The US Election system

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Famine

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Can someone explain any of this to me?

Why are there only two parties? What "is" a Republican? What "is" a Democrat (and keep this objective, not subjective - if this thread gets closed I will hunt each and every one of you responsible for it, then wear your skin. Hard)? Do people in the US only believe in one of two things? Apart from Ross Perot - which reminds me, why Ross Perot?

What do the public's votes actually do, if an "electoral college" actually picks the winner in each state? And what the hell IS an "electoral college".

HUH?
 
There are more than two parties. But the two big ones are thoroughly entrenched. You could say they are both "incumbent", in a way. But there is also a Socialist party, a Libertarian party, a Green party, even a Communist party. It is not in our countries best interest to rely so heavily on the Republicans and Democrats, though. More and more they are just mirror images of eachother.
 
Exactly. And remember, it's not been this way forever. As little as 100 years ago there where non-Republicrat presidents. It's just like Labour vs. Conservative. It just happens they are heavily predominant, because it makes it easier for knee-jerk voters to pull the switches and think they're expressing their values.
 
Please try not to use terms like "Labour", "Conservative", "Liberal", or any mention of "wing"... :D

Biritsh governments of the last 100 years were mainly Liberal, or coaltion. It's just the last 50 years where Labour and the Conservatives haven taken hold - but at least 6 other parties hold seats in the House of Commons (where the laws are though up and presented... :D)
 
:confused:
But the same is true in the US, or at least potentially so. There is nothing legislated about restricting the parties to two. You could say each major party here is a coalition: Democrats range from foaming-at-the-mouth Socialists to reasonable centerists; Republicans range from reasonable centerists to foaming-at-the-mouth Fascists.

But as mentioned above, other parties hold seats in Congress. Just not too many.
 
Has the US President ever been a non-Republican/Democrat?

How could Ross Perot have hoped to become president? Did he finance an entire political party to fight for seats in every constituency, or does it not work like that?
 
At one time the names "Republican" and "Democrat" meant very different things. For instance, the South used to be almost completely Democratic. The opposite is true now. Abe Lincoln was a Republican. So a president didn't need to have been of a different party to be very different from what these two parties represent now. But I do know that there have been presidents who were niether Republican or Democrat, but not in my lifetime.
 
Yes. Teddy Roosevelt was not a Republican or a Democrat. He founded his own "Bull Moose" party.

The US doesn't elect its President based on number of seats in Congress, so Perot had no need to campaign for House or Senate seats in order to win the Presidential election. He just needed to stir up enough votes for his own President/VP ticket. Otherwise a change of party majority in the off-year Congressional elections would lead to a change in the Presidency.

Being a registered Republicrat just means you can vote in those parties' primaries where the preliminary selection of candidates happens. Each voter can vote a mixed ticket if they wish. I'm registered as Independent but I vote Libertarian anywhere there's a candidate, and for whoever I like best if there's not.
 
There have been Federalists and Whigs, but not in a very long time.

*edit* And Populists, but I don't think they ever came into power.
 
Originally posted by neon_duke
Yes. Teddy Roosevelt was not a Republican or a Democrat. He founded his own "Bull Moose" party.

The US doesn't elect its President based on number of seats in Congress, so Perot had no need to campaign for House or Senate seats in order to win the Presidential election. He just needed to stir up enough votes for his own President/VP ticket. Otherwise a change of party majority in the off-year Congressional elections would lead to a change in the Presidency.

Being a registered Republicrat just means you can vote in those parties' primaries where the preliminary selection of candidates happens. Each voter can vote a mixed ticket if they wish. I'm registered as Independent but I vote Libertarian anywhere there's a candidate, and for whoever I like best if there's not.
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I didn't understand any of the last paragraph...

So, the US can have a political party with a vast majority in the House, but a President from a different political party?
 
Yes. So if Kerry is elected he won't be able to accomplish anything because congress and the senate are dominated by the Republicans. This liberal pipe dream of "anyone but Bush" is futile.
 
Well, Tony Blair may bite the big one, but he's only Prime Minister because his party polled more seats in the lower House than any other (although he only effectively had a 27% approval - only 27% of all those eligible to vote voted for the Labour party).

