Why vote in a corrupt sytem? Does it even count?

Since the elections are coming up, I thought it might be a good time to get a discussion going about the voting process.

I'll be the first to admit, I don't understand the electoral vote as well as I should.

Second, how did Florida suddenly get the largest amount of electoral votes.

I always thought Iowa had the most.

And if it's about population density, then why did Iowa have so many votes?

Is the electoral college just another tool to control who is in power?

[edit on 28-11-2007 by stompk]

well voting doesn't count in belgium (the ironic home of the european parliament).

most of you may not know this but belgium has had no government for just over 6 months now as the winning party is not able to form a government because the losing party won't let them (i'm still trying to figure that out). what's the point in having elections if the winner doesn't win? what the point in having government when a country can run without one.

i guess the belgian problem is a whole other thread though

[edit on 28-11-2007 by justyc]

reply to post by justyc


Interesting insight. Yes, I do feel we are lucky to have some form of voting system. And on the local and state level, I feel it works well enough. It's the presidential level that concerns me.

For example. On the local level, it's how many votes counted. Now if each local level can count the votes, then why isn't it done this way in the National elections.

Each local level counts the votes, and turns them in. Why the electoral middle man?

Voting is quite simple in Australia, and I'm pretty sure it isn't rigged. If we don't vote, we get a fine. If you don't vote, you get Bush!

To answer your question; no your vote does not legally count for anything in a court of law, paper-trail or not.

I agree makes one wonder if your vote actually counts or if you are just going thru the motions,been my thought last few years,think everything is settled already

The United States Electoral College is a term used to describe the 538 President Electors who meet every 4 years to cast the electoral votes for President and Vice President of the United States; their votes represent the most important component of the presidential election. The Presidential Electors are elected by the popular vote on the day traditionally called election day. Presidential Electors meet in their respective state capitol buildings (or in the District of Columbia) on the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December (per 3 U.S.C. 7), never as a national body. At the 51 meetings, held on the same day, the Electors cast the electoral votes. The electoral college, like the national convention, is an indirect element in the process of electing the president.

Provisions for the mechanics of presidential elections were established by Article Two, Section One, of the United States Constitution. The 12th Amendment provided that each Elector vote separately for president and vice president. Today, the mechanics of the presidential election are administered by the National Archives and Records Administration via its Office of the Federal Register.

Wiki

The mechanics of the presidential election are administered by the National Archives and Records Administration via its Office of the Federal Register.


So basically after we vote, then "representatives" of our vote, meet in 51 seperate places, all coordinated by the NARA via another office.

There is so much room for corrupting the vote in this system, its pathetic.

reply to post by stompk



Yea, there's always corruption and liars in the government.



I've also heard since the '08 electon is rigged, Hillary is going to win the presidency.

Each state shall appoint, in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a number of electors, equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or person holding an office of trust or profit under the United States, shall be appointed an elector.

Source


Are the electors required to vote the way the popular vote in their state went?

If not, this would be utter lunacy.

Basically the constitution says, the electors can hold no office or even a business for profit.

Colorado's nine electors are:

* Vicki Edwards of Fort Morgan, a member of the First Lady's Colorado Quarter Commission, long-time Republican activist, and member of Colorado delegation to the 2004 Republican Convention.
* Diane Gallagher of Englewood, a well-known Colorado philanthropist.

* Booker Graves of Denver, the Executive Director of the Governor's Office of Workforce Development and a member of the Colorado delegation to the 2004 Republican Convention.

* Ted Halaby of Englewood, the Chairman of Colorado State Republican Party and delegate to the 2004 Republican National Convention.

* Cindy Murphy of Monument, El Paso County co-chairman for the 2004 Bush-Cheney campaign and delegate to the 2004 Republican National Convention.

* Robert Martinez of Castle Rock, a businessman, member of Republican National Committee, previous elector in 2004, and delegate to the 2004 Republican National Convention.

* Sylvia Morgan-Smith of Lakewood, a delegate to the 2004 Republican National Convention and expert in fields of physical and social sciences.

* Lilly Nunez of Littleton, a member of Republican National Committee, previous elector in 2004, and delegate to the 2004 Republican National Convention.

