If you've been following the US primary elections you've certainly become increasingly aware of some of the really byzantine election practices we've got in the country. The rules themselves seem to be screaming for reform.
In the past 8 years we've had
1. an election for president won by the person who lost the popular vote.
2. a long series of voter disenfranchisement issues where voters were unfairly removed from election roles.
3. wide spread debate over and accusation of voter fraud.
4. debate and extensive accusations over vote counting and voting machines.
5. A manufacturer of proprietary voting machines promising the elections to a candidate.
6. big discrepancies between exit polls and final vote tallies.
Anyone of those things would lead to people marching in the streets in most of the world.
So why aren't Americans screaming for election reform? It gets talked about on internet forums and the like (sort of like impeaching Bush) but to the best of my knowledge there are no serious proposals moving forward out there and that doesn't seem to bother most Americans.
Are we simply so complacent about our democracy that we don't care enough to improve the system?
Are Americans just blindly accepting that "it (stolen elections) can't happen here"?
Is the media remiss in cover election problems?
Is this related to 911? Has the threat of terrorism made it harder for Americans to critically evaluate our institutions? Or would it be this way anyway?
Are candidates afraid to raise the issue for fear of being labeled unpatriotic because they are critical of the US system?
To me it seems shameful that a country which sees itself as a promoter of democracy through out the world, doesn't even have democratic direct election of its own leader. It seems shameful that we spend so much time defending a system which was designed to guarantee unequal representation of the voters.
So why aren't the people of this country screaming for electoral reform?
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
Because its not clear that any given reform would improve the system.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
Really?
I've seen several good proposals out there for replacing the electoral college and every one of them is without question more democratic than current system.
For example, what would be wrong with having nation wide primary elections all on the same day? The only objections I've heard to this are from IO and NH residents who feel that they deserve an unfair representation in the primary race and pundits who worry that it would make the primaries too expensive. (I think the real object is from donors who don't want to have to pony up too much money for a candidate before they find out in the early primaries if they are truly viable (aka Guiliani). This system would make it harder to buy a political official, but no one wants to come out and state that as an objection.
Maybe we Americans don't really care that much about democracy.
Is the real problem that despite the lip service we give to democracy we vastly prefer stability?
Do we fear (as did our founding fathers) that genuine democracy might lead to bigger differences between the candidates and major swings of power that could threaten our economic stability?
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I think that's a big part of it. People look at the status quo and say two things: 1. What am I supposed to do about it? and 2. Even if I could change it, what is the better way?
I think we need to get rid of the electoral college. I think the primaries should all be actual primaries, not caucuses, with no delegates, and no superdelegates, it should all be straight up popular votes. I think states should vote by geographic regional blocs on the same day, so there'll be maybe 5 or 6 voting dates with 10 or so states each. One state from each region will get to vote early in January (or near enough), and the first state to vote will be rotated every four years so it's never the same state. This makes sure that no state has a strangehold on retail politics or having their issues be up front and center. It also ensures that lesser known candidates CAN use retail politics to actually get something done.
But that's the process. I don't know how to fix the actual physical process of voting, tallying, and reporting. I don't have a problem with electronic voting so long as there is a paper trail in case of a recount being needed. That's why I like the ballots we have here, which are scanned like a college scantron sheet, and then the actual ballot is still there for recordkeeping. I don't have a problem with instant reporting via electronic machines, but there MUST be something other than 1's and 0's to keep track of something like a national election.
I think Americans are generally in one of three circles on this issue. 1. They don't know and don't care. 2. They know but don't think they can fix the problem. 3. They know, they're screaming their heads off, but they're the smallest group and no one listens.
We're a nation easily placated by lip service.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit: For example, what would be wrong with having nation wide primary elections all on the same day? The only objections I've heard to this are from IO and NH residents who feel that they deserve an unfair representation in the primary race and pundits who worry that it would make the primaries too expensive. (I think the real object is from donors who don't want to have to pony up too much money for a candidate before they find out in the early primaries if they are truly viable (aka Guiliani). This system would make it harder to buy a political official, but no one wants to come out and state that as an objection.
The real objection to that is that it'd be impossible for a candidate with less name recognition to campaign in that situation without several hundred million dollars. They need to be able to spend some time in a single state and get to know the people and vice versa, so if they do well they get the free media that comes with it. It's the only way a less established less well funded candidate can break out of obscurity. The variation I offered in my post above I think is the better solution. It's a little more complicated, but it's more fair to the candidates I think, and by extension gives better options to the voters.
Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
quote:1. an election for president won by the person who lost the popular vote.
I'd probably feel different if I were on the other side, but I don't feel like someone should be able to win an election just by spamming the big cities.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
There are a couple of reasons for the electoral college. Some good, some less so. It was important for states with smaller populations and may still be. I don't have a problem with the electoral college, but I do have a problem with "winner-take-all" state elections. If we want to get away from the red/blue states and have national candidates who have to govern the whole country, electoral votes should be awarded proportionally.
This would be a state level decision, though. So lobby your state government.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I like the staggered primaries, because a big national day would simply the candidate with the most money and name recognition going in would win. I think the ordering of which states go when should change every four years.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote:The real objection to that is that it'd be impossible for a candidate with less name recognition to campaign in that situation without several hundred million dollars.
I've heard that point before and I don't give it much weight. First off, when was the last time the current process lead to the nomination of a candidate that didn't have name recognition before primaries? Not in my lifetime.
Second, never in my lifetime (until this year) has a candidate spent time in my state prior to the primaries. Despite that, I've never had trouble (even before the internet) getting information about who the primary candidates were and what their stands were. That has been true even for minor unknown candidates. The problem in primaries in this country hasn't been getting the information to the people. Its been getting the people to care enough to look at the information available.
Third: This year when the primaries are coming far closer than ever before to being simultaneous, candidates have finally started visiting everywhere. And rather than having that narrow the field sooner to the most well known candidate, we are getting one of the best primary races in a long time and people who've never been interested in primaries before are participating. If this is working so well, then I suspect a single national primary would work even better.
Forth: Other countries, even other large countries are able to do it. What is so different here that makes it impossible for us?
Fifth: Rather than eliminating all the candidates who couldn't spend hundreds of millions on a primary campaign, a national primary might force candidates to take a more grass roots approach to campaigning. The internet makes that easier and in fact several candidates including Obama and Paul started their campaigns that way this season. The idea that a candidate couldn't campaign everywhere at once might have been true 50 years ago. Its not true with modern technology.
Sixth: I heard several of the early democratic and republican candidate debates broadcast either on radio or podcast this year. They were broadcast nationally already. No big change is needed. This years close primaries already had candidates crisscrossing the nation all fall. No big change is needed to more the vote to one day.
Seventh: Perhaps I'm just not like the average voter and am more likely to cast my vote based on what I hear in the debates and am able to research myself than on expensive TV adds. Wouldn't it be great if we had a process that favored informed voters who did their own research rather than those who vote based on a good theme song from a TV add? Wouldn't it be great if we had a process that had people excited enough about elections to do their own research?
Eighth: There are only two real advantages to the current system. 1. They virtually insure the winner will have a majority. If we went to a single primary nation wide with say 10 candidates from each party, its likely no one would win even close to a majority of the votes. We would have to adopt some sort of instant run off ballot for the system to work.
2. The current system favors corporate and special interests who donate to campaigns (often to both sides) in order to buy influence rather than to really support a particular candidate. I've learned from friends in politics that in order to get donations from these types, you have to make them believe you will win. They don't want to buy influence from people who aren't going to have any influence. That's a big part of why incumbents find it so much easier to raise money than their challengers. The current primary system gives these people a chance to sit back and see whose in the lead before they bet their money on a single horse. I think loosing this is what people are really worried about when they claim that a nation wide primary would be too expensive for lesser known candidates. I think eliminating this advantage could be the best reason for having a nation wide primary election.
Finally: Exactly the same argument could be made for the final election. Third party candidates with smaller bank rolls would have a much better chance if they could focus their campaign on one or two states at a time. We don't do that because we understand how undemocratic that is. Its bad enough that voters on the west coast are hearing results from the east coast before they go to the polls. If we know how bad this is for the final elections, why do continue to tolerate much worse in the primaries?
Posted by The Pixiest (Member # 1863) on :
Rabbit: You forgot the Dead vote, Tire slashing of Republican "get out the vote" vans, and double-registered Florida/NY residents and attempts to change the rules of the election after it was already in progress (Algore, Hillary, and the NJ Democratic party), Disenfranchisement of the Military. Just to name a few. Your list seems focused on the alleged crimes of Republicans and disregards the alleged crimes of the Democrats.
But YES, we could do something to fix elections. Make sure every ballot has a paper trail would be a good start. Another would be requiring photo ID to vote. No more going to your polling place, claiming to be Jane Q Deadchick and getting another vote.
I'm also for having every primary on the same day and settling it between the top 2 at the Conventions. But I'm not for getting rid of the Electoral College.
But we'll never get any sort of reform because those in power will do ANYTHING to keep it and don't want to make their favorite dirty tricks more easy to catch. They have gone to great lengths to give the gov't more and more control over people's every day life. They don't want to go from being one of the Controllers to one of the Controlled.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote:But I'm not for getting rid of the electoral college.
Why not? The electoral college if fundamentally unfair. The electoral college guarantees extreme unequal value of votes depending on their region. One vote in a close swing state may be worth hundreds of times one vote in a state where the candidate is already winning by a large majority. This is a violation of the basic democratic principle of one person one vote. Eliminating the electoral college would make winning votes in California (or Utah) just as important as winning votes in Florida and Ohio. Its sort of ridiculous to nit pick over issues like whether photo ID should be required to vote when the basis of the system is as unfair as the electoral college.
As a side benefit, eliminating the electoral college would reduce the power of regional special interests and focus national elections on those issues which influence all Americans. If there is one thing the US could do to reduce the big pork projects both parties favor, it would be eliminating the electoral college. There would no longer be any reason for the parties to cater to particular regions just to hold the Presidency.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
quote:This year when the primaries are coming far closer than ever before to being simultaneous, candidates have finally started visiting everywhere.
It isn't that the primaries are closer together - it's because it's close.
McCain certainly hasn't visited everywhere - not even close.
quote: Other countries, even other large countries are able to do it. What is so different here that makes it impossible for us?
This is a specious argument. Other countries do lots of stuff - good and bad - that we don't. That other countries do it is not a good reason. I can't believe that even has to be said.
quote:Rather than eliminating all the candidates who couldn't spend hundreds of millions on a primary campaign, a national primary might force candidates to take a more grass roots approach to campaigning. The internet makes that easier and in fact several candidates including Obama and Paul started their campaigns that way this season.
There's still selection over what gets broadcast.
In other words, if we didn't have a free media who could put who they wanted on the news, then it might be fair. If the tradeoff of giving all candidates equal coverage is to regulate the media, it's not worth it.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:One vote in a close swing state may be worth hundreds of times one vote in a state where the candidate is already winning by a large majority.
This can be ameliorated if the states allocated their electoral votes proportionally or by district. Since the voters in a state could force this if they cared, it's hard to see how their disenfranchised.
Moreover, the electoral college (along with 2-Senators-per-state) was one of the fundamental compromises that led the states - fully sovereign entities at the time - to relinquish part of their sovereignty and ratify the Constitution. The Constitution contains the mechanism for changing this, and that mechanism pretty much guarantees that it won't happen. Nor should the citizens of a state be viewed as undemocratic because they won't forgo one of the core protections that protect it from domination by larger states - a core protection that was a key reason such states were willing to sacrifice a measure of independence in a union that would otherwise greatly favor larger entities.
I know federalism has become unfashionable, but it is one of the core underlying structural protections we as citizens have.
quote:As a side benefit, eliminating the electoral college would reduce the power of regional special interests and focus national elections on those issues which influence all Americans. If there is one thing the US could do to reduce the big pork projects both parties favor, it would be eliminating the electoral college.
