Talk:2008 United States presidential election/Archive 14

This is an archive of past discussions about 2008 United States presidential election. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 10

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Archive 12

Archive 13

Archive 14

Election Controversies

Several people have tried to remove a section on presidential election controversies involving Ohio. I find it very unusual that the section on Guam remains while the section on Ohio is deemed trivial. I find it very unusual that the section on Ohio is supposed to be unsourced or opinionated, when it is sourced to newspaper articles by the principal daily newspaper in Columbus, Ohio (and to a major national paper) and expresses no viewpoint (the political inclinations of the individuals concerned is not stated). This is a matter that people in Ohio followed closely in 2008, and has remained of concern in Ohio across party lines to the present because the issue of residency and voting is important. If people think that too many controversies will clutter up the entry, then start a new entry and link it. Don't just delete it, lest you make people think you're deleting it for political reasons, not a good-faith effort to improve Wikipedia.Avatar3333 (talk) 01:51, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Factually Incorrect

"Among the questions, Russert had asked Clinton, but not Obama, to provide the name of the new Russian President (Dmitry Medvedev)."

This is incorrect. Russert asked this question as a jumpball and didn't look at either candidate - he even stated this is an interview right after the debate. A quick google search confirms this was the case. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.80.44.231 (talk) 17:09, 7 March 2010 (UTC)

Election Day

"Following Obama's speech, spontaneous street parties broke out in cities across the United States including Philadelphia, Miami, Chicago, Columbus, Detroit, Boston, Los Angeles, Seattle, Washington, D.C., San Francisco, Denver, Atlanta, Madison, and New York City[174] and around the world in London; Bonn; Berlin; Obama, Japan; Toronto; Rio de Janeiro; Sydney; and Nairobi.[175]"

Citation 174 specifically states "dancing and singing on a corner of a street chosen in advance for celebrations" for D.C. I don't see any mention of spontaneous street parties. (Maybe we have different understandings of spontaneous?) Additionally, I couldn't find mention of London, Bonn, Sydney, or Nairobi in citation 175. 75.166.207.120 (talk) 06:07, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

Ohio "Controversy"

This is a clear misrepresentation of the facts represented in the sources.

"had a large number of people who came from out of state to attempt to cast ballots in the Ohio"
1. A large number of people didn't do anything. The article says 12.
2. That ascribes motive that doesn't exist.
"Franklin County Prosecutor Ron O'Brien brought charges against several of these individuals "
1. False. From the article '"My take is that they haven't come here attempting to deceive anyone," O'Brien said. "They were under the impression they were entitled to vote. That's how they were reading the law."' [...] "He doesn't believe they set out to intentionally thwart the law, which requires voters to live in the state at least 30 days before the election."
"O'Brien later told the Columbus Dispatch that his office investigated over 55 people for voter fraud in Columbus, and prosecuted six. A lack of evidence prevented prosecution in the remaining "
1. Unsourced
2. From the article: "O'Brien has prosecuted two cases of voter fraud in the past two years. Both individuals were convicted and given probation." (Not related to this case) "Since 1953, only six people have been sent to prison for voter fraud in Ohio."

Electiontechnology (talk) 16:44, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

This is not clear misrepresentation, but the back and forth editing dropped the earlier footnotes that clarified the assertions. The articles make it clear that multiple individuals came to Ohio with the purpose of registering Ohioans to vote and participating as voters. http://www.dispatchpolitics.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2008/10/22/copy/DEMS_STRIKE_BACK.ART_ART_10-22-08_A1_2JBLUBM.html?sid=101 http://www.10tv.com/live/content/local/stories/2008/10/17/story_brownlee.html?sid=102 The articles make it clear that the Vote from Home group was not the only group, but the one that attracted the most notoriety. http://www.dispatchpolitics.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2008/10/22/copy/DEMS_STRIKE_BACK.ART_ART_10-22-08_A1_2JBLUBM.html?sid=101 O'Brien decline to prosecute, and the group's members agreed to withdraw the registrations and the votes already cast. That is, they made a deal. http://www.10tv.com/live/content/local/stories/2008/10/23/story_voters.html?sid=102 The investigation into over 55 other people is indicated here: http://www.dispatchpolitics.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2009/11/16/copy/voter_fraud.ART_ART_11-16-09_A1_O9FM66J.html?sid=101 One of the revisions to this entry characterized this as claims by Republicans. The bipartisan Franklin County Board of Elections referred the case to the Franklin County Prosecutor once it was brought to the Board's attention: http://www.10tv.com/live/content/local/stories/2008/10/15/story_voter_investigation.html?sid=102 The board member quoted is a Democrat. Both parties accused the other of doing this; this case attracted notoriety because so many of the participants were recipients of prestigious fellowships. Revise and improve, don't just delete. Avatar3333 (talk) 00:22, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Background

"Many^[who?] also felt that political power was too lopsided in Washington and many felt that the "Rubber Stamp" congress was a problem for the country.^{[citation needed]}"

I cut this section for weasel words and citation needed. ManicParroT (talk) 23:22, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Where is the media bias section?

