Krugman points out how the lack of popular vote representation in the electoral system could work against the Democrats taking over the House of Representatives unless they win hugely.
Will the Levee Break?.: cul:. October 13, 2006 05:42 AMby Paul Krugman
The conventional wisdom says that the Democrats will take control of the House of Representatives next month, but only by a small margin. I've been looking at the numbers, however, and I believe this conventional wisdom is almost all wrong.
Here's what's happening: a huge Democratic storm surge is heading toward a high Republican levee. It's still possible that the surge won't overtop the levee -- that is, the Democrats could fail by a small margin to take control of Congress. But if the surge does go over the top, the flooding will almost surely reach well inland -- that is, if the Democrats win, they'll probably win big.
Let's talk about Congressional arithmetic.
Unless the Bush administration is keeping Osama bin Laden in a freezer somewhere, a majority of Americans will vote Democratic this year. If Congressional seats were allocated in proportion to popular votes, a Democratic House would be a done deal. But they aren't, and the way our electoral system works, combined with the way ethnic groups are distributed, still gives the Republicans some hope of holding on.
The key point is that African-Americans, who overwhelmingly vote Democratic, are highly concentrated in a few districts. This means that in close elections many Democratic votes are, as political analysts say, wasted -- they simply add to huge majorities in a small number of districts, while the more widely spread Republican vote allows the G.O.P. to win by narrower margins in a larger number of districts.
My back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest that because of this "geographic gerrymander," even a substantial turnaround in total Congressional votes -- say, from the three-percentage-point Republican lead in 2004 to a five-point Democratic lead this year -- would leave the House narrowly in Republican hands. It looks as if the Democrats need as much as a seven-point lead in the overall vote to take control.
No wonder, then, that until a few months ago many political analysts argued that the Republicans would control the House for the foreseeable future, because only a perfect political storm could overcome the G.O.P. structural advantage.
But what's that howling sound? Every poll taken this month shows the Democrats with a double-digit lead in the generic ballot question, in which voters are asked which party they support in this election. The median Democratic lead is 14 points.
And here's the thing: because there are many districts that the G.O.P. carried by only moderately large margins in recent elections, a large Democratic surge -- one only a bit bigger than that needed to take the House at all -- would sweep away many Republicans holding seats normally considered safe. If the actual vote is anything like what the polls now suggest, we're talking about the Democrats holding a larger majority in the House than the Republicans have held at any point since their 1994 takeover.
So if the Democrats win, they'll probably have a substantial majority. Whether they'll be able to keep that majority is another question. But be prepared to wake up less than four weeks from now and learn that everything you've been told about American politics -- liberalism is dead, whoever controls the South controls Washington, only Republicans know "the way to win" -- is wrong. (Are we seeing the birth of a new New Deal coalition, in which the solid Northeast takes the place of the solid South?)
The storm may yet weaken. The Iowa Electronic Markets, in which people bet real money on election outcomes, still give Republicans a roughly 40 percent chance of keeping control of both houses of Congress. If that happens, will it mean that Republican control is permanent after all?
No. Bear in mind that the G.O.P. isn't in trouble because of a string of bad luck. The problems that have caused Americans to turn on the party, from the disaster in Iraq to the botched response to Katrina, from the failed attempt to privatize Social Security to the sudden realization by many voters that the self-proclaimed champions of moral values are hypocrites, are deeply rooted in the whole nature of Republican governance. So even if this surge doesn't overtop the levee, there will be another surge soon.
But the best guess is that the permanent Republican majority will end in a little over three weeks.
electronic voting machines will not let this happen.
As has been said before, it's not who votes, but who counts the votes that matters.
Posted by: michaelg at October 13, 2006 12:57 PMwell, if indeed the electronic voting machines are allowed in the next election, your point is well taken...however, many jurisdictions are already outlawing machines that do not produce paper trails.
Krugman's points speak to the structure of the electoral system itself as opposed to the manner in which the votes are tallied.
Posted by: cul at October 13, 2006 04:42 PMThere's something so scary in seeing many people predicting a win for Democrats in Nov. I'm with michael, above. These are truly creepy folk we're dealing with here...I would be surprised if they let one iota of power go.
I want to be wrong, I want to be wrong, I want to be wrong....
I can't see the Repugnants possibly allowing a Democratic Congress of Senate prior to Bush leaving office (or after if Jeb takes over- don't be surprised). If it does, they would likely allow another attack to hit us, as they did in 2001, when Dems controlled the Senate- - then blame the Demos for it by distracting Bush.
But even then, the Bush administration can't afford to go into defense mode for two years. There's still too much American oil under foreign soil, not to mention the billions of tax dollars still to be redistributed to contractors and cronies at the expense of Social Security and Medicare.