It might have some impact, but not as big an impact as getting rid of fixed state representation in the Senate.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Don't forget state election officials also working for campaigns on both sides (Katherine Harris and Bob Butterworth in Florida during the 2000 election, for example).
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote:Originally posted by The Pixiest: Rabbit: You forgot the Dead vote, Tire slashing of Republican "get out the vote" vans, and double-registered Florida/NY residents and attempts to change the rules of the election after it was already in progress (Algore, Hillary, and the NJ Democratic party), Disenfranchisement of the Military. Just to name a few.
No most of those points were covered under "voter fraud" and "voter disenfranchisement". I didn't get into the specifics in any of my categories (except perhaps the voting machine issue).
I would add one more category. I thinks its shameful that our votes are certified by partisan elected officials. In the last two elections the people certifying the votes in key states were running the state campaigns for Bush. Now I'm not arguing that they falsified the elections, I doubt that happened but even republicans should see how bad that looks.
If this were a high school student body election, do you think anyone would accept having one candidate campaign manager count the votes -- no way. If the election were taking place in Russis and Yeltsin's campaign manager were counting the votes -- the US and every member of the UN would be protesting. Why do we put up with that here.
I suppose that its unlikely that you would be able to find any responsible US citizen who was truly a fair unbiased broker in US elections but certainly we can do better than choosing campaign managers for one of the candidates. We could also do like the encourage the rest of the world to do and invite outside officials from the UN to monitor our elections.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
Eh, Chris beat me too it.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote:Originally posted by katharina:
quote:This year when the primaries are coming far closer than ever before to being simultaneous, candidates have finally started visiting everywhere.
It isn't that the primaries are closer together - it's because it's close.
McCain certainly hasn't visited everywhere - not even close.
Candidates from both parties were visiting many western states that they have never visited before last fall when the major news media had already anointed Clinton and Guiliani as shoe ins for the nomination. Those visits were happening because of Super-Tuesday and other closely timed primaries even before anyone knew how close the democratic race would be.
I will agree, that the states that still haven't had their primaries wouldn't be getting visits now if the race were sewn up. All the more reason for one primary.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
quote:All the more reason for one primary.
That doesn't make sense - if it was all one day, since each candidate is still only one person, they'd concentrate on the big states.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
I think the big difference is the proportional awarding of delegates. I think that this would be an improvement in the general election as well. And there is no reason we couldn't do it. Two (I think) states already do some form of this. And since it is up to the states, it would be a much easier change to make.
Getting rid of the electoral college would have the opposite effect. States with smaller populations would get ignored entirely.
Posted by The Pixiest (Member # 1863) on :
Rabbit asked:
quote: Why not? The electoral college if fundamentally unfair.
Dag and Boots (two of my favorite people) said what I was going to say. Probably better than I would have said it.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote:Originally posted by The Pixiest: Rabbit asked:
quote: Why not? The electoral college if fundamentally unfair.
Dag and Boots (two of my favorite people) said what I was going to say. Probably better than I would have said it.
At the very least, the electoral college is fundamentally undemocratic. The biggest weakness of democratic systems is there tendency toward suppression of minorities. I can see how the electoral system may have served to reduce that tendency in the early days of the nation. But right now with a much larger and more homogenous nation, minorities tend to be distributed through the states not concentrated in a particular small state. As a result the electoral college doesn't serve to protect minorities in particularly. What it does do is raise regional issues to a national level in elections.
As best I can tell, the tree of you support the electoral college because you are conservatives and in recent years the electoral college system has favored the republican system.
It just goes to support my long time theory that Republicans don't really believe in democracy -- that is that they don't believe that having all voices heard most often leads to better decisions.
Posted by The Pixiest (Member # 1863) on :
Rabbit: Having all voices heard is death to minorities. We must have constitutional limits on the power of democracy.
The Constitution is an enumeration of what the federal government MAY or MUST do, as well as some specific prohibitions against some of the things it might want to do.
Basically, it's our common values put down on paper.
When Democracy decides to do something that violates our common values, it MUST be struck down.
And here's the rub. It happens ALL the time. People are always voting for unconstitutional stuff. And sometimes, it actually gets struck down. A lot of the time, like McLame's campaign finance reform, it gets through.
PURE democracy is an abomination. It's the Tyranny of the Majority. And that's a Bad thing. Just ask any black person. Or any Native American. Or any Queerfolk.
So no, I'm not big on unrestrained democracy. And you aren't either, if you really think about it.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
The Rabbit, I think that, from even the most fleeting glimpse of anything I have written in the political threads, it would be clear that I am neither a conservative or a Republican.
edit to add: and while I have many good reasons to admire Pixiest and Dag, you can be reasonably sure that our agreement on this is not likely because it would favor "our" side.
[ March 07, 2008, 07:18 PM: Message edited by: kmbboots ]
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
I agree that pure democracy can lead to the tyranny of the majority. I understand what items like the 1st amendment do to curb that. I simply can't see in practice what the electoral college system does to the curb that problem.
I'm not at all a fan of unrestrained democracy. I'm fully in support of constraints that limit the power of the majority. My comment was actually directed at a different issue.
As I see it, the fundamental strength of democracy is that it requires the building of a majority opinion. I don't think "the majority" is something that exists naturally but it can be created by building consensus and seeking compromises that satisfy the desires of most people. That only works if all the different voices are being heard.
Having only the most powerful voices heard, is a death to minorities. Those who are actually seeking to have all voices heard want to hear minority voices as well.
My sense is that the democratic process in the US has become far to focused on winning fights rather than solving problems. As a result, both sides are too likely to demonize the opposition. If they win, there is little than effort spent at building real consensus. Battle lines are drawn so deeply that few people are willing to sit down and actually understand the values of the opposition and to try to find novel solutions to problems that might address the needs and desires of both sides. I recognize that this isn't always possible and that's why ultimately decisions must be made based on a majority rather than 100%. But I believe in the basic principle that better decisions are made when the attempt is made to listen to all voices.
I'm not sure that most Americans believe that principle. In fact the current administration has made a significant effort to restrict input in the many decisions making processes. Since they won't explain their reason, we don't really know why they reject my democratic principle. I suspect that they are so convinced that they know everything and so set on winning, that they can't see the value of listening to the opposition. That is, they don't believe that they will make better decisions if they listen to more voices.
The US system of regional representation is not without its strengths but most of those strengths have become diluted with the growth the nation. In our current system no minority voice is heard in congress unless it constitutes a majority in at least one congressional district in at least one state. Regional diversity is no longer the primary source of diversity in the US and so it is highly unlikely that any small majority will be a majority in a particular district. The way districts are drawn (by the majorities in power) makes that even more unlikely. There are democratic systems that do a better job of making sure minority voices are actually represented in the law making bodies.
My sense is that most Americans fear giving minority views more representation.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: I think the big difference is the proportional awarding of delegates. I think that this would be an improvement in the general election as well. And there is no reason we couldn't do it. Two (I think) states already do some form of this. And since it is up to the states, it would be a much easier change to make.
Getting rid of the electoral college would have the opposite effect. States with smaller populations would get ignored entirely.
States with smaller populations already get ignored entirely unless they are swing states and its expected to be a close election.
The point is that without the electoral college, voters wouldn't belong to a particular state from the point of view of candidates. They would belong to ideological, sociological, and economic groups.
As best I can tell, all regions of the nation are quite diverse ideological, sociologically and economically. The electoral college assumes that states have unique issues that exist only within their borders and so we need to ensure that every state voice is heard even more than we need to ensure that every human voice is heard. I just don't think thats true.
For example, Private property rights are a big issue in many western states. But not all Montanans (for example) favor strong private property protection. In fact not all right wing republicans in Montana favor strong private property protection (access laws are supported by lots of conservative hunters and fisherman). What's more this issues break down more closely along economic divisions than state divisions. In other words, differences between the US states are largely smaller than the differences within the states. In that context, the electoral college system does more to suppress the voice of minorities than to amplify them.
Let's say for example that you are a "green voter" living in a brown state. Even if a candidate is catering to "your state", he/she still isn't going to cater to you, because you aren't in the majority in your region. But if the we eliminated the electoral college, candidates who shared your values would now have a reason to court your vote even though you aren't in the majority in your state.
I've lived in small states most of my life and I've found that the red state/ blue state dichotomy just doesn't fit the reality on the ground. The current system is one which truly marginalizes the minority (even very large minorities) in large regions of the country.
What's more even talking about "minorities" and "majorities" doesn't really describe what's going on.
In many respects, the elections have already gone national. They are covered in every state by national media. We think of ourselves as voting for a candidate not for an electoral college member. Why not make it so?
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: The Rabbit, I think that, from even the most fleeting glimpse of anything I have written in the political threads, it would be clear that I am neither a conservative or a Republican.
edit to add: and while I have many good reasons to admire Pixiest and Dag, you can be reasonably sure that our agreement on this is not likely because it would favor "our" side.
Sorry kate, I simply hadn't connected pixiest's reference to "boots" clearly with you.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: I think Americans are generally in one of three circles on this issue. 1. They don't know and don't care. 2. They know but don't think they can fix the problem. 3. They know, they're screaming their heads off, but they're the smallest group and no one listens.
You forgot groups 4, 5, 6, and 7. Like 3, but with mutually exclusive ideas of what should be done.
I like your primary system, but I agree with Dags, kmb, and pooka on the electoral college.
quote:Originally posted by pooka:
quote:1. an election for president won by the person who lost the popular vote.
I'd probably feel different if I were on the other side, but I don't feel like someone should be able to win an election just by spamming the big cities.
I'm in a big city (and I voted for Gore), and I agree.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
See, I agree with most of that - at least the goals. I don't think, though, that a majority is the same thing as a consensus. In this country a majority is half plus one. What you are suggesting, I think, is that, instead of having an idea or a candidate achieve a majority in a state to be heard, they have to achieve a majority in the whole country. This would be a bigger hurdle for minorities.
What I am suggesting is smaller geographical regions. Awarding electoral voted by district or even precinct rather than by state. Proportional awarding of electoral votes.
edit to add: I also think that you should vote for Obama. Like me. Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
Ok, so we have Lyr's staggered primaries and kmb's district-electoral-awarding.
Sounds good so far. Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
Without the electoral college, America would just be made up of the types of states Clinton is winning.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:As best I can tell, the tree of you support the electoral college because you are conservatives and in recent years the electoral college system has favored the republican system.
Rabbit, you've been regularly making statements like this in the recent past, and it's really starting to piss me off.
I quite simply don't believe you in this case, because I know you're smart enough that this isn't "as best you can tell." I gave a structural analysis of why I oppose changing the system, and you basically ignored it. Had you simply ignored my posts in this thread, this wouldn't be so bad. Instead, you proceeded to ignore what I've written and then claim that I have no reason you can see other than partisanship to believe what I believe about this issue.
quote:My sense is that the democratic process in the US has become far to focused on winning fights rather than solving problems.
You seem to have bought into this focus, judging by your casual dismissal of my views accomplished by invoking partisanship.
Posted by Juxtapose (Member # 8837) on :
quote:This can be ameliorated if the states allocated their electoral votes proportionally or by district. Since the voters in a state could force this if they cared, it's hard to see how their disenfranchised.
I largely agreed with what you said in your post, Dag, but I wanted to quibble with this. Proportional allocation of electoral votes would benefit the minority party in most states. For example, Washington (where I live), pretty consistently votes democratic. I have a hard time imagining the democrats in charge acquiescing to simply give away electoral votes to the GOP. I have almost as hard a time imagining the republicans mounting any kind of serious assault on the status quo.
Granted, I'm not exactly sure what the procedure would generally be to change allocation. Is it something that wouldn't be heavily affected by the political leanings of the state's population?
Posted by Threads (Member # 10863) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dagonee: I gave a structural analysis of why I oppose changing the system, and you basically ignored it.
