hopelessness begins at home. part three.
TWO: The voting system itself. From a flawed electoral-voting process that gives some people a full vote while basically disregarding the others, to a corporately-controlled voting process that virtually promises an inaccurate vote count, our voting system is falling to pieces beneath us.
Americans are beginning to understand that the antiquated system of electoral voting means some people have more of a say than others. And it isn't because people in Wyoming have fewer residents per electoral vote than people in New York. The problem is greater and more obvious than that. A simple analogy: Texas has 32 electoral votes (30 Congressman and two Senators which allows them 32 votes). That was a fact, so I suppose the analogy really begins here. Let's just say 49.75% of Texans cast their ballots for a Democrat candidate, and the other 50.25% go Republican. The Republican candidate gets all 32 of Texas' electoral votes. This basically means that the other 49.75% of the population of Texas might as well have not voted at all. Their votes are completely discounted. This is why a candidate can have many more votes than his opponent, but still loose the election.
There is a reason for this system, though, and it isn't a bad one. The system is in place because of a conflict of interest. Our government wanted to give the states equal power between one another to some degree. They didn't want people in the most populous states (New York, California, Connecticut, etc) the be able to exert their power over the less populous ones (South Dakota, Alabama, Iowa). The fact is that the average person in New York wants things to be very different than the average person in Alabama. The problem is that not everyone in New York or in Alabama is the same as the next guy (or girl) in New York or Alabama. A great example is Austin, Texas. I spent time there and met more liberals than I would meet at the deli on a New York morning. When I say liberal... I mean LIBERAL. The people I stayed with had a Taoist community center in their back-yard, and their next-door neighbors took me out to some posh downtown restaurant and proceeded to talk to me about how when you see an animal, you haven't chosen it... It has chosen you. The only way I would have felt as if I were in the prescence of a more liberal couple is if we were in the East Village and the "couple" consisted of two men in Gucci sunglasses. Or two women.
My point is that although this system of all or nothing electoral vote tallying was designed to keep Baptists in Alabama from being swept under by the needs and wants of gay men in California, it grossly ignores the fact that not everyone in Alabama is a bible thumping Republican. Nor are all the residents of California gay men sitting in coffee houses eating organic baby-greens with organic mango chutney salad then driving home in Priuses. I have traveled quite a bit, and I have met many extremely liberal people in states famous for their stark red status. As I mentioned earlier, Austin Texas is overflowing with people nearly drowning in leftist ideals. Birmingham, Alabama is packed with liberals. Such is the case in cities around the country. It goes the other way too. On any morning, walk into any deli on Long Island and you'll hear a surprising number of contractors talking about "killing towel-heads" and singing praises to their Comandante: the Gee Bush.
The answer, which is extremely clear but feared by politicians with a firm grip on their thrones is splitting the electoral votes fairly as the ballots are cast. This would proove to be particularly gruesome for conservatives who risk loosing votes in states that constantly go in their favor. But fair is fair. This system, which is analogous to the system of voting for members of Congress, is already in place in Maine and Nebraska, and it is the only system that guarantees both protection for less populous states' interests, as well as offering the most fairly balanced election possible. If we don't do away with the plurality voting system, people in the United States are going to begin to feel exponentially polarized as far as polotics are concerned. The divide between red and blue states will continue to grow, as will dissention within the states by members of the political minority.
Continued in part four...
Americans are beginning to understand that the antiquated system of electoral voting means some people have more of a say than others. And it isn't because people in Wyoming have fewer residents per electoral vote than people in New York. The problem is greater and more obvious than that. A simple analogy: Texas has 32 electoral votes (30 Congressman and two Senators which allows them 32 votes). That was a fact, so I suppose the analogy really begins here. Let's just say 49.75% of Texans cast their ballots for a Democrat candidate, and the other 50.25% go Republican. The Republican candidate gets all 32 of Texas' electoral votes. This basically means that the other 49.75% of the population of Texas might as well have not voted at all. Their votes are completely discounted. This is why a candidate can have many more votes than his opponent, but still loose the election.
