What If: the 2024 President Election Is an Honest-to-God Harris Landslide

Update: All of this was wrong. All of this was a lie. All of America is fucked up, don't tell me otherwise.

I'm still thinking about that USA Today report about early voting where Kamala Harris has a 63 percent lead in the ballots over trump's anemic 34 percent (with the difference going to third parties, natch).

Given how most of the modern - at least 21st Century - Presidential elections were not so heavily favored either way - balancing between 52-47 percent or closer - seeing THAT huge of a lead is stunning (and stirring up way too much hope for my own good, I admit it).

Logic dictates that the early voting is not a full representation of the likely voter turnout for this cycle. We're barely at a quarter of expected turnout - although with a week to go the numbers will go up - and more than half of the voters tend to wait until Election Day (some because they're still undecided, many because it's kinda traditional) anyway. We should expect a downward shift on that percentage lead to where the voting share fits the trends of a closer (say 55-45) election result.

We could be looking at the likelihood that a large number of Democratic - or Dem-leaning Independents - are voting earlier than the more traditional Republican voters who wait... except those early voting numbers show a near-level balance of Dem and GOP voters. So that narrative's a bit off.

The implications I'm seeing are 1) this is how the voting trends are going, and 2) there's a shocking number of Republican voters adding to that 63 percent Harris lead that can't be ignored.

So (dammit, my giddiness is getting the better of me), we are within the realm of positing a "What If": What if Harris really is getting close to 63 percent of the national vote this November?

One thing we shouldn't do is speculate on the final turnout numbers. Although there's signs of increased voter registration, there's still no guarantee of increased voter turnout (although the turnout numbers did go up in 2020 due to excessive use of mail-in ballots that made it easier to do so).

So let's go by the 2020 total turnout count, which was 158,429,631 Americans.

If that percentage trend (63) persists for Harris, she's looking at roughly 99,810,667 votes.

(jaw drops)

Considering Biden got roughly 51 percent and a total of 81,283,501 votes, I'd say that's a huge boost to the collective Democratic ego.

By comparison, trump's possible 34 percent will garner around 53,866,704 votes. It will be a decided drop off from the 74,223,975 he got in 2020 and also below his 2016 numbers of 62,984,828. It would be a massive rejection by voters tired of trump's antics the third time around.

Not only would the percentage difference be huge (Harris will win by 29 percent) but the vote total will be embarrassing (Harris will win by 45,943,963 votes). trump and the Republicans will try to scream "stolen votes," but on a scale that large there's no way even Far Right judges will buy that (or risk challenging it). 

(Also: Try imagining trump calling the Georgia Secretary of State and begging him to "find me 45 million votes.")

It would be a legitimate blowout for a Presidential election, something we haven't seen in decades. Looking back, the next closest election with that huge a percentage win gap was in 1984 when Reagan demolished Mondale 58 to 40 percent. Reagan won the Electoral votes of 49(!) states with roughly 54 million over 37 million. There's a reason why Democrats have campaigned with little joy until now, and that smackdown inflicted a ton of PTSD for years afterward.

You could consider Nixon's victory in 1972 over McGovern one of the biggest results in all of U.S. history - where he won 60 percent over McGovern's 37 for a massive popular vote win 47 million over 29 million - but then you have to remember Nixon and his CREEPs orchestrated a dirty tricks campaign to guarantee running against a massively unpopular McGovern.

The most recent Democratic win on this scale would be in 1964, with LBJ riding on Kennedy's legacy and against an (then) extreme conservative opponent in Goldwater where Johnson got 61 percent over Goldwater's 38 percent and a 43 million over 27 million popular vote turnout. 

I could go back to 1936 when FDR blew Alf Landon out of the water with a 60 percent vs. 36 percent result, but you get my drift. Harris getting 63 percent would top every other electoral trouncing to achieve a Blowout For the Ages. Even if that percentage slides down, if she's anywhere near Reagan's 58 percent turnout we're still talking a huge win trump and the GOP can't lie about.

One other thing that accompanied those big blowouts in 1984, 1972, 1964, and 1936 (and even the milder landslides we'd see from Eisenhower's 1952-1956 wins for example) were the Electoral College results (maps are from the 270towin website):

It would be pretty to see a Harris/Walz Electoral Map where most of the United States will color in as Blue...

I would argue that back in those days the geographic divisions between Democratic and Republican - or Liberal and Conservative - voters were not as severe as we have today. Back then, the states were pretty well mixed between the major parties, and moderates between them would slide one election to the next between candidates without fear of being disloyal. 

You could get an Electoral College map that would overexaggerate the popular vote wins because the winning candidate got past the bare minimum to win there (Mondale almost lost his home state in 1984 by 2000 votes! And we know how Hillary lost Wisconsin and Michigan by similar margins to our detriment...). In today's partisan environment - and where liberals and conservatives relocated to states more attuned to their worldviews - it's not as likely for Harris to flip so many states Democratic the way LBJ and FDR did in their day. 

Having said that, if Harris is garnering - and keeping - 63 percent of voters by Election Day, that HAS to mean a large number of once-solid Republicans are abandoning their partisan stance (at least for this cycle), and across a number of otherwise solid Republican-held Red states to where a massive Electoral College win is in the pipeline. Not just Harris keeping the states Biden won in 2020, and not just flipping key battleground states like North Carolina and maybe Florida, and not just the almost-real possibility of finally flipping Texas: I'm talking nearly every Red state could be in play with those numbers (save for of course deep Red states like West Virginia, South Carolina, Utah, Wyoming, and Idaho). Dear 9 readers of this blog: Even ALASKA is in play.

...

Okay, with all THAT said, this "What If" fantasy is pretty to think so, but in the real world my track record for predicting things hasn't been all that great to begin with.

Like I said near the beginning of this wishful thinking, that early 63 percent lead can easily slide down as more voters show up and if more of them are leaning Republican and trump. The trend may look nice but actual voter turnout is what counts, and the early pro-Harris counts from Republican voters could just be that voting bloc getting their ballots done before they change their minds.

But... given that a sizable GOP voter bloc IS voting Harris and getting away from the once-rigid partisan voting habits, we ought to consider the reality that Harris is getting way above the now-standard 50-to-52 percent of winning we've seen in recent cycles. Even if Harris matches the more modest result of Obama's big win in 2008 of 53 percent, we're talking 83 million votes (a nice boost over 2020) and numbers that trump can't challenge.

Voter turnout remains key, fellow Americans.

We need 99 million or so of y'all to show up and vote Harris/Walz for the blowout we need to keep America free from trumpian misrule.

