Does anyone see elections becoming closer?

[Person Man]

The sample sizes for Presidential elections (especially recent) are too small to come up with meaningful conclusions for many things.

Also, since we can't really use every election, we need a cut-off somewhere. But people tend to abuse this for cherry-picking purposes. If you go from 1992 onwards, you have three solid Democratic wins and two close Republican wins, so you spin that as "Democrats can expand the playing field more than Republicans can." But you could just as easily look from 1968 onwards, in which there were two Republican landslides but no Democratic landslides and say "Republicans can expand the playing field more than Democrats can." Inevitably, people who subscribe to the first school will say "Yeah, but times have changed since 1968, so voting patterns then aren't a reliable indicator of voting patterns now." I agree - but then you're stuck with having a piddling sample size of only five. The only sensible position is to accept that we can't rely heavily on past results in forming our predictions of the future.

[DS0816]

Quote from: Brother Bilo on January 17, 2011, 09:07:25 am

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Realignment periods: 1960 John Kennedy, in a D realignment period (and eight years before a turnover to the R's) flipped the White House from R to D, defeating Vice President Richard Nixon by a slim margin in the popular vote while crossing the 270 threshold with an additional 10% of electors. But consider the shift to get there.… In 2000, George W. Bush, in a R realignment period (and eight years before, as I predict, a turnover having manifested for the D's) flipped the White House from D to R, defeated Vice President Al Gore by a margin shy of winning the U.S. Popular Vote of D+0.52%. (1996's losing R, Bob Dole, suffered with D+8.52%.) A whole percentage more for a shift to win the popular vote by R+0.52%, the following symmetrically would've flipped from 1996 D to 2000 R: Wisconsin (11), Oregon (7), Iowa (7), and New Mexico (5). Now, JFK had 303 electoral votes. Those additonal four states would've made Bush go from 271 to 301 (again, a 10-percent increase over the required 270).

[Nichlemn]

I dislike the concept of "realigning elections" when purely random voting could result in apparent "realignment" periods.

For instance, here's 20 random numbers (generated here), representing election results:

00101000011101011010

The 6th election is a realigning election imo.

      

[Antonio the Sixth]

DS, you quoted something I don't remember saying.

[DS0816]

The sample sizes for Presidential elections (especially recent) are too small to come up with meaningful conclusions for many things.

Also, since we can’t really use every election, we need a cut-off somewhere. But people tend to abuse this for cherry-picking purposes. If you go from 1992 onwards, you have three solid Democratic wins and two close Republican wins, so you spin that as “Democrats can expand the playing field more than Republicans can.” But you could just as easily look from 1968 onwards, in which there were two Republican landslides but no Democratic landslides and say “Republicans can expand the playing field more than Democrats can.” Inevitably, people who subscribe to the first school will say “Yeah, but times have changed since 1968, so voting patterns then aren’t a reliable indicator of voting patterns now.” I agree - but then you’re stuck with having a piddling sample size of only five. The only sensible position is to accept that we can’t rely heavily on past results in forming our predictions of the future.

Though you are correct that 1992 isn’t going back far at all, we’re not here to figure out the next 100 years in presidential elections.

Each U.S. presidential election has this in common: direction. And with no electoral map having ever been duplicated, the direction deals with shifts. An adjustment. One election followed by the next. But always compared to the previous presidential election. And, yet, in referencing previous presidentials, one has to understand the nature of such elections. The more interesting elections deal with party-flipping the White House for, of course, a party-pickup president. At that point, think of it like a tug-of-rope — how much pulling (shifting) to get this and that state to the tipping point for the official flip? (It helps to explain electoral blowouts if one keeps in mind that we’re in a period where a loser, unlike 20/30/40/50 years ago, carries plenty states by 15% and up.) In 2008, Democrat Barack Obama shifted 9.73% of term-limited Republican George W. Bush’s 2.46% margin (from 2004) to win nationally by 7.26%. Symmetrically, that involved nine states to be flipped from the 2004 R to 2008 D column: Iowa, New Mexico, Ohio, Nevada, Colorado, Florida, Missouri, Virginia, and Arkansas. Oh, but wait! He didn’t get Mo. and Ark., so they were replaced by North Carolina and Indiana — and Nebraska #02. Had Obama shifted 14.73%, to win by 12.27%, he would’ve also had pickups in the following: Arizona, West Virginia, Tennessee, and Louisiana. Oh, but wait! Those four weren’t that close. So, Mo., yes — but also Georgia and Montana. Then again, had Obama experienced that level of shift, maybe Ariz. after all … plus a majority (or all) of South Carolina, South Dakota, North Dakota — and Nebraska #01.

