Arguments by Analogy

The first argument is that swing states determine the political direction of the United States. This means that these states determine the presidential elections by a narrow margin. In the past election process, the Republican and Democratic parties each developed solid bases in different states considered to be swing votes.  The Electoral College winner is determined by the few swing states that are more divided politically. This year, the presidential outcome was decided by a margin of less than 10% points.

 The analogy argument is that if Swing states determine the outcome of elections, then they determine the political direction of the United States. The second argument is that Bellwether States are attitudinal and demographic microcosms of the United States as a whole. This means that majority of the populations in these states choose the candidate who becomes president.

The first argument is strong while the second argument is weak.  The dominance of swing states is an outcome of the fact that approximately every state decide to allot all its electoral votes to the person who comes becomes place statewide, often without considering their margin of victory. That is, regardless whether the person wins other large states by a large and small margin, since the candidate will get the same quantity of electoral votes either way. Often, when the general election nears, candidate seems to ignore every noncompetitive state.  This means that the vast majority of the nation tends to pour their resources into the few states that are considered swing states.

Other electors in other states have never been significant enough to actually impact the outcome of a presidential race. The point is that there are some votes that don’t count.  These are those votes in states that lean heavily towards one party. While they don’t mean much in presidential elections, they are important in county, local and state elections. Swing states have never been significant enough to actually impact the outcome of a presidential race.

When predicting how citizens will vote, Bellwether County is one popular crystal ball. It is envisioned as a state that has perfect microcosm. Vigo County in Indiana has been considered America’s bellwether county. In every presidential contest, journalists flock there in the hope determining the rhythm of the nation. It is true that Vigo has a remarkable record, so does Valencia County.  There are other counties that are close on its heels.  In the past century, 110 counties have voted for the president in at least twelve successive presidential elections.

This justification that Bellwether County determines the US Presidential elections is weal because the winner of the majority popular vote is not essentially the winner of the election. Even if a county may be an adequately representative sample from the entire population, that’s not sufficient to determine all elections.  A bellwether’s majority may sometimes have to go in opposition to the popular vote. This is not just a speculative argument as the majority of voters in Vigo County choose George Bush in 2000. However, the winner of the nationwide popular vote became Al Gore. Thus, while residents of Vigo got the election right, they got the popular vote wrong. So, if Bellwethers aren’t substantially correct in making predictions, and Vigo County is not the only contender, then, how can they be used as the basis for predictions in the first place?

Sherry Roberts is the author of this paper. A senior editor at MeldaResearch.Com in customized term papers if you need a similar paper you can place your order for article critique writing services.