The Left Mark

Making Every Vote Count

A Simple Proposal for Improving the Electoral Process
 

Long before the 2008 election, it simply won’t matter whether or how most Americans vote. Whether they stay home, vote for Ronald McDonald, pick a name out of a hat, or spend countless months deliberating over the right choice for America’s future, their decision will be essentially meaningless with respect to the ultimate outcome of the election.

While this is a bit of an exaggeration, in terms of perception, the reality is that this is how most Americans will feel (and will be told by the media) as a result of a flaw in the design of the Electoral process, which assigns the entirety of each state’s electoral college votes to the winner, regardless of their margin of victory (true for every state but Maine and Nebraska).

In the 2004 presidential election, 31 states (including the District of Columbia) had voter margins exceeding 10%, setting up a scenario where the results of those states’ elections, and the subsequent assignment of their allocated electoral college votes, was known with near certainty long before the actual election. Another 10 states had margins exceeding 5%, leaving only 10 states where the results were close enough to leave a sense of uncertainty. The media made this point clear. And worse, the candidates and their campaigns made this equally clear by focusing their campaigns on these few states and essentially eliminating all communications in the other 40 states.

The effect of this condition is predictable and disheartening. Voter turnout varies significantly based upon whether you live in a state where your vote “matters” or not. As shown in the chart on the right (click the chart to enlarge), average voter turnout in states with greater than 10% election margins was nearly 7% lower than turnout in states where the results were less certain. While this is certainly influenced by the increased media attention and “get out the vote” campaigns in those hotly contested states, the undeniable fact is that voters in the vast majority of the states feel somewhat left out of the democratic process, and they often show it by becoming disinterested and removing themselves entirely.

Past Debates about the Electoral College
Designed originally as a means to help keep the smaller states from being rendered powerless by the more populous states, the Electoral College is no stranger to debate. As recently as the 2000 election, a chorus of people called for an end to the Electoral College, arguing that it was an antiquated process that was no longer relevant in modern times. However, the difference between their argument and mine is one of goals. In 2000, the voices of change were advocating it largely out of political convenience, namely because their candidate (Al Gore) had lost the election despite winning the popular vote by more than 500,000 votes. My position and proposal are not motivated by a desire to help shift circumstances in the favor of my candidate (as evidenced by the chart below which shows that the results of the 2004 election would have remained the same under my proposed change – again, click chart to enlarge), but rather, a sincere concern and a desire to avoid a political outcome that I foresee in the future – where presidential elections are decided in a few swing counties in Florida and Ohio, while the rest of the country becomes a passive spectator, watching as $500mm of television ads are run in Dade and Cuyahoga counties.

My Proposal – Alter (not Eliminate) the Electoral College
I am not proposing that we eliminate the Electoral College. However, I believe that by simply changing it so that Electoral College votes are allocated pro rata according to the actual election results in that state, two important changes will happen. First, from the perspective of individual voters, the perception of voting importance will be universally and immediately increased. And second, from the perspective of politicians, every vote will count the same – a vote in Ohio will no longer be more important than a vote in Utah, and as a result, candidates will have to speak to the entire country as opposed to carefully dissected swing subpopulations.

In the chart below, I have attempted to demonstrate how this proposal would  impact the results of the 2004 election.    For the purposes of this chart, I chose to use two decimal places.    However, in a real election setting, I think you would have to eliminate rounding entirely.    This obviously would mean the end of the human role in the Electoral College, as you cannot have 5.53467 individuals from Arizona casting votes for President Bush, but I think it's a small and necessary change, which would dramatically improve presidential politics.

Why Change The System?
Many of the initial people that I've spoken to about this proposed change have reacted in similar ways.    Their first response is usually something along the lines of "hum, that makes sense", but they quickly follow it up with some variant of "yeah, but I'm sure they had some good reason for designing it the way it is, so it's probably better just to leave it as is."     In actuality, there seems to be at least reasonable data to support the idea that the actual process of the election of the president was given relatively little thought (as compared to other more controversial matters at the time) beyond ensuring that George Washington would be elected the first President.

The reality is that, regardless of the legitamacy of the original idea, the world has changed enough in the past 200+ years to merit at least an honest assesment of whether or not we're still employing the best system for the conditions of our time.    The advent of radio, then television and now the Internet have dramatically changed the communication landscape from the original print world within which this system was devised, and given how dramatically each of these has impacted our own lives, it seems fair to assume that they would have some impact on presidential politics as well.    While I think there is data to support my belief that a simple change like the one that I am proposing would positively impact voter turnout (which would be a good thing), that's not the underlying reason for this proposed change.    The real reason is that as politics gets increasingly sophisticated with the continued development of instantaneously integrated nationwide real-time tracking polls, many Americans will be increasingly left out of the system - ignored because their vote is meaningless in a state that was decided years before the actual election - and our country's top official will be elected based upon how well his or her views sell in Florida or Ohio, rather than in every living room in America.    While this might be in the best interests of people in Dade or Cuyahoga county, it sure doesn't seem like it's in the best interest of our country. 

