Presidential Elections

Question 1

introduction

Answer 1

• the election of the President and VP is an indirect vote in which citizens cast ballots for a slate of members of the Electoral College; these electors in turn directly elect the President and VP
• each state is allocated a number of Electoral College electors equal to the number of its senators and Representatives in the US Congress
• under the constitution, each state legislature is allowed to designate a way of choosing electors, thus, the popular vote on Election Day is conducted by the various states and not directly by the federal government
• once chosen, the electors can vote for anyone, but they vote for their candidates who won in their state
• the formal compaign begins after the parties have nominated their candidates at the National Party Convention in august
• election day is the first tuesday in November

Question 2

Presidential Debates

Answer 2

• there are three debates
• topics discussed are often most controversial issues of the time
• elections have been nearly decided by these debates (e.g. the 1st televised tv debate between Richard Nixon and John F Kennedy
• debates are often considered a de facto election process
• debates are targeted at undecided voters, those who tend not to be partial to any political ideology or party
• the 1960 debate drew over 66 million viewers out of a population of 179 million, making it one of the most watched broadcasts in US television history
• now audiences range from 46 million for the first 2000 debate to a high of over 67 million for the first debate in 2012

Question 3

presidential debate: President Ford and Jimmy Carter

Answer 3

• held in 1976
• perceived as influential in determining Ford’s narrow loss in the election of that year when he declared “there is no Soviet domination in Eastern Europe”, widely perceived as an embarrassing gaffe

Question 4

presidential debate: George H W Bush and Bill Clinton

Answer 4

• 1992
• Bush was seen looking at his watch during questions which was perceived negatively by the electorate, whereas Bill Clinton was an effective debater particularly in the ‘town hall’ format

Question 5

todays presidential debates

Answer 5

• 2008 and 2012 demonstrated a lack of impact
• although Romney won the first 2012 debate, boosting GOP morale, a victory which nevertheless had little impact on the election outcome

Question 6

FORBES: Presidential Debate: Romney Started Slow, Then Thoroughly Beat Obama

Answer 6

• “Romney lost the first segment because he doesn’t seem confident enough in his own, at times passable policy proposals”
• Obama was knocked down after he countered Romney’s plan to reduce deficits by getting rid of corporate welfare, specifically $4B in subsidies for oil companies. Romney quickly responded that Obama misspoke about $4B, that it’s in fact $2.8B, but the knockdown was in his retort that %2.8 billion for oil companies pales in comparison to the $90B in welfare that Obama has showered on free energy companies - Romney said “you don’t just pick winners and losers, you just pick the losers”
• Obama exhibited grave facial expressions, rambling, unsteady answers that never went anywhere especially after the segment on the deficit

Question 7

DAILY FINANCE: The Obama Romney Debate: Who Won (and Why That’s Not the Key Question)

Answer 7

• 270 minutes of partisan disagreement
• Romney’s superior performance in the first debate upended this race and may have put him on the cusp of becoming the next president
• 3rd debate: Obama was strong and forceful when discussing foreign policy, and aggressive in crippling Romney’s foreign policy
• Romney was strongest when he tied his answers back to the economy, deficits, and jobs
• both candidates appeared to have accomplished their primary goals
• Obama looked presidential and strongly defended his economic and foreign policy record
• “But, the bad news for Obama, and good news for Romney, is that winning this debate may not matter very much at all”

Question 8

Electoral College

Answer 8

• when americans vote on the first tuesday of November, they are not directly voting for the President
• Americans are voting to instruct their state’s electoral college voters (ECVs) to vote for a candidate on their behalf
• the number of ECVs allocated to each state is the number of Congressional representatives the state has - therefore, every state automatically gets two (for the two senators from each state)
• some states are so small in population they only have one congressional district, so these states get three ECVs (e.g. Wyoming)
• California is the most populous state: it gets 55 ECVs
• there are 538 ECVs in total as Washington DC gets the same number of ECVs as the smallest state
• as states grow and fall in population redistricting occurs: states are allocated more or fewer congressional districts according to population

Question 9

what is the constitutional theory behind the indirect election of both the President and Vice President

Answer 9

• while Congress is popularly elected by the people, the President and Vice President are elected to be executives of a federation of independent states
• in Federalist Paper 39, James Madison argued that the Constitution would have two houses: the state-based Senate and the population based House of Representatives
• meanwhile, the President would be elected by a mixture of two modes

Question 10

what is the winner takes all principle?

