On November 08 2012 14:03 Alex1Sun wrote: So I guess it will be four more years of basically hung government with the parliament rejecting all the president's ideas and the country moving nowhere
I'm happy that Obama won, but I guess with republican parliament there will be no substantial changes for the better.
Its a far better alternative than having bad things done by the Republicans. And plus there are still things that can be done monetarily instead of fiscally that can improve the economy.
Lol, you mean printing money? Please describe in detail as to what can be done "monetarily instead of fiscally that can improve the economy."
What "bad" things would the Republicans have done in terms of the economy? A decisive majority of the electoral vote gave Mitt the best scores with respect to the economy, even though many of those people ended up not showing up to vote / deciding on other issues. Not that you would understand this, being a BlackPanther and all; didn't I see you and your "bros" in Ohio on Tues?
On November 08 2012 14:21 TyrantPotato wrote: Now that all this is over (almost) and obama is da winrar.
WTF is up with your guys election process?
you live in a democracy.....BUT from what i know of your system its nothing like that at all.
correct me if im wrong, but if 1 person can get 270 electoral points(state vote thingy pont shit) by winning each state by only 100-1000 votes. then not get a single vote in every other state he can still be president?
please tell me that isnt the case and im horrible mistaken.
Yes. Mysteriously some countries dont have a Westminster style Parliamentary system.
On November 08 2012 14:03 Alex1Sun wrote: So I guess it will be four more years of basically hung government with the parliament rejecting all the president's ideas and the country moving nowhere
I'm happy that Obama won, but I guess with republican parliament there will be no substantial changes for the better.
Its a far better alternative than having bad things done by the Republicans. And plus there are still things that can be done monetarily instead of fiscally that can improve the economy.
Lol, you mean printing money? Please describe in detail as to what can be done "monetarily instead of fiscally that can improve the economy."
What "bad" things would the Republicans have done in terms of the economy? A decisive majority of the electoral vote gave Mitt the best scores with respect to the economy, even though many of those people ended up not showing up to vote / deciding on other issues. Not that you would understand this, being a BlackPanther and all; didn't I see you and your "bros" in Ohio on Tues?
Mmmmm, delicious Republican anger. So delicious.
Mmmmm, delicious Democrat. So delicious.
Since you said nothing, I will say nothing, and the above made me lol.
On November 08 2012 14:21 TyrantPotato wrote: Now that all this is over (almost) and obama is da winrar.
WTF is up with your guys election process?
you live in a democracy.....BUT from what i know of your system its nothing like that at all.
correct me if im wrong, but if 1 person can get 270 electoral points(state vote thingy pont shit) by winning each state by only 100-1000 votes. then not get a single vote in every other state he can still be president?
please tell me that isnt the case and im horrible mistaken.
G.W.Bush became president that way didn't he, had less overall votes than Al Gore.
Surprising that we almost passed the medical marijuana issue in Arkansas. Lost it 49% to 51%. First year on the ballot and for being a conservative state I'm really surprised. Might actually pass in the coming years.
On November 08 2012 14:21 TyrantPotato wrote: Now that all this is over (almost) and obama is da winrar.
WTF is up with your guys election process?
you live in a democracy.....BUT from what i know of your system its nothing like that at all.
correct me if im wrong, but if 1 person can get 270 electoral points(state vote thingy pont shit) by winning each state by only 100-1000 votes. then not get a single vote in every other state he can still be president?
please tell me that isnt the case and im horrible mistaken.
G.W.Bush became president that way didn't he, had less overall votes than Al Gore.
I think they are aware of their shit system and have tried to changed it but to no avail or something.
Anyway happy to see that Romney didn't win.
It hasn't worked 4 times in 200 years, and only once in recent history. Sure it might not be the greatest system but IMO people are way overreacting to the system.
