Erick, Thanks for a very good post. There are lots of things going on in this election regarding verifying whether ballots are legally valid (or unlawfully submitted) and/or counting legal ballots without proper bipartisan observation. People from my area of the US know very well that large cities like Chicago and PHL have been run by Democrats for decades and that not all of these people have honorable intentions regarding producing a fair and accurate election result. While it is harder to commit large-scale voter fraud with in person elections it is much easier to commit it with vote-by-mail elections. It doesn't take a lot of bad apples to spoil a whole bunch. And as John James statement about MI indicated, a few dishonest people can theoretically produce an inaccurate election result that disenfranchises the votes of a multitude of legitimate voters. The best approach is for everybody to wait until all fraud allegations are investigated, all lawsuits are settled, and election results are officially recorded.
I am currently in Germany and voted absentee in PA before I left at the end of September. I have confirmed with the election official for my county (Lawrence) that my absentee ballot was received and that it should be counted. But I checked this PA-gov website again today and it still shows my vote was not counted ( https://www.pavoterservices.pa.gov/pages/ballottracking.aspx ). I sent another email to the head election official. I urge everybody who has voted in a critical state to attempt to verify if their ballot was received and counted. I urge Christians to pray for a fair and accurate election, as with this comment at the top of Kayliegh McEanny's twitter account: "GOD IS IN CONTROL‼️."
One last thing. The national election count is completely irrelevant to determining election results. The EC is not like the BCS and it doesn't reward states for running up the score. The one amazing thing about this year's national count is that Trump is currently at 69.65 M-votes, which is more than Obama's massive 2008 vote total of 69.50 M-votes. And Biden has about 4 M-votes more than that. So there is potential reason to consider whether the vote counts have been inflated by ballots that were not submitted by legal voters, and therefore should not be counted. But potential reason and/or anecdotal evidence needs to be evaluated by a fair and honest legal process before drawing conclusions and making definitive statements about who won this election when all legal votes and only all legal votes are counted.
This is what my message from the PA voters service website said: "We are unable to match your information with our records. You may edit your information and try your search again or you may contact your county election office to confirm the status of your ballot." However on election eve, my brother got a last-minute mail (temporarily forwarded from my house) that was from the Lawrence County Election Board saying, "The Lawrence County Voter Registration Office has recently conducted a review of the voter registration
records maintained in the Statewide Uniform Registry of Electors (SURE) database. It was discovered that your voter record does not contain a valid signature."
I emailed the signed letter back together with a copy of my PA driver's license, and a copy of my absentee ballot application, which the head election official previously reported to me as being received. This was the response from the LC head election official: "The letter asking for your signature is normal file maintenance and in no way affects the counting of your ballot. We will scan in your signature to your file and that will be that. " I believe in the complete integrity of this election official. But since he says my name is in the voter database for PA, the question is why doesn't my vote show up on the official government website for checking if an absentee vote was recorded.
I am 62 years old and have voted in every presidential election since 1980, so I didn't register at the last minute. The issue is if the PA official voter database is so obviously messed up, has it ever been safe to trust the accuracy of PA elections that use this registry to determine if ballots are legal or illegal? Or is it like the polls, which we seem to assume are a reliable way to set political policy, when the last two elections have proved that the polls are not necessarily a reliable indicator of what political policies the voters in our country want.
Our country has a desperate need to have uniform election laws that guarantee that each legal voter has the right to vote once and only once. For example, I have a residency permit in Germany that entitles me to many privileges such as the right to work that I don't use. But I have no right to vote in Germany. Each German Landkreis keeps an accurate record of all citizens and residents like me and only German citizens receive a card in the mail with a unique number entitling them to vote in person at their local polling place. As people move and or pass away, the local records are immediately updated, so there is not the huge problem with inaccurate voting roles that many states in the US have. As all things work together for good to those who love God (Romans 8:28), I ask all Christians to pray that this election may force Democratic controlled states to clean their voting roles and require that voters provide legal identification in order to vote (taking all steps necessary to ensure that anybody who wants a legal citizen-id can get one).
Erick. Sorry but you know better. When someone alleges something, they have to provide the evidence. So far, the Republicans have provided no evidence of what they are alleging. In fact, they have said the STATES or the MEDIA have to provide the evidence of this "fraud".
I know that our country has dumbed down considerably. But we have to get back to the standard that the side that asserts MUST provide evidence for their assertions, or no one should have to take them any more seriously that we would take a Q follower.
