I am not suggesting this. God knows I don’t want it to happen. And I am not advocating it or suggesting anyone else would either or would even want it.
But would Palin be swept into office if (God forbid) McCain were to be assasinated on the eve of election day.
Or would McCain win in a landslide if Palin were to be (once again, God forbid) killed by an assasin?
The only way I can envision McCain or Palin being “swept into office” (if by that you mean a landslide) is if it were quickly discovered that Obama or Biden were involved in the assassination.
Regards,
Shodan
People like Palin as Vice President because they think she’s young, energetic, and fits in with their attitudes and values. She’s also very cunning politically and quite charming. (She is in a lot of ways much like Obama.) But they are also lauding her for Vice President, where she can gain experience and learn the ropes of Washington. Conservatives have a love-hate relationship with McCain, but we do think of him as experienced and capable. Palin doesn’t have that yet.
I’m pretty sure once the election is decided the VP will become President if the president-elect dies or is otherwise unable to fulfill the duties of the office.
I cannot see Palin being assassinated helping McCain win the election at all unless, as mentioned, it was shown Obama ordered the hit.
I don’t know. I thinkTV Time makes a pretty good point.
If any of the four candidates (Prez/VP) were killed or died or whatever on Monday, November 3rd there would be a huge ground-swell of sympathy votes for whichever ticket is affected.
It would make things a little more squirrelly if it were either of the Presidential candidates who shuffled loose the mortal coil … for then there would be an issue of who people would actually be voting for.
I could be wrong, but in that case I think the party leadership would have to nominate a new candidate for President - in the space of about an hour or two - not just automatically have the intended Veep slide in.
But then again … would the vote be postponed? After all, there’s no way all the balloting could be updated overnight.
It would make for quite a compelling story one way or another … that is, in a “holy shit” sort of way.
I suppose so but it’d take an Act of Congress I think to postpone it since the date is set by law.
U.S. Code: TITLE 3 > CHAPTER 1 > § 1
§ 1. Time of appointing electors
The electors of President and Vice President shall be appointed, in each State, on the Tuesday next after the first Monday in November, in every fourth year succeeding every election of a President and Vice President.
Do the Republicans even have a free-agent candidate they could pop into McCain’s place, assuming the five-minute debate results in a resounding “hell, no” for Palin getting the spot?
The Democrats, at least, have Hillary…
The decision wouldn’t have to be made that quickly. Remember, the citizens don’t vote for the President on Election Day; we vote for electors. The electors are theoretically free to vote for anyone they want, but they’re chosen by the parties for their loyalty. So if, say, McCain were to die on the first Monday in November, the ballots would still go out printed “McCain/Palin” (which is shorthand for “The set of electors chosen by McCain and Palin’s party”), and the people would vote on that ballot. Meanwhile, the leaders of the Republican party would all get together and decide who they wanted to be the replacement candidate, and once they agreed on someone, they’d recommend to the Republican electors to vote for that other person (whomever it is). The Republican electors, being loyal to the party leadership, would presumably go along with their decision, and all cast their votes for the replacement candidate come December.
The real difficulty would come if a candidate were to die just before the Electoral College vote. In that case, there might not be enough time for the party leaders to come to an agreement on who the replacement should be, and you could end up with each elector exercising their own judgement on who the “obvious” successor would be. If they don’t all come to the same “obvious” decision, that party’s vote could be fragmented, giving the election to the other party.
Then again, there might already be contingency planning in place for situations like this. It might be that prudent VIPs from both parties have already met in smoke-filled rooms and decided “If McCain croaks suddenly, we’ll all put our weight behind Romney”, (and an equivalent decision from the Dems) or some such.
Actually, the thread title suggested something different to me.