Posted by John Publius Jr. on November 5th, 2008 — in Issues/Policy, Barack Obama, John McCain, Blog, Election Referee
On November 4, 2008, Illinois Senator Barack Obama was elected the 44th President of the United States.
By electing the first African-American President of the United States, America turns an important page in our history. Over 100,000 people celebrated in Grant Park, Chicago as the election results were announced. Barack Obama addressed the crowd, which responded with euphoric chants of “Yes, We Can!”
Obama not only won all of the traditionally Democratic states, he also won the key battleground states of Florida, Pennsylvania, and Ohio. New battleground states emerged in 2008, and Obama won them all: Virginia, North Carolina, Indiana, Colorado, New Mexico, and Nevada. Missouri was the only traditional battleground state that John McCain won.
The Obama campaign fulfilled the important goal of expanding the electoral map by winning states in the South and the Southwest. In Political Science, a “landslide” is when a candidate wins by more than 10%. Obama won an electoral landslide, defeating McCain 364-174. The popular vote was closer, with a margin of approximately 7%. Election officials are still counting the votes, and at this time the totals are Obama 63,893,037 (53%) and McCain 56,404,917 (46%).
Obama won for several reasons: widespread disapproval of the Bush administration and the U.S. economic meltdown made the conditions extremely difficult for John McCain. The Obama campaign was truly historic in assembling the largest grassroots organization ever in the U.S. Literally millions of people volunteered and/or donated to the Obama campaign. This led to many newly registered voters and very high turn-out for Obama on election day and even earlier due to “early voting” provisions in some states. Obama’s messages of hope and uniting Americans resounded strongly in a country tired of division and fear.
Analysts will continue discussing what this all means. The vote totals were very decisive but not overwhelming. Many states were very close, but the 2008 election was a much clearer decision than the extremely close 2000 and 2004 presidential elections.
The Democratic Party gained seats in both the Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives, building on the gains Democrats made in the 2006 congressional elections. The Democrats are projected to have a minimum of a 56-40 majority over Republicans in the Senate, with results for 4 seats still being counted. Democrats are projected to have a minimum advantage of 254-173 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, with results for 8 seats still being counted. Consequently, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-California) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada) have increased their power.
The Obama administration and the Democratic Party clearly have a “mandate” to enact some important changes. Voters want and expect action. The Democrats now have the power and hold that responsibility. We will hold them accountable two years from now in the 2010 congressional elections.
Simply by electing Barack Obama, the image of the United States throughout the world has improved, literally over night. This is not enough and this is not policy. The Obama administration faces many perilous global circumstances. Establishing new U.S. policies in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan are key first steps.
Necessarily, people will focus mainly on the economy, and this is not a simple problem to solve. We have some short-term major problems and long-term major problems. The U.S federal government needs to do more to stabilize the financial markets and bring relief to the struggling middle class. We are likely in the beginning of a long, deep recession. Extending unemployment benefits and tax relief for the middle class are obvious first steps toward easing the pain. The U.S. must become more competitive in global markets and we need a strong and stable dollar. For both the short-term and the long-term, the U.S. economy must provide good jobs for the middle class.
The high costs of energy, health care, and education are long-term problems that have hampered the U.S. economy. We have an historic opportunity to restructure these vital sectors. This is likely where the political battle lines will be drawn in the early days of the new Obama administration and stronger Democratic majorities in the House and Senate. The success or failure of new economic policies will depend largely on the American people and Obama’s leadership abilities. A working majority of U.S. voters must support specific new policies in order for changes to occur and be effective.
John McCain gave a magnanimous concession speech, which included this call for unity:
I urge all Americans who supported me to join me in not just congratulating him, but offering our next president our good will and earnest effort to find ways to come together, to find the necessary compromises, to bridge our differences, and help restore our prosperity, defend our security in a dangerous world, and leave our children and grandchildren a stronger, better country than we inherited.
Whatever our differences, we are fellow Americans. And please believe me when I say no association has ever meant more to me than that.
The United States has changed. For the momemt, U.S. politics have shifted toward the left. It is up to the Democratic Party to work with the American people in forming new policies that will improve our country.
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Posted by John Publius Jr. on November 2nd, 2008 — in Barack Obama, John McCain, Blog, Election Referee
The presidential election is Tuesday, November 4th.
For me, the choice is easy, obvious, and necessary. The United States has a two-party system. Every four years we have an opportunity to vote for either a continuation of current policies or to try the alternative.
The U.S. economy is in serious trouble. This has made foreign policy a secondary issue, but U.S. foreign policy is also in serious trouble. The current Republican Party policies have been a disaster. Read a newspaper, watch the news.
Barack Obama has run an historic campaign in reaching out across America, attempting to unite a new majority of voters beyond the recently rigid electoral map of red states vs. blue states. A year ago many compared Obama to John F. Kennedy. Given today’s economic meltdown, America needs leadership more reminiscent of Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Obama appears ready and able to meet this challenge. I admire John McCain, but not his policies, especially not now.
