Countdown: There are 166 days to the 2013 municipal elections, 249 days until the start of the 2014 Legislature, 525 days until the 2014 midterm elections and 962 days until the 2016 Iowa Caucuses.
An analysis says expanding Medicaid coverage will save Utah more than $130 million and would give health insurance to 123,000 residents [
Tribune].
A new report ranks Utah #1 for economic outlook next year [
Utah Policy,
Tribune].
House Majority Leader Brad Dee goes on a European vacation with three lobbyists, but Dee insists the trip was above board because everybody paid their own way and they didn’t discuss politics [
Tribune].
Former Attorney General Mark Shurtleff is caught on tape offering to get $2 million for Utah Businessman Darl McBride if he would shut down a website critical of another Utah businessman. That money was to come from a third Utah businessman who was in trouble with the Attorney General’s office [
Tribune].
Former Legislator and current blogger Holly Richardson
says she’s had enough with the “culture of corruption” permeating the Attorney General’s office [
Holly on the Hill].
Sen. Orrin Hatch wants to hear from Utahns who think they have been inappropriately targeted by the IRS as part of his investigation into misconduct by the agency [
Tribune].
Kennecott lays off 100 workers because of the massive landslide at their Bingham Canyon Mine [
Tribune,
Deseret News].
The Boy Scouts vote to allow gay members in their ranks [
Deseret News].
Former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman launches a new political action committee to support Republicans who share his point of view [
Tribune].
Gov. Gary Herbert says he is confident the state can work out a deal to avoid taxing the electricity used by the new National Security Agency data center at Camp Williams [
Tribune].
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The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC).
Every vote, everywhere, would be politically relevant and equal in presidential elections. No more distorting and divisive red and blue state maps. There would no longer be a handful of 'battleground' states where voters and policies are more important than those of the voters in more than 3/4ths of the states, like Utah, that now are just 'spectators' and ignored after the primaries.
When the bill is enacted by states possessing a majority of the electoral votes– enough electoral votes to elect a President (270 of 538), all the electoral votes from the enacting states would be awarded to the presidential candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states and DC.
A survey of Utah voters showed 70% overall support for the idea that the President of the United States should be the candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states.
Support by political affiliation, was 82% among Democrats, 66% among Republicans, and 75% among others.
By gender, support was 78% among women and 60% among men.
By age, support was 70% among 18-29 year olds, 70% among 30-45 year olds, 70% among 46-65 year olds, and 68% for those older than 65.
The bill uses the power given to each state by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution to change how they award their electoral votes for President. Historically, virtually all of the major changes in the method of electing the President, including ending the requirement that only men who owned substantial property could vote and 48 current state-by-state winner-take-all laws, have come about by state legislative action.
In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state's electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided). Support for a national popular vote is strong among Republicans, Democrats, and Independent voters, as well as every demographic group in virtually every state surveyed in recent polls in closely divided Battleground states: CO – 68%, FL – 78%, IA 75%, MI – 73%, MO – 70%, NH – 69%, NV – 72%, NM– 76%, NC – 74%, OH – 70%, PA – 78%, VA – 74%, and WI – 71%; in Small states (3 to 5 electoral votes): AK – 70%, DC – 76%, DE – 75%, ID – 77%, ME – 77%, MT – 72%, NE 74%, NH – 69%, NV – 72%, NM – 76%, OK – 81%, RI – 74%, SD – 71%, UT – 70%, VT – 75%, WV – 81%, and WY – 69%; in Southern and Border states: AR – 80%,, KY- 80%, MS – 77%, MO – 70%, NC – 74%, OK – 81%, SC – 71%, TN – 83%, VA – 74%, and WV – 81%; and in other states polled: CA – 70%, CT – 74%, MA – 73%, MN – 75%, NY – 79%, OR – 76%, and WA – 77%. Americans believe that the candidate who receives the most votes should win.
The bill has passed 31 state legislative chambers in 21 states. The bill has been enacted by 9 jurisdictions possessing 132 electoral votes - 49% of the 270 necessary to go into effect.
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