This is what 99 million Harris votes could look like

Let's do this.

One Quick Observation About the Republican War on Voters

This came up on Twitter, and my response sparked a realization about an irony regarding the Republican Party's obsession to suppress voters across all the states they can.

And this voter suppression effort is something that's been going on for a long time, this huge war against the Voting Rights Act that led to the Supreme Court's Shelby County v Holder ruling that essentially gave the Far Right states free license to throw up voting roadblocks however they see fit.

And this is with every legal assault pushed by Republicans claiming massive voter fraud they can never prove in the courts.

It's that, ironically enough, every recent attempt by Republicans to suppress voter turnout in the last two-three election cycles (since the Holder ruling) has probably done more to encourage massive voter registration and turnout with better and stronger evidence that such elections were fairly run.

From Wikipedia Commons created by Orser67

It's rather hilarious that the Republicans want to keep pushing for even more voter suppression attempts, especially in Georgia, when it's getting pretty obvious that a growing majority of Americans will push back against their efforts and vote accordingly. Every attempt the GOP legislators will come up with, the pro-voting groups will figure out how to hurdle those blocks and keep people voting. Other than outright denial of voting to ethnic minorities, women, and/or young people in open violation of the 15th, 19th, and 26th Amendments, the Republicans are going to make it worse for themselves.

I shouldn't complain. At this rate, the Republicans are going to be responsible for getting the 2024 Presidential election turnout well over 70 percent of the total population, which IMHO will be a great moment for American democracy (and the Democratic Party because the population numbers favor them).

The Calmness After The Dread

(Update: Many thanks to Infidel753 for adding me to Crooks&Liars' Mike's Blog Roundup! I need to note Infidel does a weekly roundup every Sunday - included there as well this past weekend, thanks again - so it should behoove you to check that blog every Sunday morning! IO SATURNALIA!)

It's been a month since the Election Night, after all that build-up, all that anxiety, all the stress that the results would be chaotic as hell.

There was, let's admit it, an open dread that the response to whoever won - Biden or trump - would lead to violence in the streets: That protests by one side or the other would lead to riots, police beatdowns, or worse.

Stores in major cities boarded up windows. Social media prepped for long fiery nights.

And... so far, it's been insanely quiet. Oh, trump and his lawyers are still stirring up bullshit over ballot counts and certifications, we've got a number of wingnut demagogues - especially just-pardoned Mike Flynn, who is falling further into seditious behavior - calling for shutting down everything and stealing the win for trump. We've had the pro-trump rallies screaming for arrests and acts of force in places like Georgia where the Senate runoff campaigns retained national attention.

But the oversized fears of nationwide rioting and blood in the streets hasn't happened, and it's looking like it might not happen even when the Electoral College officially calls it for Biden on December 14. (Of course, Gods help me if I've jinxed us all on this...)

It's a bit puzzling that all this brouhaha turned into a meh-haha. Bonnie Kristian at The Week is equally vexxed:

We've weathered four weeks of uncalled races, recounts, lawsuits, and allegations with relative calm. There was some rioting in Portland, where a Molotov cocktail was thrown at police, but tumultuous protests have been a fixture there for half a year now. In Michigan, some chanting Republicans attempted to force their way into a vote counting center but were restrained by police. Demonstrators assembled in other cities, too, and certainly some scuffles broke out. Yet the "dozens" of arrests reported nationwide are hardly the envisioned catastrophe...

I decided to revisit the forecasts. One of the most notable came from the International Crisis Group, a think tank that seeks to prevent war by "sound[ing] the alarm to prevent deadly conflict." Usually this work concerns places that are, well, not here, but for the 2020 election, the group issued its first report about the United States. "The 2020 U.S. presidential election presents risks not seen in recent history," the report said. "It is conceivable that violence could erupt during voting or protracted ballot counts."

The Crisis Group identified 11 risk factors, which it condensed to four larger themes in the executive summary: "political polarization bound up with issues of race and identity; the rise of armed groups with political agendas; the higher-than-usual chances of a contested outcome; and most importantly President Donald Trump, whose toxic rhetoric and willingness to court conflict to advance his personal interests have no precedent in modern U.S. history."

The first of these four is impossible to dispute. We are increasingly polarized and that polarization does involve identity as well as related issues of misinformation, information segregation, epistemic crisis, and institutional distrust spelled out in the longer risk list. With the benefit of hindsight, we also know the outcome has indeed been contested and Trump has missed no opportunity to spread division and undermine public trust and goodwill. The president still has supporters — as many as half of Republicans, per a mid-November poll, the most recent I could find — who believe he "rightfully won" the election and is being defrauded...

And yet, for some reason, the possibility of violence has not turned - not yet, I must caveat - into reality. Kristian considers why:

...One is that some of the proposed conditions went unmet: Trump didn't win; there wasn't a wildcard event; and the election contestation — the real procedure of it, as opposed to vivid nonsense the president and his surrogates have spouted on television and Twitter — has been fairly mundane. We've seen nothing so exciting as Bush v. Gore in 2000. Biden won the closest state races by margins of tens of thousands, not a mere 537 votes.

A second reason, as I wrote before Election Day, is that most Americans (including most Republicans) were prepared to wait for results. Everyone knew this year would be weird. How could we not? Trump's claim that any delay was a sign of cheating and a Democratic attempt to "creat[e] havoc" never made sense, so when the expected delay arrived, nobody panicked.

Or, at least, they didn't panic in real life. Maybe they panicked online, and maybe that, as New York Times columnist Ross Douthat has theorized, served as a way to "playact extremism, ... to approach radical politics the way they approach a first-person shooter game — as a kind of sport, a kick to the body chemistry, that doesn't put anything in their relatively comfortable late-modern lives at risk."

That brings me to my third and most significant reason: Whether because we're getting our extremist impulses out online (or by donating to Trump's still-fundraising campaign) or because we're among the plurality of Americans who don't align with either partisan extreme, most of us are not actually interested in participating in civil strife...

For all the rhetoric, for all the chest-thumping, for all the loud screams by the extremists that "they" number in the millions... when it comes down it the extremists are an extreme minority of malcontents who overstate their numbers either out of arrogance, ignorance, or projection.

We have strong, albeit violated, norms against political violence in America, and there is little post-election rioting in our national history. Worries about civil war cycle with each election, but that's not the same as an appetite for street fighting, for making your hate tangible enough to shoot your neighbor for putting out the wrong yard sign. Even the alarming willingness to say violence may be "justified" to advance a political cause — which has risen in recent years, though much less than a Politico report initially suggested — is not the same as readiness to personally enact that violence.