Critical thinking is, indeed, at a new low. There have been numbers of irregularities noted by actual news sources (ignored by the Biden-laden media from which liberals drink deeply). Recognizing evidence requires open eyes and ears.
Detroit has had issues with mismatches between poll book counts and vote counts as recently as the August, 2020 primary. Michigan law doesn’t allow a given precinct to be recounted if the poll book count and vote count are mismatched. A few links:
It becomes increasingly obvious even to CNN et al that significant irregularities are being reported nation-wide. But then, DailyKos and Mother Jones just want to click their heels and chant, "there's no prez like Biden, there's no prez like Biden..."
The Psalmist cried, "Destructive forces are at work in the city; threats and lies never leave its streets (Psalm 55:11, NIV)." Kohaleth wrote, "I saw something else under the sun: in the place of judgment -- wickedness was there..... (Ecclesiastes 3:16ff)." We cannot right every wrong in this life. Much must be left to God's judgment at the Last Day. Furthermore, it is not fitting for the President of the United States always to claim that he is a victim. He has victimized others. Ecclesiastes 4:13 warns about having "an old and foolish king who no longer knows how to take warning." Thanks, Eric for your candor. Thank God for whatever peace reigns in our land.
All it really takes is recycling ballots. Take a box of ballots that are heavily democrat and run them through the machine again. As to creating ballots, "Veritas" has video of a guy already doing that by going to apartment buildings and paying cash for the ballot - fill in voter info, we'll do the rest. On one day he had over 300 ballots for Ilhan Omar.
We have pictures of arms full of ballots being carried down an alley behind the Detroit Election Bureau, without any security, to the Detroit City County Building. Another picture of Absent Voter Ballots being delivered with the one carton seal - unsealed. This from GOP assigned surveillance team. When I acted as a Poll Watcher at the Primary in August, the Elections supervisor told us that many challenge stations were manned by two Democrats because they couldn't find enough Republicans in the city to have two independent observers looking at challenged ballots. On November 4, the same election officials barred extra Republican Poll Watchers to enter the Absentee Voter Board Room. Skeptical of voter malfeasance? Here you are
No we don't. We don't have pictures of whatever it is your alleging. If we did, you would post them. And how do you know those are ballots? What if they are other papers?
See, anyone can CLAIM anything. You have to PROVIDE evidence of your claim.
And Poll watcher malfeasance is not the same thing as VOTER malfeasance.
I appreciate this post very much. I did not wake up the day after the election screaming that Trump was robbed. I actually took your advice from an earlier post and put my trust in God. I remember being utterly unprepared and utterly lost when Obama won the first time. I had not put my trust in God, and that loss shook me. Since that day, I have learned more about the left's agenda, because I felt I had to know in order to survive. But I have also learned more about God's gift of peace to those who put their hope in him. This time my world is not rocked. I already know that neither Trump nor Biden is God. I will not only survive but thrive while I anchor my hope in God.
This is why I appreciate the reasoned, orderly presentation of your points. I knew some things and didn't know others, but this post is orderly, peaceful, and not a rant. I am utterly done with rants. Thank you for writing words worth reading.
"The President is behind by 3.5 million votes nationwide and that will impact the Electoral College."
Not strictly true. Running the numbers of 2016 from both CNN & DailyKos (that bastion of reason :-P ), Hillary's popular vote margin was ~+3Million. When Cali is removed from that count, popular vote shifted to Trump ~+1.5-2Mil depending on the source. California alone accounted for a 3.5M popularity vote swing. That would mean that Electoral map can be vastly different from the popular vote map.
In addition, the 3rd party dilution of "really can't vote for Trump" Repubs (that was me in 2016) is also gone. The popular vote vs. Electoral College comparison remains apples and oranges, heavily weighted on either side by deeply blue states on the left coast + east coast and deeply red states like TX and OK.
Again, Founding Fathers' wisdom treating POTUS election by states' preference rather than a mob-mentality vote from the super-blue cities and coasts. Somehow they understood and codified before France proved the mob-rule Democracy disaster during the French Revolution.
But is it wise when some of these states are so close. I do think there needs to be support throughout the country but if the difference is 30k votes.....
I live in California, and of course fully agree, as I'm sure vandalii does, that California is a part of this country. I think the point vandalii is making is that "behind in the popular vote" does not mean "impact on the electoral college", since California has such a high impact on the popular vote.
