AMERICA DIVIDES: The Multi-Party US Election of 2016

[Thande]

PROLOGUE

The White House, Washington DC
January 22nd 2009

A part of Barack Obama still felt like a kid posing for a photo on a movie set. Here he was, sat behind the Resolute desk in the Oval Office, the whiff of fresh paint still fading, the presidential house a state of organised chaos from the ongoing transition. But he wasn’t an extra on The West Wing checking the camera angles before Martin Sheen came on set and sat here. This was the real West Wing, the real Oval Office.

And he was the real President.

No matter that the conspiracy theorists had already started muttering about he and Justice Roberts flubbing the oath two days ago, or that to be on the safe side they had repeated it yesterday. No matter that the right-wing media were already gearing up for the same character assassination campaign they had committed against every Democratic president and candidate for the past thirty years and more. For now, he still had to focus on convincing himself this was the reality. Following the disastrous Bush Administration, in which America had been shockingly attacked by terrorists led by Osama Bin Laden and then controversially gone to war against Saddam Hussein (again), her people had seen fit to elect a President whose name was Barack Hussein Obama. It was the sort of thing that would have been laughed out of a work of fiction. Yet the electoral map didn’t lie. A first-generation immigrant, a first-term Senator, son of a onetime Muslim. The first black president, defeating the assumption by many (in his darker moments, Obama himself) that the Bradley Effect would stop Americans taking the plunge at the last moment.

Maybe that was the real American Dream. Not the mirage expounded by the old white men in both parties, the one that had crushed so many hopes and lives against the brick wall of reality. They claimed that any poor kid could rise to the highest office in the land regardless of his race or creed—now those same men seemed rather alarmed that somebody had actually done it. No, maybe the real dream was that in America, at the right moment, all things were possible.

Racism hadn’t been solved overnight, of course. But, aided by the Republicans being tarred by the financial crisis, the voters had seen fit to give Democrats overwhelming majorities in Congress, too. The electorate had a tendency to punish a president’s party in his first midterms, but for now Obama had a rare opportunity to make some bold moves, freed from the constraints of the ‘checks and balances’ that usually served only to make the cogs of the machine of government seize up. Some things were obvious—he’d already got an executive order ready to close Guantanamo Bay by the end of the year. But what should be his primary project? Healthcare reform, he had decided, that white whale that had caused so many problems for his defeated primary rival and (as confirmed by the Senate yesterday) new Secretary of State. Ten years into the twenty-first century, he would finally drag the US into the twentieth and get her citizens the same universal right to healthcare that every other first-world nation enjoyed.

It would be a challenge, but he was determined to go down in history as something more than just history for its own sake, the first black president, a symbol rather than a man. And what else could he expend his political capital on that would be anything like as worth it?

“Settling in, Mr President?” Joe Biden asked with a wink from the door. With uncharacteristic tact, the VP turned ‘Mr President’ into a gently kidding joke, disguising the fact that he and Obama were still slightly uncomfortable addressing one another by their first names. They were from such different backgrounds and generations, and Biden had not been Obama’s first choice to balance the ticket. But he had performed well on the campaign trail, and his own disastrous presidential campaigns had shown he was safely neutered, with no future ambitions like the Secretary of State clearly maintained.

“I feel like I’ll have settled down right about when it’s time to leave this place—in 2017, of course,” Obama said, answering Biden’s joke with glib faux arrogance that made the old man smile. He theatrically patted his empty pocket with a grimace. “Maybe they’ll let me have my BlackBerry back then. If we’re still using them.”

“Yeah,” Biden said vaguely, reminding Obama that his generation could still be uncomfortable with casual mentions of the internet and recent technology. He genuinely was still annoyed by the BlackBerry confiscation, though he supposed it was pretty self-evident that one couldn’t go around using a personal email system for documents of state. Still, it felt like going back in time, which so many aspects of American politics already evoked for a man who had travelled around the world and seen how other countries did things.

Obama opened his mouth to change the subject, but frowned and swatted the back of his neck. “Damn bugs. You’d think they’d clear out of this place in January at least.”

“DC is a swamp in more ways than one,” Biden said, relieved to get back on a subject he could speak about with authority. He idly began opening a cardboard box; the First Family and a few helpers were supposed to move their stuff in themselves, meaning that there were still plenty of unopened packages ready for processing. Obama found it oddly satisfying to watch Biden deftly untie the knotted string and unfold the flaps. Maybe some of the kids on the internet who’d watched stuttery CNN livestreams of his inauguration would eagerly watch the vice-president opening boxes.

He blinked and shook his head. What a ridiculous idea! That showed how much stress he was under right now.

“Huh,” Biden said as he gently withdrew the object within from its packaging, placing it on a small table nearby. “Where did you come across this gentleman?”

Obama laughed. “I hadn’t realised they’d brought that in! My Granny Sarah foisted that gentleman, as you put it, on me when I went to Kenya to look up my father’s roots, years ago. He’s been knocking around my house ever since. Family heirloom, apparently.”