Well if the Democrats fail to take over, then the people will. If Dems do not win in a landslide, there will be a Revolution by the people and God help those who are part of the Bush administration. They will be hunted down like the French did their aristocracy during the French Revolution!!!!!!!!
Posted by: cheryl at October 15, 2006 04:35 PMI agree with Cheryl...If exit polls show a Dem house victory and the the fixed voting machines show the opposite.... I think it may well stir a dramatic revolt. After all, we have the right to defend ourselves against criminals....
Posted by: Ken Belmont at October 15, 2006 05:00 PM"If exit polls show a Dem house victory and the fixed voting machines show the opposite..."
Wanna bet that exit polls are gain discouraged, or banned altogether?
Posted by: peedeecee at October 15, 2006 05:09 PMI have been saying the same thing myself, if the polls do not suggest a republican win, and yet they still do win (just as before) then I am with you all "let's take it to the streets!" I am a little worried about the 800 detention camps that king George has had built throughout the U.S. though. I hear that they are for us... (the protesters) Sounds like were going to find out! I just hope that if this next election is stolen again that the Dem's will at least have the guts to come right out and call it stolen....this time!. At least then "our cries of election fraud will get some media coverage". It can't be like in 2004. Not enough people even realized that it was stolen. In 2004 Victor Yushenko of Kiev came right out and called it stolen and told the people to go into the streets. It took 250,000 people living in the streets for several months to get a new election, but they did eventually get a new election, and Victor Yushenko is now the president of Kiev. I am certain that everyone of you remember this and are still angry that we couldn't accomplish the same here. It's not that we didn't try. Alot of us went into the streets. Passing out flyers, attending rallies and capital marches.Remember the media blackout? Not enough people even realized that the election was stolen. It's too bad that so few of people follow the polling numbers closely enough. Alot of people just have know idea when the election results appear skewered, so if the dem's don't have the guts to come onto our tv's and radios and call it stolen, "well" it'll be just just like before. We have to somehow get several thousand people to one spot, then perhaps as awareness grows, then so will our numbers. I am expecting the worst this midterm election. The republicans will steal it again. George Bush is acting too confident again just like in 2004 when he should have expected to lose, because just like 2004 he has already stolen it...and the only thing left to do is count the votes! I've gotta a feeling that I'll be seeing you all in the streets. I sure wish that I could be wrong about this! I so desperately want to be wrong!
Posted by: J.C. at October 15, 2006 06:22 PMI really wish this were true, but after 2000 & 2004, I no longer believe that this voting system works and that the Crazies and the Corrupt will run this country until Game Over.
Posted by: qwerty at October 16, 2006 03:04 AMI have seen what Krugman writes about. It is the the flaw in excess Gerrymandering. Democratic "safe seats" areas in a normal time Democrats win by 90%, while in Republican "safe seat" areas they win by 55-60%, thus even though the majority in the area are Democrats, there are 5 Republican Reps and one Democrat.
The difficulty is that even if there is a total reversal in the legitimate vote, and even if there were honest counting, the new Democratic seats would never be "safe" and likely fall back to Republicans once the furor was over.
There will certainly be massive vote fraud, but some places either are not perpared for such a storm, or have not been totally corrupted. And there are some places where prepared fraud could go ary "Mark Foley wins by large margin" comes to mind.
In any case it is possible that Dems could win back the house, but if they don't use that two years to address the structural problems and corruption, it will be Hopes last gasp.
Posted by: freedem at October 16, 2006 03:46 AMThis goes to the heart of the abject failure of the Democratic party to lead this fight against GOP corruption.
Us on the left have consistently told the Dem leadership to stop this "let the trainwreck happen" and go for the middle ground approach for years, but will they listen? No.
It is obvious that the only way to defeat outright election fraud is through a massive landslide in voter turnout, and the only way to guarantee that is to offer POLICIES that mobilize the lower 80% of income brackets to go out and vote.
The Dems are yet again playing "politics as usual" with life or death matters of the survival of our Republic.
Posted by: RAL at October 16, 2006 06:35 AMDon't count your chickens, because the Cretins ain't letting go of power....How do I know...Because the Oil Stocks and the Pharmecutical Stocks are not tanking.....That means the Investor Class thinks the Repigs will pull off another Stalinist vote counting atrocity....
Posted by: Rich at October 16, 2006 07:15 AMOne death is a tragedy; a million is a statistic.
Joseph Stalin.
Don't count your chickens, because the Cretins ain't letting go of power....How do I know...Because That means the Investor Class thinks the Repigs will pull off another Stalinist vote counting atrocity....
It doesn't matter who votes.... what matters is who counts the votes....Joseph Stalin.
When will people not only wake up but get out of bed?
Posted by: Ted at October 16, 2006 07:26 AM....How do I know...Because the Oil Stocks and the Pharmecutical Stocks are not tanking.....That means the Investor Class thinks the Repigs will pull off another Stalinist vote counting atrocity....
