Why people only pay attention to the Presidential election, but not the Congressional seats

The truth is, studying up on local and congressional elections can be tiring when you have to learn about different candidates, as well  as study propositions, and at the same time, pay attention to the presidential election.

Political apathy is fairly common in our country. In the 2012 election, the Presidential election only got about 57% of the vote. You may think that’s not horrible, and it’s not. However, when we look at the number of eligible voters who voted in the 2014-midterm elections (only Congress), only about 36% of voters exercised their right to vote. That is incredibly low, to me at least, for a country priding itself on democracy and representation.

Most people just don’t care about congress. Maybe they’ve been taught there are three branches of government, but feel the executive branch is the most important, because the President is leader of the free world. So why should they care about Congress when the President has all the power?

Some people just don’t pay attention to politics. Ask an everyday person on the street if they know who Maggie Hassan is, and whom she’s running against. Ask them what their thoughts are on the fact that Missouri is becoming more of a swing state, with a Democratic governor and a Democratic senator close to unseating a Republican incumbent. Most people wouldn’t know, and don’t really care about the intricacies of politics in that way.

Another reason for Congressional apathy could be that voters just vote Republican, or Democrat, or Libertarian down the ballot. A voter in Ohio may, for example, see Senator Rob Portman (R) and vote for him based solely off of his party. They don’t care who he is, or what he stands for, but they see the R and that’s all they need.

In my opinion, Congress is the most important branch of government, passing bills, forming committees, determining budgets and taxes, and everything in between. Congress can determine which Supreme Court Justice will be chosen, and to which countries certain ambassadors will be sent. The President can do very little without Congress, making it the most important branch to vote for in the elections.

Thanks everyone! 

2016 Third Party Candidate Choices; Who They Are and Why You Shouldn't Vote for Them

For this post, I'm going to focus on the three main third party candidates: Gary Johnson, Jill Stein, and Evan McMullin. There are about 19 other third party candidates, most of which are barely polling and have no chances of winning.  

Gary Johnson

Gary Johnson just simply isn’t smart enough of a candidate. He’s made plenty of ridiculous mistakes and gaffes (What is Aleppo, couldn’t name his favorite foreign leader), and thinks the only way he would be able to gain in the polls is through the debate. If anyone had to sit through a debate and watch Clinton and Trump fight it out with Johnson holding his tongue in a corner, we’d all go insane. Believe me, I’m not trying to insult Libertarians. I actually think Bill Weld, Johnson’s vice-presidential nominee, is a very smart man who I could conceivably see running this country. However, Gary Johnson just simply isn’t the nominee that could have made the presence of the libertarian party stronger. If you want to vote for Gary Johnson, a vote for Hillary and Trump is a better idea. Whichever one you most agree with. The time to protest this election is over, it's happened. We have the two least liked Presidential candidates of all time, and there's mothing you can do to change that fact. Voting for Johnson is basically a wasted vote, because that vote goes nowhere, and doesn't really effect one of the major parties platform positions. 

Jill Stein

Oh boy, Jill Stein. She is perhaps the least qualified candidate, maybe even more than Donald Trump, and I do not take that lightly. She’s way to the left, even compared to Bernie, and many of her policies are completely unrealistic, such as moving to 100% renewable energy by 2030. She also just takes a solid 2% away from Hillary Clinton, which if this election were closer, would be a throwback to the 200 election with Ralph Nader. Jill Stein is simply not qualified to be President, but if you want a president who speaks about Harambe, then she’s your candidate. However, if you are an upset Bernie Sanders supporter, please go vote for Clinton. Jill Stein is a wasted vote, whereas a vote for Clinton will actually translate to the progress Sanders tried to achieve during the primary process.

Evan McMmullin

Evan McMmullin is probably the best of all three. He worked in the CIA for 11 years and was a national security adviser for the House Committee on Foreign Affairs. He's also worked as a policy director for GOP House campaigns . Now, he’s thrown his hat into the ring and is having huge successes in Utah, his home state. Utah, over the past month, has gone from a solid red state to a tossup, with McMmullin either taking the lead or trailing behind Trump by a couple points. McMmullin, however, is what I would consider a Ted Cruz Republican, someone who is staunchly conservative. I would say he is the most qualified for the job out of all three, and more qualified than Trump. Voting for him is the best option if you’re a Republican who doesn't want to see Trump take office, but also doesn't want to be on record voting for Clinton.

Could any of these people win?

Simple answer-no. The United States election system works in a first-past-the-post system, where majority rules. So if you win a state by a tenth of a percent, you still win. This favors the larger parties, Republicans and Democrats, as opposed to the smaller third parties. The only possible way one of these people could secure the presidency is by winning a state or two, and subsequently tying up the electoral college so that nobody gets the necessary 270 electoral votes. When something like this happens, the vote for President goes to the House of Representatives where each state gets a vote. Because the House of Representatives is controlled by the GOP, and will most likely be controlled by the GOP after November 8th, they will either choose Evan McMmullin or Donald Trump, which will be a difficult decision for the broken party.

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Why Republicans Dominate State, not National Elections

Republicans do incredibly well in state/local governments because of gerrymandering, and the way certain districts have been formed. There’s obviously more to it than just gerrymandering, but that’s one of the biggest reasons they’ve been able to capitalize on state governments and the House of Representatives.

Due to the Republican controlled house as well as gubernatorial victories , the party has been able to redraw districts to their choosing. This means the party has outlined districts that are heavily concentrated in farming and uneducated areas of the US, districts containing a large amount of Christian right supporters (those who oppose Abortion, gay rights, etc…), and on districts which have showed a large opposition to President Obama.

