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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
The Mormons might not vote Democrat, but they are looking increasingly likely to sit out the vote entirely, possibly since the perception is that Trump embodies the opposite of Mormonism. They do a ton of charity, Salt Lake City's program for homeless people is the best one in the entire US, and many of them are the nicest people you could ever meet.
If the Mormons do sit out of the Presidential election, that might cause Utah to flip once, but it probably wouldn't have an impact on the down-ticket race. And the Tea Party didn't get much of a lasting hold on Utah anyway, so that's not really a problem, honestly.
My family on my dad's side has a lot of mormons, and I've actually been to Utah myself, so I can say with some first-hand experience that this is accurate.
Whatever regressive social beliefs they might hold, they would find Trump's blatant disregard for any sort of respect or decorum towards pretty much anyone to be intolerable and unacceptable for a presidential candidate. Him being a gigantic buffoon also doesn't do him any favors with them.
@Cap: No, I don't think that plan would actually work. For that matter, I suspect that Even Evil Has Standards in regards with that plan.
Leviticus 19:34@fred, 2 pages ago:
Nebraska and Maine are the only ones who split like that. How electors are apportioned is often determined by state law, just that the 48-state-plus-DC consensus is "winner take all statewide popular vote."
Other options being considered include the "Interstate Popular Vote Compact" which says that a state will give their electoral votes to whoever wins the nationwide popular vote (but since this would have screwed Republicans in every election since 1992 except 2004, it's not popular on that side), and the Pennsylvania GOP floated the idea of congressional-district apportionment, where the 2 E Vs that come from the Senators go to whoever is the state popular vote winner, but the X E Vs that come from the representatives is based on whoever won each district, based on the fact that Obama smoked Romney in PA but we still sent 11 of 17 Congressman as Republicans, so Romney could have won PA and won nationwide under that scheme, but it's based on heavy gerrymandering practices anyway.
http://m.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/aug/8/hillary-clinton-sued-parents-benghazi-victims/
Couldn't scandalize Clinton enough with Benghazi or the email server? How about trying again with Benghazi and the email server.
First two paragraphs:
The lawsuit, filed by Patricia Smith and Charles Woods, blames the attacks in part on the current Democratic presidential nominee’s use of a private email server when she was secretary of state.
From my neck of the woods, our Republican senator up here in Maine has officially broken her support from Donald Trump, [1]
citing three incidents in particular: Trump mocking the disabled reporter, the Mexican-American judge, and the Khans. Not particularly surprising, since our republicans apart from our current governor tend to be old school conservatives-like, Nixon era thought processes, though more socially liberal.
Medinoc: changing to a straight-up popular vote would definitely require a constitutional amendment which is really ****ing hard to do - the Electoral College is hard-wired into Article II. Using this method is (it is argued) legally easier since states already have the explicit power to decide how to allocate their electors - an amendment would be unnecessary.
The damned queen and the relentless knight.Individual states tend not to change it over a prisoner's dilemma sort of thing. If Texas changes but Oklahoma doesn't, Oklahoma now gets an even more disproportionate voice in the EC: small non-swing states who did not make the change would become even more comparatively powerful in the EC than they already are. Not to mention the obvious bias towards Democrats in the popular vote anyway.
It won't happen, not until there's a political realignment.
Proportional EV apportionment would be the most likely (state with 10 E Vs that went 60/40 would have 6 for the one and 4 for the other), since it would "unlock" Texas liberals and New York conservatives alike and do a better job of making sure most everyone's vote counted without anyone being silenced, but due to the popular vote bias towards the Dems again, still unlikely.
Not to mention the Prisoner's Dilemma emerging again in that regard - if NY did it that way while Texas didn't, it'd shoot Democrats in the foot in the Presidential race, and vice-versa if Texas did it and NY didn't.
"Why would I inflict myself on somebody else?"Yes, a state unlocking proportional EC voting would swing the vote towards the party that it is in opposition to overall, which no state is willing to do.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"ya'll could have a referendum. Even if it's not technically legally binding good luck fighting against the will of the people, as Britain found out.
Is using "Julian Assange is a Hillary butt plug" an acceptable signature quote?
You'd need some super complicated legislation for that, or a cosntiutional amendment.
I guess Calafornia counsel technically vote to change this EC system to a proportional one with a condition attached that said law will only come into effect if Texas also passes the same law.
edited 9th Aug '16 8:10:43 AM by Silasw
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ CyranAntiteilchen: The point of NPVIC is to gather enough states (those whose EC votes would sum to at least 270) to agree to vote for the popular vote winner - having 270 all agree means it literally wouldn't matter how every other state votes in the EC because the compact would have a majority (at least until Congress votes to expand its membership). In the extreme case, only the top 11 states ATM would be enough to make it binding and effective (it's just that the sky would fall before Texas, Florida, Ohio, or North Carolina would even consider it with any seriousness) - at the moment, 11 states (well, OK, 10 states plus DC) totaling 165 EC votes have signed on.
An actual constitutional amendment requires 3/4 of all states (at present, 38) to ratify, plus approval from both the House and Senate, to take effect.
edited 9th Aug '16 8:48:45 AM by megarockman
The damned queen and the relentless knight.A Constitutional amendment to force all states to use proportional EC allocation would be interesting. It wouldn't solve the inherent problems with FPTP, but it might give people more of a sense that their vote matters.
I'm not sure that making all states give their EC votes to the national popular vote winner would be taken well, though, especially by those states that tend to go against the NPV. In other words, I don't see how you could ever get the necessary states behind it to ratify such an amendment.
edited 9th Aug '16 8:50:35 AM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

Here's The Other Wikis article on Nebraska's Districts.
They are the states Congressional Districts since the state sends three people to the House of Representatives.
District 2 is Omaha, which is the most dense part of the state. Distinct 1 surrounds District 2, and District 3 takes up the other 60-70% of the state.
edited 8th Aug '16 9:10:44 PM by tclittle
"We're all paper, we're all scissors, we're all fightin' with our mirrors, scared we'll never find somebody to love."