Those "armed groups" who want to fight are a tiny minority of dunces. The rest of us may be very angry at each other, but we are mercifully not stupid enough to think violence will help...

This should not overlook the actual history we have with politically-motivated violence. We've had mad bombers and street shooters fighting over arguments - usually race-related - for decades. Redeemer governments of the late 19th Century - well into the 20th Century in some counties - made ready use of guns and rope to enforce their will. There's still a possibility that violence over who won the 2020 Presidential election - hint, Biden - can still erupt.

What's happening right now is that the fighting over this election is still relatively early, and it's focused mostly on courtroom battles where trump and his team of irrational lawyers keep losing their cases due to the simple fact they can't produce any actual evidence of voter fraud. There isn't necessarily any panic buttons getting pushed right now. Most of the trump supporters are still happily spinning conspiracy bullshit that once this all gets to the Supreme Court, trump's hand-picked Justices will SAVE 'MURIKKKA, nullify 80 million votes, and hand trump a gift-wrapped stolen election.

So what happens when all of trump's half-assed court appeals reach the Supreme Court... and a solid majority of Justices all say "This Court can only rule on the appropriate legality of the lower court rulings, and they were all relying on your evidence you never produced, there's nothing we can do, by the way where's the damned evidence?"

When we get to that moment, we may indeed see violence in the streets from the extremist trumpsters unable to cope with reality. But how bad could it get?

The scary news is that so far there's about 73 million Americans who voted trump. That's a lot of people to be worried about.

The good news is that - as Kristian pointed out - a vast majority of Republican voters are not extremists or violent towards their communities. I've noted before, most Republicans are hard-wired to vote Republican but are otherwise honest, decent people (who can't accept the fact their own party is led by crooked, vulgar people). If trump flashes out a Tweet for WAR to foment a coup takeover, many trump voters will shake their heads and mutter "okay, that's a little too far."

What we have to worry about are the trump extremists who have crossed that line of morality. The guy making pipe bombs in trump's name, for example, or the gunmen caught plotting to kidnap and kill governors.

We're not talking millions of Americans at this point: These numbers are mercifully few and far between - they have to bus in people from out of state to make their wingnut rallies number in the thousands, after all - but there's still enough of them to make the days between now and January nerve-wracking. All it will take is just one of them packing enough firepower to wipe out an entire city block to ruin everybody else's day.

Even with that dread, I am tired of talking like a Debbie Downer. There may be a nice little silver lining to celebrate in this: That in the end, a sizable number of Republicans - even ones who for godforsaken reasons VOTED FOR trump - are still able to respect the civil norms of a democratic-republic nation the same way a sizable number of Democrats do. 

Now if we can just get everyone to WEAR THE DAMN MASKS (and over the nose, everybody!) we can save our United States of America...

What If: Considering How trump Will Cheat in 2020

I wrote earlier that donald trump has no honest way to win the 2020 Presidential election.

So that means trump is going to cheat.

We're already seeing some of the steps trump is deploying to rig the turnout and thus the results. his latest Postmaster General is sabotaging the United States Postal Service to ensure mailing delays that could prevent mail-in ballots from getting received in time to count.

Other things in play, aside from trump's accusations that mail-in balloting is voter fraud, are AG William Barr's efforts to misdirect investigations into Russian (and other nations') meddling into the 2020 general vote. There's hints aplenty that Barr is setting up "October Surprises" to discourage voter turnout for Joe Biden. 

All of this culminates into a lot of worried speculation - and yes, I am piling onto that dread - of how trump and cronies are going to cause enough disruption into the results that he can shrug off a Popular Vote and also an Electoral College count that would otherwise confirm a Joe Biden victory. 

But can it really happen?

Infidel753 pointed me to a link to a website Electoral-Vote that took stock of all the fears and tried to look at the actual numbers and likely results for November 2020. What the blogger there found was, well here's a few paragraphs:

If we assume there is enough "fog" to give cover to state legislatures to start thinking about shenanigans, that still leaves the pro-Trump forces with some daunting math to confront. Let's start with the states that have Democratic trifectas. Joe Biden is expected to win all of these, and there are not going to be any EV-stealing shenanigans in Trump's favor in these places:

That already puts us (note: well, Biden) at 195 EVs. Now let's add in the states where Biden is expected to win, and the Democrats control at least one chamber of the state legislature (note: meaning the GOP can't automatically fck with the EV):

 

We're up to 233 EVs. Biden isn't going to lose any of these due to shenanigans, either. Note, incidentally, that Minnesota is the only one of the five additional states that has a split legislature. The four others have both chambers with Democratic control.

Now, let's add states where Biden is favored to win, and where there is at least one Democrat who has to sign off on the results (either the governor, the secretary of state, or both):

Now we are up to 305 EVs. Getting into the weeds of what could happen in each state is a bit much, but several things are already evident: (1) Republican-controlled legislatures in swing states would have to be very unified to pull off this scheme; (2) they would face pushback on that, including lawsuits, in many places; and (3) their likely best case scenario, even if they are unified and they prevail in court, is to deny anyone an electoral victory (by muddying the waters until the deadline for the EC to meet has passed) and to throw the election to the House...

So the good news, as long as the voter turnout matches what the polling is currently telling us, is that Biden can easily pass the 270 EV hurdle much like Obama did in 2008 and 2012. And the blogger at Electoral-Vote hasn't counted states like Florida, Ohio, Iowa, and Georgia that can still go Blue for Biden this November.

So the bad news is this: Now we know why trump and his GOP cronies are eager to fck up ballot-by-mails (aka Absentee balloting) to try and mess with ALL states results to create enough chaos to ruin this math. And now we know why Barr is readying the DOJ to cause the chaos, not prevent it.

Going through a current pandemic crisis that can hamper in-person voter turnout is probably one of the reasons - he'll never admit it, but you have to admit the thought has crossed so many people's minds that SOMEBODY in trump's orbit whispered it into his ear - why trump is failing to respond to the crisis at all.

Another element of bad news is, while the Electoral-Vote blogger - I'm not sure whose name in on it, it's either Votemaster or Zenger (hmm, as a Journalism grad I know that name) - knows the Popular vote AND Electoral vote all favor Biden, we can still see that trump and the GOP's endgame is to throw the chaos into the U.S. House. The example here isn't the 2000 Election madness - the conditions for that were different - but the 1800 and 1876 Elections, where political bias favored the Party in control of the House.

