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Grex > Agora35 > #124: Win the electoral college but lose the popular vote? | |
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| 25 new of 409 responses total. |
krj
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response 207 of 409:
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Nov 20 20:56 UTC 2000 |
Aaron in resp:203 :: challenging the ballots where the GOP operative
filled in voter ID numbers on the applications might be sound legally,
but my gut feeling right now is that it's a non-starter politically.
While I understand that the procedures to protect against fraud
on those ballots were bent, there is no specific allegation of fraud
in these votes, and with the Democrats having hammered so much on
"every vote should count" and "intent of the voter" themes, they'll
come off badly in a challenge here.
Note that Lieberman is already backpedalling on the issue of the
disqualified overseas military ballots, even though reports are that
these disqualified ballots all failed to meet Florida's legal standards.
(Of course Lieberman *can* backpedal, he's got a job no matter what :) )
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albaugh
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response 208 of 409:
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Nov 20 21:35 UTC 2000 |
Yes, candidates knew (as well as the public - at least they *should* know)
going into the election that the EC still "rules", and that one could win the
popular vote without being elected. So, by law, them's the breaks. I still
think the EC is no longer required, and the truest way for each person's vote
to count - and no more nor no less than anyone else's - is a direct popular
vote of all the people.
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tpryan
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response 209 of 409:
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Nov 20 22:46 UTC 2000 |
I think Michigan should release the results of it's counts
in the next election until 4 in the morning. Then if it's a tight
race, all the action can happen here. Lansing could use another
hotel packing event.
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brighn
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response 210 of 409:
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Nov 20 23:22 UTC 2000 |
#206> If the Pistons won a basketball game 100 to 99, nobody would say they
won "free and clear." I think you missed the point.
You may as well say that Bush won by a landslide, for how silly you're
sounding.
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krj
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response 211 of 409:
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Nov 21 01:07 UTC 2000 |
I think the contest in Florida is starting to wind down.
Radio news reports that Palm Beach County has completed 20% of its
manual recount, and Gore has netted only three additional votes.
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aaron
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response 212 of 409:
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Nov 21 01:40 UTC 2000 |
re #207: You sum up the reasons why the Democratic Party would not want its
imprimatur on the case. However, the case has nonetheless been filed,
and the Republicans lost a summary disposition bid this morning.
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scg
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response 213 of 409:
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Nov 21 01:42 UTC 2000 |
The case was apparrently filed by a "Democratic activist," while Lieberman
has been saying publicly that the case shouldn't be pursued. I suppose it
may be a while, if ever, before it comes out whether the Gore campaign had
anything to do with the filing of the case.
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gelinas
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response 214 of 409:
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Nov 21 04:36 UTC 2000 |
Re #208: there's an item for arguing the elimination of the electoral college.
I was thinking a bit earlier today that I've not seen any sound argument
either way. Care to give it a try?
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rcurl
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response 215 of 409:
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Nov 21 06:54 UTC 2000 |
A columnist put it pretty clearly (for retaining the EC): the USA is not
a democratic republic but a federation - the "United States of America".
The people have never elected the president - the "sovereign states"
(to the extent that is true) elect the president. This fact permeates
the operation of our government in one for or another: states have all
powers not delegated to the federal government (which are plenty!);
states are represented *equally* in the Senate, which has enormous
powers. It would be essentially impossible to adopt a constitutional
amendment with the larger number of less populous states wishing to
retain this power in the EC - and it would not be hard for such "small"
states to convince their citizens that they gain from this additional
power. Eliminating the EC may be a starter but I don't think it would
be a finisher.
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bru
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response 216 of 409:
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Nov 21 13:40 UTC 2000 |
I understand better the reason for having an electoral college now. Gore took
the major population centers, but that is all. The rest of the country all
went to bush. The EC keeps the big states and the big population centers from
riding herd on the rest of the country.
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aaron
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response 217 of 409:
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Nov 21 14:01 UTC 2000 |
Anything that helps you rationalize your beliefs is right, after all.
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rcurl
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response 218 of 409:
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Nov 21 16:29 UTC 2000 |
No, that is untrue. Since rationalizations may themselves be true or
false, aaron's statement really says nothing, but if it suggests that
some statements were made that were false, I would appreciate a more
explicit statement of that. As far as I can see, the explicit statements
made in 215 and 216 appear to be true.
