The current weather forecast for November 2, 2010 looks ugly for the middle Atlantic East Coast with easterly winds and rain chances set up between a Canadian high pressure cell and a developing SE US low. Temperatures there are expected to be in the 40s and 50s. The Pacific Northwest may also see considerable wet weather.
There are some old axioms that certain political parties in the USA should pray for rain or sunshine, but in early November, you never know what you will get in terms of weather. A study a few years back by Florida State University professor Brad Gomez comprehensively analyzed the relationship between Presidential voter turnout and weather using over 20,000 individual weather stations from 1948-2000. In their paper, Gomez et al. found empirical evidence that rain (snow) reduces voter participation by about 1% (0.5%) per inch, and may have affected the electoral outcome of the 1960 and 2000 presidential elections.
While the upcoming November 2 midterm elections have a significantly lower voter participation than Presidential years, it is likely that weather is more important to voter turnout and election outcome. This type of study is a great way to combine social and physical sciences to model effects of weather and climate on political issues — rather than vice versa.
Abstract of paper:
The relationship between bad weather and lower levels of voter turnout is widely espoused by media, political practitioners, and, perhaps, even political scientists. Yet, there is virtually no solid empirical evidence linking weather to voter participation. This paper provides an extensive test of the claim.We examine the effect of weather on voter turnout in 14 U.S. presidential elections. Using GIS interpolations, we employ meteorological data drawn from over 22,000 U.S. weather stations to provide election day estimates of rain and snow for each U.S. county. We find that, when compared to normal conditions, rain significantly reduces voter participation by a rate of just less than 1% per inch, while an inch of snowfall decreases turnout by almost .5%. Poor weather is also shown to benefit the Republican party’s vote share. Indeed, the weather may have contributed to two Electoral College outcomes, the 1960 and 2000 presidential elections.
And conclusions:
The results of the zero precipitation scenarios reveal only two instances in which a perfectly dry election day would have changed an Electoral College outcome. Dry elections would have led Bill Clinton to win North Carolina in 1992 and Al Gore to win Florida in 2000. This latter change in the allocation of Florida’s electors would have swung the incredibly close 2000 election in Gore’s favor. Of course, the converse is that a rainier day would have increased George W. Bush’s margin and may have reduced the importance of issues with the butterfly ballot, overvotes, etc. Scholars have identified a number of other factors that may have affected the Florida outcome (see Brady et al. 2001; Imai and King 2004; Mebane 2004)—it was, after all, a very close election with only 537 votes separating Bush and Gore—but to our knowledge we are the first to find that something as simple as rainy weather in some of the Florida counties may have played a critical role in determining the outcome of a presidential election.
The partisan bias associated with weather depressed voter turnout can have meaningful repercussions for election outcomes. Our simulation results for the 1960 and 2000 presidential elections are key examples. The closeness of the 1960 race (a scant 118,000 popular votes separated Kennedy and Nixon) made several states pivotal in the Electoral College, including Illinois, where allegations of vote fraud undertaken by Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley followed
Kennedy’s 9,000 vote victory. We cannot say whether Kennedy’s victory benefited from such actions, but we can claim that Kennedy benefited from relatively good weather. In responding to the Florida debacle in the 2000 presidential election, Democrats complained incessantly about a litany of factors that stood as obstacles to a Gore victory: “butterfly ballots,” “hanging chads,” the Florida Secretary of State, the newly elected president’s brother (the Governor of Florida), and, of course, the Republican-appointed Justices on the United States Supreme Court. Yet, our results show that the weather may have hurt their cause just as much. In close elections, the weather becomes one of many factors that can be determinative.
It is clear from our results that Republicans benefit from precipitation on election day. To offset these Republican gains,
Democrats must take action to counteract the increased cost of voting among their supporters. Otherwise, Democrats may wish to “pray for dry weather.”
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Hmmmmm. Let me think. Wait for it (cue Jeopardy music) … What is a group of FIVE labels where the last TWO don’t belong, Alex! (ding, ding, [audience cheering])
Seriously though. On one hand Tea Party (actually TEA Party), Taxed Enough Already, a very loose affiliation dominated by fiscal responsibility, limited government and constitutionalism, definitely contains lots of conservatives, and many republicans (democrats, libertarians and indies too).
