Infographic: Americans Versus the Electoral College
In 18th-century America, when there were no formal political party structures and only a few million settlers, the Founding Fathers created a method to elect a president that made the most sense at the time: an indirect decision by the Electoral College, comprised of the most informed individuals from each state. Today, that method itself remains mostly the same, but the nation has changed dramatically.
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Tonight we party, tomorrow we vote!
Who and What the F***Are We Voting For!? — A Party
Photo by Tyler Hoehne
Election Day Eats: Introducing ‘Voting Day’ Apple Pie Bake-Offs - by Lara Rabinovitch
Ask your friends to name their favorite aspect of any holiday and talk will turn to food pretty quickly. So if Election Day were a national holiday, what food would we eat?
Nothing is as American as, well, apple pie, so I propose we mark Election Day by celebrating this quintessential American dish, broadly conceived, in voter-based baking competitions across the country. Think of it was voting with your ballot and palate.
Art Direction and Photography by Jessica De Jesus
Apple pie by Carolyn Sams
Who and What the F***Are We Voting For!? — A Party - by Casey Caplowe
Even if you’re not one of the potentially mythical undecided voters in the presidential race, you may still be one of the roughly 100 percent of people (we made that up, but it feels right) who are undecided on the various ballot measures and state and local races you’ll find in front of you on November 6.
To help solve this problem and cram for the big event coming up just around the corner, we’re proposing a Who and What the F— Are We Voting For!? party.
The idea is simple:
Find a spot to have a party. Invite some friends. Assign each guest one of the non-presidential races or ballot measures and ask them to prepare a short presentation (two minutes) to be delivered to everyone else at the party. During the party, as people present (questions and consulting the internet is fine) everyone fills out the DIY Voter Guide we’re providing below to bring to the polling booth as a cheat sheet. And we figured some drinking doesn’t hurt, so we’ve got a simple drinking game you can follow along with too.
If you’re into it:
And as you get more into it, here are some resources to figure out what’s on the ballot near you:
Cheers! America is lucky to have citizens like you.
This post is part of the Take Back Tuesday campaign to make Voting Day a national holiday. Sign up or encourage your company to join in at takebacktuesday.good.is.
Why Isn’t Election Day a National Holiday? #takebacktuesday
When you get to thinking about it, holding an election in the middle of the work week doesn’t make any sense. How can our democracy thrive when voting, perhaps our most broad-reaching civic duty, must be squeezed into what odd hours we can find for it?…
So, in the spirit of a more engaged citizenship, we figured we’d do something about it: We want to make Voting Day a holiday. And here’s our plan:
For Those of Us Who Have Kids: Tuesday Is Bring Your Children to the Voting Booth Day - by David Mizner
I’ve been writing a lot about the need to create an American culture of voting. That’s what exists in places with high turnout, and that’s what the Take Back Tuesday campaign aims to help create.
Culture is passed down from one generation to the next, so this election season I’m planning to take my two older sons (Baby Izzy can wait till 2014) to the polling station (which, I should point out, is located in the lobby of my apartment building).
Not just to the polling station but into the booth. Wait—is that legal? Yeah, you can show your kids what goes on behind the curtain as long as they’re younger than 18. The process, with the machine and booth, is likely to captivate young children, and older ones—well, they probably won’t mind it. It’s a chance, in any case, to start a tradition that they may someday pass down.
Ideally, Election Day would be a national holiday, a civic celebration, and a trip to the polls with family and friends would be just one among several communal, festive activities. Till then, and to that end, create your own celebratory customs, bring your children to the polls, Take Back Tuesday.
This post is part of the Take Back Tuesday campaign to make Voting Day a national holiday. Sign up or encourage your company to join in at takebacktuesday.good.is.
Illustration by Tyler Hoehne
Frank Zappa Was Getting Out the Vote Before it Was Cool - by Jeff Newelt
Frank Zappa (RIP) was the iconoclast’s iconoclast, a genius composer/guitarist, an exacto-sharp satirist and a prominent promoter of voter registration years before “Rock The Vote” or MTV’s “Choose or Lose” began. He included “Register to Vote” on every album since 1971 when 18-year-olds won the right to vote, and was the first to register voters in concert halls, with the help of the League of Women Voters.
“Nothing scares them more than the possibility they will be voted out. The ballot box is still quite a weapon if we can just get people to use it, that’s all,” Zappa told my 19-year-old self in 1991, at the close of an interview I conducted for 34th Street Magazine at UPENN.
Illustration by Fatim Hana
Designing a Phenomenon: Student Designs Inspire a New Approach to Voting - by Matt Luckhurst
Our class “Designing a Phenomenon,” taught by Brian Collins and me, is an intensive fourth-year honors class at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. It is solely focused on a designers’ ability to influence and change behavior.
Inspired by the GOOD community’s Take Back Tuesday challenge, we asked our students to create a new phenomenon around the act of voting. The election of the president should be cause for a celebration around the most important act every American can do: get out and vote. Every four years we debate the reasons for the deep interest in the election on one hand, but the apathy people exhibit around voting on the other.
Featured design by student HeeSang Lee: For election day “We’re Closed”
Today at GOOD we’re voting and making Election Day a holiday.
How are you celebrating?
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