How to Separate the Electoral College Even More from the Popular Vote

Plans are afoot in Michigan (and elsewhere) to change how the State awards its electoral votes in presidential elections by dropping the winner-take-all system for one based on the winner of each of the state's congressional districts.

According to the plan, for the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections, Michigan would award 14 of its 16 electoral votes according to the U.S. House district lines drawn by Republicans in 2011 to favor Republican candidates. (As evidenced by the fact that almost twice as many Michigan citizens voted for Democratic candidates as for Republicans, but the Republicans won more of the races.)

Governor Rick Snyder has signaled he is willing to consider this major change in how electoral votes are allocated in Presidential elections.  He told The Associated Press for a story looking at Republican efforts to drop the winner-take-all system in states that have reliably gone for the Democratic presidential nominee in recent elections that he "could go either way."

Here's an example of what the change could mean: According to an analysis by Daily Kos, in 2012, Republican Mitt Romney would have won nine of the districts and President Barack Obama the other five, so Mr. Romney would have pulled nine electoral votes to seven for Mr. Obama, who won the state by 9.5 percentage points.

So, it's clear that the proposal to allot electoral votes by congressional district would run counter to the popular vote in a significant way.

If Synder hopes to be a Governor for ALL the people of Michigan, he'll quash this blatantly Republican-serving plan to do away with the winner-take-all system.  But, unless he hears strong protests from Involved Voters, I think he's likely to go with the flow and support the plan of fellow Republicans.

Update: For a satirical look at this topic, watch Stephen Colbert here: http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/423114/january-22-2013/the-word---win--lose--or-redraw

President Obama's Inaugural Address

I listened to the President's Second Inaugural Address live and then watched and listened with colleagues at a get-together to celebrate our success in the 2012 campaign.  If there ever was a 20 minute speech worth multiple listens this is it: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/inaugural-address/

For an analysis of where the majority of voters stand on some of the areas the President highlighted during the address - climate change, marriage equality, voting rights, immigration and gun violence, you can take a look at this blog post: http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/01/22/what-does-public-support-in-obamas-second-inaugural-speech/

One thing I took away from the President's address is that "we, the people" need to get to work to make  our law-makers responsive to us, and to do what we can to ensure that everyone in America can realize the promise of "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."

Voting IS The Best Revenge...

...revenge for having to endure the flood of lies and misinformation from Republican slime-machines like Crossroads GPS.  According to the Sunlight Foundation, 81% of the "dark money" polluting the 2012 election, is being used by groups supporting Republicans.

So, get your revenge for those TV and radio ads, robo-calls and mailers by voting!  Michigan voters can check their registration status, find their polling places and see a sample ballot at the Michigan Secretary of State's web site.

"No" to Romney on Military Spending

Why I say "no" to Romney's plan to spend an additional $2 trillion on the military in the next decade:

I'll let this quote from Dwight D. Eisenhower, Army General and President of the United States from January 20, 1953 to January 20, 1961 state the case. (Some of us are old enough to remember Ike.)

"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities. It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals. It is some 50 miles of concrete highway. We pay for a single fighter plane with a half million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people. This, I repeat, is the best way of life to be found on the road the world has been taking. This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron."

-  From DDE's Address "The Chance for Peace" Delivered Before the American Society of Newspaper Editors, 4/16/53

To many Involved Voters this "ancient wisdom" provides yet another reason to re-elect President Obama and VP Biden.

Romney & Ryan: A Former Republican's Perspective

I received the following today in an email from a friend.  It was written by a mutual acquaintance who lays out in detail why he believes the Romney/Ryan ticket is a bad choice.  The case he puts forth is well-reasoned and heart-felt.