“So this is Kenyan art?” Biden asked, glancing dubiously at the figure. It was old and worn, and had been skilfully wrought from solid black ebony. Surviving traces suggested it had once been painted. It was a seated human figure, but with exaggerated proportions and an ambiguous expression, looking rather saturnine to Western eyes.

“Not Kenyan,” Obama said, standing up and walking over to the table. “This goes back to when the Luo people came from around what’s now Uganda.” Biden nodded with the frantic air of a kid who had revised the wrong part of the textbook and was now taking in the scantron test in front of him. “There’s an old family legend that my ancestor Owiny Sigoma, who lived maybe around the time the Pilgrim Fathers showed up in New England, he beat the Bantu invaders ’cause of the magic powers of this gentleman.”

Biden hastily withdrew a hand that had been wandering idly towards the idol. “Be careful, you know what those fine fellows at Fox will make of it if they get wind you’ve got some witch-doctor fetish,” he pointed out.

Obama half-laughed, half-sneered. “Sure. I should have sent this to a museum years ago. Anyway, the legend also says that Owiny had to cut himself and smear his blood on the statue to unlock its powers. But there was a curse; his son Kisodhi later accidentally bled on it, and that caused the trick to be undone...kind of. Though the Bantu had been conquered, their culture partly took over the Luo.”

“Huh,” Biden said, cocking his head on one side. “Anything to it, you think?”

Obama laughed. “Don’t be ridiculous...Joe. It’s clearly just a folk myth to save face for why the Luo adopted some Bantu farming practices when we’d—they’d beaten them in battle. Anyway, when my father...” He paused for a moment. “My grandfather was struggling against the British and they’d locked him up. Kezia told me my father had found this old thing and cut himself over it, as though he could use its power to beat the British. Grandfather Onyango gave him hell about it when he got out—the Terror, they used to call him. My father was supposed to be a good Muslim, not some superstitious African...at least, that’s before he decided Islam was superstition, too.” Along with sticking around your wife and son.

“Families, huh?” Biden said inclusively. “Let me tell you, this reminds me of a story from the sixties. There was this gentleman with a switchblade named ‘Corn Pop’, I mean the gentleman, not the switchblade...”

“Right, right,” Obama said hastily, already having heard said story more than once. “Yeah, I’ll make a note to have this gentleman sent to a museum.”

“Makes sense,” Biden nodded. He frowned at the idol. “Of course, when you think about it, the Brits did pull out of Kenya...”

Obama gave him a cold look. “The British were kicked out of Kenya by Kenyatta and the Mau Mau and the resistance of thousands of ordinary people like my grandfather,” he said pointedly. “Not because of some old stereotypical African magic.”

“Right, OK,” Biden said, aware he had touched a nerve. He tried to turn it into a joke. “Still, best make sure you don’t bleed on him when you move him, eh? Or else you might end up being taken over by Brit culture, I guess!”

Obama had been ready to leave the task of moving him to someone else. But perhaps it would be sensible to ensure nobody else saw this, as—just as Joe had said—the right-wing media could make some big scandal out of a White House staff member mentioning the existence of this thing.

He picked it up off the table and gently but firmly thrust the idol back into its box.

It was not until a couple of hours later, when he had forgotten about the whole affair as he delved deep into more Senate office approvals, that he went to the restroom and washed his hands. The sink accepted not only considerable years’ worth of priceless African dust, but also the remains of a swatted mosquito that had been smeared against the statue.

Much would depend on the question of just when in its itinerary that mosquito had been swatted...

​

 

[Thande]

This project has been on the back burner for literally years; I began working on it in January 2020 and last looked at it in August of that year, after already completing all the graphics required (but not the text, other than that prologue above). I got burnout in 2019 doing "The Kippery Slope" and said I'd never do another Fantastic Election Night TL again like that or "Partying Like It's 1999". But I couldn't rid myself of this idea. The problem with it is not only the time investment to writing an ancillary story, but also because it uses recent American politics, and I kept waiting for the controveries of 2016 to die down - but they never have. So, rather than waste the work I put into it (I finally got Excel to actually split out proper results boxes and everything!) and on the urging of the people commenting on my Graphics thread, I will go ahead with it.

However, I'm going to be very relaxed about the timescale (maybe one update a week), and don't expect it to be as involved with the narrative as those earlier projects were; the commentary will be more about describing the states and districts as the results come in, probably without as many attempts at surreal humour (he promised naively).

Now, without further ado...

 

[Thande]

November 11th, 2016

"The US is electing a new government, and if you're not staying up all night with us on BBC 1, then BBC Five Live has all the news on Breakfast from a special extended programme. Now, though, time to see in a new era in history with BBC News."

​

"We're in New York, as the 'Land of the Free' chooses its new destiny."