The sick rule of the House solution is that the votes are not tallied by Representative - which favors Democrats - but by State Delegation (the group per state) meaning 50 votes not 435 (and DC has not vote in this matter). Thanks to gerrymandering, delegations skew to the Republicans who currently control 26 delegations over Democrats' 23 (one delegation is split). THIS is what worries Never Trumpers, more so that messing with the Electoral College: Barr could either trick or bully enough state legislatures to not accept the popular voting in their states to award Electors, forcing the College to cancel and pass it all to a GOP-bent House.

Thing is, the Electoral-Vote blogger thought of that as well:

An even bigger problem is Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections (1966). While that one was specifically about poll taxes, it also established the broad principle that once the right of people to vote has been extended, the state cannot intervene to dilute the potency of that vote. Taken together, what Bush and Harper suggest is that a state might be on firm ground if they announce on, say, Jan. 1, 2020, that "this year, the state legislature is just going to award our EVs." However, once states allow people to cast actual ballots, that method for awarding EVs is locked in and cannot be altered...

It had happened before, by the way: In 1860, South Carolina didn't host a popular vote, their legislature went and awarded their results to the pro-Slavery Democratic candidate (Beckinridge). This time, it's too late: Any GOP state that's watching the polls swing to Biden (hi, Florida!) right now in August cannot cancel the vote and nominate the Electors. They can do everything else - suppress votes, rig machines, undercount results - but they still run the risk that the popular vote won't go their way.

Which is partly why they're waiting on Barr to release "reports" of mail-in ballots being "rigged" in order to justify negating the popular vote results... but THAT all depends on if the difference in results relies on the mail-ins counting or not (if Biden wins by a wide margin without mail-ins, forget it: Barr would have to argue a way to negate the WHOLE thing, which even conservative courts would choke on).

This is the point where headaches start forming, and the stress of paranoia/despair kicks in. The solutions rely on a lot of things outside of control at our (yours and mine) level. The Democratic Party has to be ready to call on a legion of lawyers across every state to fight Barr's likely meddling in any and every possibility.

The one thing WE can do at our level is turnout the vote. THAT'S the math we can control. As long as the turnout FOR Biden and the Democrats is high enough, the Republicans can't rig a damn thing. They'll yell and scream, they'll present bad evidence to argue their side, but if Biden is winning places by double-digits in enough states and at percentages close to polling, the Republicans will have a hard time arguing rigged results... and they run the risk at state levels of alienating enough residents to diminish state-level control by the 2022 midterms, if not outright street protests by an outraged majority that will never stop (hi, Belarus!).

Democrats need to ensure enough of their numbers are registered and ready to vote, confirmed to vote for Biden against a corrupt trump that is one step away from tinpot dictator status that haunts all the failed Republics we've seen over the decades.

Elections matter, Americans. Voter turnout matters, Democrats. Come hell or high water or COVID or police crackdowns, every one of us opposed to trump's misrule, every one of us opposed to McConnell's obstructionist destruction, we have to do the math and vote and make it count and make the Republicans answer for their cheating, corrupt ways.

Florida 2020: Voter Turnout Still a Must, Get Everyone Registered, Even If Republicans Are Being Assholes About It

One of my biggest personal interests in politics is civic engagement AKA voter registration and getting everybody to vote every election to get their voice hear.

I was thrilled in 2018 when my home state of Florida passed a state referendum amendment easing the right for ex-felons who've served their time to regain their power to vote. Previously there was a convoluted and unfair request process through the Governor's office that saw a decreased disinterest - especially with Republican governors - in granting voting rights to people who should be encouraged to re-engage our society. As long as the ex-felons served for non-violent crimes (violent ones had to stick to the petition process) they would get that right automatically.

So the state legislature and Governor - Republicans all - decided to be assholes about it and passed a law in 2019 curbing that Amendment by requiring the ex-felons had to repay all fines and debts - essentially a goddamn POLL TAX - before they could get re-registered. Considering 1) many ex-felons are poor to begin with and 2) those fees could range to thousands of dollars, this would have stopped them from regaining their civil rights.

All because Republicans are terrified of point 3) many ex-felons lean toward voting Democratic... and the number of them doing so would clearly tilt the partisan demographics of Florida a solid Blue for 2020.

Funny thing about that: The Republicans may have been too clever by half. Per Mark Joseph Stern's article in Slate:

After Floridians approved an initiative to restore voting rights to approximately 1.4 million people with felony convictions, Republican lawmakers immediately moved to sabotage the historic effort. The GOP-controlled legislature passed a law along party lines that effectively required a poll tax from a majority of those poised to regain their right to vote. The GOP’s brazenly partisan measure, however, appears to be backfiring. Democratic counties are taking advantage of a compromise buried in the statute to give residents their voting rights. Meanwhile, Republican counties are taking a hard line against suffrage—meaning a substantial majority of Floridians who do manage to register to vote are likely to be Democrats.

For more than a year, Florida’s politicians have been embroiled in a fight over Amendment 4, which 65 percent of Florida voters approved in 2018. Amendment 4 abolished a Jim Crow era law that permanently stripped the right to vote from anyone convicted of a felony. But Florida Republicans quickly kneecapped it, passing a bill that forced individuals to pay all fines and fees associated with their sentences before regaining their voting rights. This legislative assault on Amendment 4 threatened to take away the franchise from more than 1.1 million Floridians; the state is a pioneer of cash register justice, imposing a mind-boggling array of “user fees” on defendants to finance its criminal justice system.

Following immense backlash from Democrats and civil rights advocates, though, legislators added a conciliatory section to their bill. It allowed courts to modify “the original sentencing order to no longer require completion” of the initial sentence. In other words, courts can waive fines and fees imposed as part of a sentence. By doing so, courts can clear the way for former felons to complete their sentences and immediately become eligible to vote.

To implement this section, Florida’s four most populous counties created “rocket dockets” to waive fines and fees en masse. Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach, and Hillsborough—which, together, make up more than a third of the state’s population—launched programs to identify individuals who owe fines and fees and fast-track their cases to the courts. A judge then waives their financial obligations (except restitution to victims) and provides them with a court order declaring their sentences complete. This order reestablishes their right to vote. Courts, prosecutors, and public defenders all support these programs, and celebrity activist John Legend helped to publicize them by sitting in on a “rocket docket” session. Local officials provide individuals with voter registration forms as soon as their fines and fees are waived...

..There is little doubt that GOP legislators opposed the amendment because they feared it would disproportionately enfranchise Democrats. But their bill has led to a bizarre system in which Democratic counties are reenfranchising their voters while Republican-majority counties are not. Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach, and Hillsborough all overwhelmingly supported Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump in 2016. They are Democratic strongholds in a state with notoriously close elections. In 2016, Trump beat Clinton by about 113,000 votes. Meanwhile, Miami-Dade hopes to grant about 150,000 former felons the right to vote. The reenfranchisement of hundreds of thousands of voters in primarily Democratic counties may very well swing the 2020 election...