My views on the vote this November:
Since nearly every other phone call these days involves an organization wanting to know how I am going to vote this fall, I decided to put the rationale for my answers in writing and, even though you didn’t ask for it, share it with you to encourage you to develop your personal rationale for however you plan to vote.  As most of you know, I once considered myself a Republican. I was even officially registered as a Republican as recently as 2000, although I increasingly voted for non-Republicans. But I have not found a Republican at any level that I could support since George W. Bush and Carl Rove sabotaged John McCain in the 2000 primary. I’ve concluded that the “new” Republican Party has totally departed from its Lincoln/Eisenhower roots, and I’m not going to follow. Although President Obama is not a perfect leader, he far surpasses his present opponent. In fact, I fear for our country if Romney and Ryan (the 2Rs) should win this election. I have the same view of current Republican senate and congressional candidates. So the reasons why I will vote for Obama and the Democratic slate – and why I will probably not return to the Republican Party as long as I live – follow below:

International relations: The 2 Rs have absolutely no experience in dealing with foreign governments. Romney demonstrated his diplomatic ineptitude in spades during his overseas trip this summer. Romney was in London four days before we arrived there this July. Every British newspaper except one voiced their view that it was incredulous that Romney had been selected as a presidential nominee. Even more important in my opinion is that Romney is of the persuasion that military might is the solution to many of the world’s problems – although he has vacillated on specifics with astonishing frequency. As one who spent two long years in Vietnam and has studied the wars of the past, my view is that all of the wars in which we participated since the Korean conflict could have been avoided if those in our administration had spent the time and effort up front to understand the culture of the countries we eventually decided to fight in, and had acted appropriately on that knowledge. Apparently Romney would skip that step.

Debt: Obama is currently being blamed for increasing the national debt. In fact, Republican administrations have a much worse record at piling up debt – and, in their case, totally without reason. In Obama’s case, at least, there were reasons. The vast majority of economists agree that his $840 billion stimulus (American Recovery and Reinvestment Act) saved 2.5 million jobs, boosted the economy by 3.8%, protected the most vulnerable, kept one million in their homes, and kept seven million from falling below the poverty line. Reagan decided to cut taxes to grow the economy – sounds familiar doesn’t it? The national debt tripled under Reagan. George Bush senior added another third to the debt. His son, George W. Bush didn’t learn from their experience; he cut taxes again, passed Medicare Part D, and fought two wars, both poorly conceived, and both very costly in lives and treasure. He took these three actions with no attempt to cover the costs. The debt redoubled due to G. W. Bush’s misguided actions. And, because of his failure to pay attention to the factors that were destroying our economy during his watch, he caused the extremely severe recession that Republican politicians tell us Obama should have taken care of by now. To say the least, the U.S. budget situation has deteriorated significantly since January 2001, (at the end of Clinton’s presidency) when the Congressional Budget Office forecast average annual surpluses of approximately $850 billion from 2009–2012. Eight years later, as of June 2009, the average deficit in each of these years was projected to be approximately $1.215 trillion! A reliable analysis of this roughly $2 trillion "swing", separating the causes into four major categories along with their share, produced this result:
• Recessions or the business cycle (37%) [primarily, in my personal opinion, caused by Bush’s tendency to deregulate and to ignore the economic trend until too late];
• Policies directly enacted by President Bush (33%);
• Policies enacted by President Bush and supported or extended by President Obama, including the reduced tax rates (20%);
• New policies from President Obama including the stimulus and his additional tax cuts (10%).
Unfortunately, the 2Rs would add steroids to the Reagan/Bush strategy that was the main cause of this disaster.