To be fair, you didn't actually express that opinion in your post (unless I am seriously misreading). You expressed why the electoral college was implemented in the first place but you didn't express explicit support for it.
I'd like to address the "tyranny of the majority" point presented earlier. I think it's a valid point but I don't think it's a good justification for permitting the minority opinion to have more weight than the majority opinion (as in the 2000 election). The filibuster technique sometimes employed in the senate is an effective protection against tyranny of the majority because it allows the minority to prevent unlawful laws from being passed while at the same time not granting them power to pass their own laws. The Condorcet voting method has effective built-in protection against tyranny of the majority.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote:As best I can tell, the tree of you support the electoral college because you are conservatives and in recent years the electoral college system has favored the republican system.
It just goes to support my long time theory that Republicans don't really believe in democracy -- that is that they don't believe that having all voices heard most often leads to better decisions.
Good grief. I was interested in this discussion, because I think this controversy is an important one. I was looking forward to discussing it with you, Rabbit. Until I read this garbage.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally Posted by: pooka I'd probably feel different if I were on the other side, but I don't feel like someone should be able to win an election just by spamming the big cities.
Instead you support a system where both parties ignore half the electorate to pander to their bases? Or for that matter, a system where millions don’t vote because they know it’s pointless, and some states are ignored by both parties because there’s simply nothing to be gained there? I fail to see how either a pure popular vote or electoral college isn’t a lot of attention paid to larger and middle sized cities. You think the status quo is any different? All both sides do is spam largish cities, and that’s likely to not change, but the difference is that more cities would get attention paid to them, in general bringing more people into the process.
quote:Originally posted by kmbboots There are a couple of reasons for the electoral college. Some good, some less so. It was important for states with smaller populations and may still be. I don't have a problem with the electoral college, but I do have a problem with "winner-take-all" state elections. If we want to get away from the red/blue states and have national candidates who have to govern the whole country, electoral votes should be awarded proportionally.
This has nothing to do with small states vs. big states. That argument only worked back in the 19th century, and I’ll tell you why. Back then, states tended to vote for their “favorite sons,” with the result being that it was impossible for a smaller state’s favorite son to garner enough votes to become president. So they changed the rule making it so every state had to vote for a president and vice president separately, instead of giving them two votes to cast as they would, and then the second place guy becomes VP by default. That was designed so big states had to choose from someone other than themselves. That situation doesn’t even slightly resemble the status quo currently. The idea that the electoral college somehow levels the playing field is a myth, and I really don’t know where it comes from, or how people even thing for a second that it makes sense. The only leveling done is ensuring that states with miniscule populations even get their three electoral college votes, but let’s be honest, serious campaigning isn’t done in “flyover states,” called that because you generally fly over them to go between the places where the votes and the delegates really are (well they are called that for other reasons too, but for this argument…). The electoral college does NOTHING to help smaller states in the 21st century, and I’ve never seen a halfway convincing argument that they do. The Senate vs. the House is where the equalizing and compromising was down to give equal voice to all the states, not the electoral college.
quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit I've heard that point before and I don't give it much weight. First off, when was the last time the current process lead to the nomination of a candidate that didn't have name recognition before primaries? Not in my lifetime.
Um, Obama? Prior to his speech at the 2004 DNC Convention, no one outside of Chicago had ever heard of Barrack Obama. And let’s be honest here, how many people REALLY watch those conventions? It’s about the same number of people who watch C-SPAN on a regular basis, which I’m convinced is about 25 people, and I know five of them personally. Seriously, my ex-girlfriend loves C-SPAN, and I like it too, but not that much. Anyway, the point is that few people watched. Even fewer of them were Republicans or Independents. Only the hardcore politicos watched. People in Illinois knew about him when they voted him into the Senate, and he had some minor recognition nationally, but come on, he wasn’t a household name. Few of the candidates were. If they hadn’t had the chance to make themselves known in Iowa or New Hampshire, Clinton would have walked away with this election, no contest, it would have been over months ago.
Same thing for your second point, you care about the process way, way more than the average person, who expected the candidates to woo them, rather than them figuring it out for themselves. Most of them don’t even start paying attention until the week before they actually have to vote.
quote: Third: This year when the primaries are coming far closer than ever before to being simultaneous, candidates have finally started visiting everywhere. And rather than having that narrow the field sooner to the most well known candidate, we are getting one of the best primary races in a long time and people who've never been interested in primaries before are participating. If this is working so well, then I suspect a single national primary would work even better.
Go back to the beginning, how did it all start? It all started with retail politics in New Hampshire and Iowa. A single national primary in January would have led to a Clinton coronation in February. Do you remember where national polls had everyone in January? Nationally Obama was getting smoked by 20 points or more in most states. He would have been eviscerated. You can’t say how great things are NOW and ignore how we got here.
I’m not going to point by point the rest of your post. I think you’re making a couple assumptions that aren’t really backed up by how things are going this year. I don’t like the status quo, but I think a national primary would severely, severely narrow the field of able candidates to a chosen few. And I think you greatly underestimate the resources necessary. It’s taken Obama a year to amass the fortune that he has, and he’s still spent most of it, and that’s with a fifth of the nation to go. A candidate would have to grass roots raise $200 million to have a prayer BEFORE the national primary day you propose. It’s just an insurmountable obstacle you’d create.
Kmb, riv, Dag –
If one of you would care to take a swing at it…how the does electoral college protect smaller states? I agree that that protection had some sway with how elections were held when the nation first started, although the necessary changes to protect smaller states weren’t made until after the first couple elections, and were gone by the last quarter of the 19th century, but as far as I can see, they’ve been outdated for years. The electoral college was created out of necessity, because holding a national election of a few million people across a territory as vast as the US’ eastern seaboard would’ve been a logistical nightmare, so they broke it down and had you vote for electors. This was back when you actually voted for an elector who supported a candidate, rather than vote for the candidate and then have your vote shuffled off into some shadowy system where you don’t even know the name of the guy you’re really voting for who will vote for your guy by proxy. In any case, the Founders were also extremely fearful of putting power directly into the hands of the people. They’d just witnessed the French Revolution, it wasn’t something they were eager about having happen here. It was far, far more logistical and philosophical than it was any bone to be thrown to smaller states. The small state vs. big state argument was primarily hashed out in Congress, and that’s how they came up with the Senate and the House, divesting and sharing powers so size gave them some advantage, but smaller states were still protected, and until they changed to the more modern delegate apportionment system, the second change to the electoral college I think provided some modest protections to small states. But today? Nope, not a factor. Small states are ignored by both parties: Because none of the small states are really swing stats, except maybe for New Hampshire. Most of the small states out west go Republican, so Democrats don’t waste a lot of time and money in states with little to gain and no real chance at taking, and Republicans don’t waste the effort because they don’t have to. Similar story in reverse for the couple small states that Democrats get like Vermont or Rhode Island. There are states that many know will go Democrats, know will go Republican and the stuff in between is what is really fought over. The electoral college I think is like the Titanic. When a candidate knows that certain parts of the ship are flooding, he closes the bulkheads to keep the ship afloat, and sacrifices everyone in those compartments he might have saved.
I’m more than willing to hear the other side of the argument though. In the meantime, I’m going to go searching for the post I did before on the electoral college, I think this’d be a good place to repost it.
quote:Originally posted by Threads The filibuster technique sometimes employed in the senate is an effective protection against tyranny of the majority because it allows the minority to prevent unlawful laws from being passed while at the same time not granting them power to pass their own laws.
See, I don't get that. Unlawful laws? If a law is unconstitutional, you challenge it in the courts, it's what they are there for. Otherwise there is no unlawful law. If it's not unconstitutional then it's fair game. Filibusters are a procedural loophole that I don't like at all. It allows a minority to stymie a majority, which I think is actually undemocratic. Our nation was founded on the principle of majority rule with respect for minority rights, which means you don't steamroll them, but the majority still gets to legislate. That's the same sort of justification I'd expect to say that recess appointments of controversial figures is fair, when recess appointments were really designed to fill vital vacancies while Congress went on long vacations. The recess appointment I think is an outdated power as well, as Congress no longer takes 3 month breaks and takes months to travel back to Washington from across the country. We have planes now, it's unnecessary.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Originally posted by Threads:
quote:Originally posted by Dagonee: I gave a structural analysis of why I oppose changing the system, and you basically ignored it.
To be fair, you didn't actually express that opinion in your post (unless I am seriously misreading). You expressed why the electoral college was implemented in the first place but you didn't express explicit support for it.
Fine, then Rabbit's comment was even more ridiculous and wrong than it appeared at first.
I never expected to place something Rabbit said on the same level as what Ron Lambert posts, but that comment definitely was.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
Even with the electoral college being in need of reform it does in fact give a slight boost to smaller states in that electors match the number of representatives each state has in the house + 2 for their senators. That +2 benefits Utah or Alaska far more than it benefits New York or California.
The college was designed primarily to act as a buffer zone between the people and their president. You can say the protection of minorities is no longer necessary as they are spread throughout the country, but who is to say new minorities won't form, or that certain ones won't combine together in the same geographic location? Without some sort of check on stupid people voting in large numbers, I can't support simply removing the college and hoping nothing bad happens. This aspect of federalism I believe is indispensable for our democracy.
I think if we want to make the playing fields in all states more important we should eliminate the winner takes all rules in every state that stills has them. They guarantee a two party system and it's the reason certain states are totally ignored by one or both parties. If candidates have something to lose or gain by campaigning in any given state it will force a restructuring of their strategy. I also think it is beneficial to not have all the primaries on the same date but to spread them out throughout a period of a few months, thus allowing candidates to better micromanage their campaign.
I'm not sure if there is anything I would do about the fact that electors at the college are forced to pledge support to a party. It's wrong, but I'm not sure how to efficiently fix that.
I almost amusingly support Jeff Buckley's idea that stupid blacks and whites should be barred from voting.
edit
Rabbit:
quote:As best I can tell, the tree of you support the electoral college because you are conservatives and in recent years the electoral college system has favored the republican system.
That was pretty ridiculous. I have a hard time believing you seriously think that, or that you consider that an argument you can stand behind.
double edit: Or perhaps you were simply saying that the college has favored republicanism and the republican system rather than the "Republican party." You didn't capitalize the R, so it leaves one wondering.
[ March 08, 2008, 10:34 AM: Message edited by: BlackBlade ]
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
It would not be good to have all the primaries on one day. It is better for the nomination process to be strung out over many months, so the candidates--even those who may be the darlings of certain networks--can receive prolonged critical scrutiny and proper "vetting."
I have disliked the electoral college for a long time; but it could potentially have value as a last-stop means of saving the country from some candidate who is discovered at the last moment (even the day after the general election) to be something absolutely unacceptable to the general electorate--like a pedophile, serial killer, or undercover terrorist or "manchurian candidate."
Just because nothing like that has happened yet, does not mean that it could not. In fact, having the electoral college may even serve as a deterrent, since it means that much more difficulty for someone unworthy to maintain the fraud and deception.
Posted by Zalmoxis (Member # 2327) on :
Either 8 regional primaries staggered over 6 months; or 6 regional primaries staggered over 4 months. Regions positions in the line-up are rotated every presidential election. All delegates are awarded proportionally. No super delegates. Absentee ballots only count if received 10 days or less before the regional election.
Keep the electoral college. I agree with Dagonee's federalism comments. I think federalism as well as the primacy of states as a governing body will become increasingly more important as America's population continues to congregate in metropolitan areas. Metropolitan areas should do more regional planning and sharing of resources -- states will be there to make sure that rural areas and smaller cities aren't wholly ignored.
Edit: Removed a repeated sentence.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:value as a last-stop means of saving the country from some candidate who is discovered at the last moment (even the day after the general election) to be something absolutely unacceptable to the general electorate--like a pedophile, serial killer, or undercover terrorist or "manchurian candidate."
