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Title is the subject!

I am hoping someone can explain to me, in idiot proof terms, how the American Electoral, and by extension, Government works.

Now, I get that the President is The Head Of State, and that there is the House of Representatives, and also a seperate (?) Senate.

If memory serves, The Democrats currently hold majority in both the Representatives and the Senate, hence why Bushyboy has been very quiet of late.

But which arm has what powers, and, should McCain become President, how much actual power will he wield with the Senate and Representatives both arguably outside his jurisdiction? And I remember hearing something about the Supreme Court about to go Democrat, though I could be mistaken.

Please, throw me a bone here!

I understand the British system of course. Queen is Head of State, but has very little Power. Prime Minister makes the Decisions, but has to form a Bill of Parliament. This gets voted on, then goes to the formerly unelected House of Lords, and if passed, then becomes an Act of Parliament. A General Election is when the country votes for who controls their local 'Seat' using the First Past The Post. The Party with the Majority of Seats becomes the Government, the next biggest the Shadow Government, and everyone else remains a Mook. Under this system, it is perfectly possible, though highly unlikely (Safe Seats...in some areas, the Tories could stick a Blue Ribbon on a Turd and it will still get elected!) for the new Government's Leader to have to step down, having lost his or her seat.

Americans are on average very misinformed by who really does what. And a lot of the people in different sections sometimes use powers they don't actually have (A no-no but no one notices or cares).

We first cast our votes, that tells our representative in the electoral college (the guys who's votes actually matter) to vote that way (but they don't actually have to). Then there are some other guys who get an electoral college vote who don't really have to vote with how the American people vote. Then you have an elected U.S. president. That's it in a nutshell.

There's three branches to the federal government.

The President is the head of the Executive Branch. The Executive Branch upholds the laws of the country.

The Supreme Court is the highest court of the land and the top court of the Judicial System. They interpret the laws of the country.

The House and Senate are the Legislative Branch. They make the laws, and bills have to pass a vote in both the House and Senate to become a law.

There's a lot of grey area, but that's the basic breakdown. The President can issue Executive Orders, which technically aren't a law, but have a similar effect. The most prominent one in my memory is the one against assassinating foreign leaders. The Supreme Court can really establish law by their interpretation. Abortion is legal in the US because of the Roe vs. Wade ruling, in which the Court upheld the right of a woman to have an abortion. That could be overturned by an amendment to the Constitution (which is the highest law), which would require the House and/or Senate and the States to pass the bill (I forget the exact details, but it's a complex and usually long process). The Legislature can squeeze the President by doing things like: not passing the laws he wants, passing laws that limit his powers (after Vietnam, the Congress reduced the ability to deploy troops overseas without Congressional approval), and not passing the annual budget.

The House and Senate both make up the Congress, aka the Legislature. The House has 435 members, and they are elected based on population of a state (minimum one). I think Montana has 1 Representative in the House and New York has like 40-50. The Senate has two Senators from each State. This was the great compromise to develop the Constitution. The big states wanted the Legislature determined by population, the little states wanted it based on equal representation. Members in the House serve 2 years, the Senate is 6 years (and 1/3 of the Senate comes up for re-election every two years, so that no more than 1/3 of the Senate is changing at any election).

The Electoral System is the compromise to elect a president (again, it's a big state vs little state situation). Each State has a number of electoral votes based on the number of Representatives in the House +2 (for each Senator). The District of Columbia has several electoral votes (which was a Constitutional Amendment in the, iirc, 20th century - so for a long time, people that lived with DC's limits, didn't vote in the presidential election). This is how George Bush could lose the popular vote and win the election. He narrowly won a lot of 'big' states (and the electoral votes are all or nothing) and lost the small states by a lot. So, he lost the popular vote, but carried all the big states, so he won.

Now, originally, the electoral system wasn't so cut and dried. Each state has a number of Electors that convene in the Electoral College after the election. Which electors attend are based on which candidate won in the popular vote (so, if Obama wins Illinois, Illinois send their Democratic Electors to the College). Then the Electors, technically, elect the president. This is, in theory, a safeguard to prevent people that are really popular from getting elected (some like, Hulk Hogan or Britney Spears, say) president. Since there are really only two political parties, this is just a rubber-stamp at this point. 200 years ago, Electors were a little more willing to vote for who thought should be President.

