Larry J. Sabato at the Wall Street Journal’s headline reads: The 2012 Election Will Come Down to Seven States — National polls are nice, but Electoral College math is what matters.
Which begs the question: What about the other 50 states in Obama’s America?
In case you’re wondering, the 7 states that Sabato thinks the election hinges on are (with electoral votes in parenthesis): Colorado (9), Florida (29), Iowa (6), Nevada (6), New Hampshire (4), Ohio (18) and Virginia (13)
I don’t buy Sabato’s starting electoral premise, though. The election is the Republican’s to lose at the moment. Given the huge swing to the GOP in the 2010 elections, I would take Virginia, Florida, and Ohio off the list, which would give the GOP 266 electoral college votes and leaving Colorado, Nevada, New Hampshire, and Iowa as the remaining toss ups.
And if you add Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) to on the ticket, I think it makes CO, NM, and NV locks, too.
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Marco Rubio will for sure lock up those 3 states on the GOP side. On the Flip side if whomever is the candidate picks Susana Martinez Gov of NM will lock up all 3 as well.
In 2012, The National Popular Vote bill could guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC).
Every vote, everywhere, would be politically relevant and equal in presidential elections. There would no longer be ‘battleground’ states where voters and policies are more important than those of other states.
When the bill is enacted by states possessing a majority of the electoral votes– enough electoral votes to elect a President (270 of 538), all the electoral votes from the enacting states would be awarded to the presidential candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states and DC.
The bill uses the power given to each state by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution to change how they award their electoral votes for president. Historically, virtually all of the major changes in the method of electing the President, including ending the requirement that only men who owned substantial property could vote and 48 current state-by-state winner-take-all laws, have come about by state legislative action.
The bill has passed 31 state legislative chambers in 21 small, medium-small, medium, and large states, including one house in AR, CT, DE, DC, ME, MI, NV, NM, NY, NC, and OR, and both houses in CA, CO, HI, IL, NJ, MD, MA ,RI, VT, and WA. The bill has been enacted by DC, HI, IL,CA, NJ, MD, MA, VT, and WA. These 9 jurisdictions possess 132 electoral votes– 49% of the 270 necessary to bring the law into effect.
http://www.NationalPopularVote.com
The Electoral College is a good system; we do not need to do away with it.
Under the Electoral College, every vote, in every state, counts, regardless of what the talking heads tell you. Saying “My vote doesn’t count because of the Electoral College” makes for a good sound bite, but it doesn’t stand up to inspection. Likewise, the assertion that “7 states will decide the next election” is demonstrably false.
I have a friend who lives in Washington State. He once expressed frustration that, as a Republican, his vote for President “won’t count” because Washington is a guaranteed win for the Democratic candidate. But that’s not true; my friend’s vote will count, it’s just that he’s going to be outvoted. That’s the way a democracy works: someone has to lose the election.
In the same way, “7 states” are not going to decide the next election; all 50 states (and the District of Columbia) will decide the next election. It’s just that some states already know who they are going to vote for, and some don’t.
During the 2000 election debacle, I kept hearing over and over how “unfair” it was that “Florida gets to decide who the winner is”, the implication being that the other states’ voted didn’t count. Florida was certainly the last state to be counted, but it wasn’t the only state that counted; the reason Florida’s votes determined the outcome of the election was precisely because the election was so close in the other states.
Let’s make a little simpler: you and four other guys are going out to lunch. One guy suggests Rudy’s and one guy suggests Taco Cabana, so the five of you decide to vote. Two guys vote for Taco Cabana, two guys vote for Rudy’s, and now it’s your turn to vote. Since the vote is currently two and two, your vote will decide the winner. So that means that yours is the only vote that matters right? Obviously not. Every vote counted, but two guys are going to be outvoted.
So why the Electoral College? I know what they told you in school, they told me the same thing. But it wasn’t true then and it’s not true now. Regardless of what you’ve been told, the true purpose of the Electoral College, like so much else in our Constitution, is to prevent the big states from pushing the little states around. If it were not for the Electoral College, states with large urban populations would be the only ones whose vote counted. Ever.
If you really want to make sure that some people’s votes don’t count, then do away with the Electoral College. Then, people in Wyoming or Montana might as well not even vote.
The National Popular Vote Bill is an excellent example of people making important decisions on the basis of “I just feel like it’s more fair” rather than any type of logic or reasoning.
Under the current system, the 11 most populous states contain 56% of the population of the United States, and a candidate could win the Presidency by winning a mere 51% of the vote in just these 11 biggest states — that is, a mere 26% of the nation’s votes.
With National Popular Vote, big states that are just about as closely divided as the rest of the country, would not get all of the candidates’ attention. In recent presidential elections, the 11 largest states have been split — five “red states (Texas, Florida, Ohio, North Carolina, and Georgia) and six “blue” states (California, New York, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and New Jersey). Among the four largest states, the two largest Republican states (Texas and Florida) generated a total margin of 2.1 million votes for Bush, while the two largest Democratic states generated a total margin of 2.1 million votes for Kerry. 8 small western states, with less than a third of California’s population, provided Bush with a bigger margin (1,283,076) than California provided Kerry (1,235,659).
Under National Popular Vote, every vote is equal.
21% of Americans live in rural areas.
With National Popular Vote, big cities would not get all of candidates’ attention, much less control the outcome.
The population of the top five cities (New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston and Philadelphia) is only 6% of the population of the United States and the population of the top 50 cities (going as obscurely far down as Arlington, TX) is only 19% of the population of the United States.
Suburbs and exurbs often vote Republican.
If big cities controlled the outcome of elections, the governors and U.S. Senators would be Democratic in virtually every state with a significant city.
