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Please read my post before answering.

Which bit? (read initial post!)

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Upchurch

Papa Funkosophy
Upchurch
Joined
May 10, 2002
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Location
St. Louis, MO
As of the moment you answer the poll, how would you vote in the next presidential election?

Please, US citizens of voting age only. I already know most of the world is upset with us and, for the most part, hate Bush, I don't think there is any need to re-emphesise that. I'm interested in what the actual stance of Americans are.

edited to add: Well, the actual stance of Americans on this board. I realize this isn't a good sampling of ALL Americans.
 
I'm sorry. I didn't mean to squash all debate about the subject. I haven't voted in the above poll yet, so feel free to argue and bicker on one side or the other.

The thread is open to anyone, American or otherwise. I just wanted the poll to be for Americans.

Edited to add:

For those of you who voted either definitely for or definitely against Bush, why and what do you consider to be your party affiliation?
 
Assuming George Bush will win the nomination of the Republican Party for President again, I will vote for him.

I am a Republican. I voted Democrat one time and lived to regret it.
 
I will always vote Republican. If it's Bush he get's my vote. I just pray to Ed_God that Al Sharpton screws up the Democratic Party to the point he gets a place on their ticket as V.P.
 
Upchurch said:
I didn't realize there was that possibility, or was that sarcasm?
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No, no sarcasm. There will be other Republican candidates in the 2004 race. Their chances of getting the nomination are slim to none, but real nonetheless.
 
LukeT said:
Their chances of getting the nomination are slim to none, but real nonetheless.
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Okay, gotcha. I should have said that I didn't think it was possible from a pragmatic stand point. I knew it was technically possible.

I remember thinking after the last election (finally) ended that there was no way Bush would get re-elected for a second term after an election that close. First, he nearly lost to Gore. If the Democrats manage to find a canadate with a little personality, Bush would be doomed. Second, the first year or so after the election Bush was made out to be almost another Dan Qualye in terms of sheer number of poor wording choices.

Now, however, the 9/11 attacks and the current war in Iraq has changed everything, so I'm not so sure anymore. Based on the poll so far, assuming all of the undecideds swing to Bush's side, he's got almost a 50/50 chance. I guess I'm still guessing he's going to lose, but he's got a better chance now than I would have imagined for most of 2001.
 
As far as I understand it Americans do not vote for their President in the sense of: mark an x beside the name of the candidate you choose for president.

If I am wrong please correct me. I am no expert on elections in th US.

It seems to me that the choice comes in the form of becoming a party member and voting for a nominee pairing of Pres and VP.
 
Jedi Knight said:

Bush!! Bush!!! 10 more years!!!!!!!!!
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Why don't you cut out the middleman and vote for a ticket of Cheney/Rumsfeld? I'm sure they wouldn't have wasted so much time in getting us into a war with Iraq.

:p
 
I will vote for Bush if he gets the Republican nomination. I'm not so sure he will run again. I'm saying this if the election is held today, who knows what kind of scandals might come up to change my mind in the future.
 
PygmyPlaidGiraffe said:
As far as I understand it Americans do not vote for their President in the sense of: mark an x beside the name of the candidate you choose for president.

If I am wrong please correct me. I am no expert on elections in th US.

It seems to me that the choice comes in the form of becoming a party member and voting for a nominee pairing of Pres and VP.
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Actually you can write in any name you want. Mickey Mouse always gets a few votes. The votes are tallied and go to the electoral college who actually cast the votes for president.
 
PygmyPlaidGiraffe said:
As far as I understand it Americans do not vote for their President in the sense of: mark an x beside the name of the candidate you choose for president.
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In the actual voting itself, that's exactly how it works. As Denise said, there is then an electorial college process involved, but that's the short answer.
It seems to me that the choice comes in the form of becoming a party member and voting for a nominee pairing of Pres and VP.
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One has the option of voting a straight ticket (i.e. voting for all Republican canidates or all Democrat canidates or some of the smaller parties), but you don't have to. I, myself, don't belong to either party and vote for each official based on what I know of them. If I don't know much about the candidates involved, I usually try to balance out the Republican/Democrat ratio on my ballot.

(Aside: having a single party in charge of the executive branch, the House of Representatives and the Senate makes me nervious, no matter what party it is.)

I know some people who do consider themselves aligned with a party who will occasionally vote outside their party for various reasons.
 
Denise said:

Actually you can write in any name you want. Mickey Mouse always gets a few votes. The votes are tallied and go to the electoral college who actually cast the votes for president.
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Which explains why Bush lost the popular vote and was still elected. :rolleyes:
 
Hey with all the people putting down "Jedi" as their religion in censuses (sp?), I wonder if we could get Obi-Won elected to president?

True, he's not an American citizen, he's fictional and he's dead, but never underestimate the power of the Force...
 
Explain electoral college for me. In Canada we have a vague resemblance to a form of Rep by Pop so this is foreign to me...

Is it assumed that individuals on the electoral college are honost?

What checks and ballances are there at this point?
 
Re: Interesting

PygmyPlaidGiraffe said:
Gore got more of the popular vote:

http://www.archives.gov/federal_register/electoral_college/scores2.html#2000
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Yeah, that's the rub. See, each state gets so many electorial votes. The state casts those votes for the candidate that wins the popular vote in that state. So, if a candidate gets all the votes in one state and only marginally wins another, s/he still gets all the electorial votes for both states. It doesn't matter by how much s/he wins it by. So, it is entirely possible for a candidate to win the popular election and loose the electorial vote. It's happened before now, I'm sure, but I don't remember when.

Occasionally there is a movement to remove the electorial college and just use popular vote, but the electorial college is the only way to keep all of the US involved. Otherwise, candidates would only campaign on the coasts and in major cities.
 
Allow me :) :

  • 1824: John Quincy Adams received more than 38,000 fewer votes than Andrew Jackson, but neither candidate won a majority of the Electoral College. Adams was awarded the presidency when the election was thrown to the House of Representatives.
  • 1876: Nearly unanimous support from small states gave Rutherford B. Hayes a one-vote margin in the Electoral College, despite the fact that he lost the popular vote to Samuel J. Tilden by 264,000 votes. Hayes carried five out of the six smallest states (excluding Delaware). These five states plus Colorado gave Hayes 22 electoral votes with only 109,000 popular votes. At the time, Colorado had been just been admitted to the Union and decided to appoint electors instead of holding elections. So, Hayes won Colorado's three electoral votes with zero popular votes. It was the only time in U.S. history that small state support has decided an election.
  • 1888: Benjamin Harrison lost the popular vote by 95,713 votes to Grover Cleveland, but won the electoral vote by 65. In this instance, some say the Electoral College worked the way it is designed to work by preventing a candidate from winning an election based on support from one region of the country. The South overwhelmingly supported Cleveland, and he won by more than 425,000 votes in six southern states. However, in the rest of the country he lost by more than 300,000 votes.
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Source.
 
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