This election was considered onf the most biased elections in the history of the united states, with many independent and non-partisan groups finding massive media bias in support of barrack obama and against mccain. Further, we now have thise recent news where 400+ journalists were found on a mailing list involved in a vast consiparcy to color the news to favor Obama.66.190.31.229 (talk) 10:42, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

^{[citation needed]}; certainly doesn't accord with any actual facts. --Orange Mike | Talk 17:51, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Orphaned references in United States presidential election, 2008

I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of United States presidential election, 2008's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "Scheiber":

From Bill Ayers presidential election controversy: Scheiber, Noam (2008-02-22). "Parsing the Ayers Allegation". The New Republic. Retrieved 2008-10-12.
From Cindy McCain: Scheiber, Noam (2008-08-20). "Made Man". The New Republic. Retrieved 2008-08-22.

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 10:38, 9 August 2010 (UTC)

incorrect or badly explained expense summary

For example, the figure quoted for Obama ($532,946,511) is completely different from the figure ($778,642,047) in the source provided. --Espoo (talk) 09:06, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Catholic

Currently the 3rd paragraph of the intro says that one of the "firsts" of this election was that it was the first time that a Roman Catholic had been elected VP. I'm going to remove this from the intro because it's super unimportant — the country's first Roman Catholic President was news some decades previously, but the first Roman Catholic VP? Who cares? It's already mentioned as a "first" down lower in the article, so I'm removing it from paragraph 3 as a trivia item that's insufficiently important to be in the intro. Comet Tuttle (talk) 21:17, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Problem with Election Map

The election map in the info box, file: ElectoralCollege2008.svg, doesn't seem to be showing up correctly.Geoff (talk) 23:19, 4 November 2010 (UTC)

Added percentages to State breakdown table

I have augmented the state-by-state vote tally to include the votes each major candidate received as a percentage of the votes cast in the given state. I find that the ability to sort by percentages is far more informative than just sorting by numbers of votes.

Briefly, my construction technique was to paste the vote counts from the existing page into a spreadsheet and set the sheet up to calculate percentages. Then I wrote a simple text manipulation program to merge the percentages with the data already in the table. I will provide details and source code upon request.

Anyone can verify in half an hour that the numbers are accurate, by pasting the data into a spreadsheet and setting up some simple calculations. I have done that myself, but I welcome others to do it too. Notice that percentages of 1% and greater are rounded to the nearest 0.01% and that percentages under 1% are rounded to the nearest 0.001%.

Although the new table is certainly serviceable and correct, I don't know the nuances of sorted tables, so there may be obvious ways to improve the formatting.

I hope that people find this useful. If you have any objections, please mention them here. I hope even if there are objections that the augmented table can stay at least for some days so that people can try it out and give feedback.CountMacula (talk) 17:25, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Added Obama+McCain column to by-state results

I added a column to the by-state results table so that people can now sort the states according to how much or how little the popular vote went to only the top two candidates. It is simply the percentage of Obama votes plus the percentage of McCain votes for the state.

I also recalculated the Obama-minus-McCain percentage column, which had numerous small and apparently old errors of unknown origin. The only assumption is that the table as I found it a couple weeks ago had the correct actual vote counts for the six major candidates and the Others category.

Again anyone can verify the calculations fairly easily by pasting the table into a spread sheet and setting up some simple calculations.

Also you can use the compare-selected-revisions feature on the history page to easily see exactly what was changed and added. That is best done in two steps, as I made the mentioned changes in two steps (by storing two new revisions).CountMacula (talk) 08:02, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

Good article

This article should be further promoted a good article. Yes? No?--Rafael Wiki (talk) 14:25, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

2008 Republican presidential nomination redirects here?

2008 Republican presidential nomination should redirect to 2008 Republican National Convention or maybe to Results of the 2008 Republican Party presidential primaries, I guess, unless somebody has a better idea. I don't see that redirecting it here makes any sense. I don't know how to fix it.CountMacula (talk) 02:30, 17 March 2012 (UTC)

I redirected it to Republican Party presidential primaries, 2008, sort of the "entry level" article; anyone else is free to indicate another preference on the talk page. Fat&Happy (talk) 02:57, 17 March 2012 (UTC)

