Sometimes, You Just Get a Feeling Like You Need Some Kind of Change

[pseudohistorian]

On November 7, 2000, I was staying in a Melbourne hostel, watching news reports about the US presidential election on a small television in a common room. When they called it for Bush, I groaned quite audibly, whilst the (mostly British) backpackers around me had very little reaction. "What's the difference?" said one of them nearby

Comments

[lampbane]

the world may very well simply write the country off as ideologically stagnant.

Or that we just have a really, really, really crooked electoral system.

(Because we do. It's awful. And filled with so many loopholes that proving malfeasance is impossible (or at least, impossible in a timely matter that can change the outcome of an election).

[pseudohistorian]

Either way, the end result is a weakened US on the international stage, since its government won't be taken seriously--especially if it tries to continue lecturing the rest of the world on how to run its affairs.

I've thought a lot about the electoral system's limitations (to use a mild term) as I watch the long line-ups and reports of irregularities already coming in. :/ I can easily imagine the nightmare scenario of an electoral college tie, or an Obama/Biden win which is endlessly contested by the GOP, dividing the country and causing increasing civil unrest, and I really hope it doesn't come to anything like that.

This whole every-county-is-different system for federal elections is just crazy. At the national level, you really need national standards to help prevent the malfeasance you mentioned...

On another note, what's the signage breakdown like in New York's Fighting 10th?

[lampbane]

At the national level, you really need national standards to help prevent the malfeasance you mentioned...

Unfortunately, this would still lead to problems with the whole "everyone must use touch-screen ballots" that already plague some areas. Thankfully, New York still uses lever machines, even though the deadline for switching to computers passed some time ago...

(I think the lever system is probably one of the most tamper-proof voting machines out there, but it's funny how it's being used in a state where rigging the election doesn't even matter since we always lean Democratic anyway...)

I, uh, haven't seen many signs, but if I have seen any, they were probably all for Obama anyway. The primaries were far more interesting. However, there are a lot of people wearing Obama pins and t-shirts across the city.

Also? I haven't gotten any campaign literature for any local races since the primaries, which just proves that we are a Democratic city and it doesn't matter which Republican is on the ballot, they don't stand a chance.

[caericarclight]

Well....as for advertising I was pretty amused by one particularly large sign with 'terrorist' spray painted across it. Amused because it was a McCain sign.

The visible signage leans heavy towards McCain and the junk mail is pretty much all Republican-oriented, but polling and the glances I stole at other ballots when I voted seem to indicate that the Obama camp is pretty strong.

[pseudohistorian]

Interesting...and encouraging on the presidential front. :)

Is your incumbent House Representative a Democrat or a Republican? And are you voting for a senator this year?