I took political science 101 in my first semester of my freshman year of college, and I still remember the first day of class. After a lecture about the importance of politics, our professor gave us homework for the following session: make a list of 10 things that are affected by politics. Leaving it to the last minute, I found it kind of difficult to think of so many. I was impressed during the next lecture, as our professor randomly called on people to read 2-3 things on their list. They were all different. There wasn’t a single similar thing on anybody’s list. This cleverly reinforced our first lesson: politics affects everything. The cost of electricity in your home. Your NFL viewing experience. Where you live and how long it takes you to get to the grocery store. It literally affects every facet of our lives. This doesn’t mean we have to make it the center of our lives (as the media tries to do every 4 years in October), but that we can better understand its importance and how it affects our lives. Giving politics the proper amount of attention across our society is something we have yet to figure out. It’s time we take charge.