Person of color vs African American in lead

Person of color was in the last paragraph of the lead. An IP, 86.184.20.41 changed the lead to say African American instead of person of color (and added some uncited info lower down). I reverted the edit, then TrebleSeven tried to rework it and changed it back to African American. I decided to discuss here instead of reverting again per WP:BRD. I think person of color is more appropriate in the lead. The fact that he is the first African American to be nominated or become president is covered lower down in the article. He is, in fact, the first person of color, of any race, to win a major party nomination or the presidency. Thank you. -- JoannaSerah (talk) 18:59, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

You have a point. Perhaps the lead could be tweaked to say "first African American as well as the first person of color" to be elected and nominated by a major party. As that is accurate on both counts, I do not see a need for the two terms to be mutually exclusive.--JayJasper (talk) 19:11, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I had thought about that. Wasn't sure if it sounded redundant or not. Ok with me to put that in. Thank you. -- JoannaSerah (talk) 03:08, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

While you and I agree that's it is reasonable, it might be best to get more input on this before putting it in the article, as this discussion on the Obama article talk page indicates there may not be a consensus on the matter.--JayJasper (talk) 04:58, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

Extremely biased state-by-state discussion.

I looked through most of the state pages and from what I can tell it is extremely biased towards Obama. Using Oregon as an example it's page says "Voters in Oregon, a fairly blue state, have a strong penchant for advancing the protection of civil liberties and individual freedoms, liberal values that give Democrats a big edge in the state." The bias leaning towards the Democarats is unmistakable and all of the other pages are filled with statements just like it or disparging the Republicans. Before anyone goes on about me being a whiny conservative, I'm not, I'm fairly liberal, but Wikipedia is supposed to be written from a neutral point-of-view and those pages very clearly lack it. The reason I posted this here is because I didn't want to take the time to type on each states page individually. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.64.104.4 (talk) 02:45, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Can we use this?

I came across this while clearing out accumulated userspace junk:

It's an imagemap that I apparently put together in 2009 then promptly forgot all about. It needs a bit of tweaking, but I think it'd be nice in the infobox or body of this article. Any thoughts? – Arms & Hearts (talk) 20:27, 7 August 2012 (UTC)

Sure takes up a lot of space.--William S. Saturn (talk) 22:29, 7 August 2012 (UTC)

It could be transcluded. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 15:16, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

I would support that.--William S. Saturn (talk) 18:24, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

I would support a transcluded version as well.--JayJasper (talk) 18:59, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

I've moved it into template space at Template:United States presidential election, 2008 imagemap, but transcluding it in the infobox is more complicated than I'd anticipated. The map_image parameter is designed for a file and so introduces stray code, whereas the map parameter stretches the infobox across the whole page. Also some borders in the imagemap itself are annoyingly imperfect, especially around smaller states. Hmm. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 19:06, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

300 electoral vote ceiling for the GOP

Why is pointing out the fact that the GOP has not won more than 300 electoral votes in a presidential election since 1988 not a relevant piece of information? It represents a trend regarding the electoral college map, does it not? Please answer. Jayday617 (talk) 06:45, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

Why is relevant though? The burden is on you to prove its important enough. Hot Stop 07:23, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

I would like an answer from someone else. Jayday617 (talk) 07:27, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

It seems completely arbitrary. First there is the date. Why start in 1988? Why not start in 1980? For that matter, why use a 300 EV threshold? GWB did win 286 in 2004, which is very close. Why not 400 EVs (which would exclude every candidate after 1998)? This strikes me as something as useful as (to bring a factual example up) that the Democrats hadn't won a majority of votes cast for President from 1980 until 2008 (Clinton won with a plurality due to Perot, and Gore didn't receive more than 50% of the vote.) It's interesting trivia but I'm not sure it's encyclopedic. --Mr. Vernon (talk) 07:44, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

So, you're saying it is a meaningless trend, and shouldn't be included in the analysis? There are several trivia points included in the analysis part of the 2004 election. In fact, the point you brought up, about the democrats not winning at least fifty percent of the popular vote, used to be one of them. There is no consistency. And doesn't Rjensen's edit count for anything? Jayday617 (talk) 07:54, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

As the experts explain, parties need to shoot for at least 300 electoral votes in their campaign strategies (rather than the bare minimum of 270--there are always a state or two that surprises on election night), and so the possible evidence in multiple elections of a historic cap is a problem for GOP. See Ann DeLaney (2002). Politics For Dummies. John Wiley. p. 285. for cite. Rjensen (talk) 08:28, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

The source supports the idea that during campaigns, 300 or 325 is a desirable planning target for strategy development. It does not follow that winning less than 300 in the actual election is meaningful. Winning between 270 and 299 would indicate the planning worked and there was enough cushion developed during the campaign to ensure a final victory. And 1992 as a cutoff is still completely arbitrary. Fat&Happy (talk) 15:07, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