And he'd be impeached the next day. Or just plain ole sent to jail. I know impeachment is for "high crimes and misdemeanors" and there's been some contention in the past over what that means, but, I'm going to assume that if you commit a jailable offense, you don't get a free pass if you're elected. No other elected official has.
quote:The college was designed primarily to act as a buffer zone between the people and their president. You can say the protection of minorities is no longer necessary as they are spread throughout the country, but who is to say new minorities won't form, or that certain ones won't combine together in the same geographic location? Without some sort of check on stupid people voting in large numbers, I can't support simply removing the college and hoping nothing bad happens. This aspect of federalism I believe is indispensable for our democracy.
That some people are stupid is a thin excuse. First off, how do you know the actual electors themselves are any smarter? Besides, electors, the high grand majority of the time, vote for who the idiot electorate tell them to vote for. And in any event, it takes more than half a million people to get you an elector. It was 535,000 last time I checked, I don't know what it is now, but I assume it's gone up, ever since the electoral college's membership number was capped and they instead started raising the number of people you have to have to get electors. The higher that number goes, the less and less chance small parties will have to have ANY effect on the process, because even if they were to get large numbers of voters from all over the country, unless they can concentrate those votes in smaller areas, they'll still never get an elector out of it.
Besides, Bush was elected TWICE. I don't see any proof at all that the electoral college protects us from stupid voters. If anything, it's proven that stupid voters in the right geographic locations have MORE power than smart ones.
Posted by The Pixiest (Member # 1863) on :
quote: Besides, Bush was elected TWICE. I don't see any proof at all that the electoral college protects us from stupid voters.
Or from incredibly awful options.
Just because someone thinks that Kerry and Algore were Even Worse than Bush, doesn't make them stupid.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Apologies.
People who voted for Bush may not have been stupid, but I think they were awfully neglectful in their judgement, most especially the second time around, and that's a valid opinion I'm entitled to. I'll apologize for calling people stupid, that was a bad choice of words. But I still think they made a horribly wrong decision, and that the electoral college does nothing to protect us from bad choices, regardless of the reasons they were made.
Posted by The Pixiest (Member # 1863) on :
Lyr: well, look on the bright side, from your point of view.
If Kerry had gotten elected 4 years ago, he'd be running for re-election right now and the Obama-nation never would have gotten out of the starting gate.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I go back and forth on something like that. On the one hand, Bush delivered Congress to the Democrats on a silver platter and the country is poised to elect a Democrat to the presidency, or at least give Democrats an arsenal of issues and support that they haven't had in more than a decade. But on the other hand, is having a Democrat in office now worth the wrongs and devastations committed by a Bush White House the last three years and change and the rest of this year? No, I don't think so. The man just vetoed a bill yesterday that would have outlawed waterboarding because he says it's a vital tool in the fight against terrorism, but also says that we don't torture. The man's willing to sacrifice morality and principles we hold dear to save lives, which might sound good on paper, but people have sacrificed their lives to achieve those principles. It seems wantonly dishonorable to then in turn sacrifice the principles to save lives (if in fact that's even true).
So that bright side is a double edged sword, and doesn't much make me feel better, especially since I'm not even a Democrat, I'm just extremely anti-Bush, and I think Republicans are disastrously wrong in almost all of their solutions to our problems. I think Democrats are horribly inept, but mostly right on policy issues.
But maybe I'll feel better about it a year from now.
Posted by Sterling (Member # 8096) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dagonee: This can be ameliorated if the states allocated their electoral votes proportionally or by district. Since the voters in a state could force this if they cared, it's hard to see how their disenfranchised.
This strikes me as a dangerous precedent... Theoretically, a party could coordinate to make electoral votes winner-take-all in states where they had small majorities, and proportional in states where they did not. Effectively, gerrymandering on a nation-wide level.
I definitely think the election system is in need of reform, for many of the reasons Rabbit mentions and others. But I think the leadership of the two major political parties would feel they'd have far too much to lose. Which I guess puts me in the "would like to see change, believe I'm powerless to effect it" camp.
EDIT to ADD: I should make a note, also, that one should look well beyond race when considering the protection of "minorities" with regard to election systems. Historically, the divisions between agricultural and industrial America have played at least as great a role, for example.
Posted by AvidReader (Member # 6007) on :
While it would be more fair for Florida to be split half and half, I have to admit, I like the football aspect of our votes. Who's going to pull ahead at the last minute? Did the liberals in the big cities turn out in enough numbers to override the rural voters? Who's going to win?
I'll admit, it's gone my way the last couple times. (I still like Bush. I think he's doing ok.) But if it doesn't go my way this time, that's ok too. I like the excitement of seeing what happens next more than getting my fair share.
Posted by aspectre (Member # 2222) on :
That's precisely what the Republicans are trying to do by splitting California's electoral votes through the inititative process. Note that they have no interest in splitting electoral votes in Republican-majority states.
More interestingly through the initiative process, Schwarzenegger&Company are trying to gerrymander California by forbiddingcompanies which have provided the California legislature with demographic data for redistricting from providing data or even bidding on contracts to provide data to a new redistricting board that would be set up by the same ballot measure. Nor would members of that new state redistricting board be elected into office.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
aspectre
quote:That's precisely what the Republicans are trying to do by splitting California's electoral votes through the inititative process. Note that they have no interest in splitting electoral votes in Republican-majority states.
Of course they don't have any interest. Naturally the Democrats have to haggle over what they want in exchange for something that benefits the Republican party so significantly. Or else the Republicans have to concentrate their support California and get it passed despite what the Democrats want.
Lyrhawn:
quote:That some people are stupid is a thin excuse. First off, how do you know the actual electors themselves are any smarter? Besides, electors, the high grand majority of the time, vote for who the idiot electorate tell them to vote for. And in any event, it takes more than half a million people to get you an elector. It was 535,000 last time I checked, I don't know what it is now, but I assume it's gone up, ever since the electoral college's membership number was capped and they instead started raising the number of people you have to have to get electors. The higher that number goes, the less and less chance small parties will have to have ANY effect on the process, because even if they were to get large numbers of voters from all over the country, unless they can concentrate those votes in smaller areas, they'll still never get an elector out of it.
The greater threat to small parties gaining any control is people's notions that third parties are villainous because they take votes away from THEIR candidate instead of the other candidate. Until people stop smirking at Nadar for his umpteenth candidacy and realize that what he is attempting to do is far more important and precedent changing than electing a woman or minority to office, there will only be so much we can do to foster smaller parties.
As for Bush's two terms proving that stupid people still vote in large numbers, it seems pointless to discuss with you the merits of my ideas when you have such a strong assumptions about certain people amongst your opposition.
And btw, I say that as somebody who voted for Kerry in 04.
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
There is a problem with awarding delegates proportionally. At first glance, this might seem better than "winner takes all." But the method of determining proportional delegates can be unjust. For example, this year's Texas Democratic caucuses awarded delegates on an unequal method having to do with senate votes that gave more delegates to the predominantly African-American neighborhoods in big cities. So even though Clinton won the popular vote by over three percentage points, Obama won more delegates in the caucuses which followed, since he wins around 90% of African-Americans' votes.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
the African American community isn't a solid block thats like "hey Obama is black lets for him" It would be more accurate to say "our parents want to vote for clinton, lets vote for Obama instead"
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
Blayne, exit polls show 80% to 90% of the African-American electorate has been voting for Sen. Obama. That is far more than just the youth rebelling against their parents.
Posted by scholar (Member # 9232) on :
The inequalities in the primary don't upset me. I don't view them as real elections. The party is deciding who they want to support, not who will actually be president. So, if they believe that giving Austin a larger amount of delegates per person will give them a better candidate for the general, that is there decision. And people who support that party can leave or not. I don't know how the green party comes up with its candidate. If we had a party who wanted to pick the candidate it will support by who wins an ultimate fighting style match, that's their choice. I would like to see reform in the election system that leads to a candidate. I would love to see a third party or independents have a chance.
Posted by Human (Member # 2985) on :
quote:Originally posted by Ron Lambert: Blayne, exit polls show 80% to 90% of the African-American electorate has been voting for Sen. Obama. That is far more than just the youth rebelling against their parents.
For once, we agree. The African-American community finally realized that voting for a black man was more in their interests than voting for a white woman.
Now I just wish Obama could convince Hispanic voters of the same thing.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Blackblade -
quote:The greater threat to small parties gaining any control is people's notions that third parties are villainous because they take votes away from THEIR candidate instead of the other candidate. Until people stop smirking at Nadar for his umpteenth candidacy and realize that what he is attempting to do is far more important and precedent changing than electing a woman or minority to office, there will only be so much we can do to foster smaller parties.
As for Bush's two terms proving that stupid people still vote in large numbers, it seems pointless to discuss with you the merits of my ideas when you have such a strong assumptions about certain people amongst your opposition.
I don't see then how electing based on the popular vote has anything to do with third party candidates. In the past, third parties have only been successful at the national level due to major upheavals in the national political dialogue. The American (Know Nothing) party, the formation of the Republican party out of the ashes of the Whigs and Free Soilers (and the Free Soilers themselves for that matter), and TR's Bull Moose party, all of them came out of major feelings of either betrayal by the two main parties on either a regional or nationwide scale, which got a large number of their people into Congress, but other than arguably Lincoln, a third party candidate has never made it to the presidency, and it's been literally a century since a third party candidate was a serious contender.
In other words, I don't think a third party candidacy has anything to do with the electoral college or the popular vote, but, near as I can tell, they haven't had any luck with the electoral college thus far.
I don't believe my particular opinions on Bush's presidency and the ineptitude of those who voted for him has anything to do with your position or its merits. You haven't detailed the merits of your ideas, not that I've seen specifically pertaining to the electoral college being a protection against stupid people anyway. But really, that entire part of the argument is really subjective isn't it? If two people don't already agree on a specific decision being good or bad, it's hard for them to have any sort of discussion on the people who made that decision.
Having said that, if I gave you the impression before that I was dismissing your ideas, then I apologize. I didn't mean to brush you aside, Bush having been elected honestly jumped out to me as a colossal mistake, and to me that seemed like a major lack of judgement on the part of the American people, and that's my opinion. But I'm perfectly willing to have that discussion academically without using specific presidents that have been elected in history who were very, very poor choices.
Posted by Mike (Member # 55) on :
quote:Originally posted by Ron Lambert: There is a problem with awarding delegates proportionally. At first glance, this might seem better than "winner takes all." But the method of determining proportional delegates can be unjust. For example, this year's Texas Democratic caucuses awarded delegates on an unequal method having to do with senate votes that gave more delegates to the predominantly African-American neighborhoods in big cities. So even though Clinton won the popular vote by over three percentage points, Obama won more delegates in the caucuses which followed, since he wins around 90% of African-Americans' votes.
Yes, there are problems with proportional representation. Are you saying that because of this, winner take all is better?
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
Mike, awarding delegates proportionally might be better if it were done more fairly without favoring any one voting block. But someone always wants to try to Gerrymander the voting districts. Winner-take-all might be better, if fairness cannot be achieved otherwise.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by Ron Lambert: Mike, awarding delegates proportionally might be better if it were done more fairly without favoring any one voting block. But someone always wants to try to Gerrymander the voting districts. Winner-take-all might be better, if fairness cannot be achieved otherwise.
Relevant question: Were you in favor of Tom DeLay's redistricting of Texas?
Posted by Mike (Member # 55) on :
Ron, thanks for clarifying. I disagree, but I see where you're coming from.
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
Samprimary, I don't know anything about Tom DeLay's redistricting of Texas. If he did the "Gerrymandering," so that most of the caucuses were held in predominantly African-American neighborhoods, then I don't think he should be praised for it.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
If you want to get rid of the two party system, the only way to do it is Proportional Representation.
Vote for your party, then they get as many seats as their portion of the vote.