One other interesting note on popular vote...since California and New York are DEEPLY blue, I wonder how many Republicans (and like minded Independents) simply choose to not vote, since they know it won't change anything, this increasing even more the popular vote margin in the country.
Maybe...I've read multiple comments from people with this idea. I'm not 100% sure...would need to think about it more.
A couple thoughts...
First, how much different is proportional representation from simply counting the popular vote? If the electoral college is based off of groups of voters (ie. 10,000 votes like you mentioned below), then how different is that from simply going full popular vote?
Second, while I am not a big historian, I tend to see things this way...
House of Representatives - represents the population
Senate - represents the states
Presidency - represents the population AND the states.
Popular vote (and potentially proportional representation) would remove the "states" part of that equation.
...and deeply left. It is 1/50th of this nation's states (even if 15% of the population). We are a united federation of states, not a pure democracy. "fly over country" gets ignored by both coasts to their peril. The rules of engagement are "win the most Electoral votes", not "win the popularity contest". Hillary failed to campaign effectively assuming states held by O would stay blue. Trump fought for the votes in those states and turned them. Yes, by a small margin. But that is the rule of law. Hillary chose to blow that by ignoring what she assumed she was "entitled" to win.
OTOH, Covid really threw a wrench in the works from both a campaign and a voting perspective. Biden's basement strategy prevented more of his gaffes from coming out. Voting by mail/absentee/drop off plays right into the hands of activists. Erick says in "Messenger vs. Message" today "Democrats are not out manufacturing tens of thousands of votes ". That is arguably a foolish statement to make. The left are pure utilitarians, "end justifies the means" kinds of activists. Keep in mind that "tens of thousands of votes", if spread across 5,000 activists is really only a few manufactured votes each, put in the trunk of a car collectively, etc. It is not outside the realm of possibility that true TDS Dems aren't willing to bend the rules by a few each...amounting to tens of thousands when considering 62million Dems vote across the country.
Play the Electoral College game or go home. That's how this runs.
Agreed. The ease of which 1000's of activists could tilt an election is not hard to imagine.
Second, I find in the popular vote argument a false belief. "Oh look, get rid of the electoral college because of the popular vote". Yes, but as you mentioned about campaigning, if we went to a popular vote model, then the candidates would try to win the popular vote rather than the electoral college, which is not what they're doing now.
In that scenario, candidates would spend tons of time in California, New York, Florida and Texas. I wonder how many people, after a switch to that model, would than be saying, "Maybe we should switch back to the electoral college model". lol Although, by that point, the system would be ruined and we probably wouldn't switch back.
But then we get know screaming about 10k vote difference in one state and they don’t campaign in big states at all which is why proportional should be good
maybe...but again, I'm not sure that proportional representation solves it, since their greatest number of votes will come from the big states (New York, California, Florida, Texas), so they would probably spend more time there and ignore the rest of the country.
Good to see an expanded response, Erick, but I'm still left with the feeling that you don't think very highly of your readers/listeners/followers. It hasn't been the "first reaction" of folks I know (of a Rightish bent) to claim that the election has been stolen. I am seeing a lot of healthy skepticism that the processes are unfolding on the up-and-up, and that seems perfectly normal, especially given the Democrats' infamous history of election...activities.
Anecdotal, but watching friends on social media I will report that (even the loudest) Trump supporters are staying fairly quiet so far, it's the Lefties who seem the most...disgruntled, to put it mildly.
It is "wait and see" time - gather evidence of "errors" as the presents themselves, make the case where it matters (i.e. *not* in MSM or public opinion but in court), decide from that point whether the various cases of irregularity are getting the serious consideration they should.
At some level, we are in the hands of lawyers and judges during these periods, hoping (praying?) there will be some measure of objectivity at the end of the judicial process regarding election irregularities. Up to that point, yelling and screaming about "fair" as the left does is meaningless. Conservatives are not Antifa. Riots are a leftist tool, not a tool of the conservatives.
By comparison to Occupy xxx, Antifa, BLM et al? Care to cite equivalent misbehavior either in size, scope or grand larceny from conservatives in the last, I dunno, 50 years?
To be honest all this belly aching is an argument against the electoral college Because Joe Biden clearly is won the popular vote it’s not close there.