Adding: I did not notice that the actual edit included a reference in addition to the one cited above, which removes the edit summary description of OR/synthesis. However, I still consider that paragraph as being somewhat misleadingly phrased, and question whether it is truly relevant to the article on the 2008 election. Reporting of the blog commentary on a five-election trend would seen to belong in an article on the Republican Party if anywhere. Fat&Happy (talk) 15:57, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

Are 76.120.182.161 and JayDay617 the same editor? The edit comments of the two seem to indicate they are. If so, they did five reverts in five hours. As far as the issue, the overriding problem with the "300" content is that choosing that number is very random. It has no real (notable) meaning other than some people perhaps having the personal opinion that because it's the first hundred number above 270 it's important. It's slightly interesting, but certainly not encylopedic. It's more like trivia. If someone can show proof that 300 has important significance, I'd certainly be willing to reconsider. By the way, if the content were to be included, it is redundant to say "fifth consecutive election" and "since 1992" in the same sentence. --76.189.117.62 (talk) 09:02, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

A book and the Washington Post says 300 is important to Republican strategists: there is a cap that leaves only a narrow path for Romney to get his 270 votes. That's proof enough for Wikipedia to report. Rjensen (talk) 09:08, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

Again, even if it is important enough to report somewhere, it doesn't seem to be an important enough feature of the 2008 election to report here. Why not change the 1992 article to say it was the first of a five-election streak,,, etc. Or the intervening elections to say they were the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th? If this opinion belongs anywhere in an encyclopedia, it needs to be either in an article covering long-term trends, or the article to which the WaPo article referred, the current Romney campaign. Fat&Happy (talk) 16:14, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

It's a historical ceiling that started in 1992 but was not obvious at first -- in 1992 and 1996 the GOP blamed Bush and Dole (and Perot). In 2000 and 2004 it seemed Bush was personally limited. But then the GOP lost badly in 2006 and in 2008 suddenly discovered it had run out of states in which it was competitive. Rjensen (talk) 16:45, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

Rejensen, show us links that prove that 300 is an important number and will support your claim that the content being proposed is worthy of inclusion. Or 76.120.182.161's claim. Or JayDay617's claim. It's confusing to figure out who's whom or if you're all the same person. --76.189.126.159 (talk) 20:16, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

Comment: Jayday617 is a newly registered account, and may well be the same person who originally posted as an unregistered IP; nothing wrong with that, and any 3RR violation does not seem to be continuing, so no harm, no foul. Rjensen is a well established editor and subject-matter expert in American history (possibly among other areas). While disagreeing on some specific edits, I would never suspect him of using another ID as a sock-puppet ruse here. Fat&Happy (talk) 21:24, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the info about Rjensen. :) But if 76.189.126.159 and Jayday617 are in fact the same person, then their four reverts in two hours was indeed a violation of the revert rule. The rule is per person, not per account. But I'm glad to see they stopped. --76.189.126.159 (talk) 23:28, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

My IP address showed as 76.120.182.161 and then I made an account right after my first edit. I didn't know about any three revert rule, since this is the first time I've tried to edit wikipedia. There's no need to accuse Rjensen of making another account, I'm dumbfounded by that. There are plenty of trivia points located in the analysis section of the 2004 presidential election. Why can't mine be included on this page? It's an interesting fact.Jayday617 (talk) 04:08, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Interesting, perhaps. Relevant, not in the least. There is only one magic number for the EC and that is 270. Arzel (talk) 04:25, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Like I said, there are plenty of points on the 2004 page that could be construed as interesting but not relevant...and yet, there they are. Jayday617 (talk) 04:46, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Interesting isn't enough to warrant inclusion. It has to be reliably sourced and noteworthy. As I said before, show us links that prove that 300 is an important number and I'm sure editors will support your claim that the content you're proposing is worthy of inclusion. Otherwise, sorry. If 300 is really a meaningful number for some reason, then you should have no problem showing us the proof. --76.189.126.159 (talk) 04:51, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

here's the proof: the 300 number is clearly explained in Ann DeLaney (2002). Politics For Dummies. John Wiley. p. 285.. She says that presidential campaign game plans go for the 300. Rjensen (talk) 04:55, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Umm, some information was interesting enough that it was included on the 2004 page. Why isn't there consistency? Jayday617 (talk) 04:59, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

By the way, why are you using just your IP address as your signature? You also mentioned your own IP address yesterday, not mine, when mentioning me. Jayday617 (talk) 05:08, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

It is fine to use an IP (without creating a named account). What is not fine is editing under multiple identities interchangably in order to bypass the rules and avoid sanctions. The English Wikipedia allows and welcomes anon editors, with all that it entails. Most anon editors editing here have dynamic IPs, like me. Their IPs change automatically from one to the next every so often, so they can only use one at a time. One stops, then the next begins. What you did, covertly (whether intentional or not), was to edit under two different accounts in this article, reverting reverts in order to get your desired content back into the article and in the process violating the 3RR rule in a huge way. You did four reverts in 2 hours. I'm sure you didn't mean it, but I'm just making you aware of it. Thanks for noticing the IP mixup; I fixed it. --76.189.126.159 (talk) 06:03, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

