Week 4 Political Science
Use attached article to respond to either opt 1 or 2 whichever you prefer.
For the initial post, respond to one of the following options, and label the beginning of your post indicating either Option 1 or Option 2:
Option 1: List the ways in which contemporary presidential campaigns have used social media as a campaign tool. Do you consider social media as a successful tool? Explain your answer. Do you see social media as an unsuccessful tool? Explain your answer and provide examples.
Option 2: There are numerous discussions involving the Electoral College. There are some people that want to abolish the electoral college while others want to keep it. What do you think? Keep the electoral college or abolish it? Explain the reasons for your choice.
Be sure to make connections between your ideas and conclusions and the research, concepts, terms, and theory we are discussing this week.
Sample Answer
Option 2: There are numerous discussions involving the Electoral College. There are some people that want to abolish the Electoral College while others want to keep it. What do you think? Keep the Electoral College or abolish it? Explain the reasons for your choice
For many years, there has been a debate on whether the United States of America should continue using the Electoral College or not. There have been differences among the USA population. Most people believe that the popular vote is the only one that matters, while others argue that the Electoral College offers a sound and equal voice for all (Edwards, 2019). From my point of view, I advocate for the abolishment of the Electoral College vote as the electors do not consider the citizens’ passions. During the election period, the issue of faithless electors has risen to be a major problem. Recently, electors have not functioned as independent agents or representatives of the state legislature but are elected by party conventions or their party leaders. For instance, during the 1992 and 2012 presidential elections, 99 percent of the elected electors pledged their loyalty to a candidate, and there were two faithless electors (Edwards, 2019).
During the presidential election campaigns, most presidential candidates ignore rural areas. Since 2000, the Electoral College has influenced most candidates to conduct their campaigns in big cities from 12 states rather than campaigning in the other 40 states. Most presidential candidates ignore the rural areas as they do not have many votes compared to the cities. For example, from the data collected in the 2016 campaigns, the four presidential candidates’ campaign visits were from Florida, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Ohio (Bugh, 2016). Finally, most people advocate for the continuation of the Electoral College as the winning candidate is given a stronger mandate to lead. In the 2016 presidential elections, Trump won in the Electoral College but had few popular votes compared to Clinton. However, Trump’s victory in the Electoral College vote gave him the mandate to lead.
References
- Bugh, G. (Ed.). (2016). Electoral college reform: Challenges and possibilities. Routledge. https://books.google.co.ke/books?hl=en&lr=&id=eJ4WDAAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PP1&dq=Bugh,+G.+(Ed.).+(2016).+Electoral+college+reform:+Challenges+and+possibilities.+Routledge.&ots=lRoUCeWqDf&sig=HxwpffU67c_pLvAniT3hHRbFtE0&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=Bugh%2C%20G.%20(Ed.).%20(2016).%20Electoral%20college%20reform%3A%20Challenges%20and%20possibilities.%20Routledge.&f=false
- Edwards, G. C. (2019). Why the Electoral College is bad for America. Yale University Press. https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.12987/9780300249651/html
