Free Republic

President Certified After Objection Delay Thursday, January 06, 2005 WASHINGTON — A joint session of Congress resumed meeting Thursday evening and quickly finalized certification of President Bush's (search) 286 Electoral College votes to Democrat John Kerry's 251. A candidate needs 270 votes to win the presidential election. Kerry running mate John Edwards received one Electoral vote. The certification was delayed for several hours after Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., and Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones, D-Ohio, stopped the formal declaration of Bush's second term to protest voting irregularities. The joint session had met earlier in the day but quickly recessed per congressional...

Marblehead, Mass. (PRWEB) December 11, 2008 -- Dr. Mary Maxwell, political scientist, said today: "Obama's silence about his citizenship is indefensible and unworkable. Next Monday, the 538 members of the Electoral college meet and they are at risk, themselves, of violating state election laws if they participate in a fraud." "If a presidential candidate's claim that he meets the requirements are later found to be false," Maxwell said,"one or more of the 50 states could bring charges against him. But that would be a terrible thing if it comes after Inauguration Day. It would be better if a state would...

A lawyer playing a major part in a California lawsuit urging officials to prevent the state's 55 Electoral College votes from being recorded for Barack Obama until questions about his citizenship are resolved has written to county clerks around the state, seeking an investigation into a process that has allowed a dead woman to be listed as an official elector. According to Gary Kreep, executive director of the United States Justice Foundation, the clerks have been advised about the "irregularity" in the list of electors provided by the Democratic Party in California. "In the 28th Congressional District (Congressman Howard Berman),...

I’m pretty sure that I’ve never mentioned the birth certificate issue up until this point, even in the heat of the campaign.I have to confess that I have no idea what to make of the fact that, despite all of the lawsuits (most of which were thrown out due to lack of standing, which in turn makes one wonder, if a US citizen has no standing to challenge whether or not a presidential candidate is eligible to be president, who does?), the Obama campaign could easily put this to rest by simply unsealing the birth certificate, which (coincidentally with his...

The chasm between those who want President-elect Barack Obama to produce his birth certificate to verify his eligibility to hold the nation's highest office and those who simply support the Democrat is widening. "The Constitution means what we today decide it means," opined one participant on a new WND forum that offers readers an opportunity to express their opinion on the birth certificate dispute.

What if Electoral College Elects Sarah Palin to Presidency? Satire By John LillpopWhat if Barack Obama is declared a non-citizen and ineligible to serve as U.S. President?That is most improbable, right? Perhaps, but not impossible.In fact, a challenge to Obama's citizenship is scheduled to be the subject of a "conference" at the U.S. Supreme Court on December 5, 2008. A conference is a meeting of the Supreme Court Justices where cases are reviewed and the court decides which ones to accept for formal review. *The formal election of Barack Obama by the Electoral College is scheduled for December 15,...

Over the last 8 years, did George W. Bush help or hurt our party? We did see 2 electoral wins, and the first majority win since his dad trounced Dukakis. He helped keep a Democrat out of the White House for 8 years, and stave off out and out John Kerry liberalism, who is probably more liberal than Barack Hussein Obama. however, we got trounced pretty badly on November 4, all across the board, even in Governor's mansions, where Dems managed to do well in 2002. The Dems ranks grew over the '90's, going from 43% of the vote steadily...

the silence is deafening. it was a big issue in '00 and '04. hhhhmmmmmm!????

Its pretty simple. Assuming McCain wins the states he is currently in the lead or tied in according to RCP averages of state polls, then theses are the states he would have to carry to defeat Obama: State Obama (D) McCain (R) RCP Average RCP Status 2004 2000 Florida (27) 48.5 46.0 Obama +2.5 Toss Up Bush +5.0 Bush +0.1 Virginia (13) 50.0 45.8 Obama +4.2 Toss Up Bush +8.2 Bush +8.1 Ohio (20) 48.3 44.7 Obama +3.6 Toss Up Bush +2.1 Bush +3.5 Colorado (9) 50.5 45.0 Obama +5.5 Leaning Bush +4.7 Bush +8.4 This would make it a...

As the dynamic race between the McCain-Palin ticket and the Obama-Biden ticket hurtles toward Election Day, many respected private analysts have predicted that there is a very strong possibility that McCain-Palin will win an Electoral College victory despite the fact that Obama-Biden will win the popular vote nationwide. The Founders’ vision was of a body of electors that would protect the Republic from masters of the political arts who would not best serve the nation. If the Electoral College defeats the popular vote, then in this case, it is doing its job. In six weeks, America will elect a new...