I never edited under two different accounts interchangably, what are you talking about? How do I have mutltiple identities? I edited the first time, and it showed my IP address, since I didn't have an account. Then before my second edit, I made an account, jayday. I didn't know about any 3-revert rule, since this was my first edit, and you already brought that up before anyway. I stopped editing, but why are you making false accusations? Jayday617 (talk) 15:23, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

A game plan is what happens in the couple months before the election (right now for 2012) - both parties have a list of swing states they need; they ignore states that are safe for the GOP or the Dems. the game plan is this: take your safe states and add enough swing states to get to at least 300 electoral votes. Say you have 200 "safe" then you put your $$$ in states with 100 elec votes. If you put your $$$ in more states, say shoot for 370 --then you are spreading yourself thin and that is risky. The GOP has the problem that they can't crack the 300 ceiling--not since Reagan was president (in 1988) have they done that. (The Democrats did it several times and do not have this problem.) Therefore the GOP looks at the info we're trying to add here and does not make a game plan that goes to 325 or 350. Rjensen (talk) 05:09, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

a quote: :: a quote: "It's no secret that former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney has a narrow path to win the presidency this fall.... No Republican presidential nominee has received more than 300 electoral votes in more than two decades" Washington Post April 29, 2012 (it's online) Rjensen (talk) 05:15, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Actually, no Republican presidential nominee has received more than 286 electoral votes since the 1988 election, when GHW Bush had 426. From 1992 through 2008, it was 168 (GHW Bush), 159 (Dole), 271 (GW Bush), 286 (GW Bush) and 173 (McCain). So why is 300 important? Why not 286? 300 is simply just picking a random number because it's the first hundred number above 270. And it's only 30 EVs above what's needed to win. In general, it's an interesting little piece of trivia. But in an encyclopedic sense, it's meaningless. --76.189.126.159 (talk) 06:27, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Rjensen, I'm sure most of the editors here are extremely familiar with the process. I am. In regards to the evidence you presented from Politics for Dummies, your representation was that it says "that presidential campaign game plans go for the 300". First, it doesn't say that at all. Your portrayal is inaccurate and completely out-of-context. Second, what it does say is merely the opinion of one person from one (weak) source. The actual quote, for accuracy, is: When a candidate decides which swing states she can win and comes up with a game plan to do it, she's guessing. Sure, polls and focus groups make those guesses educated ones, but they're guesses nonetheless. A campaign has to leave room for error. A game plan can't target enough electoral votes to reach just 270 votes. It targets enough to reach, say, 300 or 325 votes. The extra votes give the candidate a cushion if something happens in a target state, or if she and her consultants guessed wrong about her ability to win one or more of the swing states." So even your own source isn't saying what you are claiming it says. The writer is simply throwing out a general range ("say, 300 or 325 votes"), and in no way is stating that 300 itself is some sort of important or magic number. The writer is simply saying (in very elementary "Dummies" format): hey, the candidate needs to give him/herself a cushion. It's sort of a "duh" explanation. Fat&Happy said essentially the same thing to you at 15:07, 2 September 2012 (UTC). Again, 300 has no meaning of any significance. The only number that is indisputably important is 270. Again, if there are multiple reliable sources that clearly show that 300 (not "say, 300 or 325") is some sort of magic number, I'm sure other editors will be very open-minded about considering it. --76.189.126.159 (talk) 06:03, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

please don't argue with the RS and make silly personal claims about how poltitical strategists work. the Wiki rule is that you have to find an alternative RS. Furthermore there is a 2012 cite: "It's no secret that former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney has a narrow path to win the presidency this fall.... No Republican presidential nominee has received more than 300 electoral votes in more than two decades" Washington Post April 29, 2012 from a leading newspaper that specifies 300 . Rjensen (talk) 07:36, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

You already gave the Washington Post quote at 05:15, 4 September 2012 (UTC), and it's been responded to. And just because there is a cite, doesn't make the content worthy of inclusion. As others have said, 300 is just an arbitrary, trivial number. Sorry. --76.189.126.159 (talk) 07:44, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

we can choose between the judgments of experts or the speculation of an unknown IP who has never cited any source for his personal opinions. Have scholars used the 300 elec vote as a standard? yes: "In the twenty-five elections in the twentieth century, only three resulted in the president-elect winning with less than 300 electoral votes." (Wayne & Wilcox. The Election of the Century and What It Tells Us About the Future 2002 p 240) Rjensen (talk) 07:57, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Simply because something happened, doesn't make it notable. And while you unfortunately think it's productive to personally insult "an unknown IP," the fact is that five editors have already expressed their view that 300 is arbitrary and trivial, and that the content is not worthy of inclusion. And for the record, IPs are human too. Please act civil and focus on the issue at hand. This is not personal. Thank you. --76.189.126.159 (talk) 08:09, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