Answer 10

• 48 states allocate ECVs on a “winner-takes-all” principle

- e.g. in 2012 Obama won 50.1% of the popular vote in Florida, but won all 29 of Florida’s ECVs

Question 11

how does Maine and Nebraska allocate EVCs?

Answer 11

• allocate one ECV for a popular vote victory in each congressional district, and a further two for the overall winner in the state
• although no ECV is required by federal law or the Constitution to honour the ay their state voted, there have only been very few occasions when an ECV voted contrary to a pledge
• some states have laws punishing faithless electors

Question 12

Criticisms of the Electoral College:

Irrelevance of popular vote

Answer 12

• Political scientist George C Edwards wrote in 2011: “The United Sates is the only country that elects a politically powerful president via an electoral college and the only one in which a candidate can become president without having obtained the highest number of votes in the sole of final round of popular voting
• on three occasion the candidate who won the election actually lost the popular vote (1876, 1888 and 2000)
• this breaches a basic principle of democracy for many commentators
• this is due to the ‘winner-takes-all’ system and that smaller states are significantly overrepresented
• technically, in a two-candidate race, with equal voter turnout in every district and no faithless electors, a candidate could win the electoral college while winning only about 22% of the nationwide popular vote
• additionally, a candidate who won the popular vote in the eleven states with the most ECVs would win the Presidency, even if they won no votes whatsoever in the remaining 39 states

Question 13

Criticisms of the Electoral College:

Disproportionate influence of and focus on ‘swim states’

Answer 13

• the vast majority of states in the US are ‘safe’, they lean heavily Democratic or Republican
• since most sates use a winner-takes-al arrangement in which the candidate with the most votes in that state receives all of the state’s electoral votes, there is a clear incentive to focus almost exclusively on only a few key undecided states
• in 2004, more than 1/4 of television advertising money was spent in Florida alone (the largest swing state), and in 2012 the Obama campaign had 790 field offices in the US overall but in 25 safe states the campaign only had one

Question 14

Criticisms of the Electoral College:

Overrepresentation

Answer 14

• as each state automatically receives two ECVs regardless of population this means that states with small populations are significantly overrepresented
• e.g. if California had the same ECV proportion as the smallest state (Wyoming), it would have 180 ECVs instead of the current 55

Question 15

Criticisms of the Electoral College:

discourages voter participation

Answer 15

• other than swing states, voter turnout is largely insignificant due to entrenched political party domination in most states
• the Electoral College decreases the advantage a political party or campaign might grain for encouraging voters to turn out, except in those swing states
• if the presidential election were decided by a national popular vote, in contrast, campaigns and parties would have a strong incentive to persuade their friends and neighbours to turn out to votes
• the differences in turnout between swing states and non-swing states under the current electoral system suggest that replacing the Electoral College with direct election by popular vote would likely increase turnout and participation significantly

Question 16

Criticisms of the Electoral College:

unfair on third parties

Answer 16

• as with any ‘winner-takes-all’ electoral system, national third parties are at a distinct disadvantage
• e.g., in 1992 Ross Perot won 19% of the national popular vote but no ECVs
• regional third parties, conversely, may be able to concentrate their support more effectively

Question 17

Arguments in favour of the Electoral College:

Prevents an urban-centric victory

Answer 17

• proponents of the electoral college argue that the Electoral College prevents a candidate from winning the Presidency by simply winning in heavily populated urban areas
• this means that candidates must make a wider geographical appeal than they would if they simply had to win the national popular vote
• states with more rural or geographically spread populations would be likely to be ignored without the Electoral College, a particular problem given that 25 states have a population density of less than 100 people per square mile

Question 18

Arguments in favour of the Electoral College:

Maintains the federal character of the nation

Answer 18

• the US is a federal coalition which consists of component states
• proponents of the current system argue that the collective opinion of even a small state merits attention at the federal level greater than that given to a small, though numerically equivalent, portion of a very populous state
• the system also allows each state the freedom, within constitutional bounds, to design its own laws on voting and enfranchisement without an undue incentive to maximise the number of votes cast
• in his book ‘A More Perfect Constitution’, professor Larry Sabato elaborated on this advantage of the Electoral College, arguing to “mend it, don’t end it”, in part because of its usefulness in forcing candidates to pay attention to lightly populated states and reinforcing the role of the state in federalism

