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American English in the UK (continued)
"He won a majority of votes where it counts- in the electoral college."
I know how the electoral college works and that how he won was constitutionally legal. All I meant to point out was that he did not have the popular vote the first time he got into office.
It's amaznig how these off-topic threads generate some of the longest and most interesting posts.
<<It is all rhetoric. 'Obama will bring about change and lead American forward, McCain appeals to American core values.' It's all said without any reference to something concrete. The hottest topics of debate have been whether or not the candidate is Black, Female, or likely to die in the next four years. >>
Not in real life. You may have read that somewhere, but how do you really know what we talk about to each other? Even on the internet, I've seen people delve into some serious minutiae about the various candidates' policies and past actions. <<But the second time, they knew exactly what to expect and by re-electing him, gave him their approval.>> Hey, I'm a hardcore Democrat, but even I was partially relieved to see him get reelected (although I voted for the other guy). Bush had made his bed, let him lie in it. I didn't want my party getting blamed for it! The electoral college is an equalizing mechanism -- it gives small states a stake in the election. A president can win the election with just 11 states -- provided they are the right 11 states (the most populous) -- so a shrewd contender in a popular vote could simply concentrate on California and the East Coast, and the rest of us would be blown off completely, and never have a say in the matter, or have our needs and wishes acknowledged in any way. But when the president is elected by states rather than by individuals, smaller states can make or break him on the basis of swing votes, early primary performance, and a host of other issues. My state, for instance, has only 5 measly electoral votes, but we are a swing state (could go either way), and in all of the last three races we have been hotly pursued by candidates up until the last moment, because we have the potential to play tie-breaker in a close race -- and the last three races have all been very close. Several of the other small states are in the same position. In a popular race, our 2 million voters would be completely ignored as candidates focused on more populous regions with a better payoff....
<<Not in real life. You may have read that somewhere, but how do you really know what we talk about to each other?>>
I lived in the US during the last campaign. I had a lot of intelligent friends who didn't just vote based on superficial things, but there are plenty that do. This is not a particularly American problem. It's seen almost everywhere --- the electorate are rarely well informed across the board. The problem is that the US media supports this superficial attitude. If you 'support our troops' it can't be bad! This is a very dangerous state to maintain, as it means that the reactionary and radical views can become reasonable positions to hold. Democracy can only operate if there is some kind of reasonable standard of debate and although this standard is frequently below the desirable level in many countries, without quality media the problem is very much compounded. You can see it in things like creationism. Creationists have miraculously held ground with arguments that a child can see don't hold water. <<Bush had made his bed, let him lie in it.>> I understand that sentiment, I remember feeling that way somewhat myself. But just how long should you let things go to the wind? I don't want to just America-bash, but I do hope you feel the need to make a difference and work to improve the situation. I feel the same about my own country and while I hate patriotic non-sense, we each have a duty to maintain high standards because they can be quickly eroded.
<<But just how long should you let things go to the wind? >>
8 years is pretty much the limit -- after that, they can't run again. ;P And the wind has usually changed by then. <<If you 'support our troops' it can't be bad! This is a very dangerous state to maintain, as it means that the reactionary and radical views can become reasonable positions to hold. >> That's odd, because "supporting the troops" was originally MEANT to be an entirely non-partisan sentiment and neither reactionary nor radical. The entire sentiment was "Whether you support the war or not, you have to support the troops", and it was really popularized during the first Gulf War (I tend to think of Iraq as Gulf War, Part Deux), which engendered a lot of mixed reactions. It was basically a kneejerk reaction to what the soldiers in Vietnam went through on their return -- being personally held to blame for foreign policy by those who disagreed with it and being treated shamefully --like shit --by the general population and the government alike. How it got conflated with conservatism or the Republican party I don't know, but it was not meant to be. (Especially if you recall that the current wars were fully backed by both major parties -- only in the wake of their abject failure is the Democrat party trying to distance itself.) <<I do hope you feel the need to make a difference and work to improve the situation.>> I vote, sure. I give to charities I think are doing good works. I ain't shy with my opinions. But you win some, you lose some. Every time there's a new president, about the half the country is thrilled, and the other half disgusted as hell -- it's been a long time since anyone won in a landslide. Races are usually close these days. And people tend to vote not on individual issues like economic packages or gay marriage, but on a preponderance of what they perceive as that candidate's basic paradigm -- and how well it jibes with their own. That's why it's usually social issues that trump things like foreign policy. People are voting to create an environment for themselves. I know I do it. I couldn't bring myself to vote for a creationist, a pro-lifer, a strict fundamentalist, or a gay-basher for any office under any circumstances. Even if he/she/it paid the entire national debt out of their own pocket, cancelled my mortgage, and brought me Bin Laden's head on a plate. It would just go against my grain and my basic personal beliefs on too deep a level. It wouldn't be worth the price of having to live in the ensuing cultural and political millieu. Drilling for oil in sensitive environments. Erosion of reproductive freedom. Criminalization of consenting adult relationships. Having to watch reruns of the 700 Club. Often you vote based on domestic policy because the foreign policy you'd like to see is largely in line with, and a side effect of, the basic social paradigm. The details of that economic plan or that diplomatic policy aren't always as important as the attitude behind it -- and the details will be hashed out in committee, anyway.
