U.S.: Pending revisions, semi-final results are: @BarackObama 65,899,557 (51.06%), @MittRomney 60,931,959 (47.21%). https://t.co/...' @Redistrict via web
The only state that hasn't certified its results is Hawaii, and it apparently is just a technicality at this point. The vote total is final. President Barack Obama becomes the first president since Eisenhower to win with 51 percent of the vote twice.
Turnout was down 1.71 percent over 2012, or just over 2 million votes. 600,000 of that shortfall came from New York, which was down 7.58 percent due to Sandy. But Oklahoma, without any real excuse, saw led the nation in turnout suckiness with an 8.74 percent decrease. I won't venture to guess why. Vermont was down 7.92 percent, while Alaska was down 7.88 percent without their ice queen on the ballot.
The biggest voter increases were DC (10.5 percent) and Utah (6.83 percent). In all, 32 states saw their turnout drop while 18 states plus DC saw it increase. Of course, this doesn't account for population growth, so turnout stats would look even worse if we went by the percentage turnout of the overal voting-age population.
Still, of the nine swing states (Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Virginia, and Wisconsin), only one saw turnout decrease, and that was (ironically) Ohio. Generally speaking, if voters feel their votes will make a difference, they are more likely to vote. Relegating 82 percent of the nation as electorally irrelevant is not conducive to functioning democracy.
And speaking of a functioning democracy, behold the power of gerrymandering:
With NY certified, House Dems' popular vote lead over GOP has expanded to 1,362,351 (59,645,387 to 58,283,036): https://t.co/...' @Redistrict via web
Democrats beat Republicans at every level. The only thing protecting the GOP's remaining hold on power are artificial constructs like gerrymandering and the filibuster. In a genuine democracy, they would be fully relegated to where they belong'the deep minority.
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