Electoral Vote Contest

In just over two weeks all the campaigning, debating, advertising and analyzing will be over and it’ll all be up the Electoral College.

As a little election-season fun, see if you can guess what the Electoral College result will be.

If you need a little help figuring out a good guess, you might find these helpful: The Electoral College, and 2012 Presidential Election. Post your best guess in the comment section.

Prize: the winner will receive a copy of two books:

The World-Tilting Gospel: Embracing a Biblical Worldview and Hanging on Tight and Fatal Illusions: A Novel

Whoever is closest to the actual electoral vote is the winner. Ties will be drawn from a hat (or similar randomizing tool). The contest is open to all registered SI users (register here), but the Publisher and Moderators, etc. are not eligible for the prize (only bragging rights). The deadline for your “prediction” is midnight, Friday, November 2.

(But don’t wait until Nov. 2, to post your guess. You can always revise it until the deadline.)

Discussion

In the announcement, it might have been better to end that opening statement with “…and it’ll all be up the Electoral College and the courts.

Many states could be close, and I’m sure both camps have lawyers lined up to challenge results that went against them, or to defend results in their favor.

Since Bush v. Gore, we’ve seen two more high-profile, drawn-out recounts, in Washington and Minnesota, both of which resulted in a win for the Democrat.

Rick Franklin Gresham, Oregon Romans 8:38-39

[Alex Guggenheim]

Electoral: Romney 342 Obama 196 but when I win please give my prize to the second place person.

Popular: Romney 52% Obama 47% (just like Mitt described)

p.s. Crybaby is 1 word!

CanJAmerican - my blog
CanJAmerican - my twitter
whitejumaycan - my youtube

[JohnBrian]

[Alex Guggenheim]

Electoral: Romney 342 Obama 196 but when I win please give my prize to the second place person.

Popular: Romney 52% Obama 47% (just like Mitt described)

p.s. Crybaby is 1 word!

Thanks Brian. I plead literary license since, imo, Cry Baby Boomer, is visually more distinct.

[Alex Guggenheim]

[JohnBrian]

p.s. Crybaby is 1 word!

Thanks Brian. I plead literary license since, imo, Cry Baby Boomer, is visually more distinct.

And once again I agree with you.

To manipulate a quote by one of SC’s former senators, Fritz Hollings:

“there’s too much agreeing going on out there.”

CanJAmerican - my blog
CanJAmerican - my twitter
whitejumaycan - my youtube

Romney - 276 (wins Florida, Ohio, Virginia, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Nevada)

Obama - 262 (wins Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, Colorado)

Pray vigorously!!

I’m afraid that Obama and the democrats are going to hi-jack the election some way ie. starting riots, declaring martial law, rigging the voting machine. I wouldn’t put anything past him since he uses executive orders for whatever he wants to accomplish. There is no way he’s going to walk away gracefully and dignified.

Michelle Shuman

As of right now, I’ve got Obama winning by 277-266 EC votes. I’m giving Romney VA and FL, but I’ve got Obama winning OH, MI, WI, and PA for an insurmountable lead. I’m also praying fervently that doesn’t come true.

"Our task today is to tell people — who no longer know what sin is...no longer see themselves as sinners, and no longer have room for these categories — that Christ died for sins of which they do not think they’re guilty." - David Wells

Some of the punditry are spreading confusion about executive orders. Though it’s possible to overstep authority, these orders are completely legal when they address matters in any of the Departments under the executive branch—and when there isn’t specific legislation limiting them further.

So a President can’t, for example, use an executive order to change how elections operate in any particular state or in all of them. The states would simply ignore an order like that, I would think.

The real problem is that the executive department bureaucracy has grown so immense that the exec. branch now has enormous regulatory power via EO, if it chooses to use that. Shrinking that back down seriously is a really tough sell politically. Though Romney Ryan talk about doing this some, they haven’t suggested anything on the scale that’s really needed, IMO…. and it’s pretty hard to tell where it fits in their priorities (I’d guess more campaign promises are broken by “not getting around to it” than by “I never meant it in the first place”).

Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.

If I am right and Romney wins VA and FL, then he only has to pick off one of the Obama states I listed to win the election. So that’s good news.

"Our task today is to tell people — who no longer know what sin is...no longer see themselves as sinners, and no longer have room for these categories — that Christ died for sins of which they do not think they’re guilty." - David Wells

Pretty decent debate for MR. Not fabulous but challengers always have some difficulty distinguishing themselves in foreign policy debates w/sitting presidents. Managed to look well informed, “presidential,” confident, calm… it’s about all he needed to do, though a slam dunk would have been nice.

Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.

A few things pointed out today by Steve Deace, a national radio talk show host (albeit still fairly small at this point) who started out on talk radio here in Des Moines. He lives here in Des Moines and is a born-again believer.

All this year I have been comparing this election to 2004. How similar is it? Barack Obama is at about 60% on Intrade two weeks before the election, which is exactly where George W. Bush was two weeks before the election in 2004. All time in American history incumbent presidents have won re-election about 70% of the time. Since 1896, the only 4 incumbent presidents to lose either faced a primary or a Great Depression.

Two things:

  1. I would want to know how the momentum shift in recent weeks compares to 2004. I don’t remember. Was John Kerry gaining ground on Bush in the last month before the election? If not, it might not be an exact comparison because Romney has been gaining ground on Obama in the last month.
  2. Obama didn’t face a primary, but the current economy draws some comparisons to a Great Depression scenario in that one of the questions people have is how much responsibility he bears for the bad economy.

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Greg Long, Ed.D. (SBTS)

Pastor of Adult Ministries
Grace Church, Des Moines, IA

Adjunct Instructor
School of Divinity
Liberty University

I do understand that executive orders are legal and not to override powers given to other branches of our government. But Obama uses them for whatever he wants including making appointments that he can’t push through Congress. Therefore, I don’t trust him. States have tried to control the illegals situation, the voter identification measures, and healthcare reform overrides and the courts at best have in some cases let them go through restricted in other cases the states basically had their hands tied. What’s to stop him from doing something to the election?

Michelle Shuman