Interesting, and still slightly confusing. But the confusion is arising from me, not from yourself.

SO....Electoral Votes....The number of 'College' Votes in each State is pretty much worked out by Proportional Representation, yes? But, they are assigned to a Presidential Candidate on an All Or Nothing basis, correct? Have to say, not entirely sure that's fair, but I'll hold off on that until I am sure I have the right end of the stick.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:Title is the subject!

I am hoping someone can explain to me, in idiot proof terms, how the American Electoral, and by extension, Government works.

Now, I get that the President is The Head Of State, and that there is the House of Representatives, and also a seperate (?) Senate.

If memory serves, The Democrats currently hold majority in both the Representatives and the Senate, hence why Bushyboy has been very quiet of late.

But which arm has what powers, and, should McCain become President, how much actual power will he wield with the Senate and Representatives both arguably outside his jurisdiction? And I remember hearing something about the Supreme Court about to go Democrat, though I could be mistaken.

Please, throw me a bone here!

President is head of state, and heads the Executive. The president is determined by election every four years.

Then you've got the legislative, otherwise called congress, which consists of two parts, the senate and the house of representatives. The senate has two members elected by each state, for a total of 100 senators. The house of representatives has its members elected by each state, but each state gets a number of members equal to its population, so there's lots for Texas and just the one for Alaska.

The Democrats currently hold a single seat majority in the Senate, but this is because Lieberman aligned himself with the Democrats when the senate was formed, but has since aligned himself more with the Republicans (he's sprucing for McCain pretty hardcore). The Democrats hold a stronger lead in the house of Representatives. It is expected the Democratic majority in both houses will increase a little in the upcoming election.

Exactly which part of the US government is responsible for which part of government is a really big topic. In part because it's just a complex topic with every country, but also because it's a really fuzzy thing in the US. In theory, the legislative writes laws and passes budgets, while the executive executes policy. In practice it's a lot more complicated as there's a lot of by-play between the two elements and the vagaries on the constitution have allowed for a lot power to creep towards the President. For instance, it's a power of Congress to declare war, but 50,000 US troops were killed in Vietnam without Congress ever doing so - it was a 'police action'.

Okay. So just how scuppered is a President whose Party doesn't hold the Legislative?

Would I be right in thinking that Congress can tell the President to knob off on a number of issues?

For example, in the UK, we have the House of Lords almost as a control. An example of which follows. In 1997, Labour won by a Landslide Majority. This meant they held more than half the Seats in Parliamant. As a result, it would be possible to apply a 'Three Line Whip' (forcing Elected Party Members to vote a certain way, on threat of expulsion from the Party. Ain't Democracy great!) and send a Bill through Parliament without the opposition to stop it. Clearly, this is dangerous, as you risk a legally elected Party tearing up it's Manifesto, and shoving through whatever the hell they want. And this is where the (again, not 100% elected) House of Lords come in. They can vote on the Bill as well, though, strictly speaking, they cannot stop it (more on this in a second). If they do not pass the Bill, it is returned to the House of Parliament with a list of ammendments reccomended. The Bill is then tinkered with, and sent through again. There is a finite number of times the House of Lords can refuse a Bill though, I believe three, and on the fourth, it bypasses them completely. A good example of this in very recent Memory was the banning of Hare Coursing, Hunting With Dogs etc that got the Toffs in a right old hooha (I don't care if Fox Hunting is an ancient 'tradition' So was human sacrifice and Wickermen, but you don't see that anymore...)

They are pretty well balanced against each other. The president can veto anything the congress passes, UNLESS they have a 2/3s majority to override the veto. That rarely ever happens. Basically, when the two parties are split between the executive and legislative, it becomes a stalemate where compromise is the general outcome.

This will be somewhat simplified becuase books could be written about it, and they are.

