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The ballots are hardly counted and already the Democrats are talking about the "mandate" and yet, as it stands now with the popular vote it is 51% Obama and 48% McCain.

"Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada declared that the American electorate gave the Democratic Party a “mandate as he pledged to aid the middle class and restore fiscal responsibility to “lead this country to a much better place.

How do you define mandate?

QUINNSCOMMENTARY;1046218 wrote: The ballots are hardly counted and already the Democrats are talking about the "mandate" and yet, as it stands now with the popular vote it is 51% Obama and 48% McCain.

"Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada declared that the American electorate gave the Democratic Party a “mandate as he pledged to aid the middle class and restore fiscal responsibility to “lead this country to a much better place.

How do you define mandate?


Mandate will be defined to us by the news media just as they have defined every other thing about the campaigns for almost the last two years. :-5

Well 51% is a lot better than the mandate of 32% Labour got in Britain. Or of the mandate of 0% that Gordon Brown has now as nobody voted him in except himself. In British party politics it's "one man, one vote"--and Brown had the one vote. Surely above 50% is a mandate, majority rule isn't it? Otherwise how did Bush become president he had less then 50% of the popular vote so no mandate at all.

QUINNSCOMMENTARY;1046218 wrote: How do you define mandate? By reading the law of the land.

Well, it works for England, we write our laws here to be readable. For some strange reason there's no obligation on US legislators to facilitate comprehension on the part of those governed.