On the other hand Fascist and Nazi, radical authoritarian dictatorial and national socialist. Not to mention massive overpowering controlling government with near destruction of private preoperty and individual liberty. And did I mention genocide and murder?
Gareth, the nicest thing I could call you on this forum is a jackass, but that would be a huge insult to a very nice animal. But since that nice animal has very thick skin and can take the embarrasement of being the mascot of the party of segregation and socialism, I’ll say it anyway, you Gareth Phillips, are a certifiable jackass.
There should be a neurological brain condition called Opposite Associative Disorder, a form of Cognitive Dissonance that allows such irrational almost childish thinking. Here is to hoping that researchers identify the gene that is responsible or for phsychiatrists to identify the childhood trauma behind this disorder. It sure would go a long way to explain the AGW cult thinking.
Ryan Maue says:
October 28, 2010 at 12:22 am
If individual states awarded their electoral votes based upon the percentage of popular vote, then that would be an absolute catastrophe for the Democrats which really only have smatterings of blue against a very red tapestry.
==================================================
If you are referring to the presidential election I think I have to disagree with you on this one. (Maybe you’re distracted watching the 3 areas of potential tropical development in the mid-Atlantic – a bit unusual for late October)
The current system which allocates electors based on the number of representatives in congress [house + senate] favors the republicans since there are more red states than blue states. There are seven small population states with only one house rep but triple that number of electors, while a heavily populated blue state like California with 53 congressmen has 55 electors – a small percentage increase. Since there are more small population red states than big population blue states, the overall effect favors the Republicans. Another way to look at is that 438 electors are allocated to states based on population but an additional 100 electors are allocated equally amongst all states regardless of population. This amplifies any party bias that exists towards small population states – in this case for the republicans.
If the electors for each state were allocated proportionately by popular vote, this effect would get diluted. The democrats would likely pick up more of the electors from the multitude of red states than the republicans would capture from the handful of populous blue states.
The founding fathers knew they were creating this bias when they devised the Electoral College, but they did not want one region of the country to dominate another. If we ever went to a national popular vote system the closest someone living in the center of the country would come to a presidential candidate would be 35,000 feet – vertical.
A strange fact: it appears that blue states almost always have a border along a large body of cold water [under 60 degrees]. In 2000, Gore got 94% of his electors from cold water states. Kerry got 98% and Obama 84%. By this measure, a rise in global temperatures would turn blue states red. Perhaps the reason democrats are more concerned with global warming than republicans is a simple matter of survival.
Death is the only thing that will keep me from voting on Tuesday. Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for an a lot of Democrats.
It was a fascinating piece of historical research, but I believe it to be outdated. In the last few years, the following states have instituted in-person “early voting”:
I’ve voted already, and if the Fox News text-poll they ran last night is any indication, so have half of the people who watch Fox News.
WRT the latest “superstorm” reported at ClimateProgress, I left this comment which was in moderation for a while, but has now disappeared.
==========
“#41
“*If* that trend…” – indeed.
It’s a good point, and one that more than one skeptical blog has also made on more than one occasion, so lots of common ground.
So where is the trend? Over what timescale? What is the source of raw data? How was it processed?
Without this information – if that trend currently does not exist – a single event remains a single event, as informative (or uninformative) as a particularly cold snap.”
==========
First time I’ve been elided from a discussion in this way. I thought it was on-topic and polite – not enough evidently.
evanmjones says
I have given this matter a lot of thought.
In the end, I prefer the electoral college system
Thanks for reading my post, Mr evanmjones! I appreciated a lot your comments! My comment was not meant to be a critic of the US Electoral College system. My comment was on the extreme psychological strain that Mr. Gore went into. Losing by a mere 0.0005% of popular vote! That election was electrifying!
Here tens millions of latin americans we followed every bit of the 2000 election in awe, asking ourselves if things would end in civil war up there in the USA. But the outcome was peaceful and millions of us here were utterly relieved -and amazed-.
If tens millions of foreigners -i.e. non US citizens, non US residents- suffered such important psychological strain watching the events unfold there in the USA, one wonders how colossal was the psychological strain on the main protagonist of that drama, Mr. Al Gore. I think that a person that went through what Mr. Gore actually went through has a high probability of losing his psychological balance, that is my opinion and my central point and that is the reason I am always kind to Mr. Gore.
Your points on the electoral college are very interesting , I had never tought of it in such a way. I think the more limited the (utter destructive) power of the political class the better and your electoral college is another limit on the (utter destructive) power of the political class so it may be another good institution that you have in the USA.
You need a lot of votes to elect a senator in California but you can elect a senator with much fewer votes in Utah or Wyoming. I think such a thing is good since it limits the power of the political class and it limits the power of majorities.
I think the main reason of the US greatness is that your founding fathers established a political system that actually limited the utter destructive power of the political class. The USA and Switzerland are perhaps the countries were the power of the people is the bigger and the power of the political the most limited by the power of the people. It is not a coincidence that they have always been among the most prosperous, peaceful, free and productive places on earth.
Of course you US citizens tend to have a natural talent for technological innovation and entrepreneurship and here in Latin America we tend to be slaves of the passions of love, beauty and attractiveness but I think your political system limiting the power of the political class is the main reason you became such a technological, economic and military superpower, there is abundant research on that matter.
Human beings are esentially libertarian. That people want socialism is another falsehoood promoted by mainstream media, academia & bureaucracy who very often promote more (utter destructive) power & control & tax & spend for the political class (but IMHO the internet and websites like WattsUpWithThat (WUWT) are writing humankind history and are changing the way things always were. But I will not bore you with a repeat of my rants on how WUWT is writing history by demolishing the politcians and academics pseudoscience )
In socialist tax hells like France, Germany or England the political class has enormous power, the people cannot limit the power of the political class that in the way the people can in the USA and Switzerland. In those european tax hells they live under a kind of socialism serfdom. You will see often in Western Europe a demonization of the USA and Switzerland, which happens to be the superior democracies (and they happen to be too the No1 and No2 tax havens thanks to tax exemptions to foreigners that bring $trillions to USA and Switzerland).
Socialists often hate freedom because they want to enslave us with exorbitant power & control & tax & spend for the political class and that is the reason IMHO so many in Western Europe demonize the super democracias, USA and Switzerland
In polls the english said that Churchill was greatest englishman, the german said that Adenauer was the greatest german and the french said that De Gaulle was greatest frenchman. Those politicians are NOT socialist ones. They tend to be conservatives, i.e, they tend to be more libertarian, more against socialism which is a system where the political class has exorbitant power & control & $trillions. I think those western european polls are a sample of how even in allegedly “socialist” western european tax hells human beings are esentially freedom loving.
The people does not want a socialism or a tax hell. Socialism and tax hells is what the political class will often establish if their power is not limited enough. Western Europe -with the remarquable exception of Switzerland, of course- always had an inferior democratic system that permitted monarchist or socialist political classes to have exorbitant power & control over the people.
Cheers
Vote early, vote often ;o)
My polling place is about 150 yards from my kitchen table. It would take some weather event worthy of worldwide evening news to stop me from walking over to vote.
Hey!… Do I get extra greenie-points for walking to the polls instead of driving?
Bring on the mother of all storms to help rid us of the extreme agenda of the current congress. And then an even bigger storm in 2012.
Did anybody else enlarge the map and click on the animate button? You can also drag your cursor over the 3 hour time segments above the map and animate it manually. I did this because I was curious about the storms (tropical?) predicted over or near the east coast. This sequence shows the bad weather hitting on Nov. 4th. It appears that the only nasty weather will be over the Pacific Northwest on election day.
SouthAmericanGirls says:
October 28, 2010 at 6:35 am
Long live US democracy!