Taxes: Cutting taxes is the battle cry of nearly all Republicans seeking office. This in spite of the fact that, under Obama, the effective Federal tax rates have been lower than under Reagan and in spite of the fact that the U.S. collects less in taxes as a share of the economy than every other industrial country except Chile and Mexico! And, as is apparent from the data above, cutting taxes only leads to an increase in the national debt, not an improved economy. In fact, the best economic activity in recent years was when President Clinton raised taxes. Clinton also provided some budgets with surpluses. As a result of our unreasonable fear of taxes, we spend much less to help the vulnerable than other countries and, to deal with one of my professional frustrations, have caused our once-enviable infrastructure to fall apart through neglect. Addressing the latter, America’s infrastructure has decayed to the point where the American Society of Civil Engineers gives its condition a grade of D. ASCE has repeatedly raised the alarm that decisive action is necessary to immediately invest more than $2.2 trillion dollars in repairs and upgrading to bridges, roads, rail, airports, dams, inland waterways and levies, treatment plants, schools, and utilities before it is too late. The more we delay, the more each repair will cost. At our present insufficient rate of reinvestment, the backlog of public infrastructure deferred maintenance increases $100 billion/year. Yet we have people like Sheldon Adelson, the conservative billionaire Las Vegas casino owner, now intent on plowing $100 million of his money into supporting the 2Rs in the current campaign. Why? Just because under their ill-defined “economic plan” Adelson would expect to save $2 billion in taxes! Apparently the current crop of Republican politicians and their supporters want to return to the pioneer/frontier days before the government provided essential public facilities like roads, bridges, sewage treatment plants, etc. I don’t.

Jobs:  As you know, Republican administrations have been in power for 28 of the years since 1960, Democrats for 24. The Republicans, with all their talk about creating jobs by reducing taxes and government regulations, created 24 million private sector jobs. Under Democratic administrations, 42 million private sector jobs were created, over twice as many/year. They were created because there are essential roles for government to play in stimulating job growth including funding research and education. Norway understands this. Their unemployment rate is currently 2.7% (1.3% in Telemark where Eric lives!).

Climate Change: Apparently most Republican politicians have signed a pledge to refuse to acknowledge climate change just as they have signed the pledge not to raise taxes. They deny the fact that we are causing the temperature of our planet to rise and therefore refuse to do anything about it. The National Academy of Sciences produced a report 33 years ago stating that there was no doubt that increased carbon dioxide levels would lead to an increase in average global temperature. Since then the evidence has been accumulating: The average Arctic temperature has increased 4ºF in the last 30 years. The rate of rise will increase even more rapidly now since there is much less ice in the summer (the absolute lowest amount remaining occurred early this month, 24%, which is 60% of the amount in the 1980s), causing the sun’s heat to be absorbed over a much greater area. The warming effect causes the jet stream to meander further north and south than normal, causing extremes in temperature. Greenland’s ice sheet is decreasing rapidly. Ice core samples collected from Greenland’s glaciers show the chemical makeup of the atmosphere for thousands of years; the conclusion is that what is going on now has no precedent. As of last year, the 13 hottest years (globally) since 1850 have occurred in the last 15 years. In the U.S., this July was the hottest ever. And much of the U.S. is beginning to see the extremes in weather that have been predicted as a by-product of global warming – drought, floods, and an increase in damaging winds. But Republican politicians have decided that they will ignore science as well as sound economics in order to, they think, improve their chance of election.

Medical Care: Although the Affordable Care Act is deeply flawed and falls far short of the benefits and cost savings of a single payer system, it begins to eliminate some of the abuses by insurance companies, covers many of the uninsured, caps some of the outrageous overhead and profit margins of insurance companies, and, despite what the Republicans claim, should, if fully implemented, reduce costs from what they would be if it didn’t exist. Romney promises to eliminate this act to satisfy the Tea Party, even though he invented the concept. A single payer system would likely provide care for all at a much lower cost than this act. Our present health system costs 17% of the U.S. Gross Domestic Product. Taiwan, whose government studied all existing models, chose a single payer system covering everyone, much like Medicare does for U.S. seniors; Taiwan’s system costs 7% of its GDP, much less than half of ours. Yet Republican politicians claim a single payer system would cost too much, so their opposition prevented the United States from the chance to achieve real health care reform. By the way, military retirees over 65 and their families, like Karen and I, are essentially covered by a single payer system and, based on our experience (which, in our case, does not involve care at any government facility), works nearly perfectly. But we will never see real reform under a Romney administration.