Question 19

Arguments in favour of the Electoral College:

Promotes a two-party system

Answer 19

• many believe that a two-party system promotes political stability and prevents rapid, destabilising change
• the two-party system ensures the Republican and Democrats are deeply rooted in US society, perceives as better than a system subject to constant flux

Question 20

Arguments in favour of the Electoral College:

Little impact of voter turnout

Answer 20

• although critics argue the Electoral College depresses participation, there is little evidence that this occurs in practice
• in 2012, for instance, the state with the highest turnout (Minnesota - 76.1%) and the state with the lowest turnout (Hawaii - 44.5%) were both safe blue Democratic states, suggesting that levels of voter participation have nothing to do with the Electoral College and are instead related to other factors

Question 21

Arguments in favour of the Electoral College:

Constitutional framework

Answer 21

• the US is a constitutional democracy, and as the Electoral College is a key element of the Constitution and demonstrably supported by the Founding Fathers many argue it should be maintained

Question 22

the federal argument

Answer 22

• the 2000 Presidential election was razor-close because, for the most part, Vice President Al Gore won the electors of most of the highly populous states and Governor George W. Bush won the elects of the least populous states - which are the majority of the states
• GOre won most the big electoral states (which are few) and Bush got a large number of the small electoral states
• the closeness of the election highlights the fairness of tens system - the populous states should each carry a heavier weight in the vote total, but since the states themselves select a President, no individual state can afford to be dismissed
• to eliminate the electoral college would be essentially to eliminate the role of states in presidential elections.
• it would comprehensively nationalise the selection and insinuate that states as such have no interest in national presidential politics
• for all practical purposes, it would remove the borders between states and transform the United States of America into the united people of America

Question 23

popular vote for Obama and Romney

Answer 23

O- 51%

R - 47%

Question 24

electoral vote for Obama and Romney

Answer 24

O - 61%

R - 38%

Question 25

vote for Obama:

Race

Answer 25

White - 39% (R-59%)
Afro-American - 93%
Asian - 73%
Hispanic - 71%

Question 26

vote for Obama:

Age

Answer 26

18-29 - 60%

65 and over - 44%

Question 27

why did Romney lose?

according to CNN

Answer 27

• he had little support from young, minorities
• Romney lost embarrassingly among young people, African-Americans and Hispanics, a brutal reminder for Republicans that their party is ideologically out of tune with fast-growing segments of the population
• Obama crushed Romney among Hispanic voters by a whopping 44 points, a margin of victory that likely propelled the president to victories in Nevada, Colorado, and possible Florida
• “Latinos were disillusioned with Obama, by they are absolutely terrified by the idea of Mitt Romney” - GOP fundraiser Ana Navarro
• many campaign aids blamed Sandy for the loss, as the storm dominated news headlines for the final week of campaigning
• the storm, former Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour told CNN on Sunday, “broke Romney’s momentum”
• at the same time, the campaign’s door-todoor canvassing effort was heavily reliant on fired-up but untrained volunteers
• “What was presented as discipline by the Romney campaign by staying on one message, the economy, was a strategic error that resulted in a winning margin of pro-life votes being left on the table” said Marjorie Dannenfelser, president
• some wondered aloud about the selection of Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin as Romney’s running mate, suggesting that a Republican from a more winnable battleground state might have made a difference
• Romney never seemed to articulate a clear rational e according to CNN article Nov 2012

Question 28

why did Obama win?

according to CNN

Answer 28

• Obama organizers, meanwhile, had been deeply embedded in small towns and big cities for years, focusing their persuasion efforts on person-to-person contact
• not only did Obama field marshals get their targeted supporters to the polls, they found new voters and even outperformed their watershed 2008 showings in some decisive counties, a remarkable feat in a race that was supposed to see dampened Democratic turnout
• in Florida’s Hillsborough County, home to Tampa, the Obama campaign outpaced their final 2008 tally by almost 6,000 votes. In Nevada’s vote rich Clark Country, Obama forces scrounged up almost 9,000 more votes than they did four years ago
• Sandy offered Obama a chance to again look presidential
• Democrats showed decisively that their ground game is devastatingly better than anything their rivals have to offer
• Sasha Issenberg wrote “No party ever has ever had such a durable structural advtange over the other on polling, making television ads, or fundraising, for example”

Question 29

why did Romney lose?