"So join us for every bitter twist and turn of an election night like no other!"

Imagery, projected by modern trickery as though on the screens of Times Square and other landmarks throughout New York City. Surprisingly, much of it was devoted not to those who would be battling for power this time, but to the outgoing President, Barack Obama. Or, as some critics had described him, the last President of the United States.

​

Andrew Neil - for, alas, it was he - glared at the audience from the centre of a panel of five journalists and experts, looking like the world's most unhelpfully specialised University Challenge team. The American members of the panel could easily be picked out by their lack of Remembrance Day poppies, evidently having failed to receive the memo from Cookie Monster.

"Good evening!" Neil addressed an audience of millions around the world, a reassuring thought after last night's nightmare where he'd dreamed he was stuck on some obscure streaming service with a smaller audience than most Twitch streamers or local radio stations. "Welcome to the heart of New York, our home for history in the making! According to Google Maps - other online mapping services are available, but they're all shite - this building, 1211 Avenue of the Americas, is supposed to be a TV news studio. However, when the BBC showed up with an army of Daleks, it appeared to have fallen into disuse and just be used as a convention hall for conspiracy theorists and military veterans trying to sell books, so I'm sure they won't mind us taking it over for tonight."

If the viewer focused, they might be able to hear muffled angry voices in the background, possibly emanating from a locked broom cupboard just visible behind the elaborate display of the map of the United States in the shape of an eagle. "I am joined tonight by my colleague from BBC World News America, Katty Kay. Katty, you've covered four presidential elections, but tonight will be almost as new to you as it is to everyone else - or the American electorate - isn't it?"

"That's right, Andrew," Kay agreed, speaking in a disconcertingly British voice that didn't match her Americanised name or image. "Whatever else might be said about him, Barack Obama has unquestionably transformed the nature of American democracy. And tonight is when we will see the first-fruits of that change which he asked his first supporters to believe in, all those years ago. Over the past century the United States has changed demographically, it has changed technologically - but, until now, it has not changed politically. As recently as the last midterms in 2014, American voters were still going to the polls to elect the same two big-tent parties that had been around since before the US Civil War, when everyone was wearing stovepipe hats and corsets - not both at the same time, probably. But now, for the first time, multi-party democracy has arrived in the United States."

"Thank you Katty, and we'll be going back to you shortly to help explain the complex events of the last few years which have led to these dramatic reforms, Mr Obama's legacy, for good or ill. As the results come in - the first states have just closed their polls - we will be reporting on them here and Jeremy Vine will be putting them on his giant map. Now, Jon Sopel is there in New Hampshire, and he can tell us more about what's going on. Jon."

"Yes Andrew, I'm here in Concord, New Hampshire, where the poll workers are working flat-out. Historically, New Hampshire has boasted of being first in the nation to hold a primary election for president - claiming that Iowa doesn't count, of course. This is the first election in many decades where they have been robbed of that boast, as of course there were no presidential primaries held."

Sopel edged to one side of the camera view, revealing what was behind him: a huge hall filled with people examining voting records. Oddly, a lot of them were dressed like petrol pump attendants. "Another big change for this election is that votes are now being counted centrally by district, sometimes even centrally by state, whereas formerly the United States reported votes by each precinct separately. In British terms, that's like every polling station posting the votes cast there, rather than them being taken to a central counting location first."

"Seems like it would be a bit easy to find out how your neighbours voted," Neil commented.

"Perhaps. It has meant in the past that sometimes close elections' results are unknown for a long time, as we wait for the last few precinct results to come in. On the other hand, if a particular election is a landslide and only knowing the winner is important, it does mean the Americans knew the result sooner than we would.

"This time," Sopel pointed, "we have what some are calling the best of both worlds - and others the worst. Whereas the UK still uses paper ballots, as did many US states in various forms, this time all states have adopted voting machines by federal law. Some worry that this will lead to elections which could be stolen or subject to IT failure - a warning that has been made by a number of parties and candidates. However, it will considerably accelerate the vote-counting process, as each precinct's voting machine results can simply be brought here and totted up, rather than having to count each ballot individually."

"That's fascinating, Jon," Neil said politely, his eyes lacking sincerity, "but what is the upshot for New Hampshire?"

"Well, rather than being first in the nation to a primary, the people of New Hampshire have decided to instead attempt to be first in the nation to finish counting their votes in this new, unique kind of election," Sopel said. "Not unlike Sunderland back home."

"They certainly seem to have hired in a lot of workers to transport and count the votes," Kay commented.

"No, actually that's just the members of the state legislature," Sopel clarified, "who themselves probably have almost enough people to count as their own constituency. Traditionally, a few towns in New Hampshire reported their votes early, such as Dixville Notch - racist name, by the way - but this time that's not allowed. So instead it'll be the whole state, or one of its two districts, at least, which reports-"

Sopel frowned as a murmur came from behind him. He turned and had an exchange with a man in a giant 'I Voted' sticker costume. "Well, we need to leave Jon there," Neil said over the footage, "and we'll go back to Katty's explanation, or perhaps one of our American--"

"Sorry Andrew," Sopel interrupted, turning back. "It turns out the vote counting has gone faster than even I expected, a testament to these new methods, and New Hampshire is about to report the results for its first district."