The advantage of cornering the more agriculturally based districts and uneducated districts is that those demographics tend to agree more with the Republican party (in recent years). They’re angry at the US government for not doing anything about 1. Businesses relocating costing hundreds of thousands of jobs and 2. Foreigners taking up the remaining jobs in the US. This demographic will also more often believe the propaganda the Republican party has been churning out through Fox News. Because most of these people are farmers or have jobs that don’t require as much of an educational background, they will believe that Obama was “born in Kenya”, or Hillary Clinton, after seven different hearings, is still responsible for the deaths of four US servicemen after she’s been cleared of wrong doing. These people will most likely vote Republican in elections, and targeting these districts where those voters have a majority gives a huge advantage to the GOP.

Next, the Republican Party, over the past 20 years has appealed to the Christian right, giving in on positions which have brought religion into government (grr). The Christian right will most likely not be voting for a Democrat who supports gay marriage, or a woman’s right to choose, or the legalization of marijuana. These voters will be looking for a candidate who reflects their views within the Republican party, and redrawing districts, to give a majority to this demographic, ensures a Republican victory.

Finally, Republicans have been able to capitalize on the uneducated and the Christian right, inciting these voters into becoming an incredibly angry and frustrated demographic. These voters want a dramatic change, which has manifested itself into the perfect candidate: an outsider who in truth has no idea how to rule a country, no idea how to run a business, and no idea how to speak about any person without oozing some disrespectful or hateful language.

On the national level, the Republicans aren’t as strong in large general elections because these types of elections are no longer dependent on small districts containing a very slim segment of the population. The general election, instead, takes into account an entire state, which includes black voters, hispanic voters, and general voters of the Democratic party.

Districts containing minority groups are usually concentrated in urban areas, and have a fairly easy time electing a Democrat. When we add up the total votes in a state, for example a swing state such as Virginia, Florida, Colorado, Ohio, or North Carolina, generally democrats outperform Republicans because minority groups are more likely to vote Democrat. Further, Dems do fairly well with Independents ( depending on the candidate and the economic and political attitude in the given period of time).

Of course, that’s not to say Republicans always lose the general election, this is far from true, but the political climate is changing and the way the electoral map is drawn makes it difficult for any Republican to win (especially Trump).

Leave a comment if you agree, disagree, or agree to disagree. 

Thanks, 

Emmanuel 

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How Moderate Republicans Can Take Back the GOP

For the time being, moderate Republicans likely won’t be able to take back the GOP.

Currently, the party is dominated by angry, white, hardcore christians. I’m not saying this represents the entire party, however these groups have come to dominate the party, and are the ones voting in Tea Party candidates, and worse, Donald Trump (the Christian right doesn’t love him, but frustrated Americans do).

When the party recovers from what is hopefully a Trump loss, it needs to take a good hard look at itself. The GOP needs to give up it’s most ridiculous positions, and needs to adopt a much more approachable platform.

1.Give up on gay rights and abortion rights.

The GOP has to give up it’s fight against gay rights and abortion rights if it wants to become more moderate. The Republican party was founded on the idea that the government should not constantly get involved in people’s private rights. See a contradiction here? The first step is to stop getting involved in people’s sexual orientation, and stop restricting a woman’s right to do what she chooses with her own body.

2. Get minorities back onto their side.

The Republican party has basically excluded every group of Americans that is not white. The GOP has to actually take steps in helping African American communities, and show to the population the party is not the racist institution it represents. The party also has to loosen up on immigration. Hispanic voters are proven to be on the more conservative side. However, the only conservative party has turned their backs on these voters. The party endorses politicians who call them rapists, thieves, politicians who want to give them less rights than any other American, who want to stick them behind a wall or send them back to whichever country they so desperately tried to escape. The GOP has to open its stance on immigration. I’m not saying the party should adopt a platform which is pro illegal immigration, but the party does have to adopt plans similar to Jeb Bush’s immigration plan earlier on this year.

3. Reaffirm the parties fiscal conservatism

The Republican party has detracted from its most important message; the message that sets it apart from the democrats: fiscal conservatism. The GOP prides itself on this message, but it’s become a footnote in the parties platform. The Republican party has to recenter its focus on reducing government spending, reducing income taxes and corporate taxes, while closing loopholes and keeping up with regulations which are necessary to prevent further market crashes. This being said, the party has to adopt smart fiscal conservatism. The current party wants to reduce taxes for the very richest in the United States, however it’s been proven this doesn’t stimulate the economy and doesn’t “trickle down” to the middle class and lower class. I would love to believe trickle down economics works, but it doesn’t. The GOP needs to stay strong in their ambitions to cut taxes on the middle and lower class, reduce corporate taxes, reduce military spending, and reinvest into education and infrastructure. Only then can our countries economy truly grow.

4. Work with the other party

Congresses approval rating is at an all time low; we have a vacant supreme court seat and have important bills to pass, but nobody to pass them. Over the past eight years, I have seen Republicans refuse to pass common sense gun control bills, even when a majority of the population thinks doing so would be a good idea. I have seen Republicans who once supported positions similar to Obamacare, positions similar to gun control, and clean energy solutions have now turned their back on these policies because…the Democratic President supported them. The Republican party has to find bipartisan compromises with the democrats, and vice versa. We can’t have a stagnating congress because Republicans don’t want to give the democrats a victory. Just recently, Republicans wanted to pass a Zika Virus bill, but had placed so many different positions such as regulating access to contraception and environmental deregulation with pesticides, the Democrats were forced to vote against the bill. This is not a party with the best interests for its population, but for its own benefit.

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