Then you have the legislature vote for the president.
So long as the people choose the president, we'll always have "Well, I have to vote for X because if I vote my heart, Y will win" situations.
What you get in this type of system, however, is nasty. You get coalitions that will promise anything to get the support of small, but swing parties. This sounds GREAT if you're looking for gay marriage, but not so great when you consider that a small, orthadox party in Israel managed to ban (or very nearly ban, not sure) Gay Pride marches there.
The two party system really really really stinks, but the alternative is every batship crazy voice getting pandered to (even more than it is today.) Believe me, I'd LOVE to have some Libertarians and Constitutionalists in congress. But not at the cost of having the Klan and a ton of Greens in there.
What we NEED to do is a better job of holding our laws up against the Constitution and striking down ones that don't meet it's strict interpretation. And VERY CAREFULLY amending the Constitution in the rare cases where it needs to be fixed.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
quote:Originally posted by The Pixiest: If you want to get rid of the two party system, the only way to do it is Proportional Representation. ...
Huh. I think our non-proportional representation form of government missed the memo about only having two parties. Maybe the memo should be re-sent so that they can get right on the task of consolidating into two parties Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote:Samprimary, I don't know anything about Tom DeLay's redistricting of Texas. If he did the "Gerrymandering," so that most of the caucuses were held in predominantly African-American neighborhoods, then I don't think he should be praised for it.
Boy, you know lots about Texas primaries!
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote:The two party system really really really stinks, but the alternative is every batship crazy voice getting pandered to (even more than it is today.) Believe me, I'd LOVE to have some Libertarians and Constitutionalists in congress. But not at the cost of having the Klan and a ton of Greens in there.
So you are happy to go without representation of your views in order to deny representation to others.
quote:So long as the people choose the president, we'll always have "Well, I have to vote for X because if I vote my heart, Y will win" situations.
There are many proposed and working solutions to that problem in the world besides which allow for direct election of the president. The most common is run off elections, either with some sort of one ballot instant run off or through multiple balloting. Its done right now in lots of countries so it seems weird that Americans don't even know its possible.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit:
quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: The Rabbit, I think that, from even the most fleeting glimpse of anything I have written in the political threads, it would be clear that I am neither a conservative or a Republican.
edit to add: and while I have many good reasons to admire Pixiest and Dag, you can be reasonably sure that our agreement on this is not likely because it would favor "our" side.
Sorry kate, I simply hadn't connected pixiest's reference to "boots" clearly with you.
So Rabbit, does your ability to apologize for assuming partisan motives in those who disagree with you only extend to those whose political views you largely agree with?
Posted by Mike (Member # 55) on :
Proportional representation is one way to do it, but it is not the only way. See, for example http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant-runoff_voting, which is starting to gain popularity, though it would be even better to have a voting system that satisfies the Condorcet Criterion (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Condorcet_method).
I wholeheartedly agree that we need to be very careful amending the Constitution, and I don't trust our current leaders to do it well, nor do I expect to at any time in the near future.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:See, for example http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant-runoff_voting, which is starting to gain popularity, though it would be even better to have a voting system that satisfies the Condorcet Criterion (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Condorcet_method).
Excellent - I'm glad to see alternatives other than instant runoff being discussed. I know they get covered a lot in more academic discussions of voting reform, but instant-runoff seems to get a disproportionate amount of press coverage.
Posted by The Pixiest (Member # 1863) on :
Rabbit: The purpose of Representation, and of our government in general, is to protect our freedom. Or, as the Constitution put it "Secure the blessings of Liberty."
If you get the whacked out kook fringe a louder voice than their numbers warrant, though the use of coalition building, you give them the power to destroy our liberty. "We'll vote for your Highway bill if... you enact nationwide Blue laws!" "We'll vote for your defense bill if... You make it illegal to fire people!"
This kind of government leads to the anti-gay stuff I mentioned in Israel as well as the disaster of the French economy with it's run-away youth unemployment (If you hire someone, it IS really hard to fire them) and constant strikes.
Posted by Threads (Member # 10863) on :
Dr. Eric Maskin recently gave a talk at my school on voting methods (part of my school's effort to get eligible seniors to vote). Here's a summary of some of his views. It was the first time that I had heard of the Condorcet method and I found the true majority system attractive. As I mentioned earlier it avoids nearly all problems with "tyranny of the majority" and allows for people to vote for fringe candidates without much worry (it does have corner cases). In general, I like the idea of voting for people much more than voting for parties.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: People who voted for Bush may not have been stupid, but I think they were awfully neglectful in their judgement, most especially the second time around, and that's a valid opinion I'm entitled to.
Well, gosh. Thanks for deciding I might not be stupid after all.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
You're welcome.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote:...that's a valid opinion I'm entitled to.
Sure you're entitled to that opinion.
I don't really know why anyone ever says that, though, since no one is ever entitled to freedom from criticism of their expressed opinions.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Did I ever claim I was?
I expressed an opinion and was then told that the discussion should end because my opinion somehow made me incapable of fairly considering Blackblade's ideas.
Frankly my opinion had absolutely nothing to do with what we were even discussing, as my opinions on Bush have nothing to do with an academic discussion on the merits and faults of the electoral college. So when I said that, I guess I was really just asking not to be summarily dismissed because of my opinion. I consider that to go beyond simple criticism, which I can handle.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:So when I said that, I guess I was really just asking not to be summarily dismissed because of my opinion.
You don't want to be summarily dismissed because you summarily dismissed half the electorate as either stupid or neglectful?
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
In what way did I dismiss them? I didn't say they should shut up, I didn't say they shouldn't vote, I wasn't actively engaged with any of them on the subject of the election. I expressed an opinion on a single vote they made in one election and that's all, nothing further.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:In what way did I dismiss them?
In the same way that Rabbit dismissed Pixiest and me in this thread - you made up a reason for their actions rather than considering the reasons they actually have.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
Bingo.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I think you're wrong twice there.
First off, and I only browsed over some parts of your exchange with Rabbit, but from what I gather, you held an opinion and she said something to the effect of 'well of course you'd think that, you're a Republican and thus benefitting from the system you support,' which assumes your positions and assigns motive.
Yeah, I didn't do that. I didn't even come close to doing that. I don't know what the political leanings are of Bush voters, I don't know what they hoped to gain out of it, and I've made no claim to the contrary here in this thread or anywhere else. I know that in my opinion they made a very, very poor choice in voting for him the second time around. Admittedly the more I think about it, I don't blame them for the first vote, becuase they had no idea what they were getting, so that's not fair. But I'm sticking with the second vote. So where have I assumed intent or made up a reason for what they did? If I want to say people lacked judgement in voting for someone, that too is an opinion, and has nothing to do with 'making up a reason.'
Second, I didn't dismiss them. Dismissal implies in this instance that you're shutting down all debate for whatever reason. I didn't do that, especially because there wasn't even a debate going on at the time about that subject.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:I know that in my opinion they made a very, very poor choice in voting for him the second time around.
And that the reason they made that choice is either because they lack intelligence or because they didn't bother to investigate:
quote:Besides, Bush was elected TWICE. I don't see any proof at all that the electoral college protects us from stupid voters. If anything, it's proven that stupid voters in the right geographic locations have MORE power than smart ones.
quote:People who voted for Bush may not have been stupid, but I think they were awfully neglectful in their judgement
***
quote:If I want to say people lacked judgement in voting for someone, that too is an opinion, and has nothing to do with 'making up a reason.'
You didn't just say they lacked judgment. You gave REASONS why they lacked judgment: stupidity or neglect.
quote:Second, I didn't dismiss them. Dismissal implies in this instance that you're shutting down all debate for whatever reason. I didn't do that, especially because there wasn't even a debate going on at the time about that subject.
Dismissal implies that you took all the possible reasons that intelligent people who took time to investigate and make their choice and ... dismissed them. There's really no other way to say it. They're either stupid or neglectful in your world.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
It seems to me that calling everyone who voted for Bush either stupid or neglectful in their decision making is rejecting serious consideration of their reasons and motives.
[/2 cents]
Posted by Sterling (Member # 8096) on :
...Is there a point to this, other than the grinding of axes of righteous indignation? There was a discussion going on here that was actually kind of interesting for a while.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Dagonee -
I disagree.
quote:because they didn't bother to investigate:
You just made that part up, and your quotations don't make it true.
quote:You didn't just say they lacked judgment. You gave REASONS why they lacked judgment: stupidity or neglect.
So what you're saying is, the reasons I gave for lacking in judgement is that they...lack judgement? You're construing neglect in this case as me saying that they didn't bother to find out any of the facts and just voted blindly. That isn't what I said at all. That's making a lot of assumptions about what I'm saying. You're misinterpreting what I said, and I'll clarify further to help. They could have a thousand reasons for voting for him, I don't know what those reasons are, but regardless of the reasons, whatever they may be, they brought the voters to the same choice that I think was wrong. "Neglectful in their judgement" was me saying they exercised poor judgement or none at all, in this specific instance. If that's the sticking point then I hope it's clarified, I am not talking about anything further than this one choice, as the rest of you are assuming.
Jon -
What am I rejecting serious consideration of? We're talking about a single issue, a single issue, and that is the vote for Bush. Dag, and apparently you, seem to be turning that into some sort of blanket dismissal of everything involving those people. Where you got that beats the hell out of me, but it assumes a heck of a lot about me that you certainly didn't get from this thread.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote:Where you got that beats the hell out of me, but it assumes a heck of a lot about me that you certainly didn't get from this thread.
Lyrhawn, this is pretty simple. They 'got that' from the part where you said voters for Dubya the second time may not have been stupid, but were at best very seriously neglectful in their vote.
You're writing them off as stupid or at best incompetent.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:You just made that part up, and your quotations don't make it true.
Neglectful means failure to take appropriate care. I'll gladly expand "did not investigate" to "failed to take appropriate care before making their selection for President in 2004."
quote:"Neglectful in their judgement" was me saying they exercised poor judgement or none at all, in this specific instance. If that's the sticking point then I hope it's clarified, I am not talking about anything further than this one choice, as the rest of you are assuming.
I never said or implied you were talking about more than this one choice.
quote:What am I rejecting serious consideration of?
The reasons for voting for Bush that don't amount to neglect or stupidity. No one accused of dismissing everything about these people.
quote:...Is there a point to this, other than the grinding of axes of righteous indignation? There was a discussion going on here that was actually kind of interesting for a while.
And that discussion can still occur. If this particular discussion is too distracting for you ignore while participating in the other conversation, then you can imagine how hard it is to ignore people dropping insults in the midst of the discussion.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Rak, rivka, Dag, Jon and anyone else who wants this to be addressed to them -
Let me try this and see if it comes off differently: I'm not dismissing them. If I were to dismiss them, it would mean that I don't want to have a discussion about this issue. I think I've proven six ways from Sunday from the debates on this board that I have no problem at all with discussing the failures of the Bush White House, and if that conversation has to be specified to failures made during his first term and thus made into a specific argument on why he didn't deserve reelection and how I think people were wrong in giving it to them, then I will. You all keep using the word "dismissed" like what I said precludes the possibility of discussion automatically. It doesn't. I can think you're horribly wrong and still be open to discussing an issue with you. Maybe they are to you, but thinking someone is wrong, and not wanting to talk to them about it at all are not automatically paired to me.
quote:Neglectful means failure to take appropriate care. I'll gladly expand "did not investigate" to "failed to take appropriate care before making their selection for President in 2004."
Change that to "failed to take appropriate care IN making their selection..." and you're a lot, lot closer.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Change that to "failed to take appropriate care IN making their selection..." and you're a lot, lot closer.
OK, so the reasons anyone voted for Bush are either 1) stupidity or 2) failure to take appropriate care in making the decision. Where does that leave room for discussing whether someone's reasons for voting for Bush were good or not?
quote:I can think you're horribly wrong and still be open to discussing an issue with you. Maybe they are to you, but thinking someone is wrong, and not wanting to talk to them about it at all are not automatically paired to me.