I know someone in the industry who tells me that traders are talking about the market tanking on Nov. 8th--so it sounds as if they are not all convinced....
I think they plan to steal it, too. What will make it difficult for them to do is huge turn-outs for a midterm, rare in American politics. There are never large turnouts when there is no anger in the electorate directed at the party in power, especially for mid-terms.
The turn out in 2004 was historical, as I recall, but Rove managed to explain it away by a supposedly large turn-out by evangelicals, which was ludicrous on the face of it. Those people always vote. It's like going to church for them.
But a lot has changed since 2004. Many evangelicals may well stay home this year. The Foley thing, plus this new book, which claims that Rove and company see evangelicals as nutcases, goofy and easily manipulated may have a very adverse effect on the evangelical ground troops, even while the evangelical leaders denounce the book's author.
What was known by a minority in 2004 is well-known now. The lies, lies and more damned lies about Iraq, which has really gone south now, and according to a new NYT/CBS poll, even 9/11. Something like 83 % now question the official story about what the White House knew prior to 9/11 about the coming attacks and what they didn't do about it..
The wheels are coming off the Gooper bus.
A huge turn-out will make it much harder for them to steal more elections. Especially, if the news media picks up on the amount of people voting in a midterm.
Why don't we all camp out at our polling places in the early morning hours of Nov.7 and notify the news media that large groups of people are doing so, all over America.
I'm just thinking out loud, but we have to find a way to get the news media's attention early and keep them focused on the historically large turn out.
It will, then, be impossible for Rove to account for a Gooper win anywhere.
By all means, talk to the exit polling folks. (Exit polling hasn't been outlawed yet, has it?)
Posted by: badmoonrising at October 16, 2006 09:53 AMBoth Republicans and Democrats: Who do you think you are? You were put into your positions by we the voters to do a job of keeping our country honest ???, safe ??? and protecting our rights as citizens.
There are many of us out here who are just as smart, or smarter, more honest, and would really watch out for our country, but because we do not have the money it takes to obtain such a position we are left out. What have you accomplished in this last years or so, having only worked around 93 days this year, obviously nothing of great importance other than stripping our consitutional rights and debating subjects like Terri Schiave, don't burn the flag, bash to gays, God forbid given them basic rights, etc. etc. etc.
We the American citizens have reason to be very afraid and there are a great many of us who have been so dissolusioned that we really wonder if we should vote because we fear that either our votes will not be counted or that the election will again be stolen.
Thanks for listening.
Posted by: san at October 16, 2006 10:10 AMNo, but one state has just outlawed exit polling that is within a certain distance from polling stations. Why...I have no idea. Some people were interviewed who do exit polling. They said that the distance is so great, that they probably wouldn't know who actually voted or not.
Maybe someone can answer this for me...why has so much attention been paid to preventing paper trails in several states. It's it against the law in Florida for there to be a paper trail? Also, why are bills being passed to clamp down on voting drives and, in some cases, impose felonies if ballots are submitted with the slightest delays. All of this legislative attention toward restricting policies which help/assist/or inform the average American is very suspicious...very very suspicious.
If you ask me, I'm betting the Republicans will comfortable hold on to both the House and Senate. Look how close Kerry and Bush were before the vote in 2004...and look what the ending results were. As predicted, those people who were under 30 had the lowest turnout at the poles. People are too concerned today about their I-Pods, Who's going to be the next Apprentice, etc. I think it's going to take another long hard recession/depression to make substantial changes in politics. Though most Americans are living with huge house payments and credit card debt, most, in my opinion, don't seem very interested in politics.
My company, for instance, just announced in a nice way that they aren't giving us sick leave anymore and that we are losing 3 days of vacation a year. We also received a pension cut two years ago. There was barely a wimper of protest from anyone. IBM and HP got rid of their pensions altogether. Has anyone ever heard about employees protesting this? People are just too complacent today. Most people alive today do not know
Posted by: Todd at October 16, 2006 10:44 AMWhat is needed is an end to gerrymandering. Impossible? No. Here's how a truly impartial districting would work:
1. Find the population center of the state. In Minnesota (where I live) that would be a few miles northwest of the Twin Cities.
2. Lay out a line from the population center due north.
3. Divide the state into the 9 districts Minnesota has by laying out pie-shaped districts with their apex at the population center and with 2 of the districts separated by the due- north line.
4. Where the population is relatively sparse (to the west of the Twin Cities), the pie slice would be wide in order to have equal population with the very narrow district to the southeast of the population center, which would encompass parts of the Twin Cities.
Thus would be born a totally objective way of laying out legislative districts.
In this way
Posted by: Dean DeHarpporte at October 17, 2006 01:08 AMThe last two comments seem to have been cut off in mid-stream and I don't know why.
Posted by: cul at October 17, 2006 07:24 AM