This doesn't automatically mean the Dems win and the GOP loses. Voter turnout still matters, even in solid Blue counties (some of which will be the centers of massive Far Right disinformation and voter suppression efforts no matter what). Those voters - every single one who has a vested interest in key Democratic issues like affordable health care (still), better wages, an end to trumpian corruption - have to keep involved with early voting, absentee balloting, handling long lines at the precincts, and keeping up with oversight and counting results to make sure every ballot is counted fairly and accurately.

This is all what 2020 is about, Floridians: GET THE DAMN VOTE OUT.

And for the Love of GOD, kick the cheating vote-suppressing Republicans out of every office we can.

Primary Voting Still Too Low

I don't care what the papers are saying about Trump "getting the most primary votes ever" for the Republican nomination:

Politico's Kyle Cheney noticed something interesting about Donald Trump's big primary wins on Tuesday night. With a number of states still to vote — including the largest, California — Trump is poised to set a new record vote total in Republican presidential primaries. The current record is held by George W. Bush, with his 10.8 million votes in 2000. Trump, according to RealClearPolitics, is currently at a little north of 10 million.

If 10 million or 12 million or 15 million sounds like a lot to you, try some perspective:

• There are roughly 142 million voters overall in the United States as of the November 2014 election cycle (numbers are bound to go up a little for 2016).
• If turnout is anything equal to the 2012 election, we're expecting 129 million actual voters (out of 313 million residents).
• There are no official numbers of registered Republicans, but if we're looking at primary turnout, the total turnout of 25 million - not just for Trump but for all the other 16 wannabes who failed - is about 17 percent of the total registered voter count. And to be fair, the Democrats are seeing smaller turnout numbers at around 12 percent of the total voter count (the excuse being a simple two-player race of Hillary vs. Bernie).

Overall voter turnout for the primaries looks to be 29 percent of the registered count.

That's obscenely low.

Part of the problem is that the independent non-party voters cannot vote in Closed Primaries, which is most of them. A Closed Primary makes sense for a party to host because it encourages party membership... except that it doesn't. There is no way a majority of Party members - neither Republican NOR Democrat - are contributing their time and energy towards selecting their own party nominee.

It boils down to choices, and a lack of them. Let's be blunt, if the voters who DIDN'T SHOW UP for a Primary were counted as "No Confidence" None-Of-The-Above votes, none of the last remaining names would be standing. Nobody would be. Which is why we don't get "None of the Above" as a ballot choice.

There ought to be other ways - better ways like full holidays or mandating a minimum voter count before the elections can be closed and confirmed - to encourage higher participation. To me, higher participation means getting more voices involved, more choices offered up to appeal to the broader range of voters. As it stands right now, the only candidates who run are the ones who think they can appeal to the extremists as those extremists are the only ones guaranteed to show up to vote.

Which makes the rest of us suffer because we don't end up with good choices at all. Just desperate ones.

If we ever get a primary where over 50 percent of the voter population actually shows up, then I'll buy the argument that the will of the people is being heard and that the winning candidate is truly reflective of the national mood and momentum. Otherwise, they're all just weak offerings to the Old Gods and the New.

There's Only So Much You Can Do With a Map: It's All About Voter Turnout

So you know I like messing with Presidential Electoral map generators.

270towin.com is kind of fun, but it's limited in that you make your own guesses as to which states are going to go for your candidate over the other one. It may be satisfying to have Hillary stomp the hell out of Trump in 47 out of 50 states (plus DC), but there's little actual evidence - unless you're Nate Silver and you have all the true numbers - to back you up.

I like how RealClearPolitics went and created their own generator based on the 2012 voter turnout. As you mess with the number variables on two columns - one for voter turnout favoring Republicans, the second for overall voter turnout - you get a better sense of how certain states are demographically aligned Red or Blue by four established blocs (White, Black, Hispanic, Asian), and a better idea of how voter turnout and support will actually create possible results.

Granted, it's still not accurate to predict for 2016 - demographic have changed over the last four years, and there are new variables each election cycle - but it's better than just your own guessing.

So it all comes down to how the numbers actually play out this election cycle.

One thing I've learned messing with the demographic calculator to that map is that while having Blacks, Hispanics, and Asians all solidly line up in favor of Democrats is a good thing, any discernible changes in BOTH their support for Republicans and overall turnout doesn't swing any states. It's a combination of two factors: most minority voters are either residing in heavily Blue states or else are so alienated against the Republicans that there's little chance they can flip states one way or another.

Bumping up Black voters alone to favor Republicans doesn't really flip any states until getting to 12 percent for the GOP, and that's with Florida. And there's little sign the Republicans are going to do THAT well with Blacks considering the GOP's voter suppression efforts and other policy beliefs openly affect Blacks.

Florida flips to Republican if the Hispanic vote favoring Republicans go up to 32 percent nationwide support. Considering the anti-immigration stance of the GOP - Trump's horrifying stances are bad enough, but Cruz will be just as oppressive as a candidate - there's no way Hispanic support goes that high (most polling is showing Hispanic support dropping).

Asian voting population numbers are the smallest of the four blocs, as such any noticeable shift in Republican approval AND disapproval is meager at best. All that happens if they favor the GOP is that Blue states turn lighter and Red states stay almost the same color (I think Texas darkened Red a bit) up until the support gets to 50 percent, at which point Florida flips Red (damn, Florida, you're on the razor's edge here).

Things may flip quicker if all three minority groups do start favoring Republicans more, along with growing overall turnout, but neither factor is realistic to contemplate. We're facing an election cycle in which Republicans have pretty much alienated every voting bloc - Blacks, Hispanics, Chinese, Muslims, Women, Youth/College - outside of the Uneducated White Male category.

What I'm finding going by RCP's Map Generator is that the real difference-maker is the White voting bloc. Where shifting the minority blocs gives you plus or minus half-percentages, shifting the White voter approval for the Republicans can get you a full percent shift, and states change their colors real quick.

If all other things remain as they were in 2012, if Republicans bump up White voter support from 60 percent to 64 percent, they flip the Electoral College to their favor (this is 4 percent to flipping Black voters up 6 percent to 12). That may sound simple enough... except the current polling is showing White voter support for Republicans dropping, likely due to the fact that White WOMEN voters are turning against the GOP.