I think the electoral college should be kept but I would support a proportional system that that way 10,000 votes in some states doesn’t trump millions of votes. It would safe a lot of belly aching. The point of the electoral college is to make sure big states don’t run rush shot over small states but if a candidate is winning 48 percent in the small states a lot of support exits.
Apparently you are not so familiar with Electoral College. This is not like the Senate where each state has the same number of Senators. Each state has a representative number of electors, with large states like Cali, NY, TX, FL having a large number of electors, small states like AK, SD, etc have just three or four. So the Electoral College is comprised of electors based representative population already.
What you are describing is more like a sub-division of electors in each state more along the popular vote line. Some states already do that, others choose a "winner takes all" approach. Again, we are a Democratic Republic, not a Democracy.
I'm with you Erick. I want a fair system but I just cannot trust the left. Back when Franken beat Coleman in that Minnesota Senate race by finding a lost ballot box with enough votes to beat Coleman just sits queasy with me. My questions are: why did the vote counting stop on election night? What happened in those hours that everyone was supposed to be asleep? And then when we all wake up all the Trump leads are gone or dwindled? This just reeks of questions. I want to trust the system but don't trust the left and since they hate Trump so much.
Here's one citizen who appreciates your conscious determination to report objectively and truthful. Keep up the good work, Erick.
Thanks for keeping an eye on things.
But here's a wild idea whose time might have come: What about . . . if the controversies and legal battles were to render this election to be one huge clusterfoible. Therefore, to resolve the question . . . petition the Supreme Court to grant true choice to the Electoral College, i.e. the Electors be freed to vote their conscience on this election, even as they are provided all evidence pertaining to the conduct of this election.
Too crazy? Maybe not, considering the complexity of these multiple behind-the-scenes manipulations on both sides.
Who knows? Maybe Complicated questions and challenges such as these . . . is why the Founders wrote in an Electoral College to begin with!
Erick, Thanks for a very good post. There are lots of things going on in this election regarding verifying whether ballots are legally valid (or unlawfully submitted) and/or counting legal ballots without proper bipartisan observation. People from my area of the US know very well that large cities like Chicago and PHL have been run by Democrats for decades and that not all of these people have honorable intentions regarding producing a fair and accurate election result. While it is harder to commit large-scale voter fraud with in person elections it is much easier to commit it with vote-by-mail elections. It doesn't take a lot of bad apples to spoil a whole bunch. And as John James statement about MI indicated, a few dishonest people can theoretically produce an inaccurate election result that disenfranchises the votes of a multitude of legitimate voters. The best approach is for everybody to wait until all fraud allegations are investigated, all lawsuits are settled, and election results are officially recorded.
I am currently in Germany and voted absentee in PA before I left at the end of September. I have confirmed with the election official for my county (Lawrence) that my absentee ballot was received and that it should be counted. But I checked this PA-gov website again today and it still shows my vote was not counted ( https://www.pavoterservices.pa.gov/pages/ballottracking.aspx ). I sent another email to the head election official. I urge everybody who has voted in a critical state to attempt to verify if their ballot was received and counted. I urge Christians to pray for a fair and accurate election, as with this comment at the top of Kayliegh McEanny's twitter account: "GOD IS IN CONTROL‼️."
One last thing. The national election count is completely irrelevant to determining election results. The EC is not like the BCS and it doesn't reward states for running up the score. The one amazing thing about this year's national count is that Trump is currently at 69.65 M-votes, which is more than Obama's massive 2008 vote total of 69.50 M-votes. And Biden has about 4 M-votes more than that. So there is potential reason to consider whether the vote counts have been inflated by ballots that were not submitted by legal voters, and therefore should not be counted. But potential reason and/or anecdotal evidence needs to be evaluated by a fair and honest legal process before drawing conclusions and making definitive statements about who won this election when all legal votes and only all legal votes are counted.
This is what my message from the PA voters service website said: "We are unable to match your information with our records. You may edit your information and try your search again or you may contact your county election office to confirm the status of your ballot." However on election eve, my brother got a last-minute mail (temporarily forwarded from my house) that was from the Lawrence County Election Board saying, "The Lawrence County Voter Registration Office has recently conducted a review of the voter registration
records maintained in the Statewide Uniform Registry of Electors (SURE) database. It was discovered that your voter record does not contain a valid signature."