“”””” Marcus K says:
October 28, 2010 at 4:27 am
Ryan Maue says:
October 28, 2010 at 12:22 am
If individual states awarded their electoral votes based upon the percentage of popular vote, then that would be an absolute catastrophe for the Democrats which really only have smatterings of blue against a very red tapestry.
==================================================
If you are referring to the presidential election I think I have to disagree with you on this one. (Maybe you’re distracted watching the 3 areas of potential tropical development in the mid-Atlantic – a bit unusual for late October) “””””
Well I think the Electoral College system is misunderstood even by most Americans (citizens).
And it is roundly condemned by the losing party when the “popular vote” goes counter to the Electoral College; and they immediately rabble rouse for its abolition.
The “popular vote” serves to preserve the myth, that The President of the United States of America is elected by “The People”, in a democratic fashion; one man; one vote !
Well the one man; one vote rule applies; but the President of the United States of America, is elected by the 57 “Sovereign States” of America; NOT “The People”. And the Electoral College is the mechanism for that collective decision of the States.
Each State of course is allowed a number of “Electors” that is directly proportional (linear not logarithmic) to the number of legal voters in each State.
But there is absolutely no requirement that any State vote ALL of its electors to the winner of a popular vote in that State. I believe that States can actually choose their electors by any means they wish; as permitted in the State Constitution. All choose to do it by popular one man one vote choice of the voters (people).
A number of States have considered amending their State Constitutions to assign their electors to the several Candidates for President; according to the outcome of their popular vote; and they are entitled to do that if they wish; which if universally adopted, would lead to a de facto vote of the people for President. It gets a bit messy with multiple candidates; especially in the smaller States with few electors.
The present system as adopted by all States at the moment uses the popular vote of its legal voters to reach a State Concensus, as to who the citizens of that State prefer by majority vote; and then the State tends to vote ALL of its electors for their people’s concensus choice.
The framers must have been Clairvoyant; because I think that any other variant on the present system; would eventually lead to chaos; and certainly to disenfrachisement of some States, and some of “The People”. The two Senators per State in the Senate, also serves to add a State bias to the deliberations of the Congress; and for the same reason. That way, the State of Delaware; which can be fitted into 12 different non-overlapping places in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve of Alaska, gets the same Senatorial voice as Alaska does. The house on the other hand is representative of the People’s wishes.; not the State’s.
How wonderful it would be if the house really did represent the People.
All that heavy, muddy dirt makes it a lot harder to open up the lid of your coffin.
—-
This is counterintuitive, Anthony. One would think that rain would not significantly impact the Democrats rolls of deceased voters.
Until, I believe, around 1984 or 1988 Democrats were traditionally the Red party on the obligatory TV map, and the Republicans blue. I’ve always been interested in cartography and propoganda, and all the MS media now use Dems as blue on a map with a blue background so as to subconciously show the Dems as more dominant than they actually are during the evening (and thus possibly skewing late votes on the west coast). This is especially necessary since republicans tend to win the large area states in the midwest. Find a county level Red/Blue map of any recent election and you’ll be stunned just how dramaticly large the red areas are. A veritable sea of red with a few blue islands in all the expected urban areas.
—-
(I still believe it was a media conspiracy to designate conservative states “red”.)
I think the Republicans are girding their loins to fight the expected voter fraud cases that are going to be popping up all over the country, especially with Team Obamas experience in the “Chicago Way”. Already one in Berks Co., PA where a local DNC official was mailing out absentee ballots with a pre-paid return envelope that did not go to the official voting office, but to a PO Box owned by the DNC. Heads are going to roll in that one. Also several states are dragging their heels on mailing out absentee ballots to military personel overseas, even in defiance of Justice Department mandates, since the troops tend to vote pretty heavily Republican. And of course the illeagal alien vote, gotten out by La Raza, is going to be an issue in Arizona. Anyway, our elections have become a sham thanks wholly to the Democratic party.
—-
I hope the tea party/real republican alliance wins and starts the deconstruction of the budding socialist state, I am sceptical whether this can be achieved without fierce and bitter conflict but as they say in the old West ‘hope dies last’.