Help for the less fortunate: Christ cared for the poor, the sick and the vulnerable; he taught us to do the same. Obama has tried to provide relief for these and has succeeded to a limited extent, in spite of fierce opposition from Republican congressmen. Romney and especially Ryan (who had required his staff to read the literature of Ayn Rand, an atheist who argued that selfishness is a virtue and the poor are a drag on society) actively solicit the vote of Christians, but their words, proposed policies, and actions are in total opposition to what Christ taught. Amazingly, some still question Obama’s commitment to Christ. I suggest we judge that commitment by policies and actions. Those of Romney and Ryan totally fail the test.

These are just a few of the reasons I have lost faith in the present Republican Party. As is probably apparent, I would have to see a lot of change before I would trust them to guide our nation or state again.

Jim Christenson
September 2012

Lessons from the Republican Party's Convention

Here’s what I learned from the Republican National Convention: A candidate can tell one lie after another about his opponent’s record and fellow Republicans will still claim he’s a man of integrity.  Their “winning strategy” – repeat the lies until they are accepted as true.

Lessons from the Republican Party Platform:
• There are self-defined “makers” (the 1%) and they’ve got theirs; the rest of us are “takers” and we’ll be on our own with only a shredded safety net.
• Our children and grandchildren will have to rely on a Medicare substitute with no guarantee they’ll be able to afford the health care coverage they need.
• Reducing the national debt is a priority; but only if the already-wealthy get to keep their privileged tax status and the military budget is off-limits to cuts.
• Prosperity is for the super-rich and their children. The rest of us can expect to shoulder more of the cost of needed infrastructure and services and be content with whatever wage increases happen to trickle down.
• The interests of big energy companies trump our need for clean air and water.
• Freedom of religion is only for those whose beliefs are the same as those of certain Republican fundamentalists.
• All women must be controlled. Women are incapable of making moral choices on their own.  A fertilized egg is to be acknowledged as a person with rights, but the woman involved doesn’t count.
• A good education is for the privileged few; public education should be left to rot and teachers are the enemy.
• It’s okay if tens of thousands in America, most of them children, go without food and shelter, as long as not a single one of “those undeserving people” gets help from a government program.
• Only a few people are welcome to come to America – the ones who have the skills big corporations are looking for and have the “right” skin color.

Perhaps candidate Romney’s views differ a bit from some of what’s in his Party’s platform, but a Republican Congress would make him fall in line.

The Democratic National Convention provided a clear contrast, as speaker after speaker explained why, as noted in the automobile analogy used by former Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm, "D" stands for moving America forward and "R" means going in reverse.

Republicans and the US National Debt

Today, as I was thinking about what little attention is being paid to the effect that two "off the books" wars and the absence of any requirement that the super-rich pitch in to pay for them has had on the national debt, I came a post on the topic by Kevin Drum at Mother Jones.

Here's the link: http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2012/08/republicans-are-responsible-our-soaring-national-debt

Drum reminded me that the Bush-era tax cuts are the biggest contributor to the debt.  To quote him on the role of the Republicans:

Nearly every single thing driving the current increase in public debt — tax cuts, wars, the recession, and measures to fight the recession — was a result of Bush-era policies that were enthusiastically supported by nearly every single Republican currently hanging out in Tampa (at the Republican National Convention). They only got religion after a Democrat won the White House and had to clean up the mess they left behind.

Take a careful look at the Ryan Budget to see how it fails to address the above and instead shifts the burden of reducing the debt to those of us in the 99%.

Does the Back & Forth on Medicare Give You a Headache?

The current debate about the future of Medicare is often reduced to sound bites.  Here are a couple of recent blog posts that might help Involved Voters dig a bit deeper.