Each state is worth a number of Electoral Votes based on population. Each State has their own rules for how the Electoral College members from each state work, but generally whoever gets the most popular votes gets the the Electoral Votes, also called Winner Takes All. A few states do a percentage allotment where they break up the votes to correspond with the citizen votes i.e. candidate X gets 60% of the votes in a state with 10 Elector votes would get 6 of those votes.

There are 538 Electoral votes up for grab, to win the Presidency a candidate must get at least 270 of them. I googled Electoral College Map and found a pretty good one that shows the values.



As for the second part of your question, there are three main bodies of the Federal government.

The Executive - Duh, the President. This person gives a face to the Government and is mostly authorized to deal with Foriegn Affairs and is the Commander in Chief of the US Armed Forces. The power of the position has grown over the years into different areas of influence, but in the end they have no legislative power at all. The President also has power to appoint certain positions and offer nominees for ones that need confirmation. His political power comes from being popular or circumstances. A popular President has a lot of political capitol because the Legislative will be less likely to brush off his ideas and proposed legislation to keep from pissing of the public.

The Legislative - This is a bicameral system as a compromise during the formative years. If they went by population alone big states would bully the small ones, but if they just had the same number of people per state the smaller ones would hold disproportionate sway. So they merged them. The House of Representatives is made up of Representatives based on the states population. The term of office is two years. The Senate makes up the other half and is comprised of two members from every state, regardless of size and serve six year terms. The Legislative Branch actually decide what laws to be considered and passed as well as hold the purse strings.

The Judiciary - aka The Supreme Court. They make sure that what the other two are doing is actually legal. If congress passes a law to Kill all the Redheads the Supreme Court would be the one to overturn it. There are Strict Constructionists who in essence say that if it isn't specifically stated in the constitution it can't be done, and then the other side which say that if it isn't there it can, in a nutshell. There is also the "living document" argument that plays into both.

As it is the Democrats have a slight Majority with 235 members while the Republicans hold 199 seats. In the Senate they are tied with 49 each and 2 Independents muckin' about. So while the Dems do have a slight lead, it's not enough to go gangbusters with their agenda.

What McCain will be able to do really do will depend a lot on how the seats in the Legislative go in the election as well. If the Dems get a bigger lead he'll be limited, if the Republicans get seats back he'll have more leeway. He would still be Commander in Chief and have control of what the military is doing, but Congress funds it, but generally you do not want to screw around with the military budget as a political move, even the left wants our soldiers to have their vests and food. it's one of the fastest ways to get voted out of office.

Edit: I take to long to type, their were no responses when I started.

Personally, I always like it when one party controls the Legislature and the other is President.

In theory, the Legistlature, Executive Branch, and Judical System are supposed to provide "checks and balances" against each other.

dietrich wrote:There's a lot of grey area, but that's the basic breakdown. The President can issue Executive Orders, which technically aren't a law, but have a similar effect. The most prominent one in my memory is the one against assassinating foreign leaders. The Supreme Court can really establish law by their interpretation. Abortion is legal in the US because of the Roe vs. Wade ruling, in which the Court upheld the right of a woman to have an abortion. That could be overturned by an amendment to the Constitution (which is the highest law), which would require the House and/or Senate and the States to pass the bill (I forget the exact details, but it's a complex and usually long process).

When you say 'establish law by interpretation' you're talking about precedent. Precedent basically means that an interpretation of an existing law is required to be upheld in lower courts. It helps establish a consistancy in law that would otherwise be lacking, unless you had law passed about every little thing you could think of. It's worth noting this isn't an American thing, its pretty much how it works everywhere in the world.

The Electoral System is the compromise to elect a president (again, it's a big state vs little state situation). Each State has a number of electoral votes based on the number of Representatives in the House +2 (for each Senator). The District of Columbia has several electoral votes (which was a Constitutional Amendment in the, iirc, 20th century - so for a long time, people that lived with DC's limits, didn't vote in the presidential election). This is how George Bush could lose the popular vote and win the election. He narrowly won a lot of 'big' states (and the electoral votes are all or nothing) and lost the small states by a lot. So, he lost the popular vote, but carried all the big states, so he won.