I agree that the electoral college system is a poor method to elect the president. I would much rather we utilize the popular vote to determine the winner. It seems simpler and more intuitive than our current system. While on the topic of reforming our process of voting, we should also implement runoff voting to encourage our citizens to vote for who they really think is the best candidate instead of feeling the need to vote for one of only two candidates to matter. Unfortunately, both of these ideas would likely hurt both parties, so neither party will bother advocating them.
On November 08 2012 14:21 TyrantPotato wrote: Now that all this is over (almost) and obama is da winrar.
WTF is up with your guys election process?
you live in a democracy.....BUT from what i know of your system its nothing like that at all.
correct me if im wrong, but if 1 person can get 270 electoral points(state vote thingy pont shit) by winning each state by only 100-1000 votes. then not get a single vote in every other state he can still be president?
please tell me that isnt the case and im horrible mistaken.
G.W.Bush became president that way didn't he, had less overall votes than Al Gore.
I think they are aware of their shit system and have tried to changed it but to no avail or something.
Anyway happy to see that Romney didn't win.
Why would they change it. Its a federal, presidential system. Sometimes it has weird results. Parliamentary style democracies have them to, you can look at Canada where a political party that represents ~ 31% of Canadians completely dominates the federal government and can do whatever it wants as long as it doesnt violate the Constitution. In first past the post, the guy who has the highest number of votes wins. Which means that if there are 5 guys running in a district, and one guy has 20.1% then he will represent that district despite being not chosen by almost 80% of the people in his district.
On November 08 2012 14:35 beamer159 wrote: I agree that the electoral college system is a poor method to elect the president. I would much rather we utilize the popular vote to determine the winner. It seems simpler and more intuitive than our current system. While on the topic of reforming our process of voting, we should also implement runoff voting to encourage our citizens to vote for who they really think is the best candidate instead of feeling the need to vote for one of only two candidates to matter. Unfortunately, both of these ideas would likely hurt both parties, so neither party will bother advocating them.
The thing is with reforming the EC system is that it would need a constitutional amendment. No way in hell you are going to get small states to agree with going along with that.
I would say that overwhelmingly, the reason why Romney lost this race was simply because a lot of women voters would not vote for him. A lot of that is because he is pro-life; however, I feel like that is a bad reason to vote against him. Regardless of who won, four years from now abortion would be legal. This election really should have been about the economy, but instead Obama's campaign managed to successfully frame it around progressive social issues--one of the few things his campaign has managed to do in the past four years. This election should not have been about abortion, but at the end of the day, that's what it was for a lot of voters.
But anyways, the saddest thing about November 6th was Scott Brown not getting re-elected. I thought after he took Ted Kennedy's seat that it might just be a sign of the start of the end of our nation's rooted political polarization, but apparently Massachusetts voters decided otherwise. Elizabeth Warren is just another person who is going to vote 90% or more along party lines, that's not what we need; we need people who are going to be more moderate and actually make decisions on their own. What really saddens me is just how polarized America has become, and it can be really highlighted in the Massachusetts Senate race. The two biggest problems I have are the following:
In any state that isn't as polarized as Massachusetts, Scott Brown would have won that election.
In any other state that isn't that polarized, Scott Brown would have never been nominated because he strays too far from the GOP.
I'm also really disappointed in my own state of Rhode Island. We still elected David Cicilline, who makes Chinese politicians look not incorruptible. Also the Republican party in this state cannot put up a decent candidate.
I'm a Republican, I voted for Mitt Romney, I voted for Doherty (the guy in Rhode Island who ran against Cicilline for the 1st Congressional District), and I am thoroughly disappointed. I think that this is going to lead to massive reforms and changes within the Republican party as they have to shift with the demographic. I have very low hopes for the next four years because Washington is effectively unchanged except that Scott Brown is no longer there. But yeah, I would be interested in hearing other people's views on what I'm talking about.
On November 08 2012 14:21 TyrantPotato wrote: Now that all this is over (almost) and obama is da winrar.
WTF is up with your guys election process?
you live in a democracy.....BUT from what i know of your system its nothing like that at all.
correct me if im wrong, but if 1 person can get 270 electoral points(state vote thingy pont shit) by winning each state by only 100-1000 votes. then not get a single vote in every other state he can still be president?
please tell me that isnt the case and im horrible mistaken.
