Political Equinox

I don’t often agree completely with the Republican National Committee. They are extremely partisan, which I cannot fault them for because that is the purpose of the committee. However, despite my support for Barack Obama in the election in just a few days, I realize the importance of the RNC’s recent campaign against electing 60 Democrats into the Senate. They have hit the nail on the head in regard to not electing 60 Democrats to the Senate, a House Majority, and a Democratic President.

For those that don’t know, 60 Democrats would mean the Republicans would no longer have the ability to block votes by refusing to end debate (of course, the flip side is true as well). Giving one party unchecked power is extremely dangerous. Even Democrats should realize that divided government is a huge advantage to our system and allowing on groups ideals to be railroaded through the legislature is not a smart move.

Now I’m not saying the Democrats are out there to pass plans that will destroy our country, that’s not what I’m saying at all. However, when you are given unchecked power and allowed to pass your plans without considerable discussion and the necessity of bringing those from the other side to the table, you’ll get plans that haven’t looked at the issue from all viewpoints.

Both Republicans, Democrats, and Independents are guilty of looking at one viewpoint from time to time, but we cannot let that time be on an issue critical to our country. For example, if Obama’s health care plan is allowed to run through Congress because the Republicans are unable to hold up debate to look over the issue a little more, then we are not going to get the best plan.

I believe in Obama, his intelligence, and his abilities, but that doesn’t mean he has developed a perfect plan. In fact, I think he’s far from perfection. I don’t think he’s taken the right approach, but he’s on track. A partisan divide is necessary to move us along that track, to discuss deeply.

Giving one party all the power is dangerous, no matter which one it is.

Shot entirely on an amateur Canon HV 20 camera, Benjamin Reece’s latest project involved interviewing 50 random people in New Orleans. He asked each person the same question, “By the end of today, what would you wish to happen?” Reece filmed the responses from each participant, the answers range from marriage to undoing the work of the Bush Administration.

A creative idea by Mr. Reece, we applaud him for his creative project. We also hope that the residents of New Orleans can have a few of these wishes come true - they deserve it.

What’s your answer?

Whoa! I have actually written a blog post for once! I want to thank Neil and Patrick for welcoming me to their site and I want to apologize for not posting anything sooner.  Their invitation to join the site landed squarely in a time where mid terms were looming and I was practically living in the library.  However, now that midterms have passed and IU magically secured a victory over Northwestern, I thought it would finally be a perfect time to post.

It is crunch time for the candidates as the election comes to a close. What is astonishing to me is not the constant bickering of Obama and McCain but rather the failure of the government in securing proper election procedures. Blah- “proper election procedures”. There has to be an easier term.

On October 14, I arrived at my early voting site and was frightened to find that I would be voting on an electronic voting machine.  While I am a child of the computer age (and do not get me wrong, I love my new Macbook), my trust of computers to determine election results is almost non-existence. It does not help that about a year ago I viewed an excellent HBO documentary “Hacking Democracy”.

After the 2000 election, I think it is apparent that the United States needs to take a serious look at election reform.  Our most important right as citizens is the right to vote.  There is something gravely wrong when hundreds of thousands of people have to stand in line to vote for hours or when thousands of voting machines malfunction.

Since it’s inception in 1804, the Twelfth Amendment has governed every presidential election since, but the clause regarding ties in the electoral college has been used just once. In 1824, Andrew Jackson, John Quincy Adams, William H. Crawford, and Henry Clay all ran for the highest office in the land. Not a single candidate received a majority of the electoral votes.

The process was riddled with corruption and resulted in John Quincy Adams claiming the highest office in the land, leaving the leading candidate Andrew Jackson shortchanged. Jackson had expected the House to vote for him given that he had won a plurality of the electoral vote, but after some bargaining between Henry Clay and John Quincy Adams, Adams was elected.

It’s unlikely an event like this would be able to play out in today’s world because of the intense media coverage.

Although it seems as if the past few weeks have taken a serious hit to any chances of our country being unable to hand one candidate the necessary 270 votes, this doesn’t erase the fact that this situation is possible in every close election.

What happens if they tie?

In the event no candidate reaches the required 270 electoral votes, the House of Representatives will cast votes to select the next President. The idea behind this system being that if the people cannot decide, then the people’s representatives should be the ones to decide. So Barack Obama wins in the event of a tie, right? Well, our founding father’s didn’t want to make it that easy on us. Each state only gets one vote, which essentially elects the president with a majority of states supporting that candidate.

Since each state receives a vote rather than each individual representatives, the electors from that state may choose one of two options. They may either go with the popular vote in their state and select the candidate that their constituents selected or they may take a majority vote of all the representatives from that vote.

Since we only have two candidates that have a chance to actually win a state (Sorry third parties, but let’s be realistic here.) the first strategy is going to leave us in exactly the same place as before. That leaves our representatives in a difficult position in determining the best way to complete their constitutional duty of representing their constituents.

How should they vote?

If each state decides to vote based on a majority vote of all representatives, then the representatives must make the difficult decision of voting based on one of these two situations. It is up to the representative to select the method they feel aligns to their values and feelings on the process the best.

This is a difficult decision and there is no real correct answer.

1. Party Affiliation/Personal Support - The first method of voting bases itself upon who the representatives believes is the best candidate to lead this country forward. Now, some may argue that the congressional representatives should keep their personal opinions out of electing the president, we must realize that they were elected to represent their people by doing what is best for the country. This is our Republic system of government. While there will be the occasional Republican voting for the Democratic candidate and vice versa, the result of this decision will result in the candidate with the most representatives in each state winning that respective state. However, this method won’t work for the dozen or so states that have an equal number of representatives from each party.
2. Congressional District - The second possible method for representatives to vote is by taking a look at the results from their congressional district. Since they should be representing their districts residents voting with the majority of their constituents seems like it meets the literal “definition,” but then we are getting into the debate about what exactly is representation.

If we do ever reach a tie, how should your representative vote? Do you have a third method for deciding?

Talented kids regardless of your political leanings: