Politico election map
We've been following the story of Republicans in the states pushing to change the rules for electing a president. The pattern is that when a state in under Republican control at the state level but tends to vote Democratic for president, those state Republicans want to divide their state's electoral college vote, typically by congressional district. They're especially eager to do that, since their redistricting campaign in 2010 resulted in millions more votes for Democrats in Congress but 33 more Republicans in office.
Today I noticed that the question has reached our nation's reddest state, Oklahoma. Will Republicans there change their rules so the electoral college is divided by congressional district? Um, no. From the Shawnee, Oklahoma, News-Star:
District 17 Senator Ron Sharp, a [R]epublican, said he had not seen any legislation relating to this filed for this session of state legislature. He added that if any came up he would likely oppose it.
“I would be very hesitant about something like that,” Sharp said.
He explained the Electoral College is historical, and that it maintains our two party system. Countries with more than two parties are typically very unstable, he added.
For the record, Oklahoma is sending an all-Republican delegation to Congress this year, but they had a Democratic member last time. If Oklahoma divided its votes by district, a Democratic presidential candidate could conceivably stand to gain. Likewise, the state went for Mitt Romney by 67-33 percent, so if Oklahoma spilt the electoral college proportionally, a Democrat for president would gain quite a lot.
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"Countries with more than two parties are typically very unstable, he added."
Which countries? The UK? Canada? Japan?
Of course, countries with only one party are the most stable of all. China, North Korea, and Cuba have gone for decades with no changes of government.
I was gonna write that, but you did it for me.
Those countries also have universal health care...a coincidence? I think not!
Didn't they do enough damage with the gerrymandering of 2010? The republican party won't be satisfied until we're the U.S of the 1950's, and they're still chasing a myth.
"Countries with more than two parties are typically very unstable, he added."
Yeah, like all those failed states in Europe. Pfffffft.
God bless the Oakies from Muscogee !!
There is some hope for Oklahoma with the last election numbers.
If Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Florida had had the GOP's proposed laws in effect for the last election, Obama would have gotten 51 fewer electoral college votes (if votes had been assigned proportionately). And he still would have won with about 10 votes to spare. The GOP should remember that there is a reason these are called battleground states. Obama won most of the battleground states by 52% or less. In the next election, the GOP candidate could get over 50% of the vote in those states, but with these laws in place, he won't get all their electoral college votes. He'll have to give back something less than half of the vote to the Democrat. The door swings both ways.
Especially true of Ohio, which has often gone Republican.
Even given the possibility that the GOP might win one or mroe of these states, these proposed changes in Republican-controlled states are an ugly reminder of the lengths that party will go to in order to win an election.
Hmmmm, just like Illinois going democratic all the time in every election.
Or like Kansas, Alabama, Mississippi, Wyoming, Idaho, etc., going Republican in every election. So what's your point?
Oklahoma used to be all democrat--remember Carl Albert. How the times have changed. As a moderate, I have been a registered democrat and a registered republican at different times of my 40+years of voting and still maintained basically the same view of what good government does.
The republicans in OK have completed their quest for a super majority (we just had a dem governor for eight years, now he is gone..and we will probably never see one again) and are proceeding in fine fashion to drive the state in to the red dirt.
This state is a lost cause. If it were not for oil, and federal government spending (military and farm subsidies) it would completely self depopulate...and may well anyway. They have driven out unions, so only low paying service sector jobs are seeing any growth (outside of oil...).
As I wrote in my last donation note to the President: Don't spend one dime in this state...it is a write off.
Why is this news?? Remember when the DEMS were so upset over the reality of the Electoral College after Bush defeated Gore in 2000? Yet they didn't do a thing about changing the Electoral College!
One of the reasons why the Electoral College has remained in effect for all of these years is because it is assumed that all of the swing states that benefit so greatly from the attention and advertising dollars, that no politician from these states would advocate eliminating it. However, if the state republicans are willing to sacrifice the attention and money that comes from these contests, then they can not logically oppose shifting to a popular vote, at least not on those grounds. This could be a unique opportunity to push for the elimination of the Electoral College. Sign the petition at:
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/eliminate-electoral-college-and-allow-american-people-elect-their-president-direct-popular-vote/KWPWPkTH
Let's make this the first petition to hit the new threshold of 100k signatures.