I think the results of this study support what I surmised all along, the Democrats are concerned that if they get wet, their dirty deeds will come out in the wash.
The current system of electing the president ensures that the candidates, after the primaries, do not reach out to all of the states and their voters. Candidates have no reason to poll, visit, advertise, organize, campaign, or care about the voter concerns in the dozens of states where they are safely ahead or hopelessly behind. The reason for this is the state-by-state winner-take-all rule (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but now used by 48 states), under which all of a state’s electoral votes are awarded to the candidate who gets the most votes in each separate state.
Presidential candidates concentrate their attention on only a handful of closely divided “battleground” states and their voters. In 2008, candidates concentrated over two-thirds of their campaign events and ad money in just six states, and 98% in just 15 states (CO, FL, IN, IA, MI, MN, MO, NV, NH, NM, NC, OH, PA, VA, and WI). 19 of the 22 smallest and medium-small states (with less than 7 electoral college votes) were not among them. Over half (57%) of the events were in just four states (Ohio, Florida, Pennsylvania and Virginia). In 2004, candidates concentrated over two-thirds of their money and campaign visits in five states; over 80% in nine states; and over 99% of their money in 16 states, and candidates concentrated over two-thirds of their money and campaign visits in five states and over 99% of their money in 16 states.
Two-thirds of the states and people have been merely spectators to the presidential elections.
Voter turnout in the “battleground” states has been 67%, while turnout in the “spectator” states was 61%.
Policies important to the citizens of ‘flyover’ states are not as highly prioritized as policies important to ‘battleground’ states when it comes to governing.
Because of the state-by-state winner-take-all electoral votes laws (i.e., awarding all of a state’s electoral votes to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in each state) in 48 states, a candidate can win the Presidency without winning the most popular votes nationwide. This has occurred in 4 of the nation’s 56 (1 in 14) presidential elections. Near misses are now frequently common. 537 popular votes won Florida and the White House for Bush in 2000 despite Gore’s lead of 537,179 popular votes nationwide. A shift of 60,000 votes in Ohio in 2004 would have defeated President Bush despite his nationwide lead of 3,500,000 votes.
The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC).
Every vote, everywhere, would be politically relevant and equal in presidential elections. Elections wouldn’t be about winning states. No more distorting and divisive red and blue state maps. Every vote would be counted for and directly assist the candidate for whom it was cast. Candidates would need to care about voters across the nation, not just undecided voters in a handful of swing states.
The bill would take effect only when enacted, in identical form, by states possessing a majority of the electoral votes–that is, enough electoral votes to elect a President (270 of 538). When the bill comes into effect, all the electoral votes from those states would be awarded to the presidential candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC).
The bill uses the power given to each state by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution to change how they award their electoral votes for president. It does not abolish the Electoral College, which would need a constitutional amendment, and could be stopped by states with as little as 3% of the U.S. population. Historically, virtually all of the major changes in the method of electing the President, including ending the requirement that only men who owned substantial property could vote and 48 current state-by-state winner-take-all laws, have come about by state legislative action, without federal constitutional amendments.
The bill has been endorsed or voted for by 1,922 state legislators (in 50 states) who have sponsored and/or cast recorded votes in favor of the bill.
In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state’s electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided). The recent Washington Post, Kaiser Family Foundation, and Harvard University poll shows 72% support for direct nationwide election of the President. Support for a national popular vote is strong in virtually every state, partisan, and demographic group surveyed in recent polls in closely divided battleground states: Colorado– 68%, Iowa –75%, Michigan– 73%, Missouri– 70%, New Hampshire– 69%, Nevada– 72%, New Mexico– 76%, North Carolina– 74%, Ohio– 70%, Pennsylvania — 78%, Virginia — 74%, and Wisconsin — 71%; in smaller states (3 to 5 electoral votes): Alaska — 70%, DC — 76%, Delaware –75%, Maine — 77%, Nebraska — 74%, New Hampshire –69%, Nevada — 72%, New Mexico — 76%, Rhode Island — 74%, and Vermont — 75%; in Southern and border states: Arkansas –80%, Kentucky — 80%, Mississippi –77%, Missouri — 70%, North Carolina — 74%, and Virginia — 74%; and in other states polled: California — 70%, Connecticut — 74% , Massachusetts — 73%, Minnesota — 75%, New York — 79%, Washington — 77%, and West Virginia- 81%.
