Did you know the electoral college is a relic from 2 1/2 centuries ago when they believed land owning was a more important quality to govern than majority rule? Its true!

now you've jinxed it subby. Awesome. Election 2000 but this time with a Mormon and a black guy.

I remember in 2004 when there were quite a few articles where it could have ended in a 269-269 tie.

making Sarah Palin automatic president for life

It's about as likely a scenario as Felicia Day surprising me tomorrow morning with breakfast in bed, subby.

Romney-Biden 2012!

Hey, subby:

Obama should get high 300s for EVs. Romney = Kerry. No motivation from the base, only ho-hum acceptance from his party.

Omahawg: Generation_D: Did you know the electoral college is a relic from 2 1/2 centuries ago when they believed land owning was a more important quality to govern than majority rule? Its true!

and the older i get the more I realize that the majority rules in favor of hot dogs and lady gaga...you know....morons.

what's wrong with hot dogs and b-b-b-butter face, butterface?

Generation_D: Did you know the electoral college is a relic from 2 1/2 centuries ago when they believed land owning was a more important quality to govern than majority rule? Its true!

The founding fathers hated two things--they hated democracy and they hated monarchy--and they saw to it that we would have neither

/would they prefer anarchy?

mat catastrophe: /would they prefer anarchy?

No, they hated that too. non-hereditary oligarchy was more their style,

I_Love_Cheesecake: Hey, subby:

[ncowie.files.wordpress.com image 500x265]

Came for this, leaving satisfied.

Generation_D: Did you know the electoral college is a relic from 2 1/2 centuries ago when they believed land owning was a more important quality to govern than majority rule? Its true!

Actually, no. The common crap you're taught in grade school about the electoral college is a load of shiat.

The electoral college exists as a way to reconcile regional differences in picking a national leader. The framers thought that debates would arise around regional issues, and that there was just about one person in the country who could command a national following. That was Washington, and how to follow him up was what was at stake. They thought the most likely scenario was that 5 or 6 regional candidates would emerge each cycle on local issues, none able to command a majority of the nation, so states would choose qualified people to go and broker a deal among these various candidates. The runner up would be vice president, since the policies and issues of the candidates would probably have significant overlap.

The advent of political parties as a mechanism for running effective national campaigns rendered the electoral college obsolete before it was ever really tested.

No, it was not about protecting landowners. No, it's not about preserving the power of small states, though it has that effect, thanks to the compromises involved in setting up representation. It was simply a means to reconcile the fact of one national office with the expectation that national campaigns would be impossible.

Omahawg: Generation_D: Did you know the electoral college is a relic from 2 1/2 centuries ago when they believed land owning was a more important quality to govern than majority rule? Its true!

and the older i get the more I realize that the majority rules in favor of hot dogs and lady gaga...you know....morons.

"Some of the people who call talk radio already have a built-in seven-second delay in their head. Every time I listen to these particular callers, the same identical thought occurs to me: you know, maybe the electoral college is a good idea after all." - Dennis Miller

All ties go to Republicans.

It's the law.

ramblinwreck: Obama should get high 300s for EVs. Romney = Kerry. No motivation from the base, only ho-hum acceptance from his party.

He even has the same kind of look too.

Did you know that if my aunt had balls, she'd be my uncle?

Right now I have a 300 to 238 win for Obama - he gets OH and PA, Romney gets FL of the big states, Obama runs small states save VA and NV, gets a surprising win in NC, gets one vote in NB, everything in MA. Percentages will be about 52 to 47 with a significant write-in contingent spread among conservatives - Palin, Paul, ect.

If there was a tie, lawyers everywhere would be partying like it's 1999.

If there's a tie, the House of Representatives votes. Article II, Section 1.

if things go really well - MO, VA and FL all go Obama. And if that happens, just for shats-and-giggles, we'd know our President by 10 PM EST if the states are called right at the turn of the clock- he wouldn't need the West Coast states. He'd win by 352 at the end.

A more interesting thought: what if there was a tie, but an elector decided to cast his vote for a fringe candiate - say a Ron Paul - and make that tie an Obama win. Could you imagine that shatstorm?

saintstryfe: A more interesting thought: what if there was a tie, but an elector decided to cast his vote for a fringe candiate - say a Ron Paul - and make that tie an Obama win. Could you imagine that shatstorm?

Yes. I think you just imagined it for us.