It's exactly the same in Australia. In the 1998 and 2010 the winner of the election had the smaller share of the first preference vote.
In 2010, labour combined with minority parties and independents to form a majority. In 1998 the liberals managed to get enough swing states that the popular vote didn't matter.
On November 08 2012 14:21 TyrantPotato wrote: Now that all this is over (almost) and obama is da winrar.
WTF is up with your guys election process?
you live in a democracy.....BUT from what i know of your system its nothing like that at all.
correct me if im wrong, but if 1 person can get 270 electoral points(state vote thingy pont shit) by winning each state by only 100-1000 votes. then not get a single vote in every other state he can still be president?
please tell me that isnt the case and im horrible mistaken.
G.W.Bush became president that way didn't he, had less overall votes than Al Gore.
I think they are aware of their shit system and have tried to changed it but to no avail or something.
Anyway happy to see that Romney didn't win.
Why would they change it. Its a federal, presidential system. Sometimes it has weird results. Parliamentary style democracies have them to, you can look at Canada where a political party that represents ~ 31% of Canadians completely dominates the federal government and can do whatever it wants as long as it doesnt violate the Constitution. In first past the post, the guy who has the highest number of votes wins. Which means that if there are 5 guys running in a district, and one guy has 20.1% then he will represent that district despite being not chosen by almost 80% of the people in his district.
They would change it because it was made for a different time and place. Our founding fathers were brilliant people, don't get me wrong, but their idea of democracy was different than our idea. The original reason for the electoral college was to keep the hoi polloi away from having as much control over the results. That's still sort of the reason, but at the end of the day, if we have more than fifty percent of Americans voting for a candidate, that person should probably win the office. I would be curious to hear what reasons you can muster up in favor of the electoral college that aren't "Well the founding fathers promoted it." The democracy that America was originally founded under didn't even have complete male suffrage, the bourgeoisie controlled almost all the political power.
On November 08 2012 14:42 The Final Boss wrote: I would say that overwhelmingly, the reason why Romney lost this race was simply because a lot of women voters would not vote for him. A lot of that is because he is pro-life; however, I feel like that is a bad reason to vote against him. Regardless of who won, four years from now abortion would be legal. This election really should have been about the economy, but instead Obama's campaign managed to successfully frame it around progressive social issues--one of the few things his campaign has managed to do in the past four years. This election should not have been about abortion, but at the end of the day, that's what it was for a lot of voters.
But anyways, the saddest thing about November 6th was Scott Brown not getting re-elected. I thought after he took Ted Kennedy's seat that it might just be a sign of the start of the end of our nation's rooted political polarization, but apparently Massachusetts voters decided otherwise. Elizabeth Warren is just another person who is going to vote 90% or more along party lines, that's not what we need; we need people who are going to be more moderate and actually make decisions on their own. What really saddens me is just how polarized America has become, and it can be really highlighted in the Massachusetts Senate race. The two biggest problems I have are the following:
In any state that isn't as polarized as Massachusetts, Scott Brown would have won that election.
In any other state that isn't that polarized, Scott Brown would have never been nominated because he strays too far from the GOP.
I'm also really disappointed in my own state of Rhode Island. We still elected David Cicilline, who makes Chinese politicians look not incorruptible. Also the Republican party in this state cannot put up a decent candidate.
I'm a Republican, I voted for Mitt Romney, I voted for Doherty (the guy in Rhode Island who ran against Cicilline for the 1st Congressional District), and I am thoroughly disappointed. I think that this is going to lead to massive reforms and changes within the Republican party as they have to shift with the demographic. I have very low hopes for the next four years because Washington is effectively unchanged except that Scott Brown is no longer there. But yeah, I would be interested in hearing other people's views on what I'm talking about.
