e0c9e25237de…

She did check the sex offender registry to check on a person in her life she had questions about. He was not a sexual offender but did indeed have a violent history that she could not discover because there was no process for it.

Sure, in the event of a Republican landslide, Connecticut sometimes goes with the flow. That doesn’t mean your individual Presidential vote ever counts for anything!

None of you guys have made a good argument in favor of the status quo.

And I’d also like to have you answer me this, “Why should Iowa and New Hampshire play such important roles in Presidential politics, with Connecticut being rendered an afterthought and meaningless joke?”

And thanks to the EC, CT’s votes will continue to go solely to the Democrat.

You never know. We went for GHWB back in ‘88, and Reagan in ‘84 and ‘80. If the national GOP ever nominates a moderate candidate again, I think we could be in play.

But that’s a pretty big “if.”

Gee, would the current complainers be complaining if the structure benefited their favorite politicians?

While a lot has changed since 1776, we still have states, and these 50 states have a fair amount of power to set their agendas. This has been somewhat eroded by a fairly broad interpretation of “interstate commerce”, but even still, states in the United States have more jurisdiction than provinces or regional areas in many other countries. States are important in our system.

Wyoming has fewer voters per electoral vote than other states. But it also has fewer voters per Senator. Way fewer. Originally, Senators were chosen by the state legislatures, and the senate was there to protect the interest of the states. Because we put so much importance on states, the states are going to — as political units — have somewhat disproportionate influence. Once you move beyond the 8 or so states that have only 1 representative, the voters per electoral vote are more equitable (but still not the same because of the minimum of 3 EVs per state).

Previously, many Democrats lamented the fact that Republicans had many Senators from small states. However, the Democrats now have about as many Senators from small states. Democrats have both Senators from Delaware, Montana, and Vermont, and 3 of the 4 Dakota Senators.

I’m not sure when you were last called an idiot, but you might want to do some simple googling before you so boldly “pan” CT’s latest reform movements…

Why must you prejudice people against electoral reform with a initial headling of “In Which We Meddle in Presidential Elections”? The Electoral College is about as archaic as it comes, and after the Florida, (and Ohio), election debacles, I would hope that the National Popular Vote effort would interest you more. I mean “one person, one vote” is generally considered to be at the heart of democracy.

Here is a stat for the curious minded. Wyoming has a population of about 510,000, and three electoral votes. That comes to one elector per 170,000 people. California has a population of 36,100,000, and 55 electors. This comes to one elector per 650,000 people. In other words, — thanks to that relic known as the EC, — a Wyoman’s vote counts more than three times as much as a Californian’s!

Personally, I don’t know what it’s like to be a Republican in New Haven. But if you were one, why would you ever go to the polls? Thanks to gerrymandering, Rosa DeLauro is congresswoman for life. And thanks to the EC, CT’s votes will continue to go solely to the Democrat. So I guess what I’m suggesting is wouldn’t it be nice, if in something as important as a Presidential election, your vote actually meant something at the margin?

The NPV effort is meant to rid Presidential elections of the EC’s inequities, to make our system much more immune to embarassment, (Florida and Ohio), and to re-enfranchise every voter, regardless of whether they live in a red state, a blue state, or a swing state.

And yet you mock it? Smell the coffee. We need you man….

I would prefer to see Drew or someone introduce a bill for Instant Runoff Voting first, instead of electing the president by popular vote. IRV expert Caleb Kleppner of New Haven (formerly of San Francisco) and the New Haven Advocate have teamed up on a sample IRV ballot for the 2008 Democratic presidential primary.

As for voting for insurance commissioner, I worry that probably 50 percent of people who voted in Nov. 2006 probably couldn’t tell you what Susan Bysiewicz’s biggest achievement as Secretary of State was. So if people have trouble identifiying constitutional officers and their duties, I think we should amend and repair that flaw in our representative system before we add more statewide candidates to the ballot.

I would venture to guess you’re both on to something, there.

Bysiewicz wants to be governor. She may get another shot in 2010, or, failing that, she could run for AG if Blumenthal (ha!) runs for another office.

When Bysiewicz was (temporarily) out of the running for SOTS in 2005, a host of very interesting people got into that race. Then they all disappeared. Flesichmann was probably the front-runner of the bunch, however.

As for Drew’s bill… Article I, Section 10… “No State shall, without the Consent of Congress… enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State” How difficult is that to understand? Of course, we no longer “declare war” either. Instead, we get to hear Hilary’s “nuanced” explanation on her Iraq votes