From the beginning of the whole presidential campaign cycle, it has been obvious that this election was about whether or not voters want change. That may sound simplistic, but remember on Tuesday you have a simple choice: Obama or McCain. This isn’t an essay question.
Don’t believe any of the non-sense from the Obama-bashers. Communist, terrorist-sympathizer, Muslim, Socialist, radical, un-American. I’m sorry I haven’t had time to address each of these wild accusations. I wanted to post on this blog more often, but I have been working very long hours trying to pay my bills.
First of all, Obama is not a Muslim, but so what if a candidate were a Muslim? People should not be prejudiced against or that ignorant about Muslims anyway. So this accusation is very dumb on two levels. Attempting to frighten people by appealing to prejudice is disgraceful.
In the last month, Obama voted to help save our capitalist system. His tax policies are hardly radical. Tweaking the tax code by a few percentage points to help the middle class is not socialism. Please look it up. Read a book.
Radical associations? I’ve known gun-nuts, anti-abortion extremists, former Black Panthers, ex-felons, ex-gang-bangers, former ’60s radicals, Christian fundamentalists, former ’30s radicals, witches, Jews for Jesus, and musicians. The United States has over 300 million people. Try to get to know someone who isn’t exactly like you. Guilt by association is against the U.S. Constitution. Obama knows many thousands of people. The isolated insular style of the Bush Administration is one cause of our problems.
Obama’s story is the American dream. The attacks against Obama’s character are shameful attempts to fool and frighten people.
I sincerely attempt to be as objective as possible on this blog. I have heard more than enough of the right-wing attacks. I especially object to the idea of “real Americans” vs. the rest of us. The president’s duty is to represent all of us. We have more than enough division in America. Obama has proven he can bridge the gap between people. Now more than any time in my lifetime, the United States needs leadership based on bringing us together and working with us to solve the many problems we face.
Whoever wins the election on Tuesday, we all need to accept the outcome and give the new president a chance.
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Posted by John Publius Jr. on June 28th, 2008 — in General Election Rules, Barack Obama, John McCain, Blog, Election Referee
Election Referee has developed an interactive point-and-click electoral vote calculator map to let you easily explore election scenarios. You can see that many states are currently “toss-up” swing battleground states. This map calculator also shows the electoral map for the last five elections. You can easily see which states have consistently voted as Democratic blue states and which have been Republican red states.
One interesting scenario: click on 2004, click on Obama, and then click on Iowa, New Mexico, and Nevada. This results in a 269-269 tie between John McCain and Barack Obama. Although unlikely, this scenario would force a vote of the U.S. House of Representatives to decide the next president.
You can embed this electoral vote calculator map into your own website or blog. Simply copy the “Embed” code above and paste it into your web page or blog post code.
For more in-depth analysis tools for the 2008 presidential election, visit these excellent resources:
Also, read our article U.S. Presidential Election Rules and the Electoral Map. This includes many interesting details and some important history with good reference links.
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Posted by John Publius Jr. on February 25th, 2008 — in Blog, Election Referee
This website is dedicated to voter participation in fair elections. A primary task is to make election rules easier to understand. Additionally, we want to add our voice to the citizen arbitrators of election controversies as they arise. Elections are critically important to democracy. Unfortunately, disgraceful political tactics often result in focusing attention away from the many important issues we face.
ElectionReferee.com will blow the whistle and throw the penalty flag when we see a foul. We attempt to be fair, non-partisan, and unbiased. We encourage you to post your comments on this site and also to vote in our polls. The first posting on this site is about the Democratic Pary Rules because there is currently much interest and confusion about this topic.
In the coming weeks, we will add more content to this site, including links to election resources and other like-minded websites dedicated to election fairness and information.
For more information about this site, read the “About Us” page.
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Posted by John Publius Jr. on February 25th, 2008 — in Referee whistle, Blog, Election Referee
We attempt to include a post on all the major controversies in the 2008 Presidential campaign (and beyond). As part of this website’s theme, we include a “referee whistle” call at the top of each of these posts. We are mainly concerned with determining whether or not someone committed a “foul”, which we define as unfair tactics by the campaigns, the media, or anyone. We assess a “penalty” using the imprecise football analogy, just to roughly estimate the severity of the unfairness. We hope you like our website regardless of your attitude toward football.
Sometimes we include a “referee whistle: silent, no foul” because a controversy has emerged, but we think nothing unfair has occurred.
Campaigns, the media, and everyone have the right (and duty) to raise legitimate criticisms of each other. We are on the lookout for unfair tactics and “dirty” politics. We review and research each controversy and avoid “knee-jerk” reactions.
Please vote in our opinion polls! For each “referee whistle”, we give you a chance to “boo” or “cheer” each call we make at www.electionreferee.com. We encourage you to base your vote more on the “call” (whistle or no whistle) rather than the “penalty” (10 yards, etc.).
We encourage you to post comments too! You can post anonymous comments. Sometimes comments do not appear on the website automatically because we need to guard against spam and totally inappropriate content. We encourage opposing viewpoints, and we will post all comments as soon as possible.
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