Maybe female voters (a) value their reproductive rights higher than the economy (b) maybe they were suspicious of a candidate who embraced people who say stuff like "you cant get pregnant from legitimate rape" or "rape is gods will" (c) maybe women voters didnt believe Romney's economic plan of "I will create 14 million new jobs by getting elected" was plausible.
As for Scott Brown. Is that how it works? If a liberal states elects a Republican, no matter what his voting record its "good" but if a liberal states elects a respect jurist who has taken a strong stance on middle class issues its bad because "that is partisan" ? I assume you are also incredibly angry at all the Republican states that have Republican senators then?
On November 08 2012 14:21 TyrantPotato wrote: Now that all this is over (almost) and obama is da winrar.
WTF is up with your guys election process?
you live in a democracy.....BUT from what i know of your system its nothing like that at all.
correct me if im wrong, but if 1 person can get 270 electoral points(state vote thingy pont shit) by winning each state by only 100-1000 votes. then not get a single vote in every other state he can still be president?
please tell me that isnt the case and im horrible mistaken.
Yeah it's pretty dumb. There's actually a way that in a three way race a person can win the presidency with less than 14% of the popular vote or something like that.
Based on a lot of the post-election comments on various news sites I've been reading, I really don't think the republicans are going to make any of the changes they need to. The tea party faction is going to 'double down' and become even more aggressive and reactionary.
Example:
Romney lost because he did not act like he wanted the job. There were hundreds of things he could have brought up about Odumbo that would have exposed this phoney, but he didn’t do that. He ran a “nice” campaign, and lost. Nuts to being “nice.” I want a vicious attack dog who will eat the other side alive. I guess the Republicans will never learn….Bob Dole, John McCain and now Romney. What a bunch of losers!
In their next primary they're going to force whatever candidates they have into more and more extreme positions on social issues and demographics are going to punish them even more. Any republican leader who tries to advocate moderation will be destroyed by Fox News, Rush et al. Eventually true libertarians will have to leave out of frustration.
On November 08 2012 14:21 TyrantPotato wrote: Now that all this is over (almost) and obama is da winrar.
WTF is up with your guys election process?
you live in a democracy.....BUT from what i know of your system its nothing like that at all.
correct me if im wrong, but if 1 person can get 270 electoral points(state vote thingy pont shit) by winning each state by only 100-1000 votes. then not get a single vote in every other state he can still be president?
please tell me that isnt the case and im horrible mistaken.
On November 08 2012 14:21 TyrantPotato wrote: Now that all this is over (almost) and obama is da winrar.
WTF is up with your guys election process?
you live in a democracy.....BUT from what i know of your system its nothing like that at all.
correct me if im wrong, but if 1 person can get 270 electoral points(state vote thingy pont shit) by winning each state by only 100-1000 votes. then not get a single vote in every other state he can still be president?
please tell me that isnt the case and im horrible mistaken.
G.W.Bush became president that way didn't he, had less overall votes than Al Gore.
I think they are aware of their shit system and have tried to changed it but to no avail or something.
Anyway happy to see that Romney didn't win.
Why would they change it. Its a federal, presidential system. Sometimes it has weird results. Parliamentary style democracies have them to, you can look at Canada where a political party that represents ~ 31% of Canadians completely dominates the federal government and can do whatever it wants as long as it doesnt violate the Constitution. In first past the post, the guy who has the highest number of votes wins. Which means that if there are 5 guys running in a district, and one guy has 20.1% then he will represent that district despite being not chosen by almost 80% of the people in his district.
They would change it because it was made for a different time and place. Our founding fathers were brilliant people, don't get me wrong, but their idea of democracy was different than our idea. The original reason for the electoral college was to keep the hoi polloi away from having as much control over the results. That's still sort of the reason, but at the end of the day, if we have more than fifty percent of Americans voting for a candidate, that person should probably win the office. I would be curious to hear what reasons you can muster up in favor of the electoral college that aren't "Well the founding fathers promoted it." The democracy that America was originally founded under didn't even have complete male suffrage, the bourgeoisie controlled almost all the political power.
