Electoral Hash

Senator Kerry is currently giving his concession speech. The election is over, and I don't think it went well. That leaves me in a mood to be perverse...

It looks like Bush takes Ohio. Fine. That gives him 274 electoral votes. At the time of this writing, Iowa and New Mexico look to also go to Bush, but are very close. For argument's sake, imagine that they instead go to Kerry.

It looks like Colorado's initiative to allow splitting of it's electoral votes will fail. But CNN still lists it as unlikely, rather than decided. So, what happens if it goes against expectations? Kerry gets 4 of Bush's electoral votes. Leaving the President with only the required 270.

And now we consider that not all electors are bound to vote in line with their constituents. A few are allowed to vote their conscience. If the above unlikely things were to happen, how unlikely would it be for one person to vote against the grain, leaving us with a 269-269 split? Or, how about two people of conscience going rogue?

What a strange trip that would be...

We keep using those words...

... but do they mean what we think they mean?

A number of folks I know have spent a lot of energy today pointing out that the 58+ million people who voted for George W Bush aren't stupid:
wcg in 3.5 Million
khaosworks in Four More Years
tpau in this entry

Feeling cynical, I tend to follow the wisdom of my father and grandfather - if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it is probably a duck. The electorate has done something that sure looks like stupidity. One is strongly tempted to then say that Occam's Razor then applies.

But referring to Occam's Razor got me thinking - what qualifies as "stupidity"? It has long been known that the American public (in fact, the whole human race, worldwide) is often a bit short when it comes to rational thought. Being a thinking ape is a relative thing. Sure, each of us think a lot more than a trout or a gazelle, but that isn't saying much.

As I understand my fellow citizens, most of them don't research their candidates much. Some of them watch some news, but tend to rely on only one news source. They tend to credit rumor as fact. They don't apply critical thought to what they are told, and don't double check facts. They listen to "talking points" as sources of real information, and react with their guts rather than with their higher brain functions.

Face it, folks, in dealing with choosing the leaders of the most powerful nation in the world, all of that is stupid. And both sides of the political fence were guilty of it, in droves and hordes. The methods both political parties use in the media rely on the fact that the people, on the whole, act stupidly. Humans are dumb, plain and simple.

So, the question isn't whether the voters were stupid. The question is how to approach stupidity. Surely responding to stupidity with more stupidity isn't constructive. So shouting to the skies and the individuals how stupid they are isn't a good idea.

The form of stupidity seen in the electorate may be the default, but it is correctable. Use of critical thinking, Occam's Razor, and other rational approaches are learned behaviors. Thus, the reasonable counter to stupidity is education.

Now, if you're trying to educate a child, it is often reasonable to take a somewhat authoritarian position. That doesn't work when you're trying to teach a superior, or a peer. You aren't going to teach your fellow American much if you talk down to them, or treat them like they were stupid. You have to treat them like you respect them, because they won't respond otherwise, and because to do otherwise would be hypocritical.

Most importantly, you have to treat them with respect because they deserve it. They're your fellow citizens, for cryin' out loud! No matter how they come to their conclusions, they have value and worth. These people are the building blocks of a better world, and that's worth a lot of respect, in my book.