Readers' Comments

Long before "austerity" measures, OUR country and OUR government (not 'THE' government) needs to work on ways to be effective and useful, and to define what that means: Why do we HAVE government, What IS government, Why do we have civilization, what IS civilization, and what are the roles of establishing what and who we are as a nation/world. The rest is just logistics once you have a solid foundation of what needs to be done. The problem is that marketing types and opportunists love to stir up the bees nest so they can capture bees for themselves and let those that aren't captured freeze to death without a hive.

If there are more than 2 candidates, the statewide popular vote winner in Nebraska could get a minority of the electoral votes: Say district 1 votes red, with green second; districts 2 and 3 vote blue, with green second; green gets most votes overall. Then you have 2 green electoral votes, 1 red, and 2 blue.

More to the point, even with just 2 candidates Nebraska can—and has—awarded electoral votes to the minority party. In a close election, the swing of an electoral vote or two could decide the presidency.

“Electoral-votes-by-district” could make the electoral vote more closely match the popular vote *if* congressional districts were drawn to give each party a share of representatives closely matching its popular vote share. According to Griff Palmer and Michael Cooper in the New York Times, that’s true in the 25 states where courts, commissions, or divided governments drew the lines. But the 20 states Republicans gerrymandered, and the 5 states Democrats did, each awarded the dominant party some 70% of the seats, with just over 50% of the popular vote.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/15/us/politics/redistricting-helped-republicans-hold-onto-congress.html?pagewanted=print

The most exciting idea, to make the U.S. electoral vote conform to the will of the people, is the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact: several states each enact law stating that if states comprising 270 or more electoral votes do the same, the state will award all its electors to the national popular vote winner. This effectively abolishes the electoral college without a constitutional amendment (which could never pass; small states wouldn’t go for it)—and it’s legal.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact

The idea that small states have more weight in the electoral college doesn’t hold true for the individual voter: Whether you’re in Wyoming or California, your individual vote does not matter: Wyoming *will* go Republican; California *will* go Democrat: you may as well stay home. It’s only the voter in Florida, or Ohio, or Wisconsin, or another knife-edge state, where voters need bother going to the polls to decide the issue. In 2000, the presidency was decided by 537 voters in Florida. The rest of the voters, in the rest of the states, had nugatory input. That’s a perversion of representative government.

One problem with national popular vote is the potential for ballot-box-stuffing in one locale to swing the entire nation. If Chicago submits 50 million votes for its candidate (with 2.7 million population), that candidate will win. Weighting votes by state population might be better. So if Alaska or Deleware or Rhode Island has a weather emergency on election day, and only a few voters turn out, the state still gets its full weight in deciding the president.

More discussion at
http://wcmcoop.com/2012/12/14/republican-gerrymandering-creates-opportunities-for-wisconsin-democrats/

We need a public-interest anti-ALEC group to draft model bills for the 99%.

We need public-interest lobbying teams on each issue the moneyed interests lobby on.

One very successful public-interest lobbying group is the Citizens’ Utility Board. With a tiny budget, it wins large savings for residential customers, off of the excessive rate increases utilities want. The CUB is a handful of hardworking, knowledgeable people, ferreting out the facts to counter the deceptions and obfuscations of the big utilities.
http://www.wiscub.org/index.php?module=cms&page=113

Part of the reason the CUBs are so successful is that decision-making is not by politicians but by an impartial, knowledgeable commission, in utility rate cases. Transferring decision-making on mining, agriculture, banking, medical services price regulation, insurance, and so on to such commissions should be a priority for public-interest lobbying.

We can’t stop lobbying by moneyed interests. We shouldn’t even if we could: even the wealthy have the right to express their views. What we must do is play them at the lobbying game. We can beat them—truth has a well-known liberal bias. We must play.

Changing the electorial allocation for the states themselves only increases the rural representation. They already get the advantage of the electorial system, where the smaller states get extra votes versus those with larger popultions. We don't need to skew it even more.

Can you please send us an email at editor@prwatch.org, so we can connect about volunteering opportunities?
Thank you very much for writing in!
Lisa

This time.

I would glaly pay more to get rid of acompany that supports ALEC which is a hate group. I am dropping my policies with State Farm ASAP and I have three. I equate such groups like ALEC to the KKK and the Taliban.ALEC is also supporting voter suppression.ALEC is a threat to this country like the red scare of the 50's and 60's.

Dick Armey in accepting $8 million to resign from the organisation he was going to leave because he was concerned about its direction reminded me of one of the funniest lines from British comedy.

In a skit Peter Cooke acting as a billionaire had hired Dudley Moore as a piano teacher in the hope of learning to play Beethoven's Fifth symphony by the following week so that he and his orchestra could play it at his wife's birthday party. Moore complained that he had too much integrity to attempt such a task. Cooke answered by saying "I admire integrity and I am prepared to pay for it"

Well done Dick $8 million buys quite a lot of integrity.

http://lissakr11humanelife.wordpress.com/2012/09/08/collapse-of-the-constitutional-government-of-the-united-states-of-america-by-geral-sosbee/

Pentagon overtly shows interest in Professosr Debarros's activity followed by my reports in the comment section. Here is the link followed by the site meter entry by Pentagon's global torturers & assassins:

http://the-telescope.com/2011/12/12/professor-to-teach-students-about-occupy/

GERAL W. SOSBEE vs. fbi

pentagon.mil ? (Military)
140.185.55.# (The Pentagon)
ISP
The Pentagon
Jan 6 2013 5:35:08 am

Referring URL

http://the-telescope.com/2011/12/12/professor-to-teach-students-about-occupy/

Visit Entry Page

http://www.sosbeevfbi.com/part19c-updatefo.html

http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2011/12/412940.shtml

http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2008/05/375399.shtml

I was most struck by the statement, "average Americans who will need to stay engaged." They will first need to become engaged, at least at some meaningful level, and the overwhelming majority of them will need to make some effort to become informed--and help by informing others. Grousing at the water cooler does not count as engagement. For that matter, even voting is so minimal a level of engagement when the best you can do to justify you vote is to say, "The poor can't afford the implementation of austerity measures. We don't have anything as it is. There is this huge wealth concentration at the top of the economic caste."

For the love of Pete! There is a very real economic impact for us all in austerity measures, and I'd bet not one in ten people have even the faintest clue about what that impact is. Knowing this--becoming truly informed--and helping to get that message out is vital.

Propaganda at it's finest! It's no secret the far right, bought and paid for media and religious zealots and greedy, power driven, soulless individuals have purposely kept many misinformed. Your comment says to all of them: job well done! Why propaganda? Keeping emotions high means keeping logic and rationale low. And is a great diversion as well.

PERSUADE the urban voters? In Florida alone, 50K didn't vote, thanks to voter suppression. Democratic votes and WHO was a con man? A vote, be it urban or rural based, isn't a matter of persuasion. It's a CHOICE.

Long ago, I learned the importance of fact checking, again and again. Your comment is precisely why.