The reason it looks archaic today is because of generally polarized nature of elections. California will never vote Republican. Texas will never vote Democrat. Therefore a bunch of random states that are politically close calls are the only ones that matter. If the number of Democratic and Republican voters was evenly distributed then no one would care how the actual votes are counted.
Quite frankly the much more important issues in American elections are: (a) gerrymendering of districts (b) low information voters (c) relatively low turnouts. And none of these need a constitutional amendment to be fixed.
On November 08 2012 14:52 tomatriedes wrote: Based on a lot of the post-election comments on various news sites I've been reading, I really don't think the republicans are going to make any of the changes they need to. The tea party faction is going to 'double down' and become even more aggressive and reactionary.
Romney lost because he did not act like he wanted the job. There were hundreds of things he could have brought up about Odumbo that would have exposed this phoney, but he didn’t do that. He ran a “nice” campaign, and lost. Nuts to being “nice.” I want a vicious attack dog who will eat the other side alive. I guess the Republicans will never learn….Bob Dole, John McCain and now Romney. What a bunch of losers!
In their next primary they're going to force whatever candidates they have into more and more extreme positions on social issues and demographics are going to punish them even more. Any republican leader who tries to advocate moderation will be destroyed by Fox News, Rush et al. Eventually true libertarians will have to leave out of frustration.
Oi. The more moderate Republicans should just leave and join the Democrats. It's not as if the Democrats are really Democrats anyways. Obama's practically a moderate Republican.
The GOP basically needs to re-brand so they no longer get characterized as the "old white men party." Otherwise they'll keep alienating the communities whose support they need to win.
On November 08 2012 14:42 The Final Boss wrote: I would say that overwhelmingly, the reason why Romney lost this race was simply because a lot of women voters would not vote for him. A lot of that is because he is pro-life; however, I feel like that is a bad reason to vote against him. Regardless of who won, four years from now abortion would be legal. This election really should have been about the economy, but instead Obama's campaign managed to successfully frame it around progressive social issues--one of the few things his campaign has managed to do in the past four years. This election should not have been about abortion, but at the end of the day, that's what it was for a lot of voters.
But anyways, the saddest thing about November 6th was Scott Brown not getting re-elected. I thought after he took Ted Kennedy's seat that it might just be a sign of the start of the end of our nation's rooted political polarization, but apparently Massachusetts voters decided otherwise. Elizabeth Warren is just another person who is going to vote 90% or more along party lines, that's not what we need; we need people who are going to be more moderate and actually make decisions on their own. What really saddens me is just how polarized America has become, and it can be really highlighted in the Massachusetts Senate race. The two biggest problems I have are the following:
In any state that isn't as polarized as Massachusetts, Scott Brown would have won that election.
In any other state that isn't that polarized, Scott Brown would have never been nominated because he strays too far from the GOP.
I'm also really disappointed in my own state of Rhode Island. We still elected David Cicilline, who makes Chinese politicians look not incorruptible. Also the Republican party in this state cannot put up a decent candidate.
I'm a Republican, I voted for Mitt Romney, I voted for Doherty (the guy in Rhode Island who ran against Cicilline for the 1st Congressional District), and I am thoroughly disappointed. I think that this is going to lead to massive reforms and changes within the Republican party as they have to shift with the demographic. I have very low hopes for the next four years because Washington is effectively unchanged except that Scott Brown is no longer there. But yeah, I would be interested in hearing other people's views on what I'm talking about.
Maybe female voters (a) value their reproductive rights higher than the economy (b) maybe they were suspicious of a candidate who embraced people who say stuff like "you cant get pregnant from legitimate rape" or "rape is gods will" (c) maybe women voters didnt believe Romney's economic plan of "I will create 14 million new jobs by getting elected" was plausible.
As for Scott Brown. Is that how it works? If a liberal states elects a Republican, no matter what his voting record its "good" but if a liberal states elects a respect jurist who has taken a strong stance on middle class issues its bad because "that is partisan" ? I assume you are also incredibly angry at all the Republican states that have Republican senators then?