Most voters don’t care whether their presidential candidate wins or loses in their state . . . they care whether he/she wins the White House. Voters want to know, that even if they were on the losing side, their vote actually was counted and mattered to their candidate.
The National Popular Vote bill has passed 31 state legislative chambers, in 21 small, medium-small, medium, and large states, including one house in Arkansas (6), Connecticut (7), Delaware (3), The District of Columbia (3), Maine (4), Michigan (17), Nevada (5), New Mexico (5), New York (31), North Carolina (15), and Oregon (7), and both houses in California (55), Colorado (9), Hawaii (4), Illinois (21), New Jersey (15), Maryland (10), Massachusetts (12), Rhode Island (4), Vermont (3), and Washington (11). The bill has been enacted by the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, Maryland, Massachusetts, and Washington. These seven states possess 76 electoral votes — 28% of the 270 necessary to bring the law into effect.
See http://www.NationalPopularVote.com
kohler says: October 28, 2010 at 12:36 pm
The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC).
I think you need to reconsider what affect this would have, considering that most of the 40% of the people in this country who receive greater than 50% of their income from the government reside in 6 states.
This bill would kill us.
Paul Deacon, Christchurch, New Zealand says:
October 27, 2010 at 6:45 pm
Paul, I think most US voters rush to their polling stations after work. They line up and wait their turn to go into a voting booth and select their choices. In rainy weather, it takes longer to get anywhere, and it makes it harder to get in, cast your vote, and get home in time to feed the family and get everyone in bed in time to make it back to work or school the next morning.
In that scenario, there is a definite “cost” to voting, and less-committed voters may not wish to pay that cost.
As for me, I can’t stand politicians, so I wasn’t planning to vote until I had some discussions with some Democratic “true believers” (on CAGW, Cap & Trade, and a number of political and economic issues) and realized that people who think about the consequences need to vote. I mailed my ballot yesterday.
Marcus K says:
October 28, 2010 at 4:27 am
California has 58 counties. Over 40 of them regularly vote Republican. A few mostly coastal counties account for the state’s leftist lean. If we broke up California’s vote by percentage, Republicans would certain get 40 to 45% of those 55 votes, which would eliminate the excessive campaign focus here by diffusing the reward for winning here.
If it weren’t for gerrymandering earlier this decade, California’s legislature would be a lot closer, too. See the Assembly district 59 map for <a href="http://arc.asm.ca.gov/member/59/?p=districtMap"an example. The district boundaries traverse two counties in order to prevent the Eastern part of Los Angeles County from having competitive elections. From Western to Northeast end of the district, a drive of about 75 miles. Two to three hours in traffic. Portions of three Census statistical areas.
@kohler
The reason I oppose that:
One could win by promising voters in five states everything they ever wanted. California, Texas, Florida, Illinois, and New York. There would never be a reason to campaign in (or consider the interests of) the other forty-five states, as long as one had a big enough lead in these five states.
I live in California, so I’d benefit. But my oldest in Kansas would not.
The 11 most populous states contain 56% of the population of the United States and a candidate would win the Presidency if 100% of the voters in these 11 states voted for one candidate. However, if anyone is concerned about the this theoretical possibility, it should be pointed out that, under the current system, a candidate could win the Presidency by winning a mere 51% of the vote in these same 11 states — that is, a mere 26% of the nation’s votes.
The political reality is that the 11 largest states rarely agree on any political question. In terms of recent presidential elections, the 11 largest states include five “red states (Texas, Florida, Ohio, North Carolina, and Georgia) and six “blue” states (California, New York, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and New Jersey). The fact is that the big states are just about as closely divided as the rest of the country. For example, among the four largest states, the two largest Republican states (Texas and Florida) generated a total margin of 2.1 million votes for Bush, while the two largest Democratic states generated a total margin of 2.1 million votes for Kerry.
