FishingBanter - View Single Post

rw · August 1st, 2008, 07:45 PM posted to rec.outdoors.fishing.fly

wrote:

Simply put, that means, under our current electoral system, that my vote
and the votes of like-minded voters in Stanley, count for nothing.

See - the Founding Fathers DID know what they were doing...

Seriously, though, I suspect you know that your idea is unworkable in
any group as large as the eligible voter pool of the US and IAC, doing
so would require a complete restructuring of the _United_ _States_.

WTF are you taking about? In every presidential election in my memory
the press has reported the popular vote. It's simply the sum of all the
popular votes in all the states. What's so hard about that?

Furthermore, there is no actual "popular vote," nor one intended, but
rather, an informal adding-up of the votes cast totals of 51 distinct
elections - no one "wins" or "loses" it because it doesn't exist.

So when the press reports a popular vote they're just puling it out of
their ass? Baloney.

The
election is for the President of the _United_ _States_, not the
President of Each and Every Citizen Officially Residing in Any of the
States or Other Locales and Eligible to Vote, regardless of the bull****
the candidates spout about wanting to the president of all citizens.
Also, no law or other such restriction prevents you from moving to a
location in which you feel your vote would count (or count more).

Under a simple popular-vote system they would count.

In a true democracy, there would be no party primaries as now (each
party could make an unofficial recommendation, endorsement, etc.). Each
voter would get, basically, a piece of paper with the name of the office
and a blank line as a ballot upon which voters would indicate their
choice for each office, but I'm sure the ACLU and similar would say that
was unfair to some group or another. As it stands, even if the POTUS
election itself were "a simple popular-vote system," if a voter wants
their vote "to count," they must choose between McCain or Obama because
no other candidate can actually win, and those two were chosen by
systems that in no way resemble a "simple popular-vote system." IOW, a
"simple popular-vote system" in the election wouldn't really be much
more "democratic" than the EC system.

More bull****.

In the next election a voter can vote for Obama, McCain, Nader, or Barr,
and maybe a few others -- anyone who met the qualifications to get on
the ballot. (Is Lyndon LaRouche running this time?) The way the parties
run their primaries is their business, although I'd hope that they'd run
them according to democratic principles.

--
Cut "to the chase" for my email address.