Talk:2012 United States presidential election

Template:U.S. presidential election, yyyy project page link

Ballot Access Update

ballot-access.org shows that Virgil Goode, Peta Lindsay, and Gary Johnson are on the New York ballot. Minnesota's secretary of state's site now shows that johnson, stein, goode, anderson, dean morstad, carlson, harris, and lindsay are on the minnesota ballot. The district of columbia's elections site shows gary johnson on the ballot 207.177.29.217 (talk) 17:03, 23 August 2012 (UTC)

We need the exact address that explicitly says that, and I'm not even sure if the source is reliable.  Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. ballot-access.org is a blog; therefore, it is not reliable. A boat that can float! (watch me float!) 13:16, 30 August 2012 (UTC)

What to Do with Constitution Party

I ask this because I remember, as someone mentioned, that Texas, despite only being a Write-In state for Goode, could be considered for ballot access given that Write-In candidates also have to nominate electors as regular balloted candidates would. Including Texas, and only Texas, under such status would place Virgil Goode at a level that would warrant his position in the Info-Box alongside Stein and Johnson. However, I am sure there would be dispute over the notion, and show wished to open it to discussion to figure out how to decide upon it. I will note however that, as it currently stands, Goode will not make the Info-Box otherwise, having suffered a number of reversals over the last two months. --Ariostos (talk) 01:05, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

The list of states we have for Goode include two that are not at his official ballot page: NY & VA. Because VA verifies signatures on a "rolling" basis as they come in, we know Goode should be on the VA ballot because he already got the 10,000 required signatures verified. As for NY, I know he submitted enough, but does anyone know if it's enough that no challenge was filed by today's deadline, or do the signatures still have to be verified? If they don't need to be, then adding TX would indeed bring him past 270, to 277. I didn't check all of his other write-in states but it really isn't necessary to do that if TX puts him over the mark. If we can verify NY, then I would support adding Goode to the infobox, per the discussion about whether and how to count write-in electoral slates here. Per prior discussions on layout, he would go by himself into a third row for now. If Johnson or anybody else matches the Dems & GOP with full ballot access, that candidate would join those two in the top row, with Goode then sliding into the second row. 68.58.63.22 (talk) 05:03, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

From what I gathered, everyone but Stewart Alexander has been validated for the ballot there. --Ariostos (talk) 00:47, 27 August 2012 (UTC)

Seeing as that's the case (and the challenge deadline has passed anyway whether the NY SoS has come out with an official list or not), then adding TX to his printed-on-ballot access total of 232 brings him to exactly 270, not counting at least a few electors from the other write-in states. Therefore, I believe he now ought to be in the infobox. 68.58.63.22 (talk) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.29.133.167 (talk) 01:28, 6 September 2012 (UTC)

Why is Mitt Romney still listed as "presumptive"

Mitt Romney secured the official nomination of the Republican Party at their National Convention, on August 28. He has the official backing of the party; there's no reason to continue to list him as the "presumptive" nominee. 128.84.125.137 (talk) 00:22, 31 August 2012 (UTC)

Justice Party candidate not on ballot in TN

Wikipedia has Tennessee listed as one of the states of which Rocky Anderson is on the ballot. However, the State of Tennessee does not have him on their list. http://state.tn.us/sos/election/cand/2012NovemberCandidates.pdf — Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.187.204.37 (talk) 15:59, 31 August 2012 (UTC)

Change Obama/Romney pictures on infobox

I really think the Obama photo now is really bad. I don't care about the Romney one, but we should just change them! I know there was already a consensus but I can't stand the Obama photo. We should change it to his official portrait. --Creativemind15 10:30, 1 September 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Creativemind15 (talk • contribs)

If the official portrait is the one you've been trying to change it to, please don't use that one because his eyes look closed in it. Ratemonth (talk) 15:20, 1 September 2012 (UTC)

Maybe you could say why you hate it? I mean that one editors taste tells him that it is bad photo dont really merrit it should be changed. There must be som rational reasons why it is bad. Personally I think it makes him look in charge and presidentiel, much more than his official photo. Jack Bornholm (talk) 16:43, 1 September 2012 (UTC)

At least crop the Obama photo. You can't see his eyes in the photo now. At least find another Obama picture on Wiki Commons. User:Creativemind15 (talk) 12:59, 1 September 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.102.149.186 (talk)

Typo Edit Request

Hello, I cannot edit this page, but notice a typo here: "Bachmann, who finished fifth in Iowa, withdrew after the caucses." (The typo being that "caucuses" is missing a 'u.')Thanks.--75.18.185.180 (talk) 05:14, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

 Done Thanks for spotting the typo.--JayJasper (talk) 05:17, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Number of Democratic Candidates

To treat a some fringe democratic candidates the same as the seriouse republican candidates is to imply that there was a democratic race. Older articles with the same setup do not do so. In 2004 Bush was the incumbent president and even though many perinnial candidates was on the ballot as the article Republican Party presidential primaries, 2004 shows the article on the general election: United States presidential election, 2004 does only list Bush as a candidate. So I have removed the candidates from this article in the same manner. There are of course still in the subjects main article: Democratic Party presidential candidates, 2012. I am looking forward to hear any arguments against this if it is undone. Jack Bornholm (talk) 08:39, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

How many third party candidates should be listed?