My Fatwah

There comes a point in a man's life where he can no longer suffer the repeated embarrassment and outright disrespect directed at him from another.     The decisions made in those situations can define that man, and his life.    In choosing properly, even if aided by luck, heroes of history are born and men of average intellect crowned geniuses.   On the contrary, the wrong decision can put in motion an uncontrollable series of progressively worse events, with the end being so remote from the beginning, that neither side can remember how things got started, or more importantly, how to get back to normalized relations.

It is with these thoughts weighing heavily on my mind, that today, April 7, 2006, I am issuing a fatwa declaring jihad on trout - in particular, rainbow and brown trout.    The plain and simple truth is that I have been wronged by trout, on a consistent basis, for close to 10 years now.    It took me a while to  realize that this was the case, as, I understand now,  I have become very good at covering up failures with aphorisms, spouting things like "Hey, no worries - that's why they call it fishing and not catching" with greater and greater consistency over the years.    But, with winter ending and thoughts of the Delaware River starting to sprout in my mind like eager tulip bulbs, something snapped in me this year and forced me to conduct an honest accounting of the situation.   

The results of that analysis were not pretty.    I haven't caught anything on my 6 weight that I would disrespect by catching on a 2 weight in at least 8 years.   And, if you don't count fishing in the Keys, I probably haven't caught anything more than 10 x bigger than the flies used to catch them in just as long.   In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if most of the fish that I have caught, were actually not trying to eat my flies, but were merely trying to wrestle or play with them - thinking it was a buddy given their comparable sizes.    Enough's enough.    I'm done taking this lying down.    Trout and I are no longer friends, and the sad truth is that we probably haven't even been on speaking terms since the summer of either '95 or '96.   

So, what do I intend to do about it, and why, you might ask, do I think that openly declaring a jihad will do anything other than further strain an already  floundering relationship?    In response to the former, I have come up with the following:

My 10 Step Plan for Catching a Trout Bigger Than a Carrot:

1. Change my fly line - It's clearly cursed.   Or it smells bad.
2. Learn to think more like a trout - There are a number of good books on this, although, to my knowledge, none of them were published by trout so that does cast some doubt on their accuracy.
3. Invest more in flies - While I do have a pretty good collection of flies, they don't seem to work.   Maybe they got too close to my cursed fly line.
4. Be humble in my approach - There's no need to go for the long cast if there are good pockets closer.    Although it may seem more exciting to throw 40 yards of line out, mending becomes an issue and trout don't seem to be impressed by casting length.
5. Become better at mending line - Trout hate flies that don't get a natural drift.    They seem to particularly hate it when my (cursed) flies get a bad drift.
6. Fish more often - You can't catch a trout in Manhattan.   
7. Don't be fooled by false rises - Sometimes, it seems that trout rise again and again, but never take a fly.   In these situations, it can only be assumed that these trout are actually miniature dolphins (or another closely evolved species), and are coming to the surface for air.
8. Don't be angry if false rises are proven to be mocking - See above.   If, it is rather determined that trout are not actually mammals, and the false rises are actually trout mocking my casts, done for no plausible reason other than to taunt me, do not get angry and cause a scene.   The offending trout don't deserve that pleasure, and it may damage chances with other trout, further up the river.
9. Change flies more frequently - If a fly ain't workin', get it back in the box.
10. Don't fear the "dry fly as indicator, nymph or emerger hanging off the hook" set up - Very complicated, and can be annoying in windy conditions, but I think that trout respect the effort.

While nothing in life is certain, I can say that I feel much better going into the 2006 trout season with a solid plan ready for execution.     As for whether or not my open declaration of jihad will negatively impact my relationship with trout, only time will tell.   That said, I'm not really sure how they would find out anyway.   Given the daily page views numbers on my blog and the fact that, to my knowledge, no trout own computers, it seems difficult to believe that any trout would stumble upon this post doing a Google search on "Collmer trout jihad  Delaware River".    I guess Blackberry's could be a problem.    Otherwise, it would have to be through word of mouth, and the big problem there is that, seeing as I've never seen a trout with ears, I don't think they'd be able to hear someone giving them the warning.    But then again, that could just be that all of the trout I've caught have been too small to grow ears yet.