I'm really quite amazed at this. All I wanted to do was make a small edit to wikipedia. I think it was cool that Rjensen agreed with my edit from the beginning, and I was even more happy when I looked on his page and saw that he was an historian. But it is really quite amazing that a guy with his expertise is being overruled by some people who are, from what I can tell, not experts. That reflects pretty bad on this site. Not to mention you, sir, a guy who is just showing his IP address, I guess so we can't find out who you are? Though I'm not sure because I don't know how that works. If I had known it was going to be this difficult to edit, I wouldn't have even bothered to try. Jayday617 (talk) 15:23, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Jayday, I will remind you to to educate yourself as well on WP:HUMAN, WP:URIP2 and WP:CIVIL. Behaving this way will certainly not help your cause in any discussions. I wonder if you would be insulting me and discounting my opinion if I supported, instead of opposed, the content you want to add. It should also be pointed out that you, too, were "a guy who is just showing his IP address" when you originally added the content (twice) under dicussion here. Yet its lack of worthiness for inclusion had nothing to with that fact. It's solely about the content, not the person. More importantly, six editors have now indicated through their comments here and/or through reversions, that it shouldn't be in the article: Arzel, Fat&Happy, Hot Stop, Mr. Vernon, William S. Saturn, and me. So please stop taking this matter personally and instead prove your case by showing us strong evidence (links). As Hot Stop told you at the beginning of this thread, "The burden is on you to prove its important enough." You also should be very careful about judging the credibility, competence or "expertise" of other editors, none whom you know personally. And for the record, as WP:URIP2 explains, you are still an IP address, as are all other editors with an account. Thank you. --76.189.126.159 (talk) 19:12, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Introduction

The 3rd, 4th, and 6th Paragraphs on the intro are superfluous and could and should easily be moved to the body of the article where they fit more comfortably. Myownworst (talk) 15:19, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Imagemap update

I've put {{United States presidential election, 2008 imagemap}} in the infobox, but some of the borders are a bit off and could do with some fixing up. I copied the code from somewhere years ago, and don't have any expertise in imagemaps, but mw:Extension:ImageMap has some more info if anyone's interested in taking a look. (It'd be nice to have a really well-defined outline that can be used to create imagemaps in other articles like this – United States Senate elections, 2008, United States gubernatorial elections, 2010, etc.) – Arms & Hearts (talk) 15:05, 16 September 2012 (UTC)

How many People Voted for Washington for President

In his auto biography Mark Twain wrote about the prevalence of people in his day voting for George Washington as an alternative to the candidates when there was no one running they could support. I know it is common to write in non candidates even now. Might it make any sense to track this here? I have looked around a bit but have yet to find anyone who does this particularly well. Might this have some significance for evaluating the comming election? John5Russell3Finley (talk) 14:57, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

If you wish to discuss the coming election, you need to go here.--JayJasper (talk) 19:26, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

Actually I was trying to find data from the past election. My thought was that it might be interesting to confirm what the web seems to show as a trend that disillusioned voters are increasingly casting nonsensical votes. 'seemed to me the 2008 data on this could be easily put here if it exists. However, I guess if YOU are interested it could become an article of its own...but I can't find the data....it should be somewhere....seemed here made sense....not meaning to bother anyone though !!! John5Russell3Finley (talk) 23:03, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

No bother at all. Thanks for clarifying your intentions. If the data is not available is not available in independent reliable sources, there's no point in adding it here. If such sources can be found, it might be best to add the content to Write-in candidate rather than a particular election article (unless it can shown that an unusually high number of such votes occurred in a particular election).--JayJasper (talk) 17:31, 4 June 2012 (UTC)

Most states don't track write-ins; and those that do don't usually issue any detailed reports that would enable us to diffentiate between people who write in Ron Paul, say, compared to those who write in Howard the Duck. --Orange Mike | Talk 17:55, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

Write-in votes for 2008 can be found in this table: http://www.fec.gov/pubrec/fe2008/tables2008.pdf I haven't checked for results in other years — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.253.139.183 (talk) 16:41, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

Total write-in vote is tabulated at http://uselectionatlas.org/ Just select "General By Year" then "Other" and find the "write-in" row. You could also define "disillusioned" as any voter who did not vote for the 2 major party candidates and calculate 100%-%D-%R. For some years (1912, 1992, 1996) you could correct for significant 3rd party candidates. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.253.140.107 (talk) 00:37, 19 November 2012 (UTC)

