A big question for everybody

But the dilema stands. With the electoral college nearly half of the votes in each state are discarded in a sense as they are meaningless once the state is won regardless of how many there are. People are disenfranchised and don't vote because they think their vote doesn't count and in this system in almost every case, they are right. You vote directly for every other elected position to vote for at every level. The reality is that the system was created, as stated by the founding fathers, for the main reason of it being impossible back then to collect and count the votes in the colonies in a timely manner. Today you can vote in alaska and everyone in the world knows the poll data seconds later. It is obsolete. How sad is it that you can listen to the media excitement over voter turn out for this election because there may be 110 million Americans showing up to vote? I will tell you how sad. That is still half or less of eligible voters! What other country on Earth that has the great right to vote squanders it in such a terrible way? Nobody. 90%+ of the population votes in Russian! How about Afghanistan? If we want to tell people that we truly are a democracy and we are going to be so arrogant as to tell the rest of the world to envy our system, wouldn't it be great if our own people cared? If our citizens votes counted?

Originally posted by evansnakes
Chris, you are being an ass. If you read my post you would have seen that I specificialy told Rich that I knew this would get moved and that he would be doing it shortly. Sadly, the most important thing in this country right now is less important than selling a couple reptiles. No, the BOI is not the right place, this is much more improtant than the BOI, BUT that is the only forum on this site that gets any hits. Everyone in the reptile business whines about government but nobody does anything to make changes.

So basically I'm an ass because I pointed out the thread did not belong in the BOI even tho you basically WHORED it there to get hits Evan? Lets not resort to this, you're a good guy and I have alot of respect for you. I agree with you as well, I just did not read your entire first post and realized it did not belong where it was.

I wish things were different, but alot of people, even with the huge turnouts this year, will still not vote because they know that a great percentage of their votes will be for not....

In a worst case scenario, 100% of the votes in 39 states and 49% in the remaining 11 could be for nothing at all under the EC.
Eleven states can gain the win, and it only takes 51% to win the state.

Just for fun I ran the numbers.
According to the 2003 population estimate, there are currently 216,557,469 people over 18 in this country.
61,709,425 votes could carry the 11 states with the most EC votes thus gaining the required 270 votes to win.
That means if 61,709,425 voted for candidate A, and 154,848,044 voted for candidate B, then in this example candidate A would win. That cannot possibly represent the interests of the people when 2.5 times as many people voted for the loser.
Granted, this exact situation would never happen, but it does not need to be that extreme for the point to be made.

I see the argument for the EC, but I still believe that every vote should count regardless. Sure, CA with their 26 million potential voters would carry alot of weight as a state, but not one of them would be any more powerful than anyone else in the country.
As it stands, the states with the highest EC votes get the attention from the candidates anyway so little would change there. When is the last time you heard of a presidential candidate making a campaign tour through Montana hoping to grab their 3 whole votes.
In the states they do visit, how often do they stray out into the countryside anyway. They stay in the cities where they can reach the most people in the shortest time so pack mentality comes into play anyway. It's just in the current situation, the pack mentality in the cities nullifies the opposing votes from the rural areas by sheer numbers.

Aside from the problems with the method of presidential election I have little interest in making the trip to the polls for lack of options. In reality the election itself is just something to try to make you feel better about the screwing you are going to get for the next four years because you're going to get one either way.
Where's the choice? You have rich boy number one against rich boy number two, both claiming they can best represent a nation full of people who will never in their lives earn the amount of money the candidates were born with. It's like Trent Lott becoming head of the NAACP.
You can believe nothing they say for the very reason it came from their mouth. Since you can't take them at their word, they give you nothing to vote for. Myself, I'm tired of having to vote against something. Trying to pick the lesser of two evils which ultimately is the one who can sling mud with the most accuracy.

Primarily for the above reasons, I take little interest in excercising my right to vote for the president. If my vote actually meant anything, and if for once in my life a candidate would give me something to be for rather that a list of things to oppose, then my attitude would change.

Clay, it sucks. We are the only major democratic society in the world that is a two party system. Countries like Canada, England, Australia, etc., parties have to get other groups to back them, they have to reach accross the isle. How great would it be if our congress had to work together to get things done that we wanted done instead of just wasting time while they passed $400+ million in garbage pork barrel spending a couple weeks ago, to give tax breaks to PGA golfers and horse racing venues??? It is total bull! Why do professional golfers need tax breaks?

It sucks when you get down to two guys worth hundreds of millions of dollars talking about the middle class, something they have never been a part of and know nothing about, BUT if for no other reason, consider the importance of voting this election because of the potential long term implications of the supreme court for the next generation. The president that appoints the next 1-4 supreme court justices will change the climate of this country for a generation.

How about a scary story for Halloween? If the 2 candidates should tie at 269 electoral votes each, which it turns out is not as unlikely as it seems, then the Congress votes in the candidate they want as president. Talk about our votes meaning nothing, there you go.

Just on side note, the 2 candidates have now spent over $550,000,000 on this campaign. Can you imagine what we could do to improve the lives of so many Americans with that money?

The sickest stat yet, the total dollar amount spent on televison advertising on the 2004 presidential election by both parties and other groups.... $1,505,000,000!!! How does that make you feel?

ill

On the topic of Cav's posts, the original country was not designed as a solid group of people under the US but rather each person was a citizen of their state, and the states were joined together to form a partnership in dealing with foreign entities and interstate dealings. So a private citizen did not call themselves "Americans" but instead "Virginians" or "Floridians" (as an example). So they elected a national leader by first deciding who would represent the state the best not who would represent the individual citizen the best. This is the reason behind the electoral college.

Since the civil war ended (the main purpose of the civil war was the destruction of states rights), the basic premise explained above has become less and less important as has the state entity. With mass transit and mass communications the basic thought process of American citizens is moving away from state citizenship. As such the electoral college is antiquated. The hard part is to develop a way to move to a popular vote at a single time, as having 1/2 the country vote one way and the other 1/2 the other would cause many issues.

Evan,

Do you see the duality of your posts?

You want each states votes to count as more, promoting more campaiging in each state.

You then point out the dollars spent on campaigning.

Wouldn't increasing the campaigning increase the dollars spent?



I'm curious how candidates and various groups are supposed to get out the message they are trying to send without large TV advertising? Low cost pamphlets mailed to people? How many caresheets have you handed out that you KNOW the people are NEVER going to read and that is for a living creature right in front of them on a daily basis. You think their going to study and read about issues that they probaby only think about for 2 months every 4 years? Personal attendance at political rallies would be physically impossible for every citizen in the US (especially with only 2 candidates, just got get to that many places in a few months).

Originally posted by dwedeking
I'm curious how candidates and various groups are supposed to get out the message they are trying to send without large TV advertising? Low cost pamphlets mailed to people? How many caresheets have you handed out that you KNOW the people are NEVER going to read and that is for a living creature right in front of them on a daily basis. You think their going to study and read about issues that they probaby only think about for 2 months every 4 years? Personal attendance at political rallies would be physically impossible for every citizen in the US (especially with only 2 candidates, just got get to that many places in a few months).

Have you really learned anything from those political soundbites? The main purpose seems not to inform, just to say, "Hey, morons, my opponent sucks." I wish I had the money. No wonder the media conglomerates grow stronger and stronger with an infusion of cash like that. They have every incentive to support the status quo. No wonder we get such weak candidates, those are the ones that need to spend the most.