Re: [Marxism] Looking for a "Man Date"?

[steve heeren <tzsche@xxxxxxx>]

Jurriaan:

you're good at these things (and other things as well!) so can you tell
me what these terms MEAN and their approx. numbers:

electorate, eligible voters, voting age population, etc. you mustn't
forget that, in the USA, you must REGISTER to vote in order to become an
eligible voter, whereas, in Canada, you are registered by enumeration,
as we call it. (that USA voters must "make a decision" to get registered
to vote is just one other small way that it never wanted even electoral
democracy!)

i think your figures would change once you defined these categories
more distinctly.

why the discrepancy, according to your figures, between "electorate" and
"eligible"?

Jurriaan Bendien wrote:

> Before we get too hung up about Bush's stylized "51%" election win, I think
> we ought to recognise that about 40% of the electorate (the total population
> eligible to vote) did not vote. As I mentioned prior to the election,
> "whoever wins, wins with minority support of the whole electorate".
>
> The voting age population within the US in 2004 was said to be about 221.3
> million, and the total number of eligible voters was said to be about 203.8
> million. The total votes cast for Bush was  59.5 million in round figures.
> This implies the votes Bush received represented about 29% of the whole US
> electorate, and about 26.8% of the voting-age population.
>
> The only way in which this warped situation could change, would be if a
> voting system of proportional representation was substituted for a
> first-past-the-post system in the US, such that no votes are lost, and
> representation in government is based accurately on real voting strength. At
> present, it is not.
>
> Jurriaan

--
The weight of this sad time we must obey.
Speak what you feel, not what you ought to say.

                       Shakespeare (King Lear)



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