I emailed the signed letter back together with a copy of my PA driver's license, and a copy of my absentee ballot application, which the head election official previously reported to me as being received. This was the response from the LC head election official: "The letter asking for your signature is normal file maintenance and in no way affects the counting of your ballot. We will scan in your signature to your file and that will be that. " I believe in the complete integrity of this election official. But since he says my name is in the voter database for PA, the question is why doesn't my vote show up on the official government website for checking if an absentee vote was recorded.
I am 62 years old and have voted in every presidential election since 1980, so I didn't register at the last minute. The issue is if the PA official voter database is so obviously messed up, has it ever been safe to trust the accuracy of PA elections that use this registry to determine if ballots are legal or illegal? Or is it like the polls, which we seem to assume are a reliable way to set political policy, when the last two elections have proved that the polls are not necessarily a reliable indicator of what political policies the voters in our country want.
Our country has a desperate need to have uniform election laws that guarantee that each legal voter has the right to vote once and only once. For example, I have a residency permit in Germany that entitles me to many privileges such as the right to work that I don't use. But I have no right to vote in Germany. Each German Landkreis keeps an accurate record of all citizens and residents like me and only German citizens receive a card in the mail with a unique number entitling them to vote in person at their local polling place. As people move and or pass away, the local records are immediately updated, so there is not the huge problem with inaccurate voting roles that many states in the US have. As all things work together for good to those who love God (Romans 8:28), I ask all Christians to pray that this election may force Democratic controlled states to clean their voting roles and require that voters provide legal identification in order to vote (taking all steps necessary to ensure that anybody who wants a legal citizen-id can get one).
Erick. Sorry but you know better. When someone alleges something, they have to provide the evidence. So far, the Republicans have provided no evidence of what they are alleging. In fact, they have said the STATES or the MEDIA have to provide the evidence of this "fraud".
I know that our country has dumbed down considerably. But we have to get back to the standard that the side that asserts MUST provide evidence for their assertions, or no one should have to take them any more seriously that we would take a Q follower.
Critical thinking is, indeed, at a new low. There have been numbers of irregularities noted by actual news sources (ignored by the Biden-laden media from which liberals drink deeply). Recognizing evidence requires open eyes and ears.
Detroit has had issues with mismatches between poll book counts and vote counts as recently as the August, 2020 primary. Michigan law doesn’t allow a given precinct to be recounted if the poll book count and vote count are mismatched. A few links:
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/after-botching-past-elections-detroit-aims-avoid-black-eye-november-n1243920
https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/politics/2020/08/21/michigan-election-officials-call-detroit-primary-voting-problems-alarming-appalling/3410790001/
https://wdet.org/posts/2020/11/02/90238-detroit-election-officials-take-steps-to-resolve-issues-that-plagued-the-primary/
It is up to Trump to prove voter fraud since he is leveling the accusation. Without it, he is just blowing smoke.
It becomes increasingly obvious even to CNN et al that significant irregularities are being reported nation-wide. But then, DailyKos and Mother Jones just want to click their heels and chant, "there's no prez like Biden, there's no prez like Biden..."
The Psalmist cried, "Destructive forces are at work in the city; threats and lies never leave its streets (Psalm 55:11, NIV)." Kohaleth wrote, "I saw something else under the sun: in the place of judgment -- wickedness was there..... (Ecclesiastes 3:16ff)." We cannot right every wrong in this life. Much must be left to God's judgment at the Last Day. Furthermore, it is not fitting for the President of the United States always to claim that he is a victim. He has victimized others. Ecclesiastes 4:13 warns about having "an old and foolish king who no longer knows how to take warning." Thanks, Eric for your candor. Thank God for whatever peace reigns in our land.
All it really takes is recycling ballots. Take a box of ballots that are heavily democrat and run them through the machine again. As to creating ballots, "Veritas" has video of a guy already doing that by going to apartment buildings and paying cash for the ballot - fill in voter info, we'll do the rest. On one day he had over 300 ballots for Ilhan Omar.
We have pictures of arms full of ballots being carried down an alley behind the Detroit Election Bureau, without any security, to the Detroit City County Building. Another picture of Absent Voter Ballots being delivered with the one carton seal - unsealed. This from GOP assigned surveillance team. When I acted as a Poll Watcher at the Primary in August, the Elections supervisor told us that many challenge stations were manned by two Democrats because they couldn't find enough Republicans in the city to have two independent observers looking at challenged ballots. On November 4, the same election officials barred extra Republican Poll Watchers to enter the Absentee Voter Board Room. Skeptical of voter malfeasance? Here you are
No we don't. We don't have pictures of whatever it is your alleging. If we did, you would post them. And how do you know those are ballots? What if they are other papers?