Vote totals don't agree

I'm confused why the popular vote totals in the sidebar and the main data table (with all of the states) don't agree. I assume the data are from different sources, but it seems that a single source should be used. SJS1971 (talk) 15:24, 12 November 2012 (UTC)

This fec link http://www.fec.gov/pubrec/fe2008/tables2008.pdf has about 40,000 more total votes for Obama and 15,000 more for McCain than ref [2] (which is also from the fec). I checked a few state by state results at the link which do agree with the table. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.253.139.183 (talk) 16:46, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

The vote totals in this article now agree with each other. Fourfourfive (talk) 19:01, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

Obama picture

why does it have to be this picture ? 37.200.154.33 (talk) 21:24, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

It's a public-domain picture (always our ideal), roughly contemporary to the election in question. What other picture would be better, in your opinion, and why? --Orange Mike | Talk 17:00, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

Scandal in Indiana: Information out of date

"Alleged" forgery scheme has moved through the courts now and resulted in prosecutions. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.231.137.223 (talk) 15:44, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

Is this picture wrong?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/9a/2008prescountymap.PNG/257px-2008prescountymap.PNG

People on the Oklahoma article insist it is incorrect about no Boroughs in Alaska going to Obama.--occono (talk) 19:49, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

That map is simply showing Alaska as one combined unit, rather than dividing it up into boroughs and census areas. It's just showing that the statewide result in Alaska was a McCain victory. Alaska technically doesn't have counties per se, but instead it does have boroughs and census areas by which election results can be broken down. In 2008, McCain did NOT win every borough and census area in Alaska. So it is indeed inaccurate on multiple levels to claim that McCain won every county in Alaska. --Inqvisitor (talk) 20:41, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

That map is supposed to show the subdivisions, it's the entire point of it, to show how counties/boroughs voted. Should the map be fixed then? --occono (talk) 01:03, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Unfortunately in many past elections we often don't have the data to provide borough level results in Alaska, so a lot of historical county maps will just show the statewide election result as if Alaska were one big county. As far as I know, we do at least have the Alaska borough-level data for the past three elections (2004, 2008, 2012). I included the Alaska subdivision results in the other county maps on this article (the SVG maps), not sure why it wasn't included on that older map. --Inqvisitor (talk) 02:20, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Here are two map sources I found. [2][3]. ─ Matthewi ^(Talk) • 23:51, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Those map sources don't seem to show Alaska subdivision results either; again they're just counting Alaska as one big county, which is common with historical election maps for which we don't have Alaska borough results. The only alternative in those cases would be to simply not include Alaska at all. But we DO have the numbers by borough for 2008. Here's a source with the actual numbers by borough and census area: [4] Obama won nine boroughs/census areas in Alaska in 2008. --Inqvisitor (talk) 01:25, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

"Game Change"

How should the McCain campaign wish for a 'game change' with the Palin Choice be indicated?

Palin objectively had more state and local executive experience than the other presidential and vice presidential nominations the democrat and republican party. The bias against stating Palin as having executive experience as Governor vs the set of Biden, Obama and McCain is sort of getting objectively old at this point. The source of the McCains campaign 'game change' is not very clear and Palin seems to be indicated as a drag to the campaign, where she injected a dynamic into the public campaign long after the polls had gone away from McCain.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/107764/Gallup-Daily-Obama-Takes-Lead-Over-McCain-48-42.aspx — Preceding unsigned comment added by Christopherwhull (talk • contribs) 13:51, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Infobox pictures

Would anyone oppose me changing the pictures in the infobox from those that are there to these? Both new pictures were taken more closely to the election. (The two currently there are from 2005 and earlier than 2004, whereas the new ones are both from January 2009.) Apologies for my poor formatting.

It would remove to replace it with
and would replace with . PrairieKid (talk) 04:36, 4 May 2015 (UTC)

I oppose it and I posted the bigger pictures of President Obama:

and Senator McCain:

I think it looks better because the other presidential election wikipedia pages have bigger pictures of the candidates. The ones you posted are too small.

If your issue is size, that's pretty easy to fix. I went ahead and did that. What do you think? PrairieKid (talk) 04:11, 26 May 2015 (UTC)

I think that's fine. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cerretalogan13 (talk • contribs) 05:10, 26 May 2015 (UTC)

I think you should change the Obama picture to his official senate portrait, as the one being used was taken after he was elected AvRand (talk) 01:41, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

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First winning ticket with no WASPs?

From the article: "The Obama-Biden ticket was also the first winning ticket in American history on which neither candidate was a White Anglo-Saxon Protestant."

