"Americans voted for a Democratic president, a Democratic Senate, and, barring significant shifts in the vote tally, a Democratic House. Instead, they will get a House majority similar to the one that held the entire nation hostage during last year’s debt ceiling hostage crisis. If the American people wanted this to happen, they would have said so at the polls on Tuesday. Instead, Republican state lawmakers took away their right to democratically legitimate leadership — with a big assist from the conservatives on the Supreme Court." ...Think Progress
Wait a minute! What was the vote count?
"Based on ThinkProgress’ review of all ballots counted so far, 53,952,240 votes were cast for a Democratic candidate for the House and only 53,402,643 were cast for a Republican — meaning that Democratic votes exceed Republican votes by more than half a million." ...Think Progress
Not all the votes have been counted yet. So there could be some minor changes in those numbers. But how do the Republicans win with 500,000 fewer votes?
"There is a simple explanation for how this happened: Republicans won several key state legislatures and governors’ mansions in the election cycle before redistricting, and they gerrymandered those states within an inch of their lives." ...Think Progress
Both sides do it. Shouldn't that be one of the first big changes that we make -- as part of a general overhaul of our election systems that make our country look like a 19th century banana republic? After all, "Americans voted for a Democratic president, a Democratic Senate, and, barring significant shifts in the vote tally, a Democratic House."
"Instead, they will get a House majority similar to the one that held the entire nation hostage during last year’s debt ceiling hostage crisis. If the American people wanted this to happen, they would have said so at the polls on Tuesday. Instead, Republican state lawmakers took away their right to democratically legitimate leadership — with a big assist from the conservatives on the Supreme Court." ...Think Progress
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Daily Intel notes the continuing mess in Florida (again!) where they're still counting (really?) Tuesday's votes. In a comment at Daily Intel, Robert Henry Eller writes that Florida may be more "relevant" than we like to think.
"Florida may seem irrelevant in this election. However, Florida may in fact be the most relevant of states in this, and coming elections.
Why? Because Florida voters effectively told the vote suppressors that they would not be denied. They said, This is not 2000, and shame on us for that (For that matter, shame on the rest of the country, and on Al Gore, for taking 2000 lying down - the only kind of lying less forgivable than Romney's, Ryan's and Rove's).
I am hoping that Florida voters will further deliver that message to Karl Rove's water-boy un-American un-Governor Rick Scott (No Rick Scott was not Mitt Romney's water boy. Mitt Romney was just another of Karl Rove's water boys. Follow the money.) sometime in the next two years as he faces re-election.
Florida matters. It is a state where democracy has been, and can again be, defeated, in our lifetimes. This time, we dodged a bullet. We haven't always been so lucky. And luck will not ever preserve us."
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