See, anyone can CLAIM anything. You have to PROVIDE evidence of your claim.
And Poll watcher malfeasance is not the same thing as VOTER malfeasance.
I appreciate this post very much. I did not wake up the day after the election screaming that Trump was robbed. I actually took your advice from an earlier post and put my trust in God. I remember being utterly unprepared and utterly lost when Obama won the first time. I had not put my trust in God, and that loss shook me. Since that day, I have learned more about the left's agenda, because I felt I had to know in order to survive. But I have also learned more about God's gift of peace to those who put their hope in him. This time my world is not rocked. I already know that neither Trump nor Biden is God. I will not only survive but thrive while I anchor my hope in God.
This is why I appreciate the reasoned, orderly presentation of your points. I knew some things and didn't know others, but this post is orderly, peaceful, and not a rant. I am utterly done with rants. Thank you for writing words worth reading.
"The President is behind by 3.5 million votes nationwide and that will impact the Electoral College."
Not strictly true. Running the numbers of 2016 from both CNN & DailyKos (that bastion of reason :-P ), Hillary's popular vote margin was ~+3Million. When Cali is removed from that count, popular vote shifted to Trump ~+1.5-2Mil depending on the source. California alone accounted for a 3.5M popularity vote swing. That would mean that Electoral map can be vastly different from the popular vote map.
In addition, the 3rd party dilution of "really can't vote for Trump" Repubs (that was me in 2016) is also gone. The popular vote vs. Electoral College comparison remains apples and oranges, heavily weighted on either side by deeply blue states on the left coast + east coast and deeply red states like TX and OK.
Again, Founding Fathers' wisdom treating POTUS election by states' preference rather than a mob-mentality vote from the super-blue cities and coasts. Somehow they understood and codified before France proved the mob-rule Democracy disaster during the French Revolution.
Now Biden is up four million in the popular vote. Still no effect? That would be laughable.
But is it wise when some of these states are so close. I do think there needs to be support throughout the country but if the difference is 30k votes.....
I live in California, and of course fully agree, as I'm sure vandalii does, that California is a part of this country. I think the point vandalii is making is that "behind in the popular vote" does not mean "impact on the electoral college", since California has such a high impact on the popular vote.
One other interesting note on popular vote...since California and New York are DEEPLY blue, I wonder how many Republicans (and like minded Independents) simply choose to not vote, since they know it won't change anything, this increasing even more the popular vote margin in the country.
Yes maybe there get proportional representation in the electoral college is the fairest way around this than every vote would count
Maybe...I've read multiple comments from people with this idea. I'm not 100% sure...would need to think about it more.
A couple thoughts...
First, how much different is proportional representation from simply counting the popular vote? If the electoral college is based off of groups of voters (ie. 10,000 votes like you mentioned below), then how different is that from simply going full popular vote?
Second, while I am not a big historian, I tend to see things this way...
House of Representatives - represents the population
Senate - represents the states
Presidency - represents the population AND the states.
Popular vote (and potentially proportional representation) would remove the "states" part of that equation.
It’s still based on states so the proportion would be states electoral votes this is done in primaries. I really think it would be better
Second California is part of this country.
...and deeply left. It is 1/50th of this nation's states (even if 15% of the population). We are a united federation of states, not a pure democracy. "fly over country" gets ignored by both coasts to their peril. The rules of engagement are "win the most Electoral votes", not "win the popularity contest". Hillary failed to campaign effectively assuming states held by O would stay blue. Trump fought for the votes in those states and turned them. Yes, by a small margin. But that is the rule of law. Hillary chose to blow that by ignoring what she assumed she was "entitled" to win.
OTOH, Covid really threw a wrench in the works from both a campaign and a voting perspective. Biden's basement strategy prevented more of his gaffes from coming out. Voting by mail/absentee/drop off plays right into the hands of activists. Erick says in "Messenger vs. Message" today "Democrats are not out manufacturing tens of thousands of votes ". That is arguably a foolish statement to make. The left are pure utilitarians, "end justifies the means" kinds of activists. Keep in mind that "tens of thousands of votes", if spread across 5,000 activists is really only a few manufactured votes each, put in the trunk of a car collectively, etc. It is not outside the realm of possibility that true TDS Dems aren't willing to bend the rules by a few each...amounting to tens of thousands when considering 62million Dems vote across the country.
