It seems so simple.
You pick up one slip of paper out of a tray holding 30+ slips, you place it in an envelope and you then slide it into a box.
Israel''s democracy rests on that not too burdensome physical act.
Of course, there is the getting to the polling station, the waiting on line, the bureacracy of displaying one''s proof of registration as well as the genial or not very genial banter while waiting for your turn.
You even might have endured the nightly TV ads of electioneering propaganda, the newspaper ads, your family over dinner, your friends at work, your minyan buddies and last of all, your own conscience.
I was part of a study of election-time involvement and so, already primed, I share with you some of the considerations that I experienced on the way to the ballot box in a sort of guide to just how perplex voting can be for a right-of-center citizen.
Are you comfortable with the Likud/Yisrael Betienu alliance?
Are you satisfied that the Bayit Hayehudi could not include Arieh Eldad and Michael Ben-Ari and what happened to Yaakov (Ketzeleh) Katz?
Are you sure you can vote for Arieh Eldad together with Michael Ben-Ari?
Is Netanyahu to be trusted that he will move forward a nationalist agenda or is he to be trusated to stick to a two-state solution?
Is Bennett to be trusted not to continue the slide to the center of the last week of the campaign?
Should Netanyahu be shored up from outside the Likud or is the new slate sufficient for that?
Will Dan Merridor and Benny Begin come back as ministerial appointees and should they? Will Tzipi Hotovely be appointed?
Should Otzma Leisrael be pushed over the threshold even so that they''ll be somewhere for the Bayit Yehudi breakaways in the future, if they''ll be any, to go?
Does one take the chance, as Dani Dayan emphasized, of losing tens of thousands of votes as happened in 1992 by voting for a small list?
Will the Likud indeed be strong, as promised, or as strong as its recent record, or not?
Do you believe in religiously-guided parties or in large across-the-board lists?
Is HaBayit HaYehudi religious or not? Is Otzma Leisrael?
Did the success of Land of Israel activists in the Likud primaries obligate one to continue to vote Likud in the national elections? And if not, what will that mean for the future?
Was the electioneering of the Likud fair in pointing a finger at the Bayit Yehudi "extremists", hiding them, while ignoring and hiding its own?
Will Arieh Eldad stay the stretch with Otzma Leisrael?
Is Am Shalem right-of-center?
So many questions, so much perplexity.
I never promised answers but I''m good at the questions.
Have a nice day on Tuesday and may we all merit only good for the next four years.
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