Soon the deadlines for attaining ballot access will be reached and it will be clear how many states the different small parties will have ballot access in. The last deadline I think is september 7th [1], and then there will of course validating and challenging for some time.
So I think now is a good time to think about how many third party and independt candidates should be listed in this article? There is already a indept article on all the candidates both the party nominees and the ones that lost the third party primaries/convention nominations. This article also includes independent candidates. United States third party and independent presidential candidates, 2012 does need some work but I think it is the place to put every single candidate running for president even those that just do it for a laugh as the Naked Cowboy from New York. If we choice not to list all candidates in this article man of the information would good to migrate to that article.
What will be the criteria? I have listed a few options:

• All and every candidate will be listed in this article.
• Only candidates with ballot access to more than 270 delegates will be listed
• Only candidates with ballot access to more than 270 delegates will be listed INCL. states where they have officially certified write-in status.
• Only candidates with ballot access to more than 100 (or another number) delegates will be listed
• Only candidates with ballot access in more than 5 (or another number) states will be listed.

Personally I would go with number 3. That would practically mean that 4 third parties will stay in this article: The Libertarians, The Greens, The Constitution Party and The Justice Party. I dont think The Party for Socialism and Liberation should be included even if they by some chance should get enough ballot access because its candidates are not eligble to be elected at all. (Lindsay is to young (28) and Yari Osorio is born in Columbia) But what do you think? Jack Bornholm (talk) 08:22, 5 September 2012 (UTC)

I am assuming your question pertains to just the body of the article, and not the infobox. Much like how there are different standards for inclusion in the infobox before and after the election, is there a similar standing consensus that deals with the difference in the list of candidates within the article before and after the election? In other words, how were third party candidates sorted in the 2008 election article before Election Day? If there is no existing consensus/precedent, then I am partial to leaving the entire list we have now until the election (option #1)- that is, every candidate on at least one ballot. After the election, I think we ought to avoid relying exclusively on ballot access thresholds and mix in a little due weight. Obviously anyone in the infobox post-election should be mentioned. The extensive tally we have now of where each candidate appears on the ballot is probably not necessary to have in this main article after the election, so that can all be removed. A section like this would be the baseline I'd use for mentioning the third party candidates in the article, with your option #3 being used to determine which parties get mentioned in such a section. Beyond that, I believe a candidate like GJ will warrant some more of a mention in the main sections of the article like the "Campaign" section (which last time around just talked about Obama & McCain), but that is just speculation on my part and we will have to await the results and the ensuing media coverage to properly assess due weight and the amount of coverage each candidate deserves throughout the article.

The question of whether to include Lindsay was sort of addressed when I asked the question of whether the ballot access we are counting up is for the candidates or for their parties. You replied at that time that we were counting up for the parties. That would mean that Lindsay would remain, because voters may still cast ballots for the PSL's slate of electors, who would then presumably cast their votes for some other member of the party if they actually won. Another consequence of counting access for the parties is that Gary Johnson may count Michigan for his total, since the LP is guaranteed access there, and the party has another "Gary Johnson" lined up to take his spot on the ballot if necessary. After I wrote that post, it came to be that some third party candidates in certain states had to get on the ballot as independents rather than their party's nominee, or file just for presidential ballot access, rather than full access for down-ticket offices for their party (such as the type of petition Stein filed in AK). Therefore, the current "Candidate Ballot Access" number counts party access plus such cases of independent or limited ballot access. 68.58.63.22 (talk) 02:34, 6 September 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.29.133.167 (talk)

I always forget (as european I guess) that the US presidentiel election is a 19th century indirect election adapted to become a 20th century direct election without chancing the US constitution. Even though 24 states have laws against a Faithless elector [2] I guess a fine wouldnt stop a determined elector. The stand-in Gary Jonhson was really funny reading about in your link, it made me think about the Eddie Murphies movie: The Distinguished Gentleman Jack Bornholm (talk) 08:00, 6 September 2012 (UTC)