This isn't about your thinking the decision horribly wrong. It's about the reasons you've assigned to the decision.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: You're writing them off as stupid or at best incompetent.
QFT
You're assuming that an intelligent informed person who thinks things through cannot come to a different conclusion than you did.
Posted by Threads (Member # 10863) on :
Lyrhawn didn't say that every reason for voting for Bush was neglectful. He said that the vote itself was neglectful.
EDIT:
quote:You're assuming that an intelligent informed person who thinks things through cannot come to a different conclusion than you did.
Nothing Lyrhawn said implies that.
[ March 10, 2008, 06:05 PM: Message edited by: Threads ]
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Dag -
You've honestly got me confused now.
quote:OK, so the reasons anyone voted for Bush are either 1) stupidity or 2) failure to take appropriate care in making the decision. Where does that leave room for discussing whether someone's reasons for voting for Bush were good or not?
I've said multiple times that they could have any number of reasons. Do I have to say it again? Do I have to put it in bold or italics? I don't get what that has to do with discussing their reasons. If they have reasons, present them, we'll discuss it. What's your issue there? I've said I'll discuss it, I've said they could have any number of reasons, but you keep harping on two things I never said were what I assumed their reasons even were. Stupidity and poor decision making aren't even conscious choices. They're things that affect the final outcome, your final choice, and are taken into account when considering any number of reasons, none of which I've listed or gotten into at all.
You're presenting some sort of all or nothing approach that is baffling me.
Threads -
Thanks, and, I'm a he.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:but you keep harping on two things I never said were what I assumed their reasons even were.
Yes, you did say it. I've quoted it. Several times now.
They were either stupid, or failed to take appropriate care in making the decision.
Posted by Paul Goldner (Member # 1910) on :
Neither of which are "reasons." They are "explanations."
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Substitute "explanation" for "reason" any my point is the same.
Posted by Sterling (Member # 8096) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dagonee:
quote:...Is there a point to this, other than the grinding of axes of righteous indignation? There was a discussion going on here that was actually kind of interesting for a while.
And that discussion can still occur. If this particular discussion is too distracting for you ignore while participating in the other conversation, then you can imagine how hard it is to ignore people dropping insults in the midst of the discussion.
Ah, that sounds suspiciously like a 'no'.
...But seriously... We've gone through this over and over again. It doesn't seem to help. Every time there's one of these "assuming motivations" brouhahas there's a ton of recriminations and one more ancient topic for someone to quote when they want to accuse someone of not coming to the discussion in good faith or being capable of rational discourse. Having everyone walking on eggshells because their words might be interpreted as assuming a motivation isn't helpful to communication.
Or to take it from another angle, is there any real likelihood of those who perceive themselves as wronged coming out of this feeling vindicated?
There are those who feel that voting for Bush was a stupid or neglectful decision. At this point, that should come as a surprise to no one. Given the numbers currently coming out of polls, I think there are some people who voted for Bush who, if pressed, might even agree.
Smart people are also capable of making decisions that are- at least to others' eyes- stupid or neglectful. Would that it were not so.
I don't see this becoming a dialogue about whether such a decision was actually justifiable.
And, yes, I'm sure we can go through the joy of infinite quote loop and say, "but that's not what he said! He said people who voted for Bush were stupid or neglectful!"
...But, really... Why? For the love o' Mike, Why?
When whole pages go by without the original subject being breached, that discussion is really for all intents and purposes over. This is not an evolution in this case. It's more of a devolution.
Again, if the "wronged" aren't going to get satisfaction out of this, is there any possibility of those "wronged" accepting that they've made plain that they're unhappy with what has been said and moving on? Rather than having this turn into what's happened before on a few hundred other threads?
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Again, if the "wronged" aren't going to get satisfaction out of this, is there any possibility of those "wronged" accepting that they've made plain that they're unhappy with what has been said and moving on?
Is there any possibility of the "wrongor" simply dropping it?
Why only poke at one side of this?
Posted by Sterling (Member # 8096) on :
I'd be fine with that, too... Shake hands, bare teeth, move on, guys?
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I give up Dag. You're dead set on pushing a position on me that I don't hold, and I don't know any other way to explain it to you.
You don't seem willing to take me at my word, only the words that you want to pick out and assign meaning to.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote:Originally posted by The Pixiest: Rabbit: The purpose of Representation, and of our government in general, is to protect our freedom. Or, as the Constitution put it "Secure the blessings of Liberty."
The US constitution describes the purpose of our Federal Government in General as being to "establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence,[1] promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty. "
It is only your opinion that "securing the blessing of liberty" is a legitimate function of government but "promoting the general welfare" is ill-legitimate. Both are enshrined in our constitution and both are legal, legitimate and in my opinion desirable purposes of government.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:You're dead set on pushing a position on me that I don't hold, and I don't know any other way to explain it to you.
You don't get it: every time you've explained it, you've confirmed my initial understanding of what you said: "People who voted for Bush may not have been stupid, but I think they were awfully neglectful in their judgement."
If you don't get why that's a problematic thing to say, I can't help you.
As it is, you've assigned things to me I didn't say ("turning that into some sort of blanket dismissal of everything involving those people").
In essence, you've repeatedly denied doing something I didn't accuse you of and totally missed what it is I've accused you of.
Regardless, your original sweeping generalization wasn't needed in this thread and was rude. I ignored it until you decided to state why BB's response wasn't warranted.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
You're right, I don't get it. I apologize for initially calling people stupid, that was a very poor choice of words. Some of them might have been stupid, or made a stupid choice for whatever reasons, I don't know, so I can't rule it out. But the people who are left, many of whom I imagine are smart people who think they have good reasons still came to a poor conclusion. You keep saying that I think they didn't have any reasons, none at all, except that they were stupid or lacked judgement. That makes no sense. What exactly were they judging? Nothing? But the thing is, I have never, ever actually addressed their actual reasons, just their final conclusion. You keep going back to reasoning, and I was never there to begin with. I've formed an opinion on their final choice, regardless of the reasons they made.
And I still don't think Blackblade's response was warranted. Nor do I think your continual responses are warranted. You don't get what I'm saying, and I, at this point, have little idea as to what you're actually accusing me of beyond what I've already apologized for. So I don't know what the hell you want from me.
I apologized right off the bat for it, I just did it again, and that's all you get. I guess that isn't enough for you, and that'll have to be that.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: . . . still came to a poor conclusion.
BZZZZ!
Nope. Came to a conclusion that you disagree with.
Believe it or not, that is not definitionally a "poor conclusion."
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
And I've said that. I've said the words "in my opinion" or something very close to it, almost every time I've presented that statement.
Do you need me to go back in the thread and quote every time I've done it thus far?
What do you want from me? Seriously. Either you haven't read the last 10 posts that I've posted in this thread, or you willfully ignored every other time I said it just to POUNCE on this one.
Posted by Threads (Member # 10863) on :
Does Lyrhawn really have to preface every one of his sentences with "In my opinion..."? That's exceedingly petty. Declaring something to be a "poor conclusion" necessarily implies an opinion in a situation like this.
EDIT: He beat me too it. Anyways, if I said "Picasso is a crappy artist" would you interpret that as me trying to state an objective fact?
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
If you believe current polls, then about half of the people who voted for GW Bush in the last election don't approve of the job he's doing. To me that suggests that about half the people who voted for Bush agree, at least on some level, that they made a poor choice when they voted for him.
I suppose that they might argue that even though they disapprove of the job he's doing -- he was still better than all the other options they had at the voting both. Still that suggests that they would have liked different options on the ballot and that in turn ought to indicate some level of dissatisfaction with the current electoral process.
There is a major disconnect when 3/4's of the population think the current president is doing a bad job, but few if any see any major problems with the way we select our President or are working toward reforming that process.
Posted by Paul Goldner (Member # 1910) on :
"BZZZZ!
Nope. Came to a conclusion that you disagree with."
Its more then that. Pick a purpose of government, any purpose, and given the factual evidence available in 2004, its hard to make an argument that Bush promoted that purpose of government.
"Came to a conclusion that isn't in line with the voter's views on good government," would actually be a better way of putting it.
Why did people do that? A variety of reasons, most of which have more to do with our method of selecting candidates, and what makes for an effective campaign.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Does Lyrhawn really have to preface every one of his sentences with "In my opinion..."? That's exceedingly petty. Declaring something to be a "poor conclusion" necessarily implies an opinion in a situation like this.
When he states that people who voted for Bush are either stupid or failed to take appropriate care in making their selection, he's doing more than expressing an opinion.
The inconsistency of some of the people who regularly attack RL is becoming more and more clear here.
In this thread, we've had the thread starter tossing off half-baked accusations of partisanship while utterly ignoring the reasons given. We've got Lyrhawn calling people either stupid or neglectful.
Demonization of political opponents is a serious problem, and I'm sick of seeing people who regularly attack others for it doing it themselves.
Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
I'm interested to know what happenned between 2004 and 2006. Why did some people who used to support Bush stop? Was it the changeover in Congress, or did the changeover in Congress reflect a growing disaffection? Is it simply that the war had gone on too long without any measurable progress?
How do we know that half of the people who used to support Bush no longer do? Or is it the case that very few of people entering voting age over the last 4 years support Bush?
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote: There is a major disconnect when 3/4's of the population think the current president is doing a bad job, but few if any see any major problems with the way we select our President or are working toward reforming that process.
Not really. If it continues to happen, that could certainly indicate a serious problem.
But then again, bear in mind that much of those 3/4s are secretly still satisfied because at least their party came out on top, and don't really care about anything else.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Heh.
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:There is a major disconnect when 3/4's of the population think the current president is doing a bad job, but few if any see any major problems with the way we select our President or are working toward reforming that process
There is a problem with the leaders we end up selecting, but it isn't due to the electoral college or voter fraud. It is a more fundamental flaw in democracy.
The problem is that we tend to end up electing the people who are best at politics rather than the people who who have the best judgement and ability to lead. People get elected by saying what the public wants to hear rather than telling the truth and doing the right thing.
I'd love to fix this problem, but I don't know of any clear solution to it - and I'd guess that any solution to it would require the system to be LESS democratic.
Posted by Threads (Member # 10863) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dagonee:
quote:Does Lyrhawn really have to preface every one of his sentences with "In my opinion..."? That's exceedingly petty. Declaring something to be a "poor conclusion" necessarily implies an opinion in a situation like this.
When he states that people who voted for Bush are either stupid or failed to take appropriate care in making their selection, he's doing more than expressing an opinion.
The inconsistency of some of the people who regularly attack RL is becoming more and more clear here.
In this thread, we've had the thread starter tossing off half-baked accusations of partisanship while utterly ignoring the reasons given. We've got Lyrhawn calling people either stupid or neglectful.
Demonization of political opponents is a serious problem, and I'm sick of seeing people who regularly attack others for it doing it themselves.
He retracted the generalization of "stupid" (albeit he didn't really apologize for it which would be appropriate). Perhaps this would be resolved if Lyrhawn clarified his use of "negligent." You are going by the strict definition. I interpreted it more broadly to mean that Lyrhawn feels that people who voted for Bush made a bad decision. Given Lyrhawn's later comments I feel that my interpretation of his intent is correct. He said "But the people who are left, many of whom I imagine are smart people who think they have good reasons still came to a poor conclusion." In other words, he acknowledges that there are people who thought carefully about their decision but who still came to a poor conclusion (in his opinion). Maybe he could clarify.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote:Its more then that. Pick a purpose of government, any purpose, and given the factual evidence available in 2004, its hard to make an argument that Bush promoted that purpose of government.
This is a really big argument involving many topics, and I'm not at all interested in getting into it, but I would like to say that I disagree with this, and it's hardly a matter of fact as you're suggesting, Paul.