Yahoo's current top story features a map that I think is a fair starting point for any electoral analysis. Barring anything huge in the final week, the electoral votes that are basically already decided look like this: Obama 234, McCain 163, Undecided 141.Obama thus needs to add only 36 EV's. The 11 unclaimed states are:FL 27PA 21OH 20NC 15VA 13IN 11MO 11CO 9NM 5NV 5NH 4If Obama takes only CO and FL (36 total EV), it's over. If he fails in six of the biggest seven prizes here, he still wins (with NH, NV, NM, CO, and VA, totalling exactly...

McCain's (Long) Road to Electoral Win 1. Abandon Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa. 2) Attack New Hampshire and New Mexico. 3) Defend Colorado, Virginia, Nevada, Ohio and North Carolina.

...The system is a relic of the early days of the republic when electors were supposed to be independent agents exercising their judgment in choosing a presidential candidate from a list of several contenders. Today, electors are party loyalists who almost always vote for their party’s nominee. On Friday, a group of legal scholars, political scientists, and systems specialists gathered at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for a conference on the Electoral College. Their focus? How to better engineer the system...

This is looking uglier & uglier: Obama/Biden 353 McCain/Palin 185

Key Obama Blue 234 McCain Red 179 Too close to call Purple 125

What changed recently, other than McCain doing very well in Florida, for RealClear to move Florida back to toss-up? Obama now ahead in electoral map. http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/maps/obama_vs_mccain/?map=5

McCain expands lead with slight shift in polls.

Might want to pin this post high and save it in your bookmarks. As most junkies know, the # McCain must reach is 270 out of 538 available votes. However, for those new to politics, many don't know this. As such, I thought I would give a "guide" as to how to get there. In the coming days you'll see a lot of "map analysis", the best of which is probably provided by John King of CNN. You'll see some optimistic McCain maps and some optimistic Obama maps. It should be noted that despite that, much has remained the same...

There are no nonpartisan state polls today for anything. PPP (D) released a poll of Ohio showing it tied at 45% each. Ohio is no doubt going to be a huge battleground again. In Gallup's national tracking poll, Obama and McCain are tied at 45% each. In Rassmusen's tracking poll, Obama is barely ahead, 47% to 45%.A quirk of the schedule this year may benefit the Republicans. Normally each candidate gets a bounce in the polls after his convention. However, the Democratic convention is followed immediately by John McCain's birthday, which will put him back in the spotlight and then...

With their appeal to independents, Barack Obama and John McCain may scramble the electoral map in November. Others want to go further and throw out the Electoral College completely, replacing this "complicated" and "undemocratic" system with a direct, nationwide popular vote for the presidency. Despite its democratic allure, it's a bad idea. Backers of the popular vote do not seek to amend the Constitution; they know this is a nonstarter. Instead, a growing "National Popular Vote" (NPV) movement wants state legislatures to instruct their electors to vote for the winner of the greatest number of popular votes in the national...

Dukakis calls for end to Electoral College Dave Wedge By Dave Wedge Tuesday, July 8, 2008 Calling it “critically important” to eliminate the Electoral College system, former Bay State Gov. Michael Dukakis called on lawmakers to join a growing number of states supporting a switch to a national popular vote to elect the president. “I think it is high time we got rid of the Electoral College and elected our presidents the way we elect every other elected official in the country - by a vote of the people,” Dukakis wrote in a letter e-mailed to state lawmakers yesterday. “The...

What? Barack Obama just creamed John McCain in the nationwide popular vote, but McCain prevails because he won in the Electoral College? What? California went for a Republican for the first time since 1988, giving McCain a decisive 55 electoral votes? Neither scenario is implausible. The referendum in California to reverse a state Supreme Court ruling in favor of gay marriage seems certain to bring out hundreds of thousands of conservative voters. And if enough irate Hillary Clinton voters carry out their threats to sit out the election or even vote for McCain, ol’ Mac would be in clover. Some...

This November, a Democratic victory will probably hinge on the Electoral College votes of a handful of swing states. Howard Dean's pollster examines 17 fall battlegrounds, one by one. Thanks to John Adams and James Madison, an American presidential election really does begin and end with the Electoral College. Didn't 2000 tell us that? (Well, it ended with Anthony Kennedy and Sandra Day O'Connor, but you get the drift.) Critics scoff and call it an antiquated and unfair system (it is). Many Democrats -- notably, this year, Obama backers -- would like their party to stop thinking in terms of...