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aaron
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response 219 of 409:
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Nov 21 17:13 UTC 2000 |
Oh, I think it was a pretty accurate summary of the way people process
information.
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scg
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response 220 of 409:
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Nov 21 19:31 UTC 2000 |
I think I'd be more inclined to accept Bruce's sincerity in #216 if he hadn't
changed his position once it became clear that it would be Bush, not Gore,
who might lose the popular vote and win the Electoral College.
I'm still not convinced that the Electoral College is a bad thing, but I do
think it is important when designing a process that has to function for
hundreds of years through different circumstances, to not make decisions based
soley on what happened in one election.
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drew
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response 221 of 409:
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Nov 21 20:00 UTC 2000 |
Re #206:
It seems to me that a margin of less than the probable error should be
considered a tie, and treated as such, whatever the rules for such specify.
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bru
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response 222 of 409:
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Nov 21 23:49 UTC 2000 |
Where did I change my position because Bush was winning? Like other people,
I am Learning from this election conflict. And I did used to support abolition
of the EC, but my mind was changed long before this election came up.
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jerryr
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response 223 of 409:
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Nov 22 13:21 UTC 2000 |
has it ever been considered to modify the ec from the winner take all mode
to a proportioned mode? would that work? whatever percentage you receive
in a state's popular vote you get that percentage of electors for that state.
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krj
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response 224 of 409:
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Nov 22 14:29 UTC 2000 |
After the Republican reaction to last night's Florida Supreme Court
ruling, which gave room for the recounts to continue, it now seems
certain to me that Bush will be president, possibly through a
constitutional putsch. Either the Florida legislature will scrap
the election result and appoint the Bush electors, or the Congress
will throw out Gore electors from Florida and pick Bush in the House,
where the GOP controls 27 (?) state delegations.
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tpryan
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response 225 of 409:
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Nov 22 17:14 UTC 2000 |
I can see the scheme to have one Electoral College vote per
congressional district (representing the vote in the presidental vote,
not the congressional race--it could be differnet) plus the two EC
votes per state being for the winner of the presidental race statewide.
That would allow states like Michigan to have something on the order
of 5 votes Republican, 14 votes Democrat.
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brighn
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response 226 of 409:
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Nov 22 17:47 UTC 2000 |
#225> And I think that scheme more accurately reflects the INTENTION of the
Electoral College, although the Fed Founding Fathers didn't want to push that
view on individual states.
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krj
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response 227 of 409:
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Nov 22 18:46 UTC 2000 |
Miami-Dade County has shut down their manual recount. I'm not surprised;
there was little chance of them making the Sunday deadline set by the
state Supreme Court. (source: many news reports)
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bru
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response 228 of 409:
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Nov 22 18:57 UTC 2000 |
Now it all falls to a judge deciding if they can use "dimpled" ballots in
Dade.
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jerryr
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response 229 of 409:
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Nov 22 19:25 UTC 2000 |
they have stopped counting *all* ballots bruce, dimpled ones included. the
gore folks are heading to court to force them to continue a handcount of all
ballots. they contend is mandated by law (since a one point the board
found that a recount could change the outcome)
broward county is going to continue evaluating the "undervote" ballots.
they will annouce that gore has gained 57 votes so far.
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scott
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response 230 of 409:
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Nov 22 19:36 UTC 2000 |
I myself don't think it's such a bad thing that we're "changing the rules in
the middle of the game". I think it makes a lot of sense to sometimes
evaluate what the rules are, what the effects of those rules are, and be
willing to make changes if the rules turn out to be defective. Heck, that's
a fair amount of what I do in software: customer finds bug, I fix. It's
interesting how often the "bug" isn't so mauch a bug as it is an area where
the customer and I assumed two different things and got two different
outcomes.
(I voted for Nader, so you can't accuse me of being a Gore partisan on this
issue. I'd actually find it rather funny if Bush's people fought this ttoth
and nail, lost the fight, and then won the vote [with an increase in lead]
after the dust settles. They'd have to pull a few yards of shoe out of their
collective mouths)
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rcurl
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response 231 of 409:
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Nov 23 18:40 UTC 2000 |
It has been established that the Bush camp is not against manual recounts -
only manual recounts that might not come out in their favor. I think the
FL supreme court should correct their time limit so that Miami-Dade can
complete their hand recount. The fundamental question is, how did the
people vote. It is really crass to fight finding out.
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