Posted by The Pixiest (Member # 1863) on :
quote:Originally posted by Threads:
EDIT: He beat me too it. Anyways, if I said "Picasso is a crappy artist" would you interpret that as me trying to state an objective fact? [/QB]
That IS an objective fact.
=D
(I hate Picasso)
Posted by The Pixiest (Member # 1863) on :
quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit:
quote:Originally posted by The Pixiest: Rabbit: The purpose of Representation, and of our government in general, is to protect our freedom. Or, as the Constitution put it "Secure the blessings of Liberty."
The US constitution describes the purpose of our Federal Government in General as being to "establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence,[1] promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty. "
It is only your opinion that "securing the blessing of liberty" is a legitimate function of government but "promoting the general welfare" is ill-legitimate. Both are enshrined in our constitution and both are legal, legitimate and in my opinion desirable purposes of government.
quote:Does Lyrhawn really have to preface every one of his sentences with "In my opinion..."? That's exceedingly petty. Declaring something to be a "poor conclusion" necessarily implies an opinion in a situation like this.
When he states that people who voted for Bush are either stupid or failed to take appropriate care in making their selection, he's doing more than expressing an opinion.
The inconsistency of some of the people who regularly attack RL is becoming more and more clear here.
In this thread, we've had the thread starter tossing off half-baked accusations of partisanship while utterly ignoring the reasons given. We've got Lyrhawn calling people either stupid or neglectful.
Demonization of political opponents is a serious problem, and I'm sick of seeing people who regularly attack others for it doing it themselves.
He retracted the generalization of "stupid" (albeit he didn't really apologize for it which would be appropriate). Perhaps this would be resolved if Lyrhawn clarified his use of "negligent." You are going by the strict definition. I interpreted it more broadly to mean that Lyrhawn feels that people who voted for Bush made a bad decision. Given Lyrhawn's later comments I feel that my interpretation of his intent is correct. He said "But the people who are left, many of whom I imagine are smart people who think they have good reasons still came to a poor conclusion." In other words, he acknowledges that there are people who thought carefully about their decision but who still came to a poor conclusion (in his opinion). Maybe he could clarify.
I've apologized specifically for that at least twice now. And your take on it seems to pretty much nail down what I meant.
quote:Originally posted by Dagonee:
quote:Does Lyrhawn really have to preface every one of his sentences with "In my opinion..."? That's exceedingly petty. Declaring something to be a "poor conclusion" necessarily implies an opinion in a situation like this.
When he states that people who voted for Bush are either stupid or failed to take appropriate care in making their selection, he's doing more than expressing an opinion.
The inconsistency of some of the people who regularly attack RL is becoming more and more clear here.
In this thread, we've had the thread starter tossing off half-baked accusations of partisanship while utterly ignoring the reasons given. We've got Lyrhawn calling people either stupid or neglectful.
Demonization of political opponents is a serious problem, and I'm sick of seeing people who regularly attack others for it doing it themselves.
Blah blah blah blah blah. How am I doing more than expressing an opinion Dag? Especially when I say multiple times that it's my opinion. You are willfully ignoring my explanations and trying to assign more meaning to my words than I've expressly intended. I would like you to stop it, but really at this point I don't expect you to.
And I'm not demonizing anyone. I didn't specify a side, I didn't specify a political affiliation, and I didn't say they were out to destroy the country, I said they made a mistake in my view. Oh no! I said some voters were neglectful! I'm practically Ann Coulter. I think they made a mistake, made the wrong choice, screwed up, put whatever synonym you want there, but stop trying to make it out to be more than it is, and stop being melodramatic, it's starting to piss me off.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Oh no! I said some voters were neglectful! I'm practically Ann Coulter.
Stop being melodramatic, it's starting to piss me off.
Irony alert! Irony alert!
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:How am I doing more than expressing an opinion Dag? Especially when I say multiple times that it's my opinion.
It's my opinion that you are demonizing people by asserting that there are only two possible explanations for voting for Bush in 2004: either they were stupid or they were neglectful.
It's just my opinion. So that makes it OK, right?
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
It's my opinion that you're being intentionally provacative, insulting, and willfully ignorant, maybe intentionally to piss me off, I can't tell, though I've never thought you were that petty before.
There's a difference there in what you're trying to use as an opinion as. My opinion is that people who voted for Bush were wrong, and I have never commented on their reasons for doing so. The thing is, that's subjective. It changes from person to person, and there'll never be a proveable right or wrong answer, and historians can argue about it for centuries to come without ever arriving at any sort of empirically true answers.
Your opinion of my argument is irrevelent. It's my argument, and I know what I mean, and clearly at least one other person here knows what I mean too, but you're ignoring what I mean and are misrepresenting my point, directly opposed to several further clarifications I've tried to make to you. I know you well enough to know you aren't stupid, so I can only assume you're intentionally doing this, though I have no idea why. You're trying to use opinion as if saying "it's my opinion that 2+2=19" as opposed to "it's my opinion that blue is the best color."
Either that or after everything I've said you still don't get it, which at this point I find unfathomable.
PS you dodged the question in the quotation marks by the way.
PPS Demonize means, in the conext you're using it, "To represent as evil or diabolic." How does that definition jive with what I've said, since we're being precise in all our meanings here, with no wriggle room?
Posted by Threads (Member # 10863) on :
Dagonee, you made it clear in previous posts that you took issue with the word "neglectful." Lyrhawn has expressed multiple times that he did not intend for his comments to come across the way they did and has already provided alternative ways of stating what he meant to convey. Do you take issue with "I think they made a mistake, made the wrong choice"?
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Either that or after everything I've said you still don't get it, which at this point I find unfathomable.
Which is pretty much how I view you in this conversation.
The only reason I commented was because of your "So when I said that, I guess I was really just asking not to be summarily dismissed because of my opinion."
That's exactly what BB was asking for, too. You still don't get that, apparently. Not only you do not get it, but you got pissy because BB decided there was no point in talking to someone who made such sweeping judgments.
Your subsequent clarifications don't change the basis of my argument. In fact, I've been quoting one of your subsequent clarifications since you made it.
The fact that you think that clarification changes the basis of my complaint is a perfect indicator that you don't understand the basis of my complaint.
It's like someone saying "I wasn't speeding" when I tell them that driving on the left side of a two-way road is unsafe. If they say that, I can be sure they don't understand what I'm getting at. Similarly, the fact that this is your opinion does not change the nature of my complaint.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I fail to see when, where, and how I dismissed anyone, for anything. You jumped into the conversation to try and say "gotcha!" and to me that doesn't make sense. I never said anything to BB to shut down the conversation, and subsequent clarifications should've made that abundantly clear.
And no, I don't understand the basis of your complaint, because you keep complaining about a position I don't hold.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:I fail to see when, where, and how I dismissed anyone, for anything.
I know that.
quote: I never said anything to BB to shut down the conversation
But you did. You might not have intended to, but you did. Would you like to discuss politics with someone who said that people who support the candidate you do so because they are stupid or "failed to take appropriate care IN making their selection"? More importantly, even if you would like to discuss politics with someone who said that, can you possibly understand why others would not?
It's true that if one takes dismissal to mean "that you're shutting down all debate for whatever reason" that you didn't do that.
But that's not what dismissal means, and it should be abundantly clear that it's not what I intended it to mean when I used the word.
You asked for clarification on how I was using the word and I gave it - repeatedly. So did others.
Posted by Paul Goldner (Member # 1910) on :
"This is a really big argument involving many topics, and I'm not at all interested in getting into it, but I would like to say that I disagree with this, and it's hardly a matter of fact as you're suggesting, Paul."
Of course its a matter of fact. Either a president promotes a purpose of government, that is he acts in such a way as to make government better at accomplishing that purpose, or he doesn't.
There was evidence available before november 2004, and I think an unbiased examination of that evidence shows that bush did not make our government accomplish any purposes of government more effectively then a replacement level president would have been able to. (Not referenced to any specific opposition, but rather then general quality of presidential candidates).
My "any purpose" was overly broad, because you could certainly make, for example, the argument that the purpose of government is to gather power into the hands of fewer and fewer people, and I would suggest that the facts are that the bush administration has accomplished this. I think this would be a ridiculous purpose of government to express, but one could believe that this is the purpose of government.
I am making no claims that Kerry would have accomplished a given purpose of government better. Rather, if we had a non-broken system of electing presidents, we would have very easily been able to find candidates for president who would fulfill that given purpose of government more effectively then Bush.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:But you did. You might not have intended to, but you did. Would you like to discuss politics with someone who said that people who support the candidate you do so because they are stupid or "failed to take appropriate care IN making their selection"? More importantly, even if you would like to discuss politics with someone who said that, can you possibly understand why others would not?
Depends. If they apologized for it immediately and clarified that to mean that they think I made an error in judgement, then I'd want to explain my reasoning about how I came to that conclusion. It's really just a fancy way of saying "I think you were wrong," without specifying a reason (despite the fact that you keep saying I've specified reasons, I never have). And I'd imagine most people probably wouldn't shut down a discussion at that point. But most not being all, I can see how some would.
You described my dismissal as:
quote:you made up a reason for their actions rather than considering the reasons they actually have.
And that isn't what I did, and I've said maybe a dozen times since then that that isn't what I did. Then you changed it to this:
quote:Dismissal implies that you took all the possible reasons that intelligent people who took time to investigate and make their choice and ... dismissed them. There's really no other way to say it. They're either stupid or neglectful in your world.
And I didn't do that either, and my clarifications expressly denied that. I didn't dismiss them under either if your definitions of the word. It seems to be your opinion that that is what I was intending, and I'm telling you right now that it was not my intention.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:And I didn't do that either, and my clarifications expressly denied that. I didn't dismiss them under either if your definitions of the word. It seems to be your opinion that that is what I was intending, and I'm telling you right now that it was not my intention.
No, it's my opinion that this is what you did, whether you intended to or not. I'm not expressing an opinion on what you intended to do.
quote:If they apologized for it immediately and clarified that to mean that they think I made an error in judgement, then I'd want to explain my reasoning about how I came to that conclusion.
For the record, you didn't apologize or clarify this immediately. The summary I gave here is a clarification you made well into the discussion, which you have since further clarified.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:No, it's my opinion that this is what you did, whether you intended to or not. I'm not expressing an opinion on what you intended to do.
Well I think you're wrong. If you want to take it a step further, I think that, taking into account all the facts you have at hand on my position, you've made an error in judgement, and by your definition, I guess that means I'm dismissing you.
And define immediately. I posted it, someone took exception in the very next post, and I apologized in the post after that, and clarified. I apologized again later on, and clarified at length again and again.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:I think that, taking into account all the facts you have at hand on my position, you've made an error in judgement, and by your definition
Nope. That would be by YOUR definition, not mine.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Sorry, grammatical error there, take the comma out after "and by your definition," and it reads as it should. Or turn the comma after judgement into a period. Either way, I'm referring to your definition of dismissal, not my definition of judgement errors.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
No, by my definition of dismissal, calling something a judgment of error is not a dismissal.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote:In this thread, we've had the thread starter tossing off half-baked accusations of partisanship while utterly ignoring the reasons given. We've got Lyrhawn calling people either stupid or neglectful.
To whatever extent I am responsible for the current argument, I am sorry.
I have over many many years observed that whether or not most people support the electoral college is dependent most strongly on whether they feel the system is favoring their side at the time. I apologize for applying that general observation to the specific individuals in this debate. That was rude and inappropriate at hatrack.
I do object however to the accusation that I totally ignored the reasons people were giving for supporting the electoral college. I believe I clearly addressed those reasons and explained why I don't find them compelling for the US as it exists today.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dagonee: No, by my definition of dismissal, calling something a judgment of error is not a dismissal.
Well then it looks like you disagree with me and you. You've listed at least two, and possibly three definitions now of dismissal.