Moreover, the notion that any candidate could win 100% of the vote in one group of states and 0% in another group of states is far-fetched. Indeed, among the 11 most populous states, the highest levels of popular support , hardly overwhelming, were found in the following seven non-battleground states:
* Texas (62% Republican),
* New York (59% Democratic),
* Georgia (58% Republican),
* North Carolina (56% Republican),
* Illinois (55% Democratic),
* California (55% Democratic), and
* New Jersey (53% Democratic).
In addition, the margins generated by the nation’s largest states are hardly overwhelming in relation to the 122,000,000 votes cast nationally. Among the 11 most populous states, the highest margins were the following seven non-battleground states:
* Texas — 1,691,267 Republican
* New York — 1,192,436 Democratic
* Georgia — 544,634 Republican
* North Carolina — 426,778 Republican
* Illinois — 513,342 Democratic
* California — 1,023,560 Democratic
* New Jersey — 211,826 Democratic
To put these numbers in perspective, Oklahoma (7 electoral votes) alone generated a margin of 455,000 “wasted” votes for Bush in 2004 — larger than the margin generated by the 9th and 10th largest states, namely New Jersey and North Carolina (each with 15 electoral votes). Utah (5 electoral votes) alone generated a margin of 385,000 “wasted” votes for Bush in 2004. 8 small western states, with less than a third of California’s population, provided Bush with a bigger margin (1,283,076) than California provided Kerry (1,235,659).
The National Popular Vote bill that is moving through the state legislatures is frought with peril, IMO. It states that once states representing 270 electoral votes (just over 50% of the total) pass the measure it becomes effective in those states that voted it in. Once that happens, the states that have yet to approve it may be reluctant to go along since they would now have increased clout. In an extreme example, lets say every state except California and Texas adopted the National Public Vote bill. Each state would know that if they adopted it next, the remaining state would have an undue influence on the outcome with their winner takes all format. Is a democratic California legislature going to adopt the law and risk allowing Texas to swing a close vote to the republican candidate – and visa versa. We could end up with one or two big states gaining influence by a poorly executed attempt to correct a problem.
W^L+ says:
October 28, 2010 at 2:46 pm
If it weren’t for gerrymandering earlier this decade, California’s legislature would be a lot closer, too.
=======================================================
Gerrymandering is the 500-pound gorilla in the room that nobody seems to talk about. Here in California we voted in 2008 to take the authority to draw electoral districts for state offices from the legislature and give it to a transparent commission of citizens balanced by party affiliation. This year we have a ballot measure to extend this to congressional districts. Nancy Pelosi has a competing measure to undo the 2008 vote and return the whole process to the politicians. Under the current system we had over 300 consecutive elections in the past decade [for state senate, assembly and congress] with only one seat changing party hands and one incumbent loss. The idea that we have a true democracy in California (and the U.S.) is debatable.
With district boundaries about to be redrawn for the next decade (after the 2010 census), this election is much more important than most. The politicians in many states will be picking their voters for the next ten years and the average voter has little power to do anything about it. Perhaps California can jump start a national movement for district writing reform across the country.
As WUWT often demonstrates, one can adjust data in many ways to produce very different outcomes. The Nancy Pelosi’s and Tom Delay’s of the world have been producing political hockey sticks long before Michael Mann and with about as much transparency.
SouthAmericanGirls says:
October 28, 2010 at 6:35 am
That election was electrifying!
It was a long night . . .
I think the more limited the (utter destructive) power of the political class the better and your electoral college is another limit on the (utter destructive) power of the political class so it may be another good institution that you have in the USA.
It is a safety valve. (Ironically, the electors themselves are complete political animals.) It is also something of a protection from 100% pure democracy.
The founders feared raw democracy more than the IPCC fears raw data.
The founders, however, were justified. The US is a republic, and more indirect than many. Only a third of the senate is elected at any given time. This ensures a degree of continuity.
I think you may have a point about our esteemed ex-president elect. He did seem to go rather badly ’round the twist starting about that time.