Caroline Kennedy may want Gov. David Patterson to appoint her to the U.S. Senate, but research by the NY Daily News shows that the author hasn’t been the most civically-minded person when it comes to voting. In fact, her record has been quite spotty over the past couple of decades.

City Board of Elections records show Kennedy failed to vote in many elections since she last registered in the city in 1988 – including votes for the Senate seat she hopes to fill, and numerous Democratic face-offs for mayor.

“It doesn’t speak to a deep-felt commitment to the electoral process,” Baruch College political scientist Doug Muzzio said when told of Kennedy’s ballot breakdowns.

Records show Kennedy never pulled the lever for any of her fellow Democrats in city primary races for mayor in 1989, 1993 and 1997 and 2005, when Republicans won three out of four.

She was also AWOL for the primary and general elections in 1994, when Sen. Patrick Moynihan was running for re-election to the seat Kennedy hopes to hold.

Aides to Kennedy actually concede that she’s not exactly the most reliable voter in history, but insist she votes “most of the time”. Of the 38 contested elections since ’88, Kennedy has failed to vote in about half of them. A spokesman claims that that’s only a “handful of occasions”. Yeah, okay.

I can understand people being unable to make it to the polling booth. However: A) It’s not like she missed once or twice, and B) It’s not like she’s working to put meat on the table. Her father once asked:

And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country.

Maybe she could take that to heart. It seems that if you’re capable of voting (and she surely is), exercising the rights millions have died to defend would be the least you could do. She can’t even get out and vote on a regular basis, but she’s going to vote for and represent the state of New York in the U.S. Senate?