* Frances Owens of Denver, First Lady of Colorado.

www.colorardo.gov

The first lady of Colorado. Doesn't she technically hold an office??

The co-chairman for the Bush-Cheney campaign??

Why vote in a corrupt sytem? Does it even count?...

Yes it does count, infact even if you go out and put a blank vote in the box it counts.

If you wanna have the right to criticise the leaders of your country in a democracy... then you have to vote.

Because by not voting, you say that you dont care who is in charge, and if you dont care... then you dont have the right to criticise them.

currupt system or not.

edit:
By the way, you also have an oblication to learn and understand how the voting system works.
Learn about what the different leaders stand for to make you able to vote for the ones you feel will represent your values in the best way.

[edit on 28-11-2007 by Bluess]

Why vote in a corrupt sytem? Does it even count?

I'll tell you why voting is still important and your vote still counts. What I learned about all the voting fraud and tricks that were played back in 2004. Voting can be manipulated, but only by about 5%, which in the case here in Ohio was enough to give the electoral votes to GB. They cannot force any more than that without illegal activity, which they cannot get away with. If more people would have voted the percentage would have been less.

Everyone should be aware of the tricks that were played in the battleground states like Ohio in 2004. There was such a discrepancy in exit polls versus actual vote counts that started an investigation into many complaints about new electronic voting machine distribution. This was still a problem in 2006 and polls were ordered to stay open longer due to long lines in strong democratic districts. The republican supported districts had more than their share of machines. The voting machine distribution was determined by the heavily republican state election board lead by republican Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell, who taunted that he gave GB the election. Needless to say when he ran for governor, we were on to him and he lost big time, but it shows that even local officials can have an effect on the presidential election.

Another trick that were played on a national level in 2004 was the gay marriage issue. Remember that? That was a ploy to fire up the conservative base to get more of them out to vote against gay marriage, because GB promised to amend the constitution to ban it. Well three years later and no action has been taken because it was a non issue, but it worked.

If you don’t vote, then you let the bad guys win. If you want to increase the chance of your vote counting, then talk to your friends and get them to go out and vote as well. Better yet explain to them why the person you think is best qualified is whom they should vote for. You can make a difference and your vote does count.

Here is some reading about the voting debacle of 2004.

Wiki article: 2004 United States presidential election controversy and irregularities
Wiki article: 2004 United States election voting controversies, Ohio

edit: Correction on Al Gore winning the popular vote and lost was in the year 2000, not 2004.

[edit on 11/28/2007 by Hal9000]

Hey stomp, if you ask me your vote will not change a damn thing in this world.

Power comes from very above, and not from some hilarious republicans/democrats politics.

reply to post by Monsterenergy791


I will have to agree with you, if you follow closely the way the politics have been played lately you can be pretty sure know who is going to be selected pre hand for president, it happen with Bush two times.

So yes Hillary will be the next president regardless of what people wants or not because is not longer the people choices what it counts in our nation anymore.

So people get, use to having the first woman president because that is what is been planned for our nation next.

Now, the only way to stop the take over of our voting system is to reverse back to paper ballot.

Since our nation is using voting machines our voting system is corrupted and manipulated.

So...

we're just going to sit back and accept this?

If Hillary gets in, it'll be something like 32 yrs of Bush-Clinton rule.

Did anyone check to see if all the money Bill and GB senior received for the Tsunami actually got to the region?

None of the choices make any sense.

Ron Paul interests me, but he's never going to get a chance, if the system is rigged.


And this is by no means a Ron Paul thread. I just think he is interesting, but the main stream news media won't even show him hardly. They never talk about him, unless it's a putdown.

Plus, Ron Paul is a politician. I'm having trouble believing any career politician at the moment, even if his message is interesting.




[edit on 28-11-2007 by stompk]

reply to post by marg6043

So marg do you think that Hillary being president would be good or bad? I don't like her particularly, but I think she would be the lesser of two evils. I just don't think that it is planned that way. If it were up to the powers that be, IMHO it would be another republican to carry on the WOT agenda. I have to disagree that Hillary in the Whitehouse is a done deal.