Uriel: you know what? You give us over here in the UK a much better, infinitely clearer, insight into the entire American Presidential election race than any of the media mogus clamouring for attention on our TV and radio channels, be they British or American. The whole affair, over there, seems to us, over here, to be so flippin' complex it makes us happy not to be faced with a choice in the voting booth come election day in November.
At least we in the UK can register our dis-satisfation with ALL politicians by opting out and voting for alternative candidates not linked in any way to the main political parties, even those from the loopy fringes of society who have the democratic right to field candidates provided they can muster enough people to nominate and support them for inclusion on the various constituency ballot papers, and provided of course they can raise the required sum of money as a deposit (I think off hand it's a £1,000) due to the local Registrar, but which they will definitely lose if they fail to secure 5% of the total number of votes cast in the relative constituency. If there are sufficient numbers of people pissed off to the back teeth with all politicians they can vote for bizarre "parties" such as the Monster Raving Loony Party thus ensuring the first ever Monster Raving Loony Party MP ever to be returned to Parliament. If that ever happened, however unlikely it would be in fact, then we may have great difficulty noticing any difference at all, anyway, between a Monster Raving Loony Party MP or an MP from any of the main parties, be they Conservative, Labour or Liberal Democrat! The hot air and total verbal garbage is the same wherever it comes from.
We can vote for the bizarre parties over here too, Damian. The Green Party is the largest and the longest lasting, but there are many others who manage to get enough support and money together to get their names on most ballots. (Just because they get on the ballot in one state, however, doesn't mean that they will be included in another state). After all, the vote itself is only given as a grant of the individual states, not the federal government. If, however, the party manages to get on some ballots, but not others, provided they have enough publicity to get them noticed nationally, they may receive write-in ballots in other states. Actually, a write-in ballot has gotten one Senator into office, but no other officials as far as I know.
Most people don't vote for the off-beat parties because they'll never win, so they see it as pointless. Although, I do know about four people who actually filled out a ballot for "no candidates listed" in the last election because they didn't agree with either Kerry or Bush.
I think a lot of this anti-Americanism is unjustified. Who is to say that what the US does ISN'T in everyone's best interests? People just like to bitch. It really doesn't matter what the US does because it's going to get criticized anyway. Maybe we are better off with Iraq having been invaded? What would the alternative be like? Somehow the thought of a nuclear armed Iran and Iraq seems like a worse alternative than the current situation.