Make up your mind. Maybe after you figure out what your argument is, you can try and figure out mine.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:Originally posted by Tresopax:
quote:There is a major disconnect when 3/4's of the population think the current president is doing a bad job, but few if any see any major problems with the way we select our President or are working toward reforming that process
There is a problem with the leaders we end up selecting, but it isn't due to the electoral college or voter fraud. It is a more fundamental flaw in democracy.
The problem is that we tend to end up electing the people who are best at politics rather than the people who who have the best judgement and ability to lead.
Agreed.
There is also the "best of two bad choices" issue, which is why I can both be in that 3/4, and still think Bush was a better choice than Kerry.
And not be a Republican, Rakeesh. Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote:There is also the "best of two bad choices" issue, which is why I can both be in that 3/4, and still think Bush was a better choice than Kerry.
Agreed, but haven't we been discussing election reform in a much broader sense including how we end up with the final election ballot.
I would think that people who are highly dissatisfied with Bush but still think he was better than Kerry, should be leading the charge for electoral reform. There must be some way to get good (or at least acceptable) candidates on the ballot.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
I'm considerably happier with this year's crop.
Also, I am unconvinced the process (especially the electoral college) is the primary problem.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
I convinced that the process is a primary part of the problem, but I'll agree that the electoral college isn't the primary problem with the process.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit:
quote:There is also the "best of two bad choices" issue, which is why I can both be in that 3/4, and still think Bush was a better choice than Kerry.
Agreed, but haven't we been discussing election reform in a much broader sense including how we end up with the final election ballot.
I would think that people who are highly dissatisfied with Bush but still think he was better than Kerry, should be leading the charge for electoral reform. There must be some way to get good (or at least acceptable) candidates on the ballot.
I'd imagine apathy and a sense of feeling powerless in the process have left most people feeling shut out from that part of the process.
But to be fair, I think this year showed a marked increase in the availability of information and attention paid to candidates who normally wouldn't see the light of day. Mike Gravel was like a the drunk uncle that comes over for Christmas but everyone hopes won't. He had virtually no money from fundraising, went nowhere in the polls or actual vote...and yet there was information on him from CNN, he had an accessible website, ads on YouTube etc. The information was there, and with the internet there was a chance for him to fundraise. And Ron Paul, who I think in any other year would have been ignored for being too far out of the mainstream view of the party he ran under was given front and center attention, had huge media attention, and massive grassroots fundraising.
I think we're at a point where anyone who is a big enough figure to garner some sort of national attention, which I think means any high level state elected official or federal government official has a serious chance of making a go of it, so long as they have something of substance. And of course I think Obama is a posterchild for how a virtual unknown can explode onto the scene if he has a well received message and good organizational support behind him.
I liked what Tresopax said earlier about people choosing those who are better at politics vs. people who are better at judgement and leading. I think that's too often been the case as well, and sometimes our best presidents have had great judgement and leadership and also happened to be decent at the political side of things as well. And a lot of them make it through on sheer force of personality, which is I think a lot of Obama's appeal.
I think we're better off now in many ways that we have been in the past, but I'm hard pressed to think of a better mechanism for nominating well qualified people for the job.
Edit to add: And I agree that the electoral college, much as I'm against it, doesn't have anything to do with the process of selecting candidates. I'm not convinced the primary process does either, for many of the reasons I listed above.
Posted by The Reader (Member # 3636) on :
The biggest problem with the primary system is that the challenging party usually has a candidate established for nomination long before the primaries begin, and the incumbent party can run either the president, of course, or the vice president.
It hasn't always been like this of course. The McGovern campaign, Strom Thurmond's Dixiecrat run, and Theodore Roosevelt's Bull Moose campaign come to mind. But even the most recent run was 40 years ago. Nixon's resignation threw a wrench into the timing, but the system was settled by then.
In my opinion, changing dates of primaries and which state goes first won't change how parties do this because there will always be a favored person among the party leaders.
This year is special. Neither major party had an initial prohibitive favorite or an incumbent intent in running. In my opinion, the system will revert back to the old way in 2012, but it won't stay that way for much longer.
quote:I think we're at a point where anyone who is a big enough figure to garner some sort of national attention, which I think means any high level state elected official or federal government official has a serious chance of making a go of it, so long as they have something of substance. And of course I think Obama is a posterchild for how a virtual unknown can explode onto the scene if he has a well received message and good organizational support behind him.
I agree with Lyrhawn here. Any figure who can get attention is legitimate. I think that no amount of legislative action will improve the primary and general election system. It is set up so that the voters can have the major influence on who the parties choose, but in turn the voters can't become complacent. That did happen, which is why we have had a "lesser of two evils" choice for so long. It looks to me like the complacency may have ended, and it's all thanks to The Internet! This is all just opinion of course.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Neither major party had an initial prohibitive favorite
Debateable. On the Republican side Giuliani was a favorite for a long time, though their side has really jumped back and forth so often that I don't really dispute it. But on the Democratic side Hillary Clinton was the prohibitive favorite for a long time. Considering they've been running for like a year now, Clinton was the party favorite, polled 20 points ahead of Obama or more nationally and in almost every state. It was only in mid to late November that he started inching up in states like New Hampshire and Iowa. And it took until December or early January for him to get ahead in Iowa, which changed everything, vaulted him into the national spotlight, but even then he lost New Hampshire to Clinton.
I think he's the best example we have that anyone has a chance, so long as they have something that appeals to regular people, and that's Obama, for better or for worse. Clinton was the odds on favorite, and people, rather than party favoritism, party machinery or any political power, launched and sustained his candidacy.
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
Yesterday's primary in Mississippi demonstrates my point about the system the Democrats are using for awarding delegates proportionally by districts being subject to abuse similar to Gerrymandering. Consider what happened: Sen. Obama won the popular vote over Sen. Clinton by 60.8% to 37.02%. That is a 23.78% margin. And yet Obama only got 17 delegates, while Clinton got 14 delegates (with two as yet to be announced). So despite getting a huge landslide, Obama only gained a net of three delegates over Clinton.
How did it happen? Well, the landslide was not unexpected, since over half the voters in Mississppi are African-American, and Obama has been winning 80% to 90% of that group. But since the delegates were awarded according to senatorial district, they were apparently Gerrymandered so that most of the African-American voters were grouped together in a few districts, while a larger number of districts were in less-populated areas--suburban and rural--which were more likely to have a majority of whites, who would vote for Clinton.
If the Democrats really want to have proportional awarding of delegates that is fair, then it should be based on percentage of the popular vote. Under that system, Obama would have gotten 20 delegates, and Clinton 12. Then Obama would have netted eight delegates over Clinton, instead of just three.
It appears that the Democratic Party's Gerrymandered district-based awarding of delegates is actually designed to diminish the impact of the African-American vote. That is certainly the effect it had in yesterday's election.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Ron, Where are you getting your numbers from? Right now on CNN, Obama is reported to have 17 delegates and Clinton has 11. That's pretty close to the margin of their percentage of the popular vote (My spot checking has it slightly favoring Obama, actually).
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
That's what I heard reported on I think it was Fox news about two hours ago. 17 vs. 14. The networks always seem to disagree on how to count the delegates. It will probably take another day or so for them to settle on the same numbers. The CNN figures could not be right, because they only add up to 28, and there were 33 delegates at stake in this primary. The news source I heard had only two delegates yet to be allotted.
[ March 12, 2008, 01:58 PM: Message edited by: Ron Lambert ]
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
You didn't get that from Fox. They are reporting the same numbers as CNN.
edit: So is MSNBC.
Posted by Threads (Member # 10863) on :
Now CNN is reporting Obama with 19 and Clinton with 14 meaning Obama got the two unannounced delegates you mentioned earlier. CNN tends to be fairly cautious with their delegate estimates so it doesn't surprise me that they lagged a little.
EDIT: Or what Squicky said
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote:The biggest problem with the primary system is that the challenging party usually has a candidate established for nomination long before the primaries begin.
I don't think that is a valid assessment of recent political elections.
In 1976 Carter entered the race as a virtual unknown on the national scene (2% name recognition) and was not initially considered a contender for the democratic nomination. Ford was the sitting President but nearly lost the nomination to Reagan.
In 1980, Carter was the sitting president but had a serious challenge from Kennedy for the party nomination. In early 1980, there were at least three serious contenders for the republican nomination Reagan, Bush and Anderson. Early in the primary season Bush was actually ahead of Reagan.
In 1984, the Reagan/Bush were essentially uncontested for the republican nomination but the democratic nomination was hotly contested by Mondale and Hart (and to a lesser extent Jesse Jackson).
In 1988, Hart was considered the front runner going into the primary but faltered because of reports of extramarital affairs. Dukakis didn't emerge as the front runner until well into the primaries.
In 1992, Clinton was relatively unknown on the national scene before the primaries. He didn't emerge as the front runner until he swept the super tuesday primaries.
In 1996 and 2000, the republican challengers did indeed nominate a pre-anointed candidate. But aside from those two elections, I can't think of an example where there where either parties nomination was won by a clear establishement front runner other than the sitting President or vice President.
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
If the CNN figures turn out to be right, then Obama still only netted five delegates over Clinton. A fairly apportioned system would have allowed Obama to net 8 delegates over Clinton. So he was Gerrymandered out of three delegates.
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
I predict that in Pennsylvania, if Sen. Clinton wins by more than ten points, she will have a disproportionately larger number of delegates, because the Gerrymandering appears to be set up to favor white votes. Another words, she will get MORE delegates in PA than would be calculated on the basis of percentages of the popular vote.
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit: In 1992, Clinton was relatively unknown on the national scene before the primaries. He didn't emerge as the front runner until he swept the super tuesday primaries.
Was there a candidate who was considered a front runner prior to Super Tuesday in '92? I'm thinking that there was, but I can't remember who it was. Jerry Brown? I know he gave Clinton some trouble later on in the primary season, but I don't think he was seen as all that strong a contender early on. Paul Tsongas, maybe?
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
I can't think of Jerry Brown without thinking "Governor Moonbeam." I wonder how Linda Ronstadt is doing these days.
Posted by The Reader (Member # 3636) on :
quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit:
quote:The biggest problem with the primary system is that the challenging party usually has a candidate established for nomination long before the primaries begin.
I don't think that is a valid assessment of recent political elections.
In 1976 Carter entered the race as a virtual unknown on the national scene (2% name recognition) and was not initially considered a contender for the democratic nomination. Ford was the sitting President but nearly lost the nomination to Reagan.
In 1980, Carter was the sitting president but had a serious challenge from Kennedy for the party nomination. In early 1980, there were at least three serious contenders for the republican nomination Reagan, Bush and Anderson. Early in the primary season Bush was actually ahead of Reagan.
In 1984, the Reagan/Bush were essentially uncontested for the republican nomination but the democratic nomination was hotly contested by Mondale and Hart (and to a lesser extent Jesse Jackson).
In 1988, Hart was considered the front runner going into the primary but faltered because of reports of extramarital affairs. Dukakis didn't emerge as the front runner until well into the primaries.
In 1992, Clinton was relatively unknown on the national scene before the primaries. He didn't emerge as the front runner until he swept the super tuesday primaries.
In 1996 and 2000, the republican challengers did indeed nominate a pre-anointed candidate. But aside from those two elections, I can't think of an example where there where either parties nomination was won by a clear establishement front runner other than the sitting President or vice President.
Ah, I had forgotten history. Thank you for the correction.
Now that my opinion has been invalidated by fact , I'll try to make a point along the same lines. It seems that whenever a candidate emerges far ahead enough to be noticed, the media tends to push that person along, mostly for a story. That is what is called "momentum." Party leaders unite behind the person so they can have someone to beat the "other guy."
However, the history pointed out above demonstrates that it isn't an automatic process. There is always enough passion for someone to pursue the spot, especially when a party has been out of power for some time, or a strong movement develops within the party.
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Thank you for the correction.