Michigan primary tomorrow, 1/15

[Bocheezu]

Obama and Edwards are not on the Democratic ballot, so it'll be a snoozer on the Democratic side.

Republican side should be pretty interesting -- Romney has had a lot of ads here since the beginning of the year, saying how he was going to boost Michigan's economy and help invest in research and innovation. Which, however untruthful it may be, is a very compelling statement to say, given the state of the economy here. Plus, the guy grew up here and his dad was governor. I kinda wonder how much a boost those two factors will give him.

[spokes]

As a Canadian the process to elect a US President confuses me and seemingly drags out way too long - my mom thinks i should care who is elected to run your country - but since i don't have a say in who is elected I have to say i don't care. for the most part i see the PResident as a figurehead as others (Codalezza Rice etc) make the decisions and just give him some information as to the why's.....

but for those of you invilved in this process have fun rocking the vote.....

[yankeeyosh]

What I find interesting about the Mich. primary is that Hillary, despite being the only major candidate on the ticket, was destroyed by "Uncommitted" with the African American vote. And a majority of today's Democrat voters would NOT vote for Hillary if nominated, despite the fact that there was no reason for any other supporters to go to the polls today.

[Bman120]

As a Canadian the process to elect a US President confuses me and seemingly drags out way too long - my mom thinks i should care who is elected to run your country - but since i don't have a say in who is elected I have to say i don't care. for the most part i see the PResident as a figurehead as others (Codalezza Rice etc) make the decisions and just give him some information as to the why's.....

but for those of you invilved in this process have fun rocking the vote.....

Oh no, the President is far more than a figurehead. The vast majority of the executive branch runs itself without him, but all roads lead to him and he is "the decision maker". The branch, including the cabinet, formulate options and make things happen, but the president orders the direction, especially in foreign policy.

In a crisis, that changes and the man becomes more powerful. In the cuban missle crisis, JFK centralized the American response to the blockade of Cuba in his office. He made sure he would be the one giving the orders and not someone in the pentagon. Just like on 9/11, the president was the central figurehead of what was happening, eventhough he wasn't able to get to Washington, the government still turned to him.

Another good example is the chaos that started when Reagan was shot. You saw the executive branch thrown into chaos with people in the presidents inner circle trying to step up and do things they shouldn't do.

[redav]

Oh no, the President is far more than a figurehead. The vast majority of the executive branch runs itself without him, but all roads lead to him and he is "the decision maker". The branch, including the cabinet, formulate options and make things happen, but the president orders the direction, especially in foreign policy.
Especially with the 'strong president' model that Bush/Cheney have been pushing for, the president has a tremendous influence on HOW things are done, such as procedures, organization, and priorities, as well as the 'official' opinions of the various govt agencies. In many ways, the president is the CEO of a company--most employees' daily routines are not affected, but the company as a whole is.

[Bocheezu]

What surprises me is the sheer number of Democrats that voted in a useless primary. The ballots were

Republican -- 867,136
Democrat -- 592,798

Michigan is a blue state, but not by much, maybe 55/45, if I had to guess. I still thought more Democrats would vote in the primary that actually mattered by either voting for the Republican they'd most like to see, or the one they think has the best chance of losing the general election. But no, almost 593k people completely wasted their time by voting in the Democratic primary.

The numbers mean absolutely nothing on the Democratic side, and it's funny reading an article on CNN that implies that Hillary will be in trouble in SC because of all the uncommitted votes (implying she doesn't have the black vote), but really, it doesn't mean a thing when you have some Democrats voting in the Republican primary instead, Democrats staying home because they know it's a useless vote, etc. There's absolutely no way you can presume anything about how the vote would have gone if it was a regular Democratic primary.