Mitt Romney is going to get reprogrammed before the convention. He will deliver the best acceptance speech ever heard by any living American. He will destroy Obama in the debates with a passionate and unassailable defense of private equity. The biggest October surprise ever will drop on Halloween as Osama bin Laden hacks into every television station and brags about how he didn't die last May. All of this will result in Mitt Romney storming to a 68%-32% landslide popular vote victory and the first-ever sweep of the Electoral College. Book it. Done.

If Obama only manages to tie against his opponent, he deserves to have his victory stolen by the GOP. And we also will deserve having to deal with Mitt Farking Romney for 4 years.

Good. Because we need another Republican elected to the Presidency by the Supreme Court.

whidbey: Good. Because we need another Republican elected to the Presidency by the Supreme Court.

The house of representives would break the tie.

Wow, I just looked up the specifics of the tie scenario and it makes the BCS look simple. (Link)

1) The ballot is conducted by the incoming house of representatives votes (not the outgoing house).
2) The delegates from each state cast an in-state ballot with the candidate getting the most votes winning that particular state.
3) Based on the results of (2), each state votes for president. If a state was tied, it doesn't vote.
4) The winner of (3) is president.

No worries

Fat Tony and his pals will appoint the winner like they did in 2000.

And that worked out great

It is theoretically possible that Mittens will win.

Is there anyone out there willing to give me even odds on $1000 that Obama will not win?

I love ignoring posts with that stupid R. Crumb flower in it.

Welcome to BANINATION! Population: YOU!

Its such a pity I know

/',.

The interesting thing is the comments to the article: "Oh, it could never happen!" Except it already did, in 1800. Remember that one? Jefferson and Burr tied the EV, 73 to 73. And another comment, "They should let the popular vote decide it!" No, the House decided, as provided in the Constitution. And they did it again in 1824, when none of the candidates got a majority, and John Quincy Adams ended up with the job. And, be it noted, the Surpreme Court played no party in the matter on either occasion.

Not to mention 1876, when the GOP bought the election outright for Hayes over Tilden by agreeing to end Reconstruction in Florida, South Carolina, and here in Louisiana. If the Republicans had possessed any political morals even back then, we would have had Tilden as a Democratic president, and probably a pretty good one.

No, people, we've seen all this before. Americans just don't know their own history. No surprise there.

saintstryfe: A more interesting thought: what if there was a tie, but an elector decided to cast his vote for a fringe candiate - say a Ron Paul - and make that tie an Obama win. Could you imagine that shatstorm?

That wouldn't happen. In that case, you'd have a 269-268-1 result, but a plurality doesn't win the electoral college, a majority does. Similarly, if a voter chooses not to vote, a 269-268 vote would still send the election to the House of Representatives.

Now, if there were a 269-269 tie, you'd have the possibility of a moderate faithless elector choosing to throw his vote to the opposing candidate (making a 270-268 result) in exchange for concessions from that candidate. Imagine a situation where in a 269-269 tie, a moderate Republican elector gets Obama to agree to some unpalatable spending cuts, or Romney to support tax increases on the rich. Most states do not force electors to vote for the nominee they're pledged to, although about half have minor punishments for faithless electors.

Absurd "tight horse race" narrative is absurd.

Smoky Dragon Dish: Lucky LaRue: There are several ways that a tie can take place. The scary thing is that, in the event of a tie, a vote from the house breaks it.

...by the incoming Congress that was just elected and sworn-in.

...with each state only getting one vote.

It gets better. The Senate picks the vice president, and there is no rule stating that they have to choose the running mate of whomever the House picks. Assuming that the incoming Congress has a similar makeup to the current one, it's quite possible that Romney might become President but Biden become Vice President. Stranger still, one could even find Romney/Obama, or the other way around (though this latter is unlikely if we continue to assume a new Congress with similar makeup to the current one).

Millennium: It gets better. The Senate picks the vice president, and there is no rule stating that they have to choose the running mate of whomever the House picks. Assuming that the incoming Congress has a similar makeup to the current one, it's quite possible that Romney might become President but Biden become Vice President. Stranger still, one could even find Romney/Obama, or the other way around (though this latter is unlikely if we continue to assume a new Congress with similar makeup to the current one).

A Democratic House and Republican Senate is not out of the question. There are a lot of Democratic Senators who came into office in the wave of 2006, up for re-election, and it's possible for the GOP to pick up a number of those. Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Missouri, West Virginia, Virginia, Ohio, Michigan, Florida and Connecticut are all potential Republican pick-ups.

Meanwhile, Republicans face the difficulty of holding the marginal seats that they narrowly won in 2010, and if a number of those flip back to Democrats, a narrow Democratic majority in the House is certainly possible.