It’s cherry-picking if one make assumptions about states without refencing their historical voting patterns. (Also the states’ partisan ideologies. And comparing them to the nation’s.) I look at likeminded states. I note that Alabama and Mississippi have only once disagreed in a presidential (1840).… I note that Pennsylvania and Michigan have disagreed just four times (two of which, mitigating factor, saw the other state not willing to support the other’s candiate: 1856’s winning James Buchanan, of Pa., did not carry Mich.; 1976’s unseated Gerald Ford, of Mich., lost Pa. The other two were in the 1932 and 1940, giving Franklin Roosevelt three out of his four elections — but not perfectly synched).… I note that every time Mich. and New York were colored differently, it’s always been Mich. that was red and N.Y. that was blue.… I note that Mich., Pa., and Minnesota voted for all prevailing Republicans from Abraham Lincoln in 1860 to Dwight Eisenhower in 1956. Minn., in particular, denied the next three decades’ prevailing R’s because it had a home son on the D ticket for president or vice president. 1972 was an exception because neither George McGovern or Sargent Shriver hailed from Minn. But 1988 absolutely broke the pattern for good because neither Michael Dukakais or Lloyd Bensten hailed from Minn. Idiot Michele Bachmann should’ve been alerted to that!)… I note that Idaho and Wyoming have voted the same in all presidentials since at least 1904 (except for 1944).… I compare a number of them over considerable stretches of time — and vital periods — for reference. For example: New Jersey was the backbone of the non-New England, northeastern states core for the GOP. Then the party — realigned with the “southern Strategy” — lost it, along with all of the northeast, in 1992. Since that first post-World War II election of 1948, N.J. and the most historically reliable Republican state — Vermont — agreed on all elections except 1960 (when Vt. stayed red for Richard Nixon while N.J. flipped, in a Democratic pickup of the White House, for John Kennedy).… I note the bellwethers (which don’t stay the same forever; there’s a cast shakeup once in a while; some do go on for the better part of a century): Illinois and Delaware and Tennessee are formers. Ohio, Florida, Nevada, and New Mexico are holding strong. Missouri is in decline. Iowa, Colorado, and Virginia are rising.

 

[Antonio the Sixth]

DS, you quoted something I don't remember saying.

I'd like to understand.

[DS0816]

DS, you quoted something I don't remember saying.

My screen isn't friendly for long responses. So I frequently do cutting and pasting, and use another application. I credited the wrong poster; but I went back and straightened it out. (Sorry.)

[Antonio the Sixth]

DS, you quoted something I don't remember saying.

My screen isn't friendly for long responses. So I frequently do cutting and pasting, and use another application. I credited the wrong poster; but I went back and straightened it out. (Sorry.)

No problem. Who was that poster, BTW ?

[DS0816]

DS, you quoted something I don't remember saying.

My screen isn't friendly for long responses. So I frequently do cutting and pasting, and use another application. I credited the wrong poster; but I went back and straightened it out. (Sorry.)

No problem. Who was that poster, BTW ?

… Brother Bilo, on page 2.

[Antonio the Sixth]

DS, you quoted something I don't remember saying.

My screen isn't friendly for long responses. So I frequently do cutting and pasting, and use another application. I credited the wrong poster; but I went back and straightened it out. (Sorry.)

No problem. Who was that poster, BTW ?

… Brother Bilo, on page 2.

Ah, OK.

[kohler]

Because of the state-by-state winner-take-all electoral votes laws (i.e., awarding all of a state’s electoral votes to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in each state) in 48 states, a candidate can win the Presidency without winning the most popular votes nationwide.  This has occurred in 4 of the nation's 56 (1 in 14) presidential elections.  Near misses are now frequently common.  There have been 6 consecutive non-landslide presidential elections (1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, and 2008). 537 popular votes won Florida and the White House for Bush in 2000 despite Gore's lead of 537,179 popular votes nationwide. A shift of 60,000 votes in Ohio in 2004 would have defeated President Bush despite his nationwide lead of 3,500,000 votes.    

Although landslide presidential elections were common for much of the 20th century, the nation is currently in an era of consecutive non-landslide presidential elections (1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, and 2008).

Therefore, it should not be surprising that we have already had one “wrong winner” election in this recent string of six non-landslide presidential elections. If the country continues to experience non-landslide presidential elections, we can expect additional “wrong winner” elections.