"Oh - very well," Neil said, surprised but rolling with it. "Yes, we certainly don't want to miss that! No reliable polls, no exit polls for this election, as everything is so unprecedented. This will be our first glimpse at some real results. Whether they'll be representative or not is another question, but--"

Neil's voice mercifully died away as Sopel stepped back to reveal a stage with a lectern. The stage was being climbed by an elderly, balding man with an air of authority. "That's New Hampshire's Secretary of State, Bill Gardner," Sopel hissed in the background. "He's been central to this push to get the votes counted first and keep New Hampshire's reputation. All these arrangements seem very homely now to you and me, though they haven't persuaded the candidates to wear rosettes and go on stage yet."

Gardner glanced around the room over his glasses, and gave a nod with the air of God deciding to rest on the seventh day. "As Secretary of State of the great state of New Hampshire, in the matter of elected representation for the first Congressional district of that great state, I hereby certify that the candidates nominated by the following parties have received votes and the according seats.

"Alliance Party. Nineteen thousand, three hundred seventy votes. No seats.
Conservative Party. Sixty-one thousand, two hundred sixty-five votes. No seats.
Constitution Party. Twenty-eight thousand, eight hundred sixty-five votes. No seats.
Liberal Party. Sixty-nine thousand ninety-three votes. One seat.
National Party. Eighty-nine thousand one hundred thirty votes. One seat.
Progressive Party. One hundred four thousand, two hundred fifty-one votes. One seat.

"I hereby certify that the Members of Congress elected for New Hampshire's first district shall be Jane Beaulieu of Hillsborough - Progressive; Matt Mowers of Bedford - National; and Maura Sullivan of Portsmouth - Liberal."

The room erupted in cheers, applause and catcalls, drowning out what Sopel was trying to say. "Well, we have our first result," Neil said, turning to Kay. "And am I right in thinking, perhaps, an unexpected one?"

"That's right, Andrew. Despite the anti-monopoly laws passed by Barack Obama, many were expecting that the voters would simply revert to the Conservative and Liberal parties, which in many ways are the natural successors to the old Republicans and Democrats respectively. Instead, we see that the leading party is Bernie Sanders' Progressives, basically a more left-wing breakaway from the Democrats, and second came the Nationals - a party which, though some thought, feared really, might have support elsewhere in the nation, is not one that analysts expected to see elected here in New England. The Liberals only just snatch the third seat, while the Conservatives are shut out altogether."

"Despite having almost as many votes!"

"Yes, that is the vagaries of the new proportional representation system. In the UK, or historically here in the US, we often hear of the alleged unfairness of the first-past-the-post voting system, but our European colleagues will tell us that it is just as easy to have heartbreak moments in a vote like this one. And also look at the vote for Ted Cruz's Constitution Party. If that had been added to the Conservatives, they could have been second, beating the Nationals."

"Which is, I believe, just what they have tried to do in some states with this so-called Fusion party?"

"Yes, which will appear on the list of parties here as a blank as it is not operating in New Hampshire...ah, I think the graphics people have our results now..."

	NH-01		
	Prog          	104,251   	28%
	Nat          	89,130    	24%
	Lib          	69,093    	18.6%
	Con          	61,265    	16.5%
	Cst          	28,865    	7.8%
	All          	19,370    	5.2%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	371,973
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Nat
			Lib

"There we have it. Three Members of Congress, as some are now calling them (others still prefer 'Representative' or 'Congressman') elected from a single district. Of course, Mr Obama's plans to introduce nonpartisan redistricting commissions have been delayed, so we will see some...interesting results from those states still blighted by gerrymandering. But that's another discussion."

"And between them those parties, or candidates, have about er...seventy percent of the vote," Neil said, crossing his eyes for a moment as he calculated. "Of course, that does mean the other thirty percent lack representation."

"No voting system is perfect, indeed," Katty agreed. "But I think Jeremy is now ready to put it on his map..."

"Yes I am!" Vine said jovially as the huge CGI map beneath his feet zoomed in from the whole United States to just New England. "No longer is my map blank, and soon we'll be filling in more results too, I have no doubt!"



"Thank you Jeremy. Yes, we have our first result, and what an historic one it is. Mr Gardner and the people of New Hampshire can consider themselves justly proud for being here to herald in a new era. But Katty, I'm sure the viewers at home - even those who thought they were familiar with American politics - are probably feeling a little confused. Before any more states get their results in, do you want to tell us about how Mr Obama has transformed this nation's politics?"