Sort of, he didn't carry any of the big New England states. What Bush did was win a lot of the smaller states, which have a higher ratio of electoral votes to population, thanks to the two bonus electoral votes for their senators.

This is why I wanted to keep it simple. You can go to Amazon and find three or four books just on Marbury v. Madison alone.

Edit: I suppose for thoroughness's sake I should point out that territories, protectorates, et al. can have some reps. Peurto Rico has a person in the House to voice concerns but they don't get to vote because they aren't a state. They also can not vote for President, though they can vote in Primaries because those are party votes, not government votes.

All I remember is that Bush carried narrowly carried Ohio. I guess maybe that's mid-sized. I do remember him carrying a lot of the 3-5 electoral vote states. I try to forget the embarrasement of the last 2 elections, partially due to the result, but mostly because of lousy choices. I might go back to voting Libertarian.

Ahtman wrote:This is why I wanted to keep it simple. You can go to Amazon and find three or four books just on Marbury v. Madison alone.

Edit: I suppose for thoroughness's sake I should point out that territories, protectorates, et al. can have some reps. Peurto Rico has a person in the House to voice concerns but they don't get to vote because they aren't a state. They also can not vote for President, though they can vote in Primaries because those are party votes, not government votes.

It has always bugged me that Puerto Rico can't vote. Seems unamerican.

Side note: Maine and Nebraska distribute their Electoral votes according to popular vote.

Puerto Rico is not a state. Various ballot initiatives in PR to call for becoming a state have failed.

Puerto Rico doesn't count, it is a protectorate. I want to live in a Protectorate. And this isn't like the Protectorate of Menoth, it's way better. iirc, They don't pay taxes or have to register for the draft - or anything else a US citizen does, but get about 90% of the benefits of being 'in' the US - like being defended by the best military in the world. It's the best of both worlds, in my mind.

Everytime I hear Puerto Rico, I still snigger from the SNL joke (and this dates me, I think it was Dennis Miller) on Weekend Update. 'Puerto Rico has approved a name change to Puerto Rico Suave.' I forget the singer, or even how the song goes (and I think it's best that I do), but there was a song circa 1990 called Rico Suave by a latino male singer - like Ricky Martin, but cheesier.

Crimson Devil wrote:It has always bugged me that Puerto Rico can't vote. Seems unamerican.

Forcing them to become a state isn't very nice either. There are advocates for Statehood, Independence, and status quo going on there and really Status Quo wins out. If they ever decided it was that important to them they could easily apply for statehood, but it's not so they don't.

How could the democrats get anything through the senate if 2 of their senators (Obama and Clinton) had missed over 2/3 of votes in the last year or so, thus giving republicans the majority?

Ahtman wrote:

Crimson Devil wrote:It has always bugged me that Puerto Rico can't vote. Seems unamerican.

Forcing them to become a state isn't very nice either. There are advocates for Statehood, Independence, and status quo going on there and really Status Quo wins out. If they ever decided it was that important to them they could easily apply for statehood, but it's not so they don't.

I'm not saying they should be forced to be a state or independent, but they should make a decision. Staying in the grey area bugs me.

Waaagh_Gonads wrote:How could the democrats get anything through the senate if 2 of their senators (Obama and Clinton) had missed over 2/3 of votes in the last year or so, thus giving republicans the majority?

In any legislative body, only a small minority of votes have any actual significance. So the question would be become how many votes of substantive importance were they absent from. Probably not so many.

In the US you usually need 60 votes to get something important done in the Senate anyway, so this is not as much of an issue as it might seem. The other question, of course, would be what would actually happen if the Senate minority actually tried to exploit this for a day or two based on knowing the candidates' schedules. Nothing good for them is your answer.

Waaagh_Gonads wrote:How could the democrats get anything through the senate if 2 of their senators (Obama and Clinton) had missed over 2/3 of votes in the last year or so, thus giving republicans the majority?