I also like number 3. Not every single person needs to be listed, only those who are actually trying to make a point, so sufficient ballot access is a good criterion. As to United States third party and independent presidential candidates, 2012, I completely disagree with including anyone and everyone. All of the sources for the Naked Cowboy are from two whole years ago when he make the announcement just to get some media attention. Has he done a single thing since then? Has he even tried to get on a ballot? To be included, a candidate must have actually attempted to become a party's nominee or gain ballot access. Reywas92^Talk 14:49, 6 September 2012 (UTC)

Good point, but that is for the other article, and it does need some love and attention. Jack Bornholm (talk) 15:10, 6 September 2012 (UTC)

Comparison of US Presidential Candidates, 2012

I do not know if there is enough data out there yet, but it would be beneficial to create a page comparing the presidential candidates policy positions in a manner similar to Comparison of United States presidential candidates, 2008. If I find the time, I'll try to set one up myself in the next week or so. 98.82.9.78 (talk) 19:28, 5 September 2012 (UTC)

Such an article briefly existed, but it was mostly just a collection of section headers with no actual content. It was recently deleted as discussed here. I'm not sure if it is possible to retrieve what was deleted to use as a template, but if you do wish to re-create that page, be sure it has at least some content first before uploading it. Good luck! 68.58.63.22 (talk) 03:30, 6 September 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.29.133.167 (talk)

Edit Request - VP nominees inappropriately added to candidate photo galleries

Somehow, without anyone noticing, on August 14th Creativemind15 changed the longstanding format of having the candidate photo galleries for each party showing the presidential candidates only, by adding the VP nominees (Biden and Ryan) and, in the Republicans gallery, adding the words "Nominees" and "Withdrew". (Creativemind also did this in the 2008 article yesterday, but it has already been reverted.) The galleries for each party is only supposed to list the presidential candidates; only those who ran for president. The VP nominees are only supposed to be listed in the infobox. This is what the candidate galleries looked like before the changes were made.[3] This is the first of multiple changes, where Biden and Ryan were inappropriately added.[4]. Then it was changed to put the Pres/VP nominees on their own lines as "Nominees" and split all the remaining candidates into their own area with the word "Withdrew" added for the Republican gallery.[5]. Please put the galleries back to way they correctly were at 21:09, 14 August 2012‎.[6] You can look at all previous election articles to verify the format: 2008,2004, 2000, 1996, and 1992, etc. Only the presidential candidates are listed. Thanks. --76.189.126.159 (talk) 22:09, 5 September 2012 (UTC)

Seems reasonably, at least it should be some comments before a old consensus going back several cycles are changed. So I am chancing it back to the old form. If the VP should be pictured under the primary gallery then lets talk about it. Jack Bornholm (talk) 22:42, 5 September 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, Jack. :) Yeah, the format has been long established going back through decades of presidential election articles. What I think happened here is that other editors simply did not notice that this major change had been made. Those galleries are for presidential candidates only. --76.189.126.159 (talk) 22:49, 5 September 2012 (UTC)

Sorry about that guys! I was just testing it out and I just wanted to save it for the day and I forgot to revert it back the next day! I'm willing to help out with candidate info and new pictures if you want me too! Have a nice day! --Creativemind15 (talk) 22:58, 5 September 2012 (UTC)

While I truly appreciate your apology, I don't understand your explanation. I don't get why you would make such a major, inappropriate change to a long-established format if you were planning on reverting it back. You cannot do live testing and save edits temporarily in an article. Also, that change in the 2012 election article was initiated three weeks ago, yet in the past 24 hours you did the exact same thing in the 2008 article. It's been fixed, as well. So, again, thank you for your apology, but please do not do testing in an article. Thanks. :) --76.189.126.159 (talk) 23:27, 5 September 2012 (UTC)

Applying due weight to the top row of the infobox

Gary Johnson is on the ballot in 43 states + DC, which total 467 EVs, not 493. I think this is the third time I've brought something like this up- I don't know why his numbers keep getting inflated. It's possible it's just an adding error, but please remember to adjust the EV total when adding or removing a state.

The 7 states that we don't have confirmed for him yet are AL, CT, KY, MI, OK, PA, and RI. MI & OK are in the courts, and the GOP just filed a challenge to get him off the ballot in PA. I'm not sure about the status of the other 4. However, it might be timely (given the impending end to the ballot-access-petitioning season) to raise the question of how, if at all, to acknowledge the milestone of Johnson reaching full ballot access. We could talk hypothetically about other candidates as well, but at this point it doesn't appear anybody else has a shot to be on every ballot other than Obama, Romney, and Johnson, and GJ only in the event he and/or the LP win the last couple challenges/lawsuits.

