Your vote counts

[SingingAnalyst]

I know I'm preaching to the choir here at Atlas, but tell your friends and neighbors: your vote counts.

A transportation renewal millage in Macomb County, MI passed by 23 votes out of 154,981. That's 50.00742% Yes. (I am proud to say, one of the Yes votes was mine). In my precinct alone, exactly 400 voted Yes and 400 No. Had I not voted, the millage would have lost in my precinct.

A total of 1,002 votes were cast in my precinct. (That has a nicer ring than 999, doesn't it?) Mine was one of them. Of them, 271 votes were cast for the GOP gubernatorial primary winner (Bill Schuette) and 271 for the Dem winner (Gretchen Whitmer).

[MarkD]

A few years ago I would have responded to you by saying that one vote does not make a difference if the Supreme Court hands down decisions like Bush v. Gore and prevents your vote from being counted. I decided in Dec. 2002 -- two years after that Court decision -- that I was not going to vote any more, and I did not vote in any elections from 2003 to 2015. I need to include a certain quote in order to help explain why I did not want to vote any more. This quote is from Judge Learned Hand, and it is part of a lecture he gave in 1958.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

By Dec. 2002, I became convinced that all nine Sup. Ct. Justices behave like Platonic Guardians, and they all deprived me of that satisfaction. But by 2016 I decided to return to the voting both again, not because I want to cast a tie-breaking vote on anything -- I still believe one vote doesn't determine anything -- but because I want to make a difference in politics in other ways, such as lobbying federal and state legislators to get their support for a constitutional amendment that rewrites the 14th Amendment (see my signature), and because I want to vote for a presidential candidate that I can believe will appoint the right kind of people to the Supreme Court -- Evan McMullin. I was one of only 7,071 voters in Missouri who wrote in McMullin, and we constituted only 0.25% of the total vote. But that doesn't matter. I voted according to my conscience in favor of the only way I could find to improve our system of self-governance. That's what I am going to continue to do or the foreseeable future. I will lobby legislators to get my constitutional amendment passed, and I will vote for President whichever candidate has the right idea about who should be appointed to the Sup. Ct.

[136or142]

I know I'm preaching to the choir here at Atlas, but tell your friends and neighbors: your vote counts.

A transportation renewal millage in Macomb County, MI passed by 23 votes out of 154,981. That's 50.00742% Yes. (I am proud to say, one of the Yes votes was mine). In my precinct alone, exactly 400 voted Yes and 400 No. Had I not voted, the millage would have lost in my precinct.

A total of 1,002 votes were cast in my precinct. (That has a nicer ring than 999, doesn't it?) Mine was one of them. Of them, 271 votes were cast for the GOP gubernatorial primary winner (Bill Schuette) and 271 for the Dem winner (Gretchen Whitmer).

Technically this isn't true, because had you not voted it still would have passed by 22 votes. 

This reminds me of a conversation I overheard today (only one person did the speaking.)  It seems the two involved in the conversation are from Zeta Reticuli.

"These humans are so stupid.  They can't even do mathematics.  They refer to us as a '5th column' when we're actually a 4.815th column." 

[Miss J]

I vote because there literally isn't anything better to do at that time.  I have an empty meaningless life and voting has become a highlight of the year.  There could be a tornado outside and I'll still risk it and go vote.  Even if its an off-year local primary.  People have died for me to have this right.

Also being LGBTQ makes me a hardcore voter.  There's nothing like a villainous opposition party demonizing you day in and day out to make you want to kick 'em where it hurts.

I voted in 2006 against Rick Santorum and it was very rewarding when an evil politician goes down in defeat.  I felt like I cleansed the world of a menace.

Every vote I cast sends a message - and this November my message is smacking that Cheeto right in the face and holding up my ballot and pushing it in his face and saying, "Bring it on, Bitch".

[muon2]

Statistically it is true that one vote would not generally tip an election, much as one drop of water would not determine whether a bucket would overflow. But people are rarely alone in making decisions about whether to vote. More likely they are individuals in a set of like-minded people making that same decision and coming to the same conclusion. The size and behavior of that set can influence the outcome of the election. That's why I agree with the statement that your vote counts.

[SingingAnalyst]

Statistically it is true that one vote would not generally tip an election, much as one drop of water would not determine whether a bucket would overflow. But people are rarely alone in making decisions about whether to vote. More likely they are individuals in a set of like-minded people making that same decision and coming to the same conclusion. The size and behavior of that set can influence the outcome of the election. That's why I agree with the statement that your vote counts.

Thank you. As a statistician, with 154,981 votes, anything beyond 3 standard deviations in either direction is still 418 votes-- much more than the 23 by which the millage passed. Of those 154,981, I only know a tiny fraction-- and I have talked politics with only a vanishingly small number of them. One of them, however, had stated he would have voted Yes but couldn't find the question on his ballot (it was alone in the 4th column, which was blank on top, the first three columns being filled with the names of Republican, Democratic, and Libertarian candidates, respectively). So, technically, he was not one of the 154,981. The law of large numbers would support my original statement.

[muon2]

Statistically it is true that one vote would not generally tip an election, much as one drop of water would not determine whether a bucket would overflow. But people are rarely alone in making decisions about whether to vote. More likely they are individuals in a set of like-minded people making that same decision and coming to the same conclusion. The size and behavior of that set can influence the outcome of the election. That's why I agree with the statement that your vote counts.

Thank you. As a statistician, with 154,981 votes, anything beyond 3 standard deviations in either direction is still 418 votes-- much more than the 23 by which the millage passed. Of those 154,981, I only know a tiny fraction-- and I have talked politics with only a vanishingly small number of them. One of them, however, had stated he would have voted Yes but couldn't find the question on his ballot (it was alone in the 4th column, which was blank on top, the first three columns being filled with the names of Republican, Democratic, and Libertarian candidates, respectively). So, technically, he was not one of the 154,981. The law of large numbers would support my original statement.

As a statistically-trained scientist I also understand the law of large numbers. Personally I'd love to see more who do. I'd like to see voting systems that can declare a tie when the results indicate it based on the intrinsic error rate in the system, not just when the final counts are numerically equal. I'm not holding my breath for that one.

As a politically-engaged individual I've also seen the effects of psychology on groups of people. I've seen and spoken with many individuals who represent samples of larger cohorts that they are sometimes unaware of. It's not uncommon for me to interact with individuals in those cohorts that are responding in similar ways to external information, even if they are unaware of the cohort.

[ND, SD, MT, WY, and ID statehood was and is unconstitutional]

I voted for the winning candidate in the Democratic primary for Baltimore County Executive this year, in a race they won by 17 votes. Given the partisan leaning of the County, the primary is basically tantamount to election.

[Sic Semper Fascistis]

That's a great story! However, the reason you should vote is not because "it counts" (which as others have pointed out, technically it only does if the race is decided by 1 vote). The reason is that it's the right thing to do.

[インターネット掲示板ユーザー Punxsutawney Phil]

That's a great story! However, the reason you should vote is not because "it counts" (which as others have pointed out, technically it only does if the race is decided by 1 vote). The reason is that it's the right thing to do.

[136or142]

It pains me because some of the comments here seem to be based on my reply as if nobody realized I was just making a joke.  This one is especially painful because I like my joke!


"These humans are so stupid.  They can't even do mathematics.  They refer to us as a '5th column' when we're actually a 4.815th column."

[Progressive Pessimist]

I always do my best to get everyone I know to vote, regardless of the election or where they live. I did manage to have some effect actually, when I got my friend to vote in the New Jersey Democratic Gubernatorial primary last year.