There is a reason for this system, though, and it isn't a bad one. The system is in place because of a conflict of interest. Our government wanted to give the states equal power between one another to some degree. They didn't want people in the most populous states (New York, California, Connecticut, etc) the be able to exert their power over the less populous ones (South Dakota, Alabama, Iowa). The fact is that the average person in New York wants things to be very different than the average person in Alabama. The problem is that not everyone in New York or in Alabama is the same as the next guy (or girl) in New York or Alabama. A great example is Austin, Texas. I spent time there and met more liberals than I would meet at the deli on a New York morning. When I say liberal... I mean LIBERAL. The people I stayed with had a Taoist community center in their back-yard, and their next-door neighbors took me out to some posh downtown restaurant and proceeded to talk to me about how when you see an animal, you haven't chosen it... It has chosen you. The only way I would have felt as if I were in the prescence of a more liberal couple is if we were in the East Village and the "couple" consisted of two men in Gucci sunglasses. Or two women.
My point is that although this system of all or nothing electoral vote tallying was designed to keep Baptists in Alabama from being swept under by the needs and wants of gay men in California, it grossly ignores the fact that not everyone in Alabama is a bible thumping Republican. Nor are all the residents of California gay men sitting in coffee houses eating organic baby-greens with organic mango chutney salad then driving home in Priuses. I have traveled quite a bit, and I have met many extremely liberal people in states famous for their stark red status. As I mentioned earlier, Austin Texas is overflowing with people nearly drowning in leftist ideals. Birmingham, Alabama is packed with liberals. Such is the case in cities around the country. It goes the other way too. On any morning, walk into any deli on Long Island and you'll hear a surprising number of contractors talking about "killing towel-heads" and singing praises to their Comandante: the Gee Bush.
The answer, which is extremely clear but feared by politicians with a firm grip on their thrones is splitting the electoral votes fairly as the ballots are cast. This would proove to be particularly gruesome for conservatives who risk loosing votes in states that constantly go in their favor. But fair is fair. This system, which is analogous to the system of voting for members of Congress, is already in place in Maine and Nebraska, and it is the only system that guarantees both protection for less populous states' interests, as well as offering the most fairly balanced election possible. If we don't do away with the plurality voting system, people in the United States are going to begin to feel exponentially polarized as far as polotics are concerned. The divide between red and blue states will continue to grow, as will dissention within the states by members of the political minority.
Continued in part four...
posted by adampaul at
1:14 PM
2 Comments:
I thought electoral votes were split among the voting in each state so if 45% were republican than 45% of votes went to republican candidates etc.
This is a very interesting commentary, I'm looking forward to section 4.
Nope, unfortunately only two states currently split electoral votes. It is known as "The Maine Method" of electoral voting. Using this process, each district receives one electoral vote, so whoever wins the majority in that individual district wins one vote for president. This means that in Maine, half the votes can go for one candidate, and half for the other. Or 1/3 and 2/3, or any other combination. This method much more accurately portrays the wishes of the residents in individual states, and the US population as a whole.
A perfect example of why the current all or nothing system is insane is Ohio in 2004. George Bush won by only 100,000 (very hotly contested) votes. According to the 2000 census, Ohio has a population of around 11,353,140. Giving 100% of the electoral votes to a state that was split nearly 50-50 is rediculous. I'm not sure how many registered voters there are in Ohio, or how many people showed up at the polls, but with a population of over 11 million, it's safe to say that 100,000 is a very narrow margin, and the residents of Ohio are not staunch republicans.
This is why when you watch the news on election night you see states completely washed in either blue or red. Unfortunately, despite the vast amount of information available to us on the internet, most Americans have no idea how our election process actually works, so the "losers" just say "darn it, maybe next time" instead of speaking out against the idiocy of our all or nothing system.
Representative Steve Israel and many other Democratic reps have been trying to introduce legislation that would institute the Maine Method across the US. Voice your support for this using the wonderful resource www.congress.org by which you can easily email your representatives and voice your opinion on any matter.
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