make a difference.

Secondly, as Smith notes, this election is “perceived as an important, historical election” by virtually all Americans because whichever candidate wins, “history will be made.” Whether helping to elect the first African-American president or the first female vice president, we can play a small part in making history.

Lastly, Smith believes “the economic crisis will energize people to vote,” from rookie voters to Social Security veterans. The economy is the one issue that will impact every voter in some way this year, and voting to support either the bottom-up or trickle-down approach of Obama and McCain could very well result in record numbers.

My final request, then, is to ignore the Electoral College and to ignore the presumptive polls. Your vote, regardless of what the political pundits and prognosticators say, can count. Only you, however, can make sure that it will.

— Steve Adams is a graduate student in political science from Annapolis, Md.