And that's IF you keep voter turnout as they were in 2012. The odds of that - due to depressed voter turnout thanks to unpopular candidates AND that aggressive GOP voter suppression effort - for 2016 are unlikely: Overall voter turnout is expected to drop this year. The question is by how much.

Ironically enough, the voter suppression effort against minority voters can become meaningless. I can drop the voter turnouts for all Non-White blocs down to 40 percent and STILL the Republicans will lose the Electoral count. That is if White voting numbers stay static: if turnout goes up or GOP support goes up, then the Electoral shift happens differently. But THAT requires White turnout going up around 70 percent while dropping Black voters to 42 percent and Hispanics/Asians both to 40 percent. The impossible factor there is getting the White vote count up: there is no way they can get to 70 percent turnout like that, and still retain 60 percent Republican support...

The Republicans are going to have to deny the Black voters down like crazy to flip the Electoral College in any way. Considering Black voters turned out at 66 percent (best among the four groups), forcing that huge a drop into the low 40s is unlikely: Republicans can't suppress the Black voters in Blue states for one thing, and they can't deny that many insistent voters when the time comes in November. If Black voter turnout drops under 50 percent, it's a clear sign of voter suppression, and no-one outside of the hater groups will ever accept that result.

It'd have to be a combination of both voter suppression efforts AND getting minority to show up in favor of Republicans. But that's a paradox: if Republicans - and they're the ones doing this, so none of that Both Sides crap - suppress the vote, there's no way they are appealing to minority voters to turn against their own interests.

What will hurt is the White voter turnout for Republicans: having built an entire Presidential electoral campaign around courting just that voting bloc is now due to blow up in the GOP's collective face.

There's been the gradual demographic loss of White voters as a percentage of the national population for one thing: there's the fact that Whites are not a uniform voting bloc the way Blacks are (and how Hispanic voters can become a solid bloc in the face of a massive anti-Hispanic outburst by the Far Right). There's a surprising number of White voters who are Democratic at heart and Liberal by belief: there is a ceiling where the Republicans cannot appeal strongly enough to get the White votes they need.

And making their appeals more Far Right than ever - trying to keep their base happy and eager to vote - ensures more moderate/centrist voters among Whites turn away as well. It's a Lose-Lose situation for the GOP: Republicans can't gain enough minority voters to overcome the Electoral numbers, and they can't afford to lose White voters the way they are this election cycle.

And when that is all said and done, the RCP generator still proves one point:

It all comes down to voter turnout, as always.

The only REAL way Republicans can win the Presidency - any election for that matter - is if Democrats and Left-leaning voters refuse to show up. Even the act of showing up fights the voter suppression effort because there's only so many voters the Far Right can try to stop.

Get the damn vote out, America.

The Angry Moderate Blues

I know it's a fault of myself when I sit here and look at the world and think "what the hell is everyone else thinking when they can't see what I'm seeing?"  I know people will have their own life experiences informing them of what choices to take.  I know people will have their own opinions.

Still.  WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU THINKING, VOTERS?!

So here I am, fuming at an electorate that damages itself by voting for partisan Far Right hacks, suffering yet another bout of Angry Moderate Blues.

Yeah, Moderates can get angry... We certainly feel the blues.

--

I get the occasional troll on this blog - rare, considering the few comments I ever get - and I got a couple of them during my post of the Sample Ballot for the Florida midterms:

Wow - you are exactly what is wrong with America today. An ideologue that appears to have no clue about what made America great - diversity. Clearly you hate the Republicans more than you love America. Too bad. As an independent thinker, I prefer to vote based on substance not on ideology. Unfortunately neither party has many options when it comes to people of integrity, which is what many of us really want.

Getting called an ideologue is a new insult, but getting accused of not knowing about diversity is a twist. Considering I've posted my support for gay marriage, the free and open practice of all religions, my horror at seeing Blacks and Hispanics and Women getting treated like shit by the authorities and the overlords... Best I can say is that the guy posting that never read the whole of my blog, and thus didn't realize I am all about the diversity. Also, that I *do* love America: he must have missed the posts I add of the 4th of July, the celebration of Gettysburg and Woodstock, the occasional cultural milestone of Americana.  He's the one without a clue (psst, bro: next time READ THE BLOG BEFORE YOU INSULT THE BLOGGER)...

The next one was pretty straightforward:

I'm voting Republican straight ticket you useless liberal.

That's been the standard insult I get from the trolls.  You don't see most of them posting because I do have an administrative setting to filter all Comments.  Not for pure censorship, mind: It's because for a few years I was getting hit with Chinese Spam.  I'm not kidding.  The Chinese were spamming me, and I was like dudes I can't read Mandarin I can't tell what it is you want me to buy, stop it.  Anyway, I have the filter so I see a couple of Comments once in awhile in my Inbox and check them out.  Most of them are Anonymous, which tells me all I need to know about how cowardly they are, and they're pretty much calling me a libtard/librul/marxist/socialist of some kind.  I don't post those because 1) they don't contribute to the debate and 2) Anonymous posters are cowards.  I posted those two above because at least they put a name to the insult.

It's not that I'm bothered by the insults: Hell, I survived Tarpon Springs Middle School.  I've heard worse.  What bothers me is how wrong they get it by insulting me by something I'm not: Liberal.

For one thing, it's not an insult.  It's no more insulting than calling someone Conservative (if you try to insult me as a Conservative I'm going to look at you funny and give you the same retort).  The second thing, I've always considered myself a Moderate:

...Moderates support competency. We support things THAT WORK. If it doesn't work (example: THE WHOLE BUSH ADMINISTRATION) we don't support it. So there... Moderates recognize not so much the NEED for bipartisanship (or compromise) for the SAKE of bipartisanship. Bipartisanship and compromise between opposing factions are welcome when the end result will be something THAT WORKS...

If I look and act like I'm a Liberal, I'm really not. I'm looking and acting like someone who hates the Republican Party, by extension the whole of Conservative, Far Right ideology that has consumed that entire party.

And I hate the Republican Party because I used to be a member:

Actually I'm former Republican and I prefer to consider myself a moderate. I'm one of those dreaded RINOs you and yours drove out of the party. My hatred for the GOP is more despair at how broken and dogmatic it has become.

Calling me a liberal just shows how out of tune and extremist you've become, 'cause everything in opposition to you can only be a "socialist" or a "marxist" or a "liberal". All complexity of issues boiled down to just the hate.

Well, now you know why my ranting here on the blog is so one-sided against Republicans: because I came from there, it's all you had to teach me and I learned it from you. The only difference is I hope my hate for you will protect the rest of the nation and the world from your ruin.