Play the Electoral College game or go home. That's how this runs.
Agreed. The ease of which 1000's of activists could tilt an election is not hard to imagine.
Second, I find in the popular vote argument a false belief. "Oh look, get rid of the electoral college because of the popular vote". Yes, but as you mentioned about campaigning, if we went to a popular vote model, then the candidates would try to win the popular vote rather than the electoral college, which is not what they're doing now.
In that scenario, candidates would spend tons of time in California, New York, Florida and Texas. I wonder how many people, after a switch to that model, would than be saying, "Maybe we should switch back to the electoral college model". lol Although, by that point, the system would be ruined and we probably wouldn't switch back.
But then we get know screaming about 10k vote difference in one state and they don’t campaign in big states at all which is why proportional should be good
maybe...but again, I'm not sure that proportional representation solves it, since their greatest number of votes will come from the big states (New York, California, Florida, Texas), so they would probably spend more time there and ignore the rest of the country.
Good to see an expanded response, Erick, but I'm still left with the feeling that you don't think very highly of your readers/listeners/followers. It hasn't been the "first reaction" of folks I know (of a Rightish bent) to claim that the election has been stolen. I am seeing a lot of healthy skepticism that the processes are unfolding on the up-and-up, and that seems perfectly normal, especially given the Democrats' infamous history of election...activities.
Anecdotal, but watching friends on social media I will report that (even the loudest) Trump supporters are staying fairly quiet so far, it's the Lefties who seem the most...disgruntled, to put it mildly.
It is "wait and see" time - gather evidence of "errors" as the presents themselves, make the case where it matters (i.e. *not* in MSM or public opinion but in court), decide from that point whether the various cases of irregularity are getting the serious consideration they should.
At some level, we are in the hands of lawyers and judges during these periods, hoping (praying?) there will be some measure of objectivity at the end of the judicial process regarding election irregularities. Up to that point, yelling and screaming about "fair" as the left does is meaningless. Conservatives are not Antifa. Riots are a leftist tool, not a tool of the conservatives.
Since when? The right has turned to armed confrontation many times in recent years.
By comparison to Occupy xxx, Antifa, BLM et al? Care to cite equivalent misbehavior either in size, scope or grand larceny from conservatives in the last, I dunno, 50 years?
To be honest all this belly aching is an argument against the electoral college Because Joe Biden clearly is won the popular vote it’s not close there.
I think the electoral college should be kept but I would support a proportional system that that way 10,000 votes in some states doesn’t trump millions of votes. It would safe a lot of belly aching. The point of the electoral college is to make sure big states don’t run rush shot over small states but if a candidate is winning 48 percent in the small states a lot of support exits.
Apparently you are not so familiar with Electoral College. This is not like the Senate where each state has the same number of Senators. Each state has a representative number of electors, with large states like Cali, NY, TX, FL having a large number of electors, small states like AK, SD, etc have just three or four. So the Electoral College is comprised of electors based representative population already.
What you are describing is more like a sub-division of electors in each state more along the popular vote line. Some states already do that, others choose a "winner takes all" approach. Again, we are a Democratic Republic, not a Democracy.
I'm with you Erick. I want a fair system but I just cannot trust the left. Back when Franken beat Coleman in that Minnesota Senate race by finding a lost ballot box with enough votes to beat Coleman just sits queasy with me. My questions are: why did the vote counting stop on election night? What happened in those hours that everyone was supposed to be asleep? And then when we all wake up all the Trump leads are gone or dwindled? This just reeks of questions. I want to trust the system but don't trust the left and since they hate Trump so much.
Here's one citizen who appreciates your conscious determination to report objectively and truthful. Keep up the good work, Erick.
Thanks for keeping an eye on things.
But here's a wild idea whose time might have come: What about . . . if the controversies and legal battles were to render this election to be one huge clusterfoible. Therefore, to resolve the question . . . petition the Supreme Court to grant true choice to the Electoral College, i.e. the Electors be freed to vote their conscience on this election, even as they are provided all evidence pertaining to the conduct of this election.
Too crazy? Maybe not, considering the complexity of these multiple behind-the-scenes manipulations on both sides.
Who knows? Maybe Complicated questions and challenges such as these . . . is why the Founders wrote in an Electoral College to begin with!