I would like to see a strong independent run, because I think the country is ready for a third party. They might not win, but it would certainly change the two party landscape.

Hal as long as our nation is ruled by two main elite parties we may not see a new fresh candidate running our nation coming from independent parties.

We have a nation that is ruled by corporate American and people all it has to see is look who is financing our political parties to know who is the power in this nation.

Only through a peoples willingness to change this type of government we may see a new system taking hold.

But who is going to go against the power behind our government?

We the people could, but we don't.

My son is a Ron Paul follower, my daughter is Hillary follower, my husband and I we are just fed up with our corrupted political system right now.

Originally posted by stompk
And this is by no means a Ron Paul thread. I just think he is interesting, but the main stream news media won't even show him hardly. They never talk about him, unless it's a putdown.

Not true. He has been getting a lot of attention, at least on CNN and it was never negative. It has always been about how well he is doing using the Internet and the money he has raised.

The only problem with Ron Paul is he is running as a republican. I think he could do better as an independent.


reply to post by marg6043

I understand and agree that many of us are fed up with the government right now, but the only means we have to change things is our right to vote. Even if it is for someone who doesn't have a chance of winning.

I look at it this way. If it didn't matter who we vote for, then why would the republicans work so hard to try to manipulate the vote? If it was rigged and our vote didn't matter, they wouldn't have to do that.

Does that even make sense?

Don't get discouraged. voting works. vote for Hillary Clinton and make it count!

Originally posted by Bluess
If you wanna have the right to criticise the leaders of your country in a democracy... then you have to vote.

Because by not voting, you say that you dont care who is in charge, and if you dont care... then you dont have the right to criticise them.

currupt system or not.

Sorry but this is absurd. It may sound perfect reasonable for you but it`s just not.

For example, I live in Brazil and here voting is not a right for the people, it`s an obligation. Yes, we HAVE to vote, there are no choices. If you turn 18, you are not obligated to vote every 2 years.
Voting system here is direct (the most direct votes from people win) BUT we vote through an electronic system (yes, the people dont use paper, but a computer screen to vote) so I`m not even going to enter the "fraud talk" because only a moron who doesnt know te first thing about computers would trust this kind of voting system.

What I wanted to say is that I`m 25 years old now and for the last 2 elections (president, governor, mayor, congress man, city chamber, etc) I dind`t vote. Despite my obligation, I realized that it`s not the candidates nor the 'right people' that are going to make a difference here... we need to change the freaking system... we face major fraud and corruption crisis for the last 20+ years and nothing gets resolved. Only agravated

So, one way of criticizing and protesting against what I think is the cancer on our society (the system) is not to vote.

Then I have to pay a fee for NOT voting, which is no more than 5 american dolars. But frankly, I pay that fee very happy every time.

And I also dont think that by not voting I have no right to speak my mind and demand solutions, beacuse after all I pay my taxes, and I play "by the book" in this system... so, NOT helping to get someone in office doesn't mean that I am less important.


Peace

[edit on 28-11-2007 by Sator]

reply to post by Hal9000


Hal's right. We may not like the way things have gone and we may feel powerless but that's not the case. No question our voting power has been usurped to some degree but IF we can stay together and buck the system in a unified manner there si no way they can steal the vote again --- unless they go for an outright power grab. In which case, ALL the rules change.

The Democratic and Republican parties have become one beast with two heads. Is it any wonder that two bitter political rivals (Bill Clinton and Bush Sr.) have become BFF's? Or that we elect a Democratic congress to put the brakes on GWB and end the war and we get a string of meaningless and utterly useless votes? And that Pelosi refuses to move against arguably the most impeachment worthy President since Nixon?

Their plan is the same as it has been in the past: divide the vote so the margin is small enough to allow them to manipulate it and no one will be able to tell. Again I say, we need to put the Democratic/Republican, Left/Right, Conservative/Liberal, Red/Blue, Coke/Pepsi crap aside and work against the status quo. We need to derail this two-party sham. This could very well be our last opportunity, make no mistake about it. The stakes have never been higher.

Stop allowing them to divide us. United we stand.