When I first registered to vote I was a Republican.  I came from a Republican household - I've mentioned that more than once, especially about how old-school my dad is about Nixon - and so grew up in an environs of respecting such conservative principles as skepticism, desire for limited government, acceptance of liberal capitalism, and an overall avoidance to any aggressive radical change.

But by 1992 I noticed the party getting meaner and darker.  Not just a response to the rise of Bill Clinton as a political entity but just to nearly every issue.  Social conservatism went from being about compassion and charity and more about ostracism and pushing Christianity as a political force rather than a social foundation.  Economic conservatism went from respect for regulatory protections of the Eisenhower era to mass deregulation and unbridled laissez-faire.  Political conservatism went from diversity of opinions to adherence to dogma.  All of it wrapped into one big package of Fear-Mongering against the Other.

The key moment was Pat Buchanan's speech to the 1992 Convention.  Railing about a "culture war" and that "Clinton and Clinton" - fueling the Far Right fear that Hillary was going to be a Co-President of feminist intent - were going to destroy "God's America," Buchanan created a political identity of Republicans being hard-Right ideologues.

That moment - and the end of Bush the Elder's one-term tenure - began the purity purge against RINOs (Republicans In Name Only) as the extremists began targeting Moderate Republicans to push out and replace with more extreme, more Far Right candidates.

There were efforts to try and stave off the Club for Greed types that backed the purge, such as Main Street Republicans, but by today those moderate groups within the GOP are minorities - 46 Representatives out of 220-plus House Republicans, just 3 Senators out of 52 - within the ranks.  The purity purge by now has pretty much claimed full control of the Republican Party.

I did what I could to stay Moderate within the ranks meself.  I wasn't happy with the party's growing enthusiasms for the death penalty, massive deregulation in spite of historical evidence that deregulation was reckless, a pursuit not for small government but NO government, voter suppression efforts (yes even in the mid-1990s they were pulling that shit), and an eagerness by the leadership to pursue fiscal corruption that would make the Gilded Age look reformist by comparison.  While the Democrats weren't angels either, I loathed what the Republicans were revealing themselves to be.  I wasn't thrilled either by how the Republicans were crafting some fantasy-world dogma revolving around idol worship of Reagan and demonization of non-believers.

By about 2000, when Bush the Lesser became the candidate of choice (and despite his "compassionate conservative" platform he was the candidate of the purist ideologues) I pretty much gave up.  The disaster of the 2000 election results - and watching Republicans riot and get away with it in the Dade County elections office - sealed the deal.  I switched my party affiliation to No Party (I briefly flirted with being a Modern Whig back in 2009, maybe 2010, but that went nowhere).

The thing about becoming NPA (No Party Affiliate).  I still can't bring myself to make a full switch to becoming a Democrat.  It's not that I don't fully support Democrats - I have to, because they're the only actual alternative to the Republicans - it's that having been burned by one party I'm not keen on getting suckered into another.

What you see here on the blog when I rail about Republicans - when I cry all "FOR THE LOVE OF GOD DON'T VOTE REPUBLICAN" - this is an act of an Apostate.  Word for the day, kids: Apostasy is the renunciation or denial of a religious (and nowadays political) group that the denier once joined.  It's at the point where anything the Republicans are for - a horrifying Far Right conservatism that is more radical and destructive than actual anarchy - is something I would strongly argue against because I dread the party's true intent (usually having to do with ripping off taxpayers and blaming others for the impending disasters).

I'm at heart still a Moderate.  I don't want Small Government (or the No Government of the Tea Partier mindset), nor do I want Big Government: I want Effective government, one responsive enough to ensure people's rights and safety, yet streamlined without bureaucratic knots.  I want fair taxation (if that means bumping up the rates on the billionaires 2-3 percent and the economic models prove its effectiveness, so be it) based on the burden, not the rate.  I want deficit reduction but not at the expense of massive spending cuts that would harm families and children.  I want government to stimulate the private sector into genuine job growth and wage increases while ensuring that the market doesn't overreact to the costs of such moves.  I believe in Jesus but I don't want to shove Christ into our public schools, nor do I want Creationism - a foolish attempt to make the Bible literal fact rather than spiritual truth - overwhelming our sciences.  I don't buy the War on Christmas because there's still 300 million people in America who are not being forced at swordpoint to celebrate Saturnalia.  I know we need a strong military but I hate the wasteful spending (we bought a fleet of airplanes for billions and pretty much turned those planes into cheap scrap metal!).  I respect our need to forge strong alliances with foreign nations, but we don't need to bomb everybody into submission.

If that stuff makes me "liberal" then you've got a problem with your dictionary, 'cause I'm still Moderate.

I'm just an Angry Moderate.  Which isn't a contradiction in terms.

Note: Rude Pundit pretty much explains why the 2014 midterms went the way it did.  Part of it tribal BS, part of it ignorance.  All of it self-destructive.

We are as a nation voting not for the right reasons.

Calling Out to the Florida Groups That Get Amendments On Ballot: I Got Ideas.

Okay, so I wanna get three amendments on the ballot for 2016 here in Florida.

• First, if we can get an amendment that requires any Florida election for local, state, and federal offices to remain open for balloting until at least 55 to 60 percent of registered voters can submit their ballots.  Voter turnout sucks otherwise.
• Second, if we can get an amendment that puts a None Of The Above option on each local and state elected office, and require that if the NOTA gets the most votes that a special run-off for that office be held with brand new candidates (and that NOTA remains on the ballot even for the do-overs just in case the parties decide to try to nominate someone worse).
• Third, if we can get an amendment that guarantees every legal resident of Florida has a right to vote unimpeded by these -ssholes running around screaming 'voter fraud' when there's no f-cking voter fraud.  Okay, so the wording on this one needs to get cleaned up a bit...

It's doable under the Initiative Petition system.  The state allows an outside group - an established non-profit that can hold petition drives - to gather a certain number of signatures across the state (has to be state-wide, not all from one area) within a set time period (deadlines are a b-tch) for submission and approval by the state's State dept. (with approval/oversight by the courts to ensure the wording is easy-to-read and fits within legal parameters).

Thing is, I'm looking for the groups who are most capable and active in getting these initiative petitions going.  I think I find them on the websites but when I try to contact or send email, there's no reply back.

I tried FIVOrg but haven't heard back... if they emailed me I hope it didn't get filtered to the Spam folder, lemme go check...  And for that "None of the Above" option there was a Floridians for Political Choice group from more than a decade ago, but that's CLOSED probably defunct...

I might not be looking in the right places.

So if any of these petition groups are surfing the Intertubes and they come across this blog entry, can I just say DUDES AND DUDETTES CALL ME I GOTZ IDEAS.