Evidence as to how a nationwide presidential campaign would be run, can be found by examining the way presidential candidates campaign to win the electoral votes of closely divided battleground states, such as in Ohio and Florida, under the state-by-state winner-take-all methods. The big cities in those battleground states do not receive all the attention, much less control the outcome. Cleveland and Miami certainly did not receive all the attention or control the outcome in Ohio and Florida in 2000 and 2004.
Because every vote is equal inside Ohio or Florida, presidential candidates avidly seek out voters in small, medium, and large towns. The itineraries of presidential candidates in battleground states (and their allocation of other campaign resources in battleground states) reflect the political reality that every gubernatorial or senatorial candidate in Ohio and Florida already knows–namely that when every vote is equal, the campaign must be run in every part of the state.
Even in California state-wide elections, candidates for governor or U.S. Senate don’t campaign just in Los Angeles and San Francisco, and those places don’t control the outcome (otherwise California wouldn’t have recently had Republican governors Reagan, Dukemejian, Wilson, and Schwarzenegger). A vote in rural Alpine county is just an important as a vote in Los Angeles. If Los Angeles cannot control statewide elections in California, it can hardly control a nationwide election.
In fact, Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose, and Oakland together cannot control a statewide election in California.
Similarly, Republicans dominate Texas politics without carrying big cities such as Dallas and Houston.
There are numerous other examples of Republicans who won races for governor and U.S. Senator in other states that have big cities (e.g., New York, Illinois, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts) without ever carrying the big cities of their respective states. It is certainly true that the biggest cities in those states typically vote Democratic. However, the suburbs, exurbs, small towns, and rural parts of the states often voted Republican. If big cities controlled the outcome of elections, the governors and U.S. Senators would be Democratic in virtually every state with a significant city.
Under a national popular vote, every vote everywhere will be equally important politically. There will be nothing special about a vote cast in a big city or big state. When every vote is equal, candidates of both parties will seek out voters in small, medium, and large towns throughout the states in order to win. A vote cast in a big city or state will be equal to a vote cast in a small state, town, or rural area.
Now with state-by-state winner-take-all laws presidential elections ignore 12 of the 13 lowest population states (3-4 electoral votes), that are almost invariably non-competitive, and ignored, in presidential elections. Six regularly vote Republican (Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, and South Dakota), and six regularly vote Democratic (Rhode Island, Delaware, Hawaii, Vermont, Maine, and DC) in presidential elections.
Support for a national popular vote is strong in every smallest state surveyed in recent polls among Republican voters, Democratic voters, and independent voters, as well as every demographic group. Support in smaller states (3 to 5 electoral votes): Alaska — 70%, DC — 76%, Delaware –75%, Idaho – 77%, Maine — 77%, Montana – 72%, Nebraska — 74%, New Hampshire –69%, Nevada — 72%, New Mexico — 76%, Oklahoma – 81%, Rhode Island — 74%, South Dakota – 71%, Utah – 70%, Vermont — 75%, and West Virginia – 81%, and Wyoming – 69%.
Nine state legislative chambers in the lowest population states have passed the National Popular Vote bill. It has been enacted by the District of Columbia, Hawaii, and Vermont.
The National Popular Vote bill is a state-based approach. It preserves the Electoral College and state control of elections. It changes the way electoral votes are awarded in the Electoral College. It assures that every vote is equal and that every voter will matter in every state in every presidential election, as in virtually every other election in the country.
Under National Popular Vote, every vote, everywhere, would be politically relevant and equal in every presidential election. Every vote would be included in the national count. The candidate with the most popular votes in all 50 states would get the 270+ electoral votes from the enacting states. That majority of electoral votes guarantees the candidate with the most popular votes in all 50 states wins the presidency.
National Popular Vote would give a voice to the minority party voters in each state. Now their votes are counted only for the candidate they did not vote for. Now they don’t matter to their candidate. With National Popular Vote, elections wouldn’t be about winning states. No more distorting and divisive red and blue state maps. Every vote, everywhere would be counted for and directly assist the candidate for whom it was cast. Candidates would need to care about voters across the nation, not just undecided voters in the current handful of swing states. The political reality would be that when every vote is equal, the campaign must be run in every part of the country.
In the 2012 election, pundits and campaign operatives already agree that, only 7-14 states and their voters will matter under the current winner-take-all laws (i.e., awarding all of a state’s electoral votes to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in each state) used by 48 of the 50 states. Candidates will not care about at least 72% of the voters– voters in 19 of the 22 lowest population and medium-small states, and in 16 medium and big states like CA, GA, NY, and TX. 2012 campaigning would be even more obscenely exclusive than 2008 and 2004. In 2008, candidates concentrated over 2/3rds of their campaign events and ad money in just 6 states, and 98% in just 15 states (CO, FL, IN, IA, MI, MN, MO, NV, NH, NM, NC, OH, PA, VA, and WI). Over half (57%) of the events were in just 4 states (OH, FL, PA, and VA). Candidates have no reason to poll, visit, advertise, organize, campaign, or care about the voter concerns in the dozens of states where they are safely ahead or hopelessly behind. More than 85 million voters have been just spectators to the general election.
Now, policies important to the citizens of ‘flyover’ states are not as highly prioritized as policies important to ‘battleground’ states when it comes to governing, too.
1. Everything that you have just said can be summed up by saying “I just feel like it would be more fair.”
2. When you are copying and pasting, you should first read through the material to make sure you are not repeating points which have already been refuted (or “refudiated”, if you prefer).
National Popular Vote WOULD be fair, period. One person, one vote. The candidate with the most votes wins. That’s how every other election in the U.S. is run. What isn’t fair about that?
The Republican ticket needs Rubio. The country needs Rubio. Some day he will be our President.
I sure hope so, he’s got my vote!