Ha Ha, that's awesome *promote

also *notterrible only amazing!

I would suggest take it out of the terrible and spacey channel and put it into the comedy channel.

Promoting this video and sending it back into the queue for one more try; last queued Sunday, April 26th, 2015 8:30am PDT - promote requested by eric3579.

done and done. It's hard to tell quite how self-aware they are with this one, http://youcanliveinsouthdakota.com seems pretty sincere

I don't know [gets slimed]. I'd rather die on Mars.

Here's a funny yet serious thought -- will anyone watch this video and read our comments while they're dying on Mars, cold, alone, asphixiating?

If only I had taken South Dakota seriously..! Why GOD?! WHY!!!!!!!! ...why couldn't I have been as smart as those people commenting on Videosift? Those geniuses! No, instead, I moved to Mars -- for the evil ends of SCIENCE.

Like a convoluted Martian ecological science fiction horror murder mystery movie poster from the 1980s --

SHE MOVED TO MARS TO FIND LOVE...
BUT ALL SHE FOUND...
WERE THE MARTIAN MEAN STREETS...
A NEW WORLD WITHOUT LAW...
WITH ALIEN ARTIFACTS...
JASON VORHEES RESURRECTED...
AND VERY... LITTLE... OXYGEN.

FOLLOW THE MONEY TRAIL...
STRAIGHT TO CAPITAL HILL...
EARTH!

bum bum buuuuum -- THE TERRESTRIAL CONSPIRACY.

A consistently red state. Perhaps dying on Mars would be preferable.

With a consistent 3 (the minimum) electoral votes.

I'm from Kansas, where it is pretty much guaranteed that any vote to a non-republican (presidential) candidate is pretty much pointless. All 6 of those electoral votes are going red unless "you look over and see Satan sitting next to you on the sofa, and then look out the window and see snow".

I'm sorry, but I hate that contention. That a vote cast for someone that doesn't win the election is pointless. I think that's why we are stuck with a 2 party system even though both party's favorability rating is in the teens. People seem to vote against someone rather than for someone they want in office.
I say the only pointless/wasted vote is one for a candidate you don't really support.

My experience has been that my candidate almost never wins....but I don't think my vote is pointless in the least. I look at it this way, if all democrats in Kansas voted, it would turn blue. Because so many believe it's pointless, they just don't vote, and it stays red.

I understand your discomfort with my phrasing. My beef is with the electoral college system.

While I was getting my degree, I took some really good American History and Government classes at college. The prof in the Govt. class really went into depth explaining the electoral college to us, and to me the shittiness of that system was just shocking. For example: (none of this is news to a truly informed voter or an interested person with an internet connection, but it WAS news to me when I was ~20 years old, and I think it still would be news to a really high percentage of US voters)

* First is the very idea of an electoral college. The only way to become president of the US is to win the most electoral votes. But voters don't cast electoral votes, the people of the electoral college do. OK, the electoral college is supposed to follow the votes/will of their state/constituents (more on that next), but the fact remains that literally/practically, our votes as citizens don't matter. Only the electoral votes count. So yes, in the most literal sense ... NONE of our votes "matter".

* In general, the "electors" (the people on the electoral college) are supposed to cast their electoral votes to the winner of the popular vote in their state / district. I think 2 states (Nebraska and Maine?) divide up their suggested electoral votes to be as close as possible to the actual proportions of the popular vote, but that's a whole other issue. Anyway, in general the electors are supposed to cast their vote for the popular vote winner in their state. BUT, that process isn't automatic. The votes that actually matter, the electoral votes, are cast by fallible human beings -- and they might "go rogue" and vote against what they are "supposed to" do. That is called a "faithless elector". That would be bad enough if it was just some weird loophole that technically exists but has never actually happened in practice, but actually faithless electors happen fairly frequently. The only upside is that they haven't ever changed the outcome of an election. Yet.

* When we're young and in civics type classes in school, we're brainwashedtaught about Democracy as a very simple, will of the public, one man one vote system. The electoral college shits all over that. One can win the popular vote but lose on electoral votes, and that actually has happened multiple times (not just to Al Gore). In my opinion, the electoral college creates a laundry list of problems (swing states are the only ones that matter, so campaign there and ignore everybody else, etc. etc. etc.), has very few benefits (any supposed benefits of the system are tenuous at best), and is completely contrary to the core concepts of Democracy.


Without the electoral college, a blue vote in Kansas would matter, as would a red vote in Massachusetts. Or a vote for a 3rd party or independent, anywhere. With the electoral college, edge cases like any of those can be safely and easily ignored by candidates.

I think it is unlikely that Kansas would turn blue, even if all of the democrats voted. That being said, we're not a complete LOCK for red; heck, out of the 10 most recent Governors we've had before we turned into Brownbackistan it is an even split between Democrats and Republicans with 5 each. And actually the Democrats had significantly longer total number of years in the office.

So basically, I don't actually think that a vote cast on a losing candidate is "pointless", I just think that the electoral college system does a really good job of making sure that some votes are more pointless than others. It amazes me that there wasn't a MUCH bigger stink made about it when Gore "lost" in 2000, but I guess voter apathy can overcome any challenge to the system.

I mostly agree with that...but keep in mind the electoral college is only applicable for Presidential elections. (arguably the most important elections, granted)
I also think the electoral college system needs an overhaul at least, perhaps complete removal. I was taught that it was designed to protect uneducated masses from fear mongers and habitual liars scaring them into electing a completely unqualified (or obviously dangerous) candidate. Somehow it has failed to stop either from being elected in recent memory, so it needs fixing.