If not, I'm gonna need to see if any of the kids I knew from high school that became lawyers can help out set up a PAC...

The Real Voter Scandal Continues: The Turnout Sucks, Florida 2014 Primary Edition

(update: hello to the people linking in via Crooks and Liars.  Thank you Batocchico for the promotion! please check out the other recent articles while you're here...)

So here we are in Florida, 2014, everyone in the state knows what is at stake - GET RICK "NO ETHICS" SCOTT OUT OF OFFICE - and we get our August Primary up and everything.  And there are actual choices for both major parties this primary: Democrats choosing between Crist or Rich; Republicans choosing between Scott (augh), Cuevas-Neunder, or someone named Yinka. (slow pause)  Yeah, well, anyway, there's every reason to think that with choices to be made for the big state-wide vote, we'd see a large number of voters showing up.  We've got 11 million-plus registered to vote, and although the NPA voters couldn't vote in the party primaries we've still got 8 million or so Republicans and Democrats on file available to make their choices known.

And what happens with the voter turnout?

We've have rat farts that made a bigger impact on things.

(copied from the Tampa Bay Times)

Governor - GOP Primary

5802 of 5804 Precincts Reporting - 99%

Name Party Votes Vote % Scott, Rick (i) GOP 833,585 88% Cuevas-Neunder, Elizabeth GOP 100,585 11% Adeshina, Yinka GOP 16,880 2%

Governor - Dem Primary

5802 of 5804 Precincts Reporting - 99%

Name Party Votes Vote % Crist, Charlie Dem 620,689 74% Rich, Nan Dem 214,111 26%

According to the state's Supervisor of Elections page, there's 4,152,489 Republicans, 4,608,759 Democrats (with NPA and third parties at 3,083,202).  I'm counting less than a million voters turning out for Republicans, waaaay less voters turning out for Democrats.  Less than a million for each party.  That's less than 25 percent (a quarter) of registered voters this Primary.  Our turnout didn't even get to the 39 percent failure I railed about in the FL-13 Special election a few months back.

WE ARE NOWHERE NEAR EITHER PARTY MAKING A MAJORITY DECISION ON WHO THEY WANT AS THEIR CANDIDATES.  We are nowhere near a 50 percent of voter turnout, where a solid majority of fellow Floridians can stand up and say "hey, this is who we want representing our interests!"

To hell with the screeching over "voter fraud" (which happens on such a meager scale - less than a percent - to be non-existent), the real screeching needs to be over the FAILURE of registered voters to actually show up and f-cking vote.

Because this is what happens when those registered voters don't show up: their interests will not be addressed.  Their real-world needs such as good jobs at good wages, working schools, functioning roads and bridges, clean water, affordable housing and utility bills... none of that will be properly addressed because we'll end up with elected officials who KNOW that a majority of Floridians didn't even care enough to show up.  Those officials know all they have to do is indulge the voters who DO show up, who always show up regardless, and they'll be able to keep their comfy, full-pension-in-4-years jobs.

And the voters who DO show up?!  They're the wingnuts.  The extremists.  The single-issue crazies obsessing over hating gays, worshiping guns, shooting doctors, and nuking the social safety nets like Medicare Social Security and Medicaid.  This is why abortion remains a major campaign issue even when a majority of Americans don't even consider abortion a Top 10 Topic: it's still red meat for the extremist voters, and the politicians know who they have to pander to.

It may be so easy for a majority of citizens to tune out, to disengage, to walk away from politics because of all the negativity and social warfare (some of it literal).  But that disengagement has a price: OUR NEEDS AS A STATE AND AS COMMUNITIES SUFFER.  They suffer because the needs of the minority (by number, not ethnicity) extremists will be sated at the expense of the many.

Worse, the minority group getting the special treatment above all others tend to be the uber-rich billionaires making themselves richer by getting their cronies they elected to hand over more and more tax breaks and free access to our public funds.  And then people wonder why income inequality has become a huge problem: IT'S BECAUSE YOU'RE LETTING THE CROOKS WIN RE-ELECTION.

This is frustrating.  This is insane.

It ought to be illegal.  There ought to be a rule making damn sure no election is certified until a solid majority (I'd love for it to be 60 percent super-majority) of voters available for that election have placed their ballots for counting.  And if that means extending the voting times, so be it (and have the parties PAY for those extensions: it'd be a good way to force them to get better at GOTV efforts).  If people don't like the choices being offered, every election - even the closed party primaries - ought to have a blank space to add a write-in vote.

WE OUGHT TO HAVE OUR ELECTIONS BE BUSINESS AND SCHOOL HOLIDAYS TO GIVE PEOPLE ENOUGH FREE TIME TO SHOW UP AND VOTE (most people don't even realize they have a right to leave work for an hour to go vote, and because they work during election hours few of them even make the effort).  We ought to move elections to Fridays or Saturdays, on weekends: this isn't 1880 when people had to travel during business hours to the county courthouse to file their ballots while they conduct business in-town.

We can do these things: except we can't.  BECAUSE BOTH MAJOR PARTIES PROFIT FROM THE BROKEN ELECTORAL SYSTEM.  Yes, even Democrats.

I remember from a political science class back in college where two professors discussed how political parties figured out a rule: that the fewer people who showed up to vote, the EASIER it got to control that election's results.  Because the ones who always turned up were the single-issue wingnuts, and those were easy to manipulate and control.  If voter turnout grows, the number of more moderate, more complex-thinking voters who can't fit within the square pegs increases to where the campaigns can't dictate the results (which really scares them, 'cause they hate to get off-message).  I'd love to remember what the name of that rule was: I did not write it down then because it was tangent to another topic discussed that class.

And so, nothing will get done.  At least, not by the parties' separate leaderships.

If anything is going to fix this, it's going to have to be from the voters ourselves.  WE NEED TO SHOW UP AND VOTE.  We need to make our voices heard.  We need to get state amendments on-ballot to reform our broken electoral system.  We need to get 8 million voters showing up for Primaries.  We need to get 11 million voters showing up for the General Election.

We need to wake up, and we need to get in the faces of the status quo a-holes running our political parties into the ground.  They need to respect the voters better, and that means showing up and making them aware we are not their puppets.

Dammit, Florida.  GET THE DAMN VOTE OUT.

P.S. just for the Love of God DO NOT VOTE FOR RICK "MEDICARE FRAUD" SCOTT.  I'm serious.  Rick Scott is not running for Governor to work for our state: Rick Scott is running to make money for Rick Scott.  That is all he represents.  Just PLEASE do not vote for him...