 

[Thande]

"Well, Andrew," Kay began. She was now standing before a greenscreen display showing a close-up image of a much younger-looking Obama giving a speech and gesturing, over which were the words THE ROAD TO REFORM. "Barack Obama was elected President of the United States back in 2008, running on a platform which we all well remember."

The washed-out, still image of Obama was overlaid by a smaller, animated video window. "CHANGE! WE CAN! BELIEVE IN!" Obama declared, as the crowd behind him cheered.

"Now Mr Obama had already made history through being the first black President of a country whose history with race relations has often been a troubled one. But what was the change he sought to enact? On the campaign trail, some accused him of being vague, and his opponents made many, rather far-fetched, dark warnings about his intentions? In the end, everyone was surprised."

The image of Obama giving the campaign-trail speech also faded to pastels, being overlaid in turn by another. This time, early in his first term but already visibly aged slightly by the pressures of the job, the President was giving his first address to a joint session of Congress, though technically not a State of the Union Address. Behind him, even Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden looked nonplussed, while the Republicans looked positively horrified. "...we have not always met these responsibilities — as a government or as a people. I say this not to lay blame or look backwards, but because it is only by understanding how we arrived at this moment that we'll be able to lift ourselves out of this predicament." The clip had started mid-sentence, and now a flash of light covered a cut to a later part. "In other words, we have lived through an era where too often, short-term gains were prized over long-term prosperity; where we failed to look beyond the next payment, the next quarter, or the next election." Another flash covering a cut. "And all the while, critical debates and difficult decisions were put off for some other time on some other day."

The past glimpse of Obama glared at Congress, a strange look in his eyes. "Well that day of reckoning has arrived, and the time to take charge of our future is here. We face many challenges. Our economy is, frankly, in ruins. The international goodwill and sympathy that we enjoyed after the horrors of the 9/11 attacks has been squandered by bullying unilateralism, and the abuses of Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib. Our healthcare bills skyrocket as our standard of living falls. This Union, which should be a shining beacon to the world, suffers from problems which have been vanquished in other parts of it. Not because there is anything wrong with America or with the American people: but because there is something wrong with the way she is governed."

Obama looked around the room, then into the camera as though addressing the viewers at home. "The American people have given the Democratic Party and myself a powerful mandate for change, and it is our duty and our responsibility to answer that call. I could choose to focus on any one of the many problems we face. The state of the economy. Our broken healthcare system. Violent crime and drugs. Though we may disagree on the details, all of us agree that there are great challenges which we must tackle.

"And yet every President who tries to is stymied by our outdated political system, our winner-take-all elections, crooked money in politics. Our forefathers in the Progressive Era, a century ago, recognised these problems and did their best to deal with them. To them we owe our directly-elected Senate, our primaries, the defeat of machine politics. Yet a hundred years later, like a mutating virus, the enemy they dealt with has seeped back, finding new tricks. Gerrymandered districts, legal loopholes. Well, I say, no more. This crisis we find ourselves in demands a bold response so that we can once again face our forefathers and claim, with our hands on our hearts, that we have not allowed government of the people, by the people, for the people, to perish from this earth. It is for this reason that I call upon the several States of the Union to back an Article V Convention..."

The clip finished just as the uproar from Congress was beginning. "That was the beginning of a long hard road for President Obama," Kay continued. "He was opposed by countless established political interests even within his own party, never mind the Republican opposition. He survived assassination attempts, a primary challenge and Republican attempts to flood the midterms. He was fortunate, perhaps, in that the only person the Republicans could find to challenge him for the presidency in 2012 was Mitt Romney, who spent most of the campaign trapped by mountain lions in a forest clearing."

"I thought they were angry dogs seeking revenge?" Neil asked from off-camera.

"No, that was a different incident - that one with the battleship made from forty-seven binders full of women," Kay said patiently. "Regardless, Mr Obama emerged triumphant. Despite what so many commentators described as impossible odds, he got his Article V convention and his constitutional amendments. And I think Jeremy is ready to explain them..."

The camera panned to Vine in front of his map, which disappeared in favour of a large, complex flowchart-style diagram. "Thank you Katty. Yes, this is a bit complicated to explain, because the way the US government used to work is already quite hard to grasp, and then I have to say how it's changed..."

Vine frowned for a moment. "I'm sorry, but I have to interrupt myself there, haha. It seems we have our second result. The state of Maine, New Hampshire's northern neighbour, has been in competition with them for the first result. They missed taking the prize, but they've won the silver medal. We have the result for Maine's first district..."

	ME-01		
	Prog          	136,016   	34.6%
	Lib          	76,758    	19.5%
	Cst          	62,796    	16%
	Nat          	54,092    	13.8%
	Con          	37,537    	9.5%
	All          	26,153    	6.6%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	393,351
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Prog
			Lib

"And that's just as interesting as the last result. Maine has delivered two seats to the Progressive Party, led by Bernie Sanders, formerly senator from the nearby state of Vermont. The third seat has gone to the Liberals. But even more surprisingly, the third-placed party was Ted Cruz's Constitution Party, certainly not what one would expect for a New England state. The establishment Conservatives are struggling here, barely ahead of the minor Alliance. But, ah, that brings us back to what we were talking about..."