That isn't accurate: McKinley/Roosevelt were Scotch-Irish and Dutch respectively; Eisenhower/Nixon were both German-Americans. I bet there are other examples. WASP shouldn't be used as a synonym for "white Protestant." marbeh raglaim (talk) 22:53, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

1,010 × 533 pixels AofZa1225 (talk) 11:21, 10 October 2019 (UTC)

Alan Keyes, "America's Independent Party," no Wiki article?

Hi, in the Results sub-section, why isn't the above titled America's Independent (political party) a hyperlink to a Wikipedia article? I found America's Party, but several articles end up saying, 1) "Create Page," or 2) are disambiguation, or 3) are confused with the ol' "Independent Party" actual party, or 4) are not to be confused with Americans who vote (small i) independently, or lastly are 5) about those like Nader who align with no Official Party at all.. Any ideas? -Peter aka Vid2vid (talk) 03:20, 14 July 2019 (UTC)

P.S. If one Googles, "America's Independent Party," the following results:

"Did you mean: American Independent Party
America's Party
Political party
OVERVIEW
MORE POLITICAL PARTIES
http://selfgovernment.us
Description
America's Party, founded as America's Independent Party, is a conservative American political party formed in August 2008 in an offshoot of the Constitution Party by supporters of Alan Keyes, with the goal of an alternative to the Republican and Democratic party system. Wikipedia <--btw, deleted Wiki article, why??
Founded: August 21, 2008
Leadership: Tom Hoefling (Party chair)
Founders: Tom Hoefling, Alan Keyes."
-Peter aka Vid2vid (talk) 03:41, 14 July 2019 (UTC)

Sigh, nobody cares.:(. From Peter aka Vid2vid (talk) 15:56, 10 October 2019 (UTC).

Semi-protected edit request on 23 January 2021

This edit request to 2008 United States presidential election has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

Please add the following section to the results section for consistency with other election pages:

Counties

^[1]

Counties with Highest Percent of Vote (Democratic)

Washington, D.C. 92.46%
Prince George's County, Maryland 88.87%
Bronx County, New York 88.71%
Shannon County, South Dakota 88.69%
Petersburg, Virginia 88.64%

Counties with Highest Percent of Vote (Republican)

King County, Texas 92.64%
Roberts County, Texas 92.08%
Ochiltree County, Texas 91.70%
Glasscock County, Texas 90.13%
Beaver County, Oklahoma 89.25% 73.110.217.186 (talk) 17:37, 23 January 2021 (UTC)

References

^ [1], Uselectionatlas.org.

Done Elliot321 (talk | contribs) 14:31, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 5 October 2021

This edit request to 2008 United States presidential election has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

Add a section to Controversies

Negativity

The 2008 election, despite its high turnout and unusual enthusiasm, also featured attack ads from both campaigns which were deemed to be unusually provocative. McCain, for example, had released an ad that erroneously claimed that Obama had supported sex education for Kindergarteners.

https://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/09/15/west.negative/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/09/14/campaign.wrap/index.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ec3aC8ZJZTc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVLQhRiEXZs 64.63.171.178 (talk) 19:00, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

Not done for now: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the {{edit semi-protected}} template. It does not appear there is consensus for this addition. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 12:23, 15 October 2021 (UTC)

Protection

Can someone put this page under protection people have been vandalizing this page for the past few days. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jon698 (talk • contribs) 22:52, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 5 June 2022

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Bring back colors to mark candidates who won states in the close states section. Editor57839 (talk) 22:21, 5 June 2022 (UTC)

Not done for now: This is actually a controversial edit, so you'll need to discuss first with other editors. Please open a new section here and start a discussion. As per article's history, the colors were removed due to violation of MOS:ACCESS. — Paper9oll (🔔 • 📝) 13:35, 10 June 2022 (UTC)

Colors

The colors in the close state sections were removed as detailed above. It seems that the other election pages have the color for the states, so should it be added back, or should they be removed from other pages? Either way, I believe the pages should be consistent.2601:241:300:B610:DF0:BFA8:41AE:6CFE (talk) 23:45, 27 June 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 29 June 2022

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In the "International reactions" subsection under the "Results" section, please remove the link to International reactions to the 2008 United States presidential election, as the article has been deleted. 2601:241:300:B610:F5EF:BF57:495A:25EB (talk) 16:04, 29 June 2022 (UTC)

Done – Muboshgu (talk) 16:17, 29 June 2022 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion

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Obama Sign Arlington Virginia.jpg

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 20:37, 2 October 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 8 January 2023

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Change John McCains picture Wooducus (talk) 22:53, 8 January 2023 (UTC)

Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. To what? Also check out WP:Image Use Policy if you have a particular image in mind Cannolis (talk) 23:00, 8 January 2023 (UTC)

[1] [1], Uselectionatlas.org.

[1]