When evaluating the arguments raised on both sides it I believe that the Electoral College should be replaced by a national popular vote. An argument that exposes the weakness of the Electoral College and why it should be replaced by a national popular vote is because the ‘winner takes all’ system distorts the results of the elections. There have been various results in which the popular vote did not reflect the results of the Presidential election. A notorious example of how distorted results can be under the Electoral College is that of Bush and Al Gore in 2000. Though Al Gore won the popular vote by 48.4% Bush won the votes of the Electoral College which resulted in him winning the Presidential election.
one reason why caucuses are an appropriate means of selecting a candidate are that caucuses could reinvigorate interest in the nominating process. Neighbourhood meetings might stimulate enthusiasm in what is now an out of touch nominating process. If the caucuses met in late February or early March, they would by far be the largest delegate prize for candidates seeking delegates before the Super Tuesday showdown. for example the large delegate pool in both parties easily surpasses the number of delegates chosen in any of the early voting states--Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Michigan. A caucus would provide the party organizations with a meaningful activity, and give local party activists a real role in the nominating process.
It would ban the political use of money deducted from paychecks by unions or corporations. And it would ban government contractors from contributing to the campaigns of public officials who control the awarding of those contracts (The Sun). By eliminating the payroll deduction union members contributions to political activity will be their decision. Proposition 32 would cut money ties between big unions and politicians and also gets corporate big money out of the politician’s pocket. The measure will curb unions’ outsized political influence everywhere, too often resulting in laws that benefit union members over the interest of all Californians.
Despite of this, Labour decided not to move ahead with the reforms. This shows that first past the post benefits the government in power because the party has majority of the votes in parliament in which makes it difficult for the other party to be heard if they want changes. Furthermore, tactical voting on first past the post encourages voters to vote for a candidate who has a better chance of winning. It prevents the election of a candidate representing the most disliked party. Example for this is in 1997 many Lib Dem and Labour voter tactically voted to get sitting Conservative
One idea was to have him selected by the congress, this idea was thrown out because people thought that it would be used to serve the congresses purpose. The second option was to have the state legislatures decide who became president this idea was thrown out for the same reason. Eventually they decided that the president would be chosen by a popular vote. The archaic nature of this comes from the similarities to the primitive roman system (which quincedently is the same
The endorsement groups offer bribes and ask for unnecessary promises to the politicians running for office. The temptation of falling into these traps is monstrous. According to Obama, these politicians feel that if they do not accept these bribes or arguments then they will lose out on endorsement deals as well as votes. Taking endorsements are not bad in anyway. However, a company endorses a certain individual for reasons such as political similarities or to help promote their product.
On the other hand, the single-issue parties, they only focus on only one public policy matter. The chapter also talks about President’s party is almost always more solidly united and better well-organized compare with other major party. However, competition often caused the leadership group in the party out of power. Federalism is a major reason for the decentralized nature of the two major political parties and also the nominating process is also a major cause of party decentralization. Often, the parties will fight with each other and compete with each other within their party during the nominating process.
The purpose of our nation’s democracy is to allow American citizens to elect officials that represent their interests and beliefs. However, the two-party system takes the power that the founding fathers set out to invest in the American people and gives it to the dominant parties. The dominant parties act as institutional bodies themselves, so the candidates remain very similar to those of previous elections. American citizens are left with a limited choice of candidates with little variation. Alternative third-parties do not have a realistic chance of winning elections, so citizens are forced to vote either Democrat or
It has been nationally and internationally proclaimed that the United States presidential election of 2008 was a historical election. The election can be considered historical for many reasons, most notably because the first African American president was elected. However, on a grander scale, the election of 2008 has brought about a significant party realignment with a powerful Democrat Party now dominating the fallen Republican Party. Conservatives, whose traditional stance is against change, found themselves voting for a very liberal candidate campaigning for change, Barack Obama. Barack Obama’s ability to garner many voters from the Republican Party, particularly conservatives, caused his landslide win in the presidential election and reflects the current shifting of party loyalties in the American political landscape.
So the tug-of-war between the president and Congress is a special part (271). The framers had never envisioned that the presidency of the United States of America would become such a democratic office. They were afraid of tyranny and the pressure of the public opinion and made the Electoral College in a way that its members would be chosen in a manner decided by the state legislatures (270). They realized that the instead of letting the people elect the members, the state legislatures would elect the members by themselves. The electors from the states would than elect the country’s president from the leading citizens.