Vine waited awkwardly until the graphics people removed the Maine results and reverted to the flowchart diagram. "This is how the US government used to work. Note the three branches of government - the legislative which makes the laws, the judiciary which reviews them, and the executive which enforces them - broadly speaking. The legislative branch consisted of Congress, made up of the Senate and the House of Representatives. In the Senate, each of the fifty states had equal representation of two Senators regardless of population, as the United States was originally conceived as a union of sovereign states, much like the European Union is today. The House of Representatives, on the other hand, much like the House of Commons in the UK, consisted of districts of roughly equal population each electing one Representative - so more populous states had more Representatives, though it was not truly proportional due to the size disparity between states."

Little icons appeared on the flowchart as Vine spoke. "The judiciary is led by the Supreme Court, nine justices who serve for life and interpret the Constitution to decide whether laws are in conflict with it or not. When a justice dies or retires, their replacement is chosen by the President and approved by the Senate. In theory, the Supreme Court should be a non-partisan review body; in practice, when one party has been in power for a while and has packed the court with its supporters, the court often then strikes down legislation made by the other party when it returns to party. This happened to Franklin Delano Roosevelt, FDR, with his New Deal programmes to tackle the Great Depression."

"Mr Obama explicitly brought up that comparison to justify why he felt attempting to pass reforms, without first reforming the structure of government itself, was doomed to failure," Kay added.

"Right. And the executive..."

	NY-01		
	Nat          	133,797   	39.8%
	Lib          	74,211    	22.1%
	Prog          	67,689    	20.1%
	Fus          	49,436    	14.7%
	All          	11,304    	3.4%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	336,437
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Prog

"I'm sorry, another result has come in there. Our first from New York, in fact - though not New York City, where we are."

"Three districts numbered the first in a row, interestingly - though that's just a coincidence, it doesn't signify anything."

"Yes, this district's on Long Island to the east of the city, and more right-wing in character than the city proper...but it's probably still a bit of a surprise that the National Party has come first, and by quite a margin as well - they nearly took two seats! Perhaps the rhetoric of the party's leader in his home state has...but we'll get back to that."

"Here, at least, the attempted Fusion between the Conservative and Constitution parties seems to have met with failure and rejection by voters, as some have warned - calling it a 'corrupt bargain'."

"Yes, but back to the structure of the US government...er, the former US government. The, ah, where was I, the third branch is the executive. The presidency, essentially." Obama's picture icon appeared by the text on the flowchart. "American constitutional theory describes - er, described this as a separation of powers into three parts, with so-called 'checks and balances' on each other, to ensure none of them could grow too powerful."

"I think we can judge how successful that notion was by the fact that no-one outside the United States has heard of any part of it other than the presidency," Neil observed dryly. "Other than the Supreme Court making occasional pronouncements seemingly at random. But that's not the only American peculiarity, is it Jeremy?"

"No, another oddity to our British eyes - though it would be normal in many countries - is the American model of a federal government. The government we hear about all the time, president and all, only has authority in certain spheres; in others, the state governments enjoy considerable powers. Some might say they have more than the powers of national parliaments of EU member states! For example, though we may debate devolution in the UK, we know that no matter where we drive, we pay the same petrol taxes. But in the US, you may pay a dollar less per gallon a mile down the road over the state border, because that is decided by the state governments."

"And that is one thing Mr Obama isn't changing?"

"No, in many ways one could argue that it can't be changed. The states have the final say, just as they did when Mr Obama called for the Article V convention which Katty mentioned. Normally the powerful state governments would also be elected tonight, well, some of them, but those elections have been delayed in order to apply the new constitutional amendments on that level of government."

	MA-06		
	Prog          	116,922   	29.2%
	Lib          	107,936   	26.9%
	Nat          	83,705    	20.9%
	Fus          	69,539    	17.3%
	All          	22,944    	5.7%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	401,046
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Lib
			Nat

"I'm sorry for another interruption there...that's our first result from the state of Massachusetts. That district is, um, help me out here map, it's north of Boston, it's quite close to the first two we saw, actually, and once again, Bernie Sanders' Progressives are coming out on top."

"And the Nationals also get another seat. Quite a shock for those who confidently predicted that Donald Trump's supposed support would melt away on election day, especially in this part of the country."

"Yes, and the Fusionists miss out once again, albeit not by as big a margin. Anyway, where was I? Oh yes. President Obama has enacted the single biggest and most controversial reform to US government since the eighteenth century - only the direct election of senators a century ago comes close."

