I'm a creature of habit and I like tradition. I like going to the voting booth. I liked using the little punch card system that left hanging and pregnant chads, but can see why they changed it. Now, we have a gigantic scan sheet that we feed into a reader on our way out.
I'm not a fan of early voting, though. I mean, I understand absentee and all. For me, I want to vote on voting day.
The push for early voting puzzles me. I mean, why not stick with the standard absentee bit and leave it at that?
I'm not convinced with early voting. I've found out that absentee don't get counted until later, as well as the military voting. (Absentee, obviously.) I think that it is just another way for them to muck up a system that seemed to work well enough. Well, outside of the whole hanging and pregnant chad bit.
Now, the electoral college does have me a bit miffed. When you can win an election by electoral vote and not by the popular vote as was the case in a Presidential election in my not-so-distant memory, that makes no sense. If you want to change something, perhaps that would be the one to consider.
Since I'm on questioning decisions of voting created by our Forefathers, what's up with caucus', why are they held where they are and why is it that the caucus' basically get to weed out the folks who actually do run for President? Who gave them special license to weed folks out?
Why do we suddenly have a Tea Party? Where did it come from? Was it always here or was it the work of Sarah?
What happened to the Green Party, Ralph Nader and what on earth happened to Ross Pero?
Why are Democrats blue and Republicans red?
Why donkeys and elephants?
Teach me, o' wise internet of knowledge. :) Seriously, if anyone can give me a good American History lesson since my 11th grade AH seems to have partially left me (well, I did sleep most of the way through the class and still aced it anyhow), I'll take it.
Please remember to be kind, remember that others may not feel politically the way that you do and try to respect that. I live for honesty, but don't want to offend those who read. Frankly, I'm hard to offend and appreciate a good argument for another side. This isn't a political forum to bash the President, his policies or whatnot. I guess that's what I'm sayin'.
Teach me stuff.
Smiles in my day:
- K- was so excited to go to school early for breakfast this morning that she was up at 6:45 AM (when her Jar Jar Binks alarm wiggled and wailed) and got the rest of her morning handled so that we could leave at 7:45 AM to walk. Such a funny girl!
Have a great day!
3 comments:
You should try teaching the electoral college to a bunch of fifth graders... it made my head hurt. ;o)
I'm not sure about some of the questions. I'm fairly certain the Tea Party arose from upset and discontented conservatives who felt the country was headed in the wrong direction and who felt the Republican party wasn't doing enough to stop it.
I'm supposed to be in the schoolroom, so I guess I had best be off. I'll come back later and see what you've learned. :o)
The National Popular Vote bill would 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. Elections wouldn't be about winning states. No more distorting and divisive red and blue state maps. Every vote 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 a handful of swing states.
Now 2/3rds of the states and voters are ignored -- 19 of the 22 smallest and medium-small states and big states like California, Georgia, New York, and Texas. 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, and not mentioned, much less endorsed, in the Constitution, ensure that the candidates do not reach out to all of the states and their voters. 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. Policies important to the citizens of ‘flyover’ states are not as highly prioritized as policies important to ‘battleground’ states when it comes to governing.
The bill would take effect only when enacted, in identical form, by states possessing a majority of the electoral votes--that is, enough electoral votes to elect a President (270 of 538). When the bill comes into effect, all the electoral votes from those 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. It does not abolish the Electoral College, which would need a constitutional amendment, and could be stopped by states with as little as 3% of the U.S. population. 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, without federal constitutional amendments.
The bill has been endorsed or voted for by 1,922 state legislators (in 50 states) who have sponsored and/or cast recorded votes in favor of the bill.
In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state's electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided). Support for a national popular vote is strong in virtually every state, partisan, and demographic group surveyed in recent polls.
The National Popular Vote bill has passed 31 state legislative chambers, in 21 small, medium-small, medium, and large states, including one house in Arkansas (6), Connecticut (7), Delaware (3), The District of Columbia (3), Maine (4), Michigan (17), Nevada (5), New Mexico (5), New York (31), North Carolina (15), and Oregon (7), and both houses in California (55), Colorado (9), Hawaii (4), Illinois (21), New Jersey (15), Maryland (10), Massachusetts (12), Rhode Island (4), Vermont (3), and Washington (11). The bill has been enacted by Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, Maryland, Massachusetts, and Washington. These six states possess 73 electoral votes -- 27% of the 270 necessary to bring the law into effect.
See http://www.NationalPopularVote.com
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2208145434#
Toto,
Thank you for such a wonderful history lesson and for information regarding a bill that I never knew existed. Call it living in a battleground state. Ohio may be average size, but apparently we are a big Presidential deal.
Thank you for giving me much to chew on!
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