San Diego mayoral race fallout promotes election change

[cascadiance]

If this were a Republican bill in Washington, you know they'd try to overturn the governor's race with it now. Not sure whether this bill can be applied retroactively for Donna Frye now, but at least now there's a chance to get a law in place to govern future "abortions" like this last election. Hope the legislature passes it.

Also interesting on how a vote came very close to California's winner take all voting system in the electoral college getting voted on to be dismantled. Fortunately, it didn't get out of committee, but shows we can't take much for granted now!

From:

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/politics/20050315-1736-ca-xgr-electionlaw.html

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San Diego mayoral race fallout promotes election change

By Don Thompson
ASSOCIATED PRESS

5:36 p.m. March 15, 2005

SACRAMENTO – About 5,500 San Diego write-in votes were tossed out in November's tight mayoral election because the voters forgot to color in a little bubble on their ballot.

State lawmakers took the first step Tuesday to change election law to require that voters' intent be honored where possible.

The bill by Assemblyman Juan Vargas, D-San Diego, was approved by the Assembly elections committee, 4-1, after election officials rejected 5,551 write-in votes for San Diego mayoral candidate Donna Frye. His bill would require officials to count write-in votes if it is clear a voter intended to vote for a particular candidate but didn't fully comply with voting instructions.

Frye lost because too many voters wrote in her name but neglected to also darken an optical-scan bubble next to the write-in blank on the ballot.

Meanwhile, a bill that would link the nation's four most populous states in a pact to change the way electoral votes are counted in presidential elections fell a single vote short in the same committee.

The author, Assemblyman Bill Maze, R-Visalia, plans to try again at a future committee hearing.

His bill would eliminate California's winner-take-all system of distributing Electoral College votes, dividing them instead among presidential candidates based on their share of the popular vote.

He agreed to an amendment that would require the next three most populous states – New York, Florida and Texas – to go along before California's law would take effect.

...

[doublethink]

1. Hello Fellow San Dieagen !!! :)

I think the local Election for mayor was the WORST example of Democracy in our countries history! How obvious does it have to be when Donna Fry's name is written in on the official ballot but not counted? And yet if someone were to just scribble a name on a piece of scratch paper and stuff it into an absentee mailing envelope .... that would be counted! Who the hell made these laws? Mayor Murphy if he had any sense of DEMOCRACY I mean really any sense of FOR THE PEOPLE, BY THE PEOPLE ..... V O T E R - I N T E N T .... would just pack up and leave !!! Still think he should be RECALLED !!!!!! Anyway good to see anther local here .... :)

[cascadiance]

3. Thanks... The Electoral College bill by Maze is more scarey....

I really wish we could apply it retroactively and help Donna clean things up here now. Aguire winning has helped some, but we need more than just him to get things moving the right ('er make that "left") way again...

For this article there really should be two threads (maybe even three since there are three different bills in committees that were considered). I'm thinking of starting a thread in the General Discussion (Politics) forum pointing back to this article to get others' attention that might not be interested in just local San Diego politics.

The one bill here we wanted passed (and what the article subject line dealt with) is what passed, but I've found nowhere else on the web anyone talking about Maze's bill to change California's winner-take-all electoral vote system (in conjunction with the three other big states - New York, Florida, and Texas) to become percentage-based electoral votes. That to me is scarey. Though it probably has little chance of passing the California legislature, the fact that the Republicans are even trying at this point makes one wonder what is going on in New York as well. They are obviously trying to get it passed in the California legislature first (and possibly New York next) with some sort of promise that Texas would follow, as well as Florida (which you and I know has probably been Democratic the last two elections, despite their successful efforts to make it count as a Republican state).

Even if all four of these states are reversed to percentage-based electoral votes, it would still reduce Democrat's clout in presidential elections. The winner-take-all system in the bigger populated states is probably the only thing that offsets the inherent unDemocratic way of giving smaller states greater per-capita representation in the electoral college than the larger states. If you take away the larger state's abillity to grab all of the states through winner take all, then the smaller states added votes will dictate greater power for the Republicans in coming elections.

I don't know what the master plan is, but I'd like to know what's also being proposed in the New York legislature now too to see what "coordinated" Delay-style tactics might be going on now. If we see Arny appoint someone like Maze for any state post, I wouldn't trust him with a ten foot (or longer) pole.

[roughandtumble]

2. i'm so jealous of your username.

I wish I thought of it...

[cascadiance]

4. Maybe try "calindependence" as a variant... :)