As Vine spoke, the flowchart shifted and reformed itself. "Instead of separation of powers, the US has now adopted a parliamentary fusion of powers system - nothing to do with the Fusionists, who are mostly against all this! - not unlike the one we're familiar with from the UK. The executive powers are now largely delegated to a single unitary house of Congress, with only a ceremonial president, elected by that Congress similar to how the German president is, for example. For now, sitting Vice-President Joe Biden will hold that office temporarily until a new President can be elected. In practice, there will be effectively a Prime Minister in Congress, though the Americans are carrying over the term Speaker - don't picture it like Jon Bercow! - who wields those powers together with his Cabinet. Unlike the former presidential cabinet, this will have collective responsibility, and its members must be drawn from elected members of Congress. Formerly, quite the opposite of what we are used to, cabinet members in the US could not simultaneously occupy elected office and had to resign any they held once appointed."

	CT-02		
	Prog          	94,178    	27.6%
	Nat          	93,115    	27.3%
	Lib          	71,621    	21%
	Fus          	62,860    	18.4%
	All          	18,984    	5.6%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	340,758
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Nat
			Lib

"That's yet another New England result, this time from the state of Connecticut, not far from here. Again a bit of a surprise, not perhaps that the Progressives have come ahead of the Liberals, but that the National Party is so close to topping the polls. There will be a number of analysts with some soul-searching to do tonight."

"Yes, and we'll be going over to some of them later tonight, Jeremy, but if you could finish?"

"Sorry, I don't think we expected the results to come in so soon, even with the new vote-counting system. Um, anyway, as I was saying, the form of government that has now been adopted in the US may seem similar to us Brits at first, but there are some important differences - besides still being a republic rather than a constitutional monarchy, of course! Unlike David Miliband's rather lukewarm attempts at voting reform back home, President Obama has also pushed through a form of proportional representation for the new powerful Congress. This may eventually be reformed further, but for now, the voting is using the existing districts that were already implemented back in 2012 - those which haven't faced court challenges since, that is."

"Yes, our analysts have more to say about those later."

	NY-05		
	Lib          	151,471   	61.3%
	Prog          	60,196    	24.4%
	Nat          	20,842    	8.4%
	Fus          	10,480    	4.2%
	All          	3,972     	1.6%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	246,961
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Prog

"Another result from New York, there. That's the best result for the Liberal Party thus far, quite an overwhelming vote."

"Yes, in former days this district was overwhelmingly Democratic - it's mostly in the New York City borough of Queens and has a majority BAME electorate. But go on."

"Are you allowed to say that?" (a whisper) "Uh, I mean, yes. So how things currently work is that each district elects three Representatives, or MCs as some are calling them, to the new Congress. Rather than strictly abolishing the Senate, its representation has been merged into the new House, so each state also gets two extra representatives elected statewide on top of that. I understand that Mr Obama initially planned for these to be so-called 'top-up' seats like those used for the Scottish Parliament or in Germany, going to parties that lost out in the districts, but that was blocked by the Supreme Court just before the incident with Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the Wonka-Vite tablet. Therefore, at least for this election, those seats will just go to the parties according to the same formula used for the districts."

"And what formula is that?"

"Come on, Andrew, it's proportional representation, nobody actually understands it, it's literally magic. The Europeans call it the D'Hondt Method, but the Americans say it's the Jeffersonian apportionment formula and that they invented it. And I'm not going to argue with them, they have all the guns."

	VA-01		
	Lib          	104,562   	26.5%
	Con          	95,143    	24.1%
	Nat          	82,001    	20.7%
	Prog          	58,369    	14.8%
	Cst          	34,848    	8.8%
	All          	20,367    	5.2%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	395,289
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Con
			Nat

"Another 'first' district there, but quite different from the others we've seen so far. That's Virginia, quite far to the south of us from here, and politically very distinct from New England. In fact, some locals refer to it as 'America's First District', because interestingly it contains the first English colony established in America, Jamestown. And a lot more right-wing than most of what we've seen so far."

"Yes, the first time that the Conservative Party has won a seat, and beaten the Nationals no less. Mr Bush will be hap - oh no, he won't, will he, he's still in hospital?"

"Yes," Kay interjected, "and for the record, I think we have to set the record straight and make it clear that the conspiracy theory circulating on the internet by National supporters is quite untrue, and Jeb Bush is not suffering from gonorrhea. He merely injured himself whilst attempting to navigate his way out of a paper bag on the campaign trail. But I'm sure the temporary joint leaders of the party, John Kasich and Marco Rubio, are pleased, and will probably mention it to Mr Bush after he recovers from fainting at the sight of his hospital bill."

	MA-03		
	Prog          	102,282   	29.3%
	Lib          	100,670   	28.9%
	Nat          	64,967    	18.6%
	Fus          	58,380    	16.7%
	All          	22,264    	6.4%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	348,563
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Lib
			Nat

"Another result from Massachusetts there, in, uh, the north of the state, I think? Well, it's not near Boston, anyway. More good news for the Progressives who just outpoll the Liberals, and, once again, even in fusion the rest of the right-wing parties can't catch the Nationals."