Because most votes are going to get up comfortably or fail badly, and this is known before the vote takes place. Obama and Clinton, like McCain who's attendance has actually been less since running, turned up for the votes that actually needed their presence.

The secret chiefs of the world meet (in secret, duh). Then they burn their ballots and we
know a new world leader has been selected when the chimneys of all the McDonalds
in the land turn a crimson red.

Off Topic

@deitrich - "...but get about 90% of the benefits of being 'in' the US - like being defended by the best military in the world..."

I find fault with your reasoning here.
1. Who the hell wants to invade Puerto Rico?
2. Richest does not equal best.

On Topic

Its a problem that every 'democratic' country faces - the fact that the vast majority of their citizens have no idea how the system works (let alone how other countries do things).

I always find it funny that in UK elections people think they are voting for a Prime Minister, or for one particular party to run the country. These very important decisions are a by-product of their votes for a local representative, not a result of them.

Nowhere to my knowledge is a democracy. The US is a republic, the UK is a constitutional monarchy and so on. People don't make decisions, they just chose other people who do.
This would be fine except that if they don't like what their representative choses to do - they'll still vote for them if they like the party they're in or the leader they erroneously think they're electing.

As Churchill famously put it:
"Democracy. The worst form of government. Except for all the others."

Democracy, true democracy, is unweildy and unworkable above a population of a few hundred, the political version of communism's financial/resource-based problem. Imagine if the US had to run national voting on every bill that came through Congress... nothing could get done at anything more than a glacial pace.

With regard to the British system....

I am shocked that people complain about Brown not being elected. When I cast my vote, I do so for Policies, not the Party, and certainly not the Leader. As long as the Policies I voted for are likewise voted for in the Commons, I couldn't give a rats buttock who is technically in charge.

Chimera_Calvin wrote:@deitrich - "...but get about 90% of the benefits of being 'in' the US - like being defended by the best military in the world..."
I find fault with your reasoning here.
1. Who the hell wants to invade Puerto Rico?
2. Richest does not equal best.

Whether anyone wants to invade them or not, doesn't matter. iirc, they don't have a standing army to defend their borders. With no military, anyone could walk in and plant a flag. Heck, even France could conquer them at that point!

You are correct about the second comment. Best depends how you measure it. I'd say that the US has the best ability to project force to far away places. When it comes to defending their home turf and launching strikes in their own region, I'd say Israel is the best. And I really wouldn't want to mess with China just because of the number of bodies they have. An illiterate rice farmer with an assault rifle and 100 rounds of ammo is a threat. 50 million of them is a huge threat.

Chimera_Calvin wrote:Off Topic

Nowhere to my knowledge is a democracy. The US is a republic, the UK is a constitutional monarchy and so on. People don't make decisions, they just chose other people who do.

As Churchill famously put it:
"Democracy. The worst form of government. Except for all the others."

The Federal Govenment of the USA is a Constitutional Republic and is consider one of the oldest. However there is a growing argument that in reality the US is now more of a Plutocratic Oligarchy. It is at the state and local level where American citzens still have somewhat of a voice. There are a lot of reasons that so many of us are apathic about our National Government.

It's one of those weird things. People have a say and can actually do something on the local and state level but people almost always ignore those; especially local where they can have the greatest impact. Instead they focus on national politics where they have almost no voice whatsoever.

Which is just way those in positions of power want it.

In the UK, the Electorate (me, and every other Registered Voter) has the power to depose our Government at any time, for any reason, as long as enough of us want it.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:In the UK, the Electorate (me, and every other Registered Voter) has the power to depose our Government at any time, for any reason, as long as enough of us want it.

That is odd, we can do the same, and unlike the UK, we have the guns to do it! Bolters and Bolt Pistols for every man woman and child!

Ahtman wrote:It's one of those weird things. People have a say and can actually do something on the local and state level but people almost always ignore those; especially local where they can have the greatest impact. Instead they focus on national politics where they have almost no voice whatsoever.

Weirder than that, look at all us foreignors who are so interested in the American race. Your vote might nearly worthless, but we don't even have that, yet we're hooked.