AZ, CA, GA, ID, IN, IL, MD, MI, MO, OK, OR, PA, NC, SC, TX, VA
Nader cannot win 259 of the Electoral Votes.
There are 538 total Electoral Votes
and you need 270 to win the Presidency.
If the NECN (New England Cable News) report that Nader has been disqualified in MA is correct,
then Nader cannot win 271 votes.
This would mean that even
if Nader won every state in which
he was on the ballot,
Nader would still fail to
win the Presidency.
I only point this out, because you are making the preposterious assumption that Nader could carry all those states. If you are willing to accept that, it's just as plausible, that there will not be a majority for a single candidate for President at the end of the electoral college.
In the case of a non-majority after the electoral college vote, the House of Representatives votes as per the rules in the XII Amendment. I'm not sure I understand the rules properly, but it looks like each state gets a single vote (so how a state with two representatives who disagree picks, I don't know).
The same set of votes takes place on Vice President, and is independent of the vote for the President. If the President fails to get a majority, but the Vice President gets a majority, the VP will become the acting President until such time as a President is qualified (this is a conglomeration of my reading of Amendments XII and XX). If neither a Vice President or a President qualifies, then Congress is empowered to enact a law to handle this case. As far as I know the 20th Amendment is the only way in which a person could become president who was never actually part of an election. It's happened once in our history. Gerald Ford was never elected President, but was chose as a replacement VP when Spirrow Agnew resigned. Then Nixon resigned, and Ford became President for the rest of the term, never having faced a vote for the term. (I'm fairly sure I got all that in history correct).
Nader mathematically eliminated? (Score:2)
Nader cannot win 259 of the Electoral Votes.
There are 538 total Electoral Votes and you need 270 to win the Presidency.
If the NECN (New England Cable News) report that Nader has been disqualified in MA is correct, then Nader cannot win 271 votes. This would mean that even if Nader won every state in which he was on the ballot, Nader would still fail to win the Presidency.
Re:Nader mathematically eliminated? (Score:2)
In the case of a non-majority after the electoral college vote, the House of Representatives votes as per the rules in the XII Amendment. I'm not sure I understand the rules properly, but it looks like each state gets a single vote (so how a state with two representatives who disagree picks, I don't know).
The same set of votes takes place on Vice President, and is independent of the vote for the President. If the President fails to get a majority, but the Vice President gets a majority, the VP will become the acting President until such time as a President is qualified (this is a conglomeration of my reading of Amendments XII and XX). If neither a Vice President or a President qualifies, then Congress is empowered to enact a law to handle this case. As far as I know the 20th Amendment is the only way in which a person could become president who was never actually part of an election. It's happened once in our history. Gerald Ford was never elected President, but was chose as a replacement VP when Spirrow Agnew resigned. Then Nixon resigned, and Ford became President for the rest of the term, never having faced a vote for the term. (I'm fairly sure I got all that in history correct).
Kirby