according to Real Clear Politics

Answer 29

• Romney put forward “self-deportation” as a partial policy prescription for the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants living in this country . Obama on the other hand embraced the DREAM Act which would grant a path to citizenship for young immigrants, even those in the country illegally, who enlisted in the armed forces or attended college
• after Romney was nominated, the president signed an executive order barring the deportation of illegal minors. It was mostly symbolic, but it was politically savvy, and Latino voters noticed. Nationally, Obama received a whopping 69 percent of the Hispanic vote - higher than 2008. G. W. Bush won 40 percent of the Hispanic vote in 2004 whereas Romney won only 27 percent
• Romney’s running mate had no help in helping him win election. In terms of the demographic and geographic, appointing Paul Ryan, the effect was a net zero. Choosing a woman could have dulled the 12 percent gender gap Romney suffered on Election Day. Despite the likelihood of drawing unflattering comparisons to McCain’s choice of Sarah Pail in 2008, it might have been worth the risk, especially given the Democrats’ “war on women” attacks and the injurious gaffes about rape by two GOP Senate hopefuls

Question 30

why did Obama win?

according to Real Clear Politics

Answer 30

• Obama’s re-election to another four-year term as the 44th president of the US was no surprise
• Obama and Joe Biden eked out victories over Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan in the hotly contested states of New Hampshire, Virginia, Ohio, Iowa, Colorado and Florida, giving Democrats a 100-vote cushion in the Electoral College, whereas Romney only flipped two states, Indiana and North Carolina
• Obama and Biden piled up large majorities among under-30 voters
• after the killing of Osama bin Laden in 2011, although poll ratings for democrats didn’t soar upwards, it was still hard for Republicans to make the case that Obama was soft on terrorism. And as the news broke out, Americans gravitated towards the white house
• “Storm Sandy” temporarily stopped the campaign in its tracts, along with any residual momentum Romney still had. It also afforded Obama the opportunity of acting like a president, which he did effectively. On Election day, some 40 percent of Americans told exit pollsters that Obama’s response to the Storm was an important factor in their vote and most of those who said so pulled the lever for the incumbent

Question 31

power of incumbency (holding office)

Answer 31

• many commentators noted the influence of incumbency in enabling Obama to secure re-election in 2012
• it is a truism that incumbents usually win: since the 1980s, every president other than George HW Bush has won re-election
• however, Obama won re-election with a smaller share of the vote and ECVs. Normally an incumbent President wins by a more significant margin (true of Reagan, Clinton, and W Bush)
• “there is one basic, fundamental reason that President Obama has a good chance at re-election, Obama is an incumbent” - USA Today, David Jackson, Oct 2012
• starting in 1900, the year President William McKinley won re-election over William Jennings Bryan, White House occupants have won 14 of 19 races in which they have run
• in the past eight decades only four sitting presidents have lost re-election: Herbert Hoover (1932), Gerald Ford (976), Carter (1980) and George H. W. Bush (1992)
• Romney can take comfort in the fact that sitting incumbents have lost three times over the past four decades; aides say they are modelling their race on the one in 1980, when a late surge propelled Reagan past Carter

Question 32

what are the factors that help an incumbent gain re-election?

Answer 32

• certainly, when a president is associated with economic recovery (such as Reagan in 1984) or strong economic growth (such as Clinton) re-election app earls highly likely
• some would argue that during a time of war an incumbent is almost certain to be del-elected (such as W Bush in 2004), but Obama seems to confound some of these arguments

Question 33

what is particularly significant about Obamas re-election however?

Answer 33

• The Washington Times declared in 2011 that not “since FDR, has an incumbent president been re-elected with the electorate feeling - and with good cause - so profoundly pessimistic about our nation’s current and future economic health”
• moreover, Obama’s approval ratings have actually been historically quite low

Question 34

comparisons of popular presidents

Answer 34

• according to Gallup (a polling company): “President Obama averaged 49.1% job approval during his first term in office, among the lowest for post-World War II presidents. Only Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford had lower job approval averages. Obama’s first term average is most similar to Bill Clinton’s. Lyndon Johnson, John Kennedy, and Dwight Eisenhower were the most popular first-term presidents. Obama’s first term approval average, like those of most presidents with lower first-term averages, was likely dragged gown by a sluggish economy. Clinton and Reagan saw higher second-term approval as the economy improved.
• these facts would suggest that Obama’s re-election had less to do with his record than other factors, especially the superiority of the Obama campaign