Make no mistake though - he does bite the big one.
 
Originally posted by Famine
I didn't understand any of the last paragraph...

So, the US can have a political party with a vast majority in the House, but a President from a different political party?
Click to expand...
In fact, that is what modern American government is all about. The Democrats held a slim majority in Congress for years and years, before and throughout the popular Reagan/Bush years. Then, as soon as we ousted them in favor of Slick Willie Clinton, a raging Democrat, we immediately voted a Repucblican majority into the House.

It's all about stasis.
 
As for your question on the electoral college

Each state gets 1 vote per member of Congress. The number that each state gets is determined by that states population, with the minimum being 3 votes. (Another way to think of it is that each state gets an equal number of votes to how many people they have in Congress).

In each state, whichever candidate wins the majority of the popular vote gets all of that states electoral votes. Whoever gets the majority of the electoral votes gets the Presidency.

Nearly all 50 states (and voting territories) require that all electoral votes go to the winner, but I believe about 2 of them do not require the electoral collegiates to all vote the same way for that state.
 
To give a simplified example of The359's explanation...

Let's say we have three states in the U.S.: A, B, and C. A has an enormous population, maybe 40 million, so they get something like 55 electoral vote thingies. B is smaller, at 15 million, so they'll get 20 electoral votes. C also have 15 million people, so they have 20 votes.

If the democrats win state A's election, even by a teeny tiny margin (51%-49%), then all 55 of the electoral votes go to the democrats, and even if the Republicans win by 100% in states B and C, the combined electoral vote will only be 40, so they lose, even though the overall count would've been some 50 million who voted for them out of 70 million people.

It is a bit of a weird system, though very rarely has a situation like the above happened. Normally, the electoral votes match the same ratio as the overall votes.
 
This is what caused the problem in Florida in 2000. Gore already had a clear victory in the popular votes, but the electoral votes were near even, no one had a majority after 49 states. This meant whoever won all the electoral votes in Florida would win the election. So, since Bush came out a (very) few votes ahead of Gore in Florida, he won the state, it's electoral votes, the majority, and the Presidency.

This is also what upsets a lot of people (mostly the Democrats), since Bush had less votes then Gore nationally. However, this has happened before in US History, and the system was never changed, and more then likely wont be changed now.
 
And the risk of it happening again this year is there. America is currently very divided, despite the fact that so many non Americans think we are all a bunch of Bush loving cowboys.
 
And were there any other Presidential candidates than Bore and Gush last time out?

How about this time - will there be any other Presidential candidates than Bush or Kerry?

Or is it just Republican president or Democrat president?
 
Oh yeah, there are always a ton of presidential candidates (can someone who's voted before throw out a number?). They just don't get any publicity (and just as few votes), since they're not democrats or republicans.
 
There are always others but they get no press.

This year:
George W. Bush
$158,803,866

John Kerry
$41,430,491

Dennis Kucinich
$9,567,476

Lyndon H. Larouche Jr
$8,227,104

Ralph Nader
$929,481

Al Sharpton
$678,496

I included how much money they have raised to further demonstrate why power tends stagnate. But only temporarily.
 
Did any of them get any "electoral college" votes last time out?
 
I'd say in the past 100 years, a 3rd party has won electoral votes maybe only once or twice.
 
Originally posted by milefile
Yes. So if Kerry is elected he won't be able to accomplish anything because congress and the senate are dominated by the Republicans. This liberal pipe dream of "anyone but Bush" is futile.
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Yes, I do love my opium. :cough: :cough:...wait I'm not a liberal. But he said...

Where were we? Oh yeah. Third party candidates lose, so, anyone who vote's for them is essentially wasting a vote. That vote could be going to the "lesser evil" mainstream candidate. Now, that doesn't mean that people don't believe in the views of a party other than the big two. They will just never win an election, in these times and in the present system anyway.
 
Originally posted by milefile
WTF are you talking about.
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Maybe you should know the origins of a term before you spew it, eh?


You said the "anyone but bush" angle was liberal. I don't consider myself a liberal.
 

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