The precariousness of the current state-by-state winner-take-all system is further highlighted by the fact that a shift of a handful of votes in one or two states would have elected the second-place candidate in five of the 13 presidential elections since World War II.

The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC).  

Every vote, everywhere, would be politically relevant and equal in presidential elections. Elections wouldn't be about winning states. No more distorting and divisive red and blue state maps.  Every vote, everywhere would be counted for and directly assist the candidate for whom it was cast. Candidates would need to care about voters across the nation, not just undecided voters in a handful of swing states.
   
In the 2012 election, pundits and campaign operatives already agree that only 14 states and their voters will matter under the current winner-take-all laws (i.e., awarding all of a state’s electoral votes to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in each state) used by 48 of the 50 states.  Candidates will not care about 72% of the voters-- voters in 19 of the 22 lowest population and medium-small states, and big states like California, Georgia, New York, and Texas.  2012 campaigning would be even more obscenely exclusive than 2008 and 2004. Candidates have no reason to poll, visit, advertise, organize, campaign, or care about the voter concerns in the dozens of states where they are safely ahead or hopelessly behind.   Policies important to the citizens of ‘flyover’ states are not as highly prioritized as policies important to ‘battleground’ states when it comes to governing.

The bill would take effect only when enacted, in identical form, by states possessing a majority of the electoral votes--that is, enough electoral votes to elect a President (270 of 538). When the bill comes into effect, all the electoral votes from those states would be awarded to the presidential candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC).

In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state's electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided). Support for a national popular vote is strong in virtually every state, partisan, and demographic group surveyed in recent polls in closely divided battleground states: CO-- 68%, IA --75%, MI-- 73%, MO-- 70%, NH-- 69%, NV-- 72%, NM-- 76%, NC-- 74%, OH-- 70%, PA -- 78%, VA -- 74%, and WI -- 71%; in smaller states (3 to 5 electoral votes): AK – 70%, DC – 76%, DE --75%, ME -- 77%, NE -- 74%, NH --69%, NV -- 72%, NM -- 76%, RI -- 74%, VT -- 75%, and WY – 69%; in Southern and border states: AR --80%, KY -- 80%, MS --77%, MO -- 70%, NC -- 74%, and VA -- 74%; and in other states polled: CA -- 70%, CT -- 74% , MA -- 73%, MN – 75%, NY -- 79%, WA -- 77%, and WV- 81%.

The bill has passed 31 state legislative chambers, in 21 small, medium-small, medium, and large states, including one house in AR, CT, DE, DC, ME, MI, NV, NM, NY, NC, and OR, and both houses in CA, CO, HI, IL, NJ, MD, MA ,RI, VT, and WA . The bill has been enacted by DC, HI, IL, NJ, MD, MA, and WA. These 7 states possess 74 electoral votes — 27% of the 270 necessary to bring the law into effect.

NationalPopularVote.com

[Napoleon]

If it's that popular, it should be extremely easy to amend the Constitution in that manner.

[Nichlemn]

If it's that popular, it should be extremely easy to amend the Constitution in that manner.

No, because support is wide but not deep. It's just not an issue many people are going to change their votes on.

[muon2]

The sample sizes for Presidential elections (especially recent) are too small to come up with meaningful conclusions for many things.

Also, since we can't really use every election, we need a cut-off somewhere. But people tend to abuse this for cherry-picking purposes. If you go from 1992 onwards, you have three solid Democratic wins and two close Republican wins, so you spin that as "Democrats can expand the playing field more than Republicans can." But you could just as easily look from 1968 onwards, in which there were two Republican landslides but no Democratic landslides and say "Republicans can expand the playing field more than Democrats can." Inevitably, people who subscribe to the first school will say "Yeah, but times have changed since 1968, so voting patterns then aren't a reliable indicator of voting patterns now." I agree - but then you're stuck with having a piddling sample size of only five. The only sensible position is to accept that we can't rely heavily on past results in forming our predictions of the future.

Even with the relatively small pool of presidential elections since 1900, there are some clear correlations. For instance, if one looks at the GOP electoral vote compared to the GOP margin of victory, there is a clear trend. Note that the points cross 0% margin very near 270 EV, as one would hope for a balanced electorate. Also the points plateau at both extremes once the margin is greater than 10%. This suggests the base level of states not winnable by the other party.

The graph shows a lack of elections where the GOP had a lead of between 3 and 8% and a similar drought of EC victories in 300-400 range. The asymmetry is that there a lot of elections won by the Dems in that range. But both have the same share of "landslide" elections at a 15% margin or better.