First off--and most importantly, I might add--do not attribute Tod Akin's idiotic statement as being Mitt Romney's or even having anything to do with Mitt Romney, that is incredibly ignorant and idiotic of you to say or even insinuate. Secondly, what I am saying is that a woman's reproductive right was not threatened, because it's going to be legal to get an abortion four years from now even if Mitt Romney had been elected. It is not as important of an issue because it's not going to change as much regardless of who wins. Now when you talk about something like Obamacare and entitlement programs, that IS something that is drastically different. I still haven't heard any idea of how Obama plans to deal with the failing entitlement programs while he's implementing his own little invention, but I would love to hear about it from any of you who can enlighten me.
But if you really still believe that women voters just didn't fall for Romney's economic plan, would you care to explain the gender gap? I believe I saw a poll on NYT that said that among men, Romney was up by about 9 points and among women Obama was up by about 9 or 10 points. Do you really believe that that 18 point difference was because all those women saw something that those men didn't see?
And actually, if you read what I wrote about Scott Brown, I am disappointed with the candidates that the GOP has been putting up. We need less Tod Akins and more Scott Browns. Scott Brown's campaign can be summed up in his slogan "People over Party." Elizabeth Warren's campaign can be summed up in the slogan "Scott Brown hates women." Frankly, one of those slogans is what our country needs more of, and one of those slogans is wildly inaccurate. I'll let you decide which one is which.
On November 08 2012 14:21 TyrantPotato wrote: Now that all this is over (almost) and obama is da winrar.
WTF is up with your guys election process?
you live in a democracy.....BUT from what i know of your system its nothing like that at all.
correct me if im wrong, but if 1 person can get 270 electoral points(state vote thingy pont shit) by winning each state by only 100-1000 votes. then not get a single vote in every other state he can still be president?
please tell me that isnt the case and im horrible mistaken.
G.W.Bush became president that way didn't he, had less overall votes than Al Gore.
I think they are aware of their shit system and have tried to changed it but to no avail or something.
Anyway happy to see that Romney didn't win.
Why would they change it. Its a federal, presidential system. Sometimes it has weird results. Parliamentary style democracies have them to, you can look at Canada where a political party that represents ~ 31% of Canadians completely dominates the federal government and can do whatever it wants as long as it doesnt violate the Constitution. In first past the post, the guy who has the highest number of votes wins. Which means that if there are 5 guys running in a district, and one guy has 20.1% then he will represent that district despite being not chosen by almost 80% of the people in his district.
They would change it because it was made for a different time and place. Our founding fathers were brilliant people, don't get me wrong, but their idea of democracy was different than our idea. The original reason for the electoral college was to keep the hoi polloi away from having as much control over the results. That's still sort of the reason, but at the end of the day, if we have more than fifty percent of Americans voting for a candidate, that person should probably win the office. I would be curious to hear what reasons you can muster up in favor of the electoral college that aren't "Well the founding fathers promoted it." The democracy that America was originally founded under didn't even have complete male suffrage, the bourgeoisie controlled almost all the political power.
The reason it looks archaic today is because of generally polarized nature of elections. California will never vote Republican. Texas will never vote Democrat. Therefore a bunch of random states that are politically close calls are the only ones that matter. If the number of Democratic and Republican voters was evenly distributed then no one would care how the actual votes are counted.
Quite frankly the much more important issues in American elections are: (a) gerrymendering of districts (b) low information voters (c) relatively low turnouts. And none of these need a constitutional amendment to be fixed.
I agree that all of those are issues we need to tackle, but getting rid of the electoral college would be a step in the right direction. Another issue you can tack on there is changing how we brand our campaigns. Obama's 2008 campaign was "Hope" and "Change." His 2012 campaign was "Don't vote for Romney" or "Mitt Romney hates you." That's not how campaigns should be run. But then again, I guess like good ole Barry-O said, "When you don't have anything fresh to run on, you use stale tactics to scare voters."
EPT