From Ed Kilgore at Washington Monthly's Political Animal Blog: http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal-a/2012_08/waldman_boils_it_all_down_on_m039279.php

From Kevin Drum at Mother Jones: http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2012/08/programming-note-ryan-2013-not-ryan-2012

So, what is government's role when it comes to ensuring access to health and stemming the growth of health care costs?  And what's the value that for-profit insurance companies add?

Whose religious freedom is actually under attack?

Catholic bishops and the radical right are screaming foul because of federal requirements to include contraception among the preventive health services for women covered by health care plans - despite the exceptions for employees of churches.

The way I see it, when a religious entity runs a hospital, university, or charity that takes money from and employees people for whom contraception is the choice of an informed conscience, they need to avoid doing things like denying coverage for it in the health plans they offer. I consider it a violation of these women's religious freedom for the hierarchy of a church to impose the church's view of morality on them.

Blogger Kevin Drum points out in a recent post just how far removed the Catholic hierarchy is from the practices of most Catholics.  Here's the link: http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2012/02/catholics-do-not-have-moral-objection-contraception.  And, I would remind the bishops, not all Americans are Catholics.  Where is the respect for people's freedom of conscience that one could reasonably expect from those who should be exemplary followers of Christ?

Trust Obama & Biden to Lead in Reforming the US Fiancial Systems

What a mess our financial system is in! And John McCain has been contributing to it all the time he's been in the Senate by voting consistently for deregulation. (Can we call that one year of experience repeated 25 times as it concerns finance?) In choosing Sarah Palin as his running mate, he has done nothing to shore up the economic leadership credentials of the ticket.

On the other hand, Barack Obama and Joe Biden are leaders who have shown excellent judgment in support of rebuilding the middle class in America. They understand just how complex the current financial crisis is and what the Executive Branch can and cannot do to address the issues. In addition, the Democratic Party's track record on the economy is far better than the Republican Party's. If you'd like to see charts and graphs that show this, here's a link to an article by Reed Hunt at the blog Talking Points Memo.

It's my opinion that Barack Obama and Joe Biden have the qualities of character most needed to navigate the rough waters we're in. To get a sense for what they are thinking, read the transcript of Obama's September 17 speech in Elko, Nevada and his remarks today calling for bipartisanship to address the crisis and craft a plan for Main Street as well as Wall Street.

Update: September 24 - McCain's knee-jerk reaction to the debate between Congress and the Bush administration about how to deal with the financial crisis: Suspend his campaign, go to Washington (where he has no official role in the negotiating), and cancel Friday's first debate with Obama. I agree with this article by Joe Klein - it's a gimmick.

The book "Obama Nation" is an Abomination!

Jerome Corsi, the guy who wrote the "Swiftboat Veterans" book, is back again. This time with a book full of lies about Barack Obama. The Obama campaign has issued a 40 page rebuttal. You can find it on the Obama '08 website. It's hard to believe that the book is listed as non-fiction! But, I guess that's how they list books that are "opinion" pieces written as hatchet jobs by people with not-so-hidden agendas.

It's my sincerest hope that Involved Voters will spread the word that the kind of campaigning we saw from the Republicans in the 2004 election will not be tolerated this time - and that the average voter is ready to say, "We won't be fooled again!"

Image versus Reality: John McCain - Update

While reading posts on one of my favorite political blogs, Talking Points Memo, I came across an article by an Arizona reporter who has been following John McCain since before his "Keating Five" days. Please ask everyone you know who is considering voting for John McCain to read this. It's more evidence that he fails the test when it comes to the character traits most Americans want to see in their president.

Here's the link: http://phoenixnewtimes.com/content/printVersion/848709

Update: John McCain's reaction to Russia's invasion of Georgian territory is an example of some traits of his that make me extremely uncomfortable about his suitability in the areas of national security and foreign policy.

Please take a look at this post from the Democracy Arsenal blog for details.