4 ms·

I believe the stronger reason is your presidential election vote won't matter in most states where the contest is already decided. So a candidate winning 70-30

I believe the stronger reason is your presidential election vote won't matter in most states where the contest is already decided. So a candidate winning 70-30 vs. 60-40 doesn't make a difference.

manachar 10y ago
Voter turnout is higher in our presidential elections when a person's vote is generally worth less. People SHOULD be voting at the local level where their votes still matter quite a bit, but generally don't through an interesting combination of apathy and ignorance (e.g. few people actually know who their rep on the city council is and what their basic platform is).
- slavik81 10y ago
  Unfortunately, limited information is an inherent consequence of scale. There's much better media coverage of national issues. If I read The Economist, they may provide insight into the presidential candidates. They do not have news about my candidates for city council.
  - manachar 10y ago
    Which is really odd to think about. Super local newspapers used to be the norm, but as the conglomerates got bigger the number of papers fell so they no longer had the space to cover the truly local news. A variety of web sites have tried to fill the need, but the money needed for local news far exceeds the revenue they're able to generate.
  - dragonwriter 10y ago
    Theres much more media coverage of national issues, but better may not be a warranted conclusion.
hackuser 10y ago
> I believe the stronger reason is your presidential election vote won't matter in most states where the contest is already decided. So a candidate winning 70-30 vs. 60-40 doesn't make a difference. Your vote, win or lose, also communicates very important messages: 1) 'I vote, and people in my community vote'. If you don't vote then why the hell should the politician care what you want? Does McDonalds care about the opinions of people who don't eat fast food? You think they should put more healthy options on their menu? 'So what? Who are you? Stop wasting my time.' The same goes for your community: If your community doesn't vote, then why would anyone address its concerns? In a world of 50% turnout, imagine the attention a community would get if 95% voted - on every issue, they'd be wondering, 'what does neighborhood X think? how does it affect them?' 2) It expresses a political outlook. A politician who sees their constituents vote 80-20 for Clinton over Trump is going to behave much differently than one who sees a 55-45 vote.
- nitrogen 10y ago
  There are much better ways we could design systems for expressing these preferences than the relative proportions of a losing vote.
  - hackuser 10y ago
    I agree, but this is all we have to work with in 2016 ...

I believe the stronger reason is your presidential election vote won't matter in most states where the contest is already decided. So a candidate winning 70-30 vs. 60-40 doesn't make a difference.

manachar 10y ago

Voter turnout is higher in our presidential elections when a person's vote is generally worth less. People SHOULD be voting at the local level where their votes still matter quite a bit, but generally don't through an interesting combination of apathy and ignorance (e.g. few people actually know who their rep on the city council is and what their basic platform is).

slavik81 10y ago
Unfortunately, limited information is an inherent consequence of scale. There's much better media coverage of national issues. If I read The Economist, they may provide insight into the presidential candidates. They do not have news about my candidates for city council.
- manachar 10y ago
  Which is really odd to think about. Super local newspapers used to be the norm, but as the conglomerates got bigger the number of papers fell so they no longer had the space to cover the truly local news. A variety of web sites have tried to fill the need, but the money needed for local news far exceeds the revenue they're able to generate.
- dragonwriter 10y ago
  Theres much more media coverage of national issues, but better may not be a warranted conclusion.

hackuser 10y ago

> I believe the stronger reason is your presidential election vote won't matter in most states where the contest is already decided. So a candidate winning 70-30 vs. 60-40 doesn't make a difference. Your vote, win or lose, also communicates very important messages: 1) 'I vote, and people in my community vote'. If you don't vote then why the hell should the politician care what you want? Does McDonalds care about the opinions of people who don't eat fast food? You think they should put more healthy options on their menu? 'So what? Who are you? Stop wasting my time.' The same goes for your community: If your community doesn't vote, then why would anyone address its concerns? In a world of 50% turnout, imagine the attention a community would get if 95% voted - on every issue, they'd be wondering, 'what does neighborhood X think? how does it affect them?' 2) It expresses a political outlook. A politician who sees their constituents vote 80-20 for Clinton over Trump is going to behave much differently than one who sees a 55-45 vote.

nitrogen 10y ago
There are much better ways we could design systems for expressing these preferences than the relative proportions of a losing vote.
- hackuser 10y ago
  I agree, but this is all we have to work with in 2016 ...