Latest CNN/USA Today polling data
Bush opens 8 point lead
Well, the Gallup Poll (which that is) has tended to be the most strongly Bush poll. As noted at the end of that article, four polls by other organizations show Bush with a 1, 3, 4, or 6% lead.
Kerry, on the other hand, is running way ahead in newspaper endorsements. From Reuters – http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6521523:
From the website of Editor and Publisher – http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000673213:
Any speculations on how that will translate into actual votes?
:shrug: I don’t know of anyone whose vote has ever been swayed by someone else’s endorsement outside the world of politics, be it celebrity or newspaper or whoever. But, if the New Philadelphia, Ohio Times-Republic issues a pronouncement, hell, that’s even more circulation than the Crawford, TX Iconoclast!
And here I thought the media wasn’t biased…
Newspaper Endorsements - 2000 Election
GWB: 138
Gore: 52
WTF? The question of “bias” or “impartiality” is relevant only to a paper’s news coverage, not to its editorial page, which exists to reflect the editors’ biases. It’s traditional for every paper to endorse somebody, and one candidate will almost certainly get more endorsements than the other. Some papers always endorse the Dem or the Pub consistently, some don’t. In this election, a lot of papers that endorsed Bush in 2000 are endorsing Kerry now.
I just want to say that you undecideds are really starting to piss me off. Make up your minds already!
The media is definitely biased, Sam; it’s just not in the direction you’re trying to insinuate.
www.electoral-vote.com now has Kerry barely ahead at 253-247. This is a dead heat, since 270 electoral votes are needed to win.
What would it take for a reform, or total elimination of the Electoral College. What if Bush won the popular vote, Kerry took the EC, and the Republicans controlled the House and Senate? I think it needs to be a consitutional amendment, but maybe two wins in a row by the loser of the popular vote would provide enough impetus? Would that get everyone behind a reform?
Such an amendment would never pass, as it would requiure ratification by the small states, and it is against their interest to do so. If our elections were based solely on popular vote, no one would campaign in Alaska, S. Dakota, Montana or Wyoming; their small population is negligible when planning an expensive campaign. Dollars would be spent in the states with the largest populations, and their issues would determine the issues of the campaign. Small states want a say in the elections and the platforms of the candidates, so the electoral college amendment will not be ratified anytime soon.
Haven’t seen RealClear Politics linked to here. Your polling fix in one quick stop. (Doesn’t have the Rasmussen or some others, but a nice cross section, it looks like.)
And the Alaskites, South Dakotese, Montagnards and Wyomingians would object to this . . . why?
Huh? Is this as opposed to the flurry of electioneering currently going on in Alaska, South Dakota, Montana, and Wyoming?
Currently, it’s not the size of the state that matters as far as campaigning goes; it’s the closeness of the race. None of those states are remotely competitive, so nobody campaigns there.
But, and here’s the rub, nobody campaigns in New York, or Massachusetts, either. Nobody campaigns in Texas or California, except for ceremonial events designed to raise funds from rich backers.
Our current system gives candidates a strong motive to ignore any state which leans heavily in one direction, no matter how many voters live in that state. As one of the millions of North Carolina leftists, I see my interests ignored every four years, because we leftists are badly outnumbered by the NC rightwing. My vote is worthless to the candidates.
If elections were one person=1 vote, instead of 1 state=x votes, then everyone’s vote would be worth something. A Republican in New York wouldn’t need to fly down to Florida to get her vote counted. A Democrat in Texas would have a say in an election equal to that of an Ohioan independent.
Daniel
As I said, small states want to have an impact on the issues that drive the campaigns. No candidate would care about issues that are unique to states with small populations. Plus, elections are big business. They provide a significant boost to small local economies. No big campaigns, no big bucks.
That’s right, and it is due to the EC system. If it was a straight popular vote, no one would campaign in small states, no matter how close the election. Less bang for the buck.
The trouble I have with scrapping the Electoral College is that it provides a disincentive for states to guard against election fraud. If you’re a small state and take rigorous steps to assure that only qualified ballots are cast and you regularly purge the deceased from the rolls, maybe you send 2,000,000 ballots for president and you have a high deal of confidence in the authenticity of those votes. Next to you is a large state with shady electoral practices and they send in 10,000,000 ballots, of which thousands are from residents of cemeteries. Your conscientiousness results in your state’s share of the national vote being diminished. If you don’t think election fraud happens, think Illinois in 1960. Vote early and vote often was the order of the day. I’m not saying the electoral system is perfect, but it prevents rigging of national vote totals.
This is a nonsensical argument. In a straight popular vote system, every vote would could. It wouldn’t matter whether the vote was in a small state or a big state. In fact, it’s hard to say what the impact of campaigning would be, because the candidates wouldn’t be campaigning “for states” any more. They’d be campaigning for votes, period. Wherever they thought that there were people whose votes they could get, they would try to get. How they would try to get it isn’t clear: Would they travel to that locality or would they do something else? I don’t know.
What does it matter what states a candidate visits, anyway? It means nothing in the big picture. What matters is whose votes they’re getting.
Again, nobody campaigns in small OR big states now, unless those are swing states.
If a state is going to be ignored by campaigners, I’d prefer it to be a state without many people in it. Right now, large states are completely ignored, and that’s a serious problem.
I take issue with the idea that less-populated states would be as ignored under a popular vote as non-swing states are ignored under our current system.
Under our current system, candidates have zero incentive to try for my vote. Bush knows, with almost 100% certainty, that he’s getting all of NC’s votes. Kerry knows the same thing. Their trying for my vote would be a waste of their energy.
If there were a popular vote, however, my vote would be worth exactly the same to them as the vote of some guy in Manhattan, of a little old lady in Tampa, of a first-year college student in Juneau. They would have an equal incentive to go after every one of our votes.
Sure, they’re not going to spend as much time in Juneau as they spend in Manhattan–but that’s as it should be, in a democracy. There are more people in Manhattan, and in a democracy in which each person’s interests are weighed equally, candidates ought to be trying to appeal to the most people’s interests. They’ll campaign where the people are, not where the swing is.
And THAT would result in more bang for the buck.
Daniel
I’m not saying I support the EC; all I’m saying is there is no incentive for the smaller states to ratify such an amendment, so it is not going to pass. The EC gives small states more power than they would have under a popular vote system, so saying it is nonsensical is irrelevant. It ain’t gonna happen.
There are two different arguments here. One is that the electoral college system give disproportionately large votes to small states. Yes, that is an incentive for small states to keep the system in place.
There is another argument about “campaigning in small states.” That is the one I’m calling nonsensical.