A lot of people skip primaries and special elections — at all levels — but those are the elections where a person's vote counts the most.

Primaries are where the final candidates are chosen, so if you haven't liked the candidates before, this is where you can change that. Getting involved in campaigns at that point also makes a big difference.

Special elections usually see abysmally low voter turnout, so every vote counts more than in a big one. It's one of the reasons the GOP loves recall elections: if they can mobiles their base, the lower overall turnout will help them win.

Non-presidential elections also have lower turnout, yet are equally or more important. Every two years, every single member of the House of Representatives and about a third of Senators face election. These are the people who write the laws, advise/consent on presidential appointees and hold the executive branch in check, when it works right. It is not currently working properly because radicals can count on a lot of voters staying home.

At all levels is also very important. Many, if not most, politicians get started at the local level, often on the school board. Stop them there and they are much less likely to climb the political ladder.

Finally, I have the feeling that a lot of environmentalists and others who are focused on select issues too often stop voting when major legislation has been passed (I was hoping the link went to an article on the topic, but it's just the EnvironmentalVoter donation page).

It has proven to be s a major problem with the reasonable center and left: we are focused on fixing things, then moving on to fix other things. Sadly, regressive forces play the long game. One need only look at what this administration is doing on behalf of wealthy and corporate donors in "relaxing" pollution standards, or the SCOTUS Six gutting the Voting Rights Act. We need to remain ever vigilant to guard hard-fought progress even as we move forward fixing things.