Well, I don't know what I enlightened you on, Damian, but I'm glad I helped give some insight....;)
Rene's right: on any presidential ballot you'll see at least 5 or 6 names, not just the two major-party candidates. I know there is an independent running, and I expect to see a Libertarian and a Green candidate, too. Minor parties do best at the state and local level, where they can and do win seats. I've voted for a Green here and there. On the federal (national) level, they fare poorly, as they really can't compete well with the big boys, and voting for them is usually either a good way to register your displeasure with both major candidates or to split a vote and possibly siphon necessary votes away from a more promising candidate (I think this was the fate of Al Gore when he ran against Bush; third-party Ralph Nader stole many votes that would otherwise have gone to the Democrat). Third parties aren't always hopeless, though; Ross Perot made a respectable showing when he ran against Bush #1 and Clinton, and Teddy Roosevelt famously won as head of his own independent Bull Moose party (which didn't outlive him). Voting for President is a far more complicated affair than any other type of straight popular election. Part of it is because it's based on very old-fashioned rules laid out in the 1700's when society was very different and there was a certain scepticism about popular voting; the only other major examples of electoral colleges that I think textbooks usually give us in school are in the Vatican's selection process for a new Pope and the selection process for German princes long ago, so it pretty much barely exists anywhere else. But I suppose this is one instance where you could legitimately compare the US to the EU; imagine if all of the countries of the EU had to vote on the president, instead of just automatically assigning it in rotation. Candidates would have to campaign in Belgium, Poland, Italy, Ireland, and every other country in the union, tweaking their message to fit the local concerns as they went. Each country would then get to cast a single vote that was weighted by their population size. They would get to choose their own internal methods themselves to determine what that single vote was -- a popular ballot, usually -- but then an elector who represented the popular choice would cast the final country vote to the union itself. The weights of all these votes would then be counted up to determine a winner. Thus, France and Greece might both go to candidate A, while Luxembourg and Lichtenstein's votes went to candidate B. Unfortunately for Lux. and Lich., their votes "weigh" much less than France's and Greece's, so candidate B isn't going to get anywhere unless he can also secure the UK vote....
↑ I have never been fond of the electoral college because I believe it has become antiquated. It made sense back in the 1700s and 1800s, but the society then was agrarian-based; it seems to make little sense in this urban society.
Supporters will point to the argument that the lack of the electoral college would concentrate all the power in large areas; but isn't this the case now? The vast majority of times, candidates don't ever campaign in such states as North Dakota, Delaware, or Alaska--or even Hawaii. By contrast, we Nevadans have much too much power in relation to our population. The worst part of the electoral college is that not-so-infrequently, the winner of the popular vote loses; that's just plain un-democratic to my eyes, no matter which way you look at it. What happened to one-man, one vote? Thank you for allowing me to vent.
It IS old-fashioned, for sure. And of course, back then the franchise to vote was limited to white land-owning men, because it was thought that to own property was to have a lot more stake in the community, and to take politics much more seriously.
Oddly enough, as settlement expanded westward, western states like Wyoming were the first to give women the right to vote and hold office in the 1800's-- matters were much more fluid on the frontier, and pioneer women had to be as tough as men anyway, so they got more respect. But as civilization marched westward, those rights were gradually taken away. Women did not get the right to vote enshrined in the Constitution as an actual amendment until 1920, when their service in the factories for the war effort finally "proved" again that they deserved some say in the government. If you look closely at campaign strategy, you will see that candidates bypass or campaign very minimally in a lot of states, regardless of how many electoral votes that state may have. That is not always because the state is considered worthless. Often it is because the state is overwhelmingly loyal to one party or the other anyway, and its vote is a foregone conclusion. The candidate who is going to win there no matter what may make a courtesy stop there, but is likely to move on quickly to concentrate his efforts on others where he still has work to do. The candidate who is NOT going to win there no matter what, is likewise unlikely to waste his time and money on that state. So usually it's the "battleground" states like Missouri and New Mexico that see the bulk of the campaigning, because they can still be swayed by debates and arguments and TV commercials -- even if they are not the huge prizes that Texas or New York are -- because Texas and New York are probably already spoken for. We saw this strategy of only concentrating on key states -- or one key state in particular -- go horribly wrong when Rudy Giuliani put all his money and effort on Florida to hand him its primary nomination. When it failed to deliver, he was too far behind in the other states that he had ignored to ever catch up, and he had to bow out of the race completely. It was a risky strategy, and one that didn't pay off.
<<But I suppose this is one instance where you could legitimately compare the US to the EU>>
You can always legitimately compare the US and the EU, but in every comparison they appear to be very different things, as is the case here. Perhaps that's because they _are_ different.
*What happened to one-man, one vote? *
Democrats never win in Colorado because of vote manipulations known as: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerrymandering Although 90 % of urban population in Colorado votes for Democrats .
<The worst part of the electoral college is that not-so-infrequently, the winner of the popular vote loses; that's just plain un-democratic to my eyes, no matter which way you look at it. What happened to one-man, one vote? <
Undemocratic it is. Democracy a demagoguery became. |