Question

write a 500-word essay on your interpretation of the Electoral College map, keeping in mind the candidate who reaches 270 electoral votes wins the presidency. For further discussion, view the 2016 Electoral Map (go to the site and click on the 2016 tap) to understand how citizens voted in the last presidential election. Pay particular interest to “toss up” states. How to you think they will vote and why?

Answer 1

Different countris of the world has opted for different modes of government and various means of electing/selecting the same. Democracy and dictatorship both have many variants with some more extreme while others are benign. From the Scandinavian model of democracy with referendums being a method to identify peoples will to Chinese model of government banning all forms of popular mandate.However even among democracies the type of electing government which is normally done via elections has many variants. English system of parliament system of democracy can be contrasted with presidential system across ''the pond''. In parliamentary system of governance the executive powers of the government is vested with parliament which sits at the top of a national government whose members are selected from different constituentcies by the public.Presidential system of governance has the powers vested in a president who is either elected by the people or by the electoral college.

United States of America has chosen to have electoral college system of electing its government. In an electoral college people vote for their chosen candidate and the party which manages to win majority of seats in the electoral college wins the entire seats in the state for selecting president. Considering that the USA follows two party system of democracy with limited appeal for an third option the voters are left with a choice only among Democrats and Republican candidates. The winning candidate has to pass the magic number of 270 out of 538 total seats. Historically Democrats have held their sway over the two coastal regions and Republicans in the middle. Coastal states are generall urban, hubs of liberal thought and are generally have in cosmopolitan nature.Faith based election campaigns have been the staple in the so called Bible belt states of Southern USA.

What has been fascinating for an outsiders have been the concept of toss up or swing states the number of which varies with from a high of 13 to the current consensus of 4. These are the states with no rigid voter mentality and can change their party preference among the two. Both Democrats and Republicans are fighting fiercely over these states considering that remaining states follow a fixed voting pattern with each having their preference. The outcome of the presidential battle in 2020 will for all certainity will be decided on the basis of voter preference of the toss up states.