The note on the top of this page (which is meant to encompass and represent all points of consensus regarding the infobox) states "Candidates are sorted by the amount of ballot access they have obtained, which is necessary to win those votes. In keeping with WP:DUE, the top row is reserved for major candidates on all 51 ballots." I worded the note this way to reflect two things: First, that ballot access (which may or may not include 'official' write-in states per this discussion) is the only measure by which we decide which candidates go in the infobox, and in what order they appear, with party names serving as a tiebreaker alphabetically, and the incumbent listed first if there is one.

The second part of my excerpt concerns the layout of the infobox- in particular, who is entitled to a spot in the top row. There was agreement that in the case where there were enough candidates who could win the election that more than one row was needed to showcase them all, that WP:DUE should apply to the top row only and limit the candidates that appear there to those who are "major." The follow-up question to that, which went unanswered, is what the definition of "major" would be. Just the big two? Those invited to the debates? Those who reached a particular polling average? Those who received matching funds from the FEC and/or raised a particular sum of money? You see the problem- we get back into the debate we had over the question of who gets into the infobox at all. Since it is all but certain that the Democrats & Republicans will be on every ballot (despite skirmishes like the recent challenge in WA, which I believe went Romney's way), I felt comfortable going ahead and linking the definition of "major" to our objective criterion of ballot access. It is not often that a third party reaches full nationwide ballot access- I believe Ross Perot in 1992/96 was the last one to do it, and maybe Buchanan in 2000. Back before AE made their no-nominee announcement, it was discussed whether to have (when there are 5 to 6 eligible candidates) 2 rows of 3 pictures/blank spot or 3 rows of 2. Back then, I wrote "As for 2 rows vs. 3 rows, I would agree that if we end up with 5 to 6 qualifying candidates, that 3 rows of 2 is better unless one (or more) of the 3rd party candidates earns full ballot access (50 states+DC). If that happens, they should be moved up to the top row, which would help to show that the nominees listed there are true nationwide candidates with a notably broad base of support." Jack voiced his support for this proposal, but I did not incorporate it into the note because I did not feel it was discussed by enough editors to be regarded as consensus (regardless of Jack's great standing around here), and it could potentially be controversial to picture Johnson directly next to Obama & Romney- particularly if we are strictly following the guidelines, which would dictate that Johnson be pictured between Obama & Romney, given that there is a 3-way ballot access tie, and 'L' comes before 'R' (although such an arrangement wouldn't be all that bad, since Obama would be on the far 'left', and Romney the far 'right'...)

Given that Goode (in my opinion) should now be included in the infobox (see above discussion: "What to Do with Constitution Party"), the 2 rows vs. 3 rows question should be resolved, along with whether or not Johnson deserves to be in the top row if he does get on every ballot (and more broadly for future elections, the definition in this context of "major"), as he currently expects to. Even if the majority opinion here turns out to be that Goode should not appear there yet, it seems likely that the date GJ is confirmed for that 51st ballot and the day Goode crosses the 270 threshold for ballots his name is printed on (which is a subset of all states with which he has submitted a slate of electors) will be very close to one another, if the current trajectory of the situation continues.

Stein's count with the current list here ought to be 402, not 403. However, she has also been confirmed for the ballot in VA. I have seen conflicting information re her MT petition, with BAN saying she didn't have enough valid signatures, but her website & the WP article on her campaign think otherwise- perhaps she's challenging? Without MT but with VA her total comes to 32 states+DC for 415 EVs. 68.58.63.22 (talk) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.29.133.167 (talk) 01:43, 6 September 2012 (UTC)

Token opposition?

The term 'token' should probably be explained to the non-US users (see Democratic primary) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.181.165.227 (talk) 07:56, 7 September 2012 (UTC)

Why? Do you consider the word Token to be a special american word that are not used in other english languaged areas of the globe? The concept itself I think is known in every political system in the world. Of course it is more common, even a problem, in countries like US and UK with only single winner constituencies, but it is used everywhere, especially in the way in this connection. With a partyleader that everyone wants to win but so he is not running unopposed someone is running against him as token opposition. I know that it is not look upon as undemocratic to run without opposition in US as it is in many other countries, but that just mean that the term Token opposition maybe should be explained to US readers since Non US readers are more family with the term. Jack Bornholm (talk) 09:55, 7 September 2012 (UTC)

Ballot Access Update

ballot-access.org has shown that Sheila Tittle is under the 'We The People' party label. It also shows that Chuck Baldwin is on the ballot in Kansas under the Reform label. Jack Fellure is on the Louisiana ballot under the Prohibition label as well. 207.177.29.217 (talk) 23:39, 9 September 2012 (UTC)