"Yes. Well, Jeremy has told us a lot about how this election will work, but one thing we still haven't heard about yet is the very nature of those new parties we've been hearing so much about..."

	RI-02		
	Prog          	71,964    	30.2%
	Nat          	69,717    	29.2%
	Lib          	49,879    	20.9%
	Fus          	35,316    	14.8%
	All          	11,713    	4.9%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	238,589
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Nat
			Lib

"Well, I'm afraid that'll have to wait as we have yet another New England result, this from Rhode Island. Surprisingly for what has historically been such a Democratic-voting state, this district almost saw the Nationals coming first! The Liberals have been relegated to a relatively distant third, and the Progressives only just surpassed the Nationals. And I think that's enough results to...yes, our New England map is starting to look a bit more filled in now..."



"A very...green map so far. But does this represent an unforeseen national surge for this left-wing breakway party, or merely strong personal support in its leader, Bernie Sanders', backyard? Time will tell."

 

[Thande]

"Yes, we'll be back to Katty in a moment as we discuss the origins of these strange new American political parties we are hearing so much about. But before that, I'm told that we'll soon be getting our first declarations from the Deep South."

"I thought we already had one from Virginia...?"

"No, that's the Upper South, these definitions do actually have meanings, you know. Either North or South Carolina - or both - are supposed to be declaring soon. Let's go to Emily Maitlis in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, who's been speaking to voters."

Maitlis looked a little more ruffled than usual, though that might have something to do with the after-effects of the recent Hurricane Natalie; some of the attractions at Broadway at the Beach, visible behind her, were still tied down under tarpaulins. "Yes, Andrew. It's been a difficult few days for the people of coastal South Carolina, but they have still gone to the polls to elect a new government. In a part of the world that was first dominated by the old Southern Democrats and then by the Republicans, having such choice on offer is quite a novelty..."

Several clips of South Carolinian voters being interviewed by Maitlis played, but owing to some hiccup by the audiovisual people, the sound was muted. Instead, still audible in the background was Maitlis grumbling to the cameraman. "So-called 'Southern hospitality'...I ordered tea and biscuits at that cafe and the tea came ice-cold and without milk, and instead of biscuits they brought scones, and then to add insult to injury they poured gravy all over them! Fetch me that iPhone, I need to leave a one-star review on TripAdvisor..."

The clips abruptly cut off, revealing an even more frazzled-looking Maitlis who had clearly been told to shut up. "Um, and of course, South Carolina is a very religious state, meaning some people have suggested that Ted Cruz's Constitution Party could do well here. However, we've also seen signs that the National Party's leader's, ah, peccadilloes - multiple divorces and so on - seem not to have dented his popularity with evangelical voters. Ironically for a state where so few people believe in evolution, their state dish is primordial soup - or 'Chicken Bog' as they call it, which is also what James May says in the Russian dub of Top Gear when something goes wrong."

	SC-07		
	Lib          	89,417    	30%
	Nat          	84,053    	28.2%
	Con          	49,836    	16.7%
	Cst          	39,157    	13.1%
	Prog          	27,227    	9.1%
	All          	8,547     	2.9%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	298,237
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Con

"And I have to cut you off there Emily because we have our first result from that fine state - and, more importantly, I should remind you that we don't plug James May on Top Gear anymore since he left for pastures anew." Neil somehow made an allusion to Sky One sound like some of the locals would have referred to 'sending a dog to a farm upstate'. "But I'm sure we look forward to Richard and Jeremy being joined by Martyn Hughes-Games this Christmas, when I believe they'll be traversing the caldera of Mount Fuji on golf carts or something."

"Sorry Andrew. Yes, that's an interesting result - the right-wing vote has split quite significantly, leaving the Liberals to top the polls. And the Constitution Party is actually third among the right-wing parties, with the Nationals and Conservatives taking a seat each. Let's see if that pattern continues to be born out."

	FL-06		
	Nat          	115,849   	30.5%
	Lib          	92,163    	24.3%
	Con          	66,580    	17.5%
	Prog          	59,290    	15.6%
	Cst          	33,512    	8.8%
	All          	12,410    	3.3%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	379,804
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Con

"That's our first result from Florida, and quite a similar one to the South Carolina one in fact, except that the Nationals have come ahead of the Liberals. However, in this brave new world of proportional representation, the MCs elected by party are the same regardless. I understand we'll be seeing more from Florida later, but for now, Jeremy, can you explain why we're getting results from these states first?"

"Yes Andrew," Jeremy grinned, changing the format of his map of the United States. Now it was coloured in multicoloured stripes running north to south. "Unlike the UK, the United States is large enough that it occupies multiple time zones. That means that everything has to happen on a different schedule depending on which part of the country you're on - well either that or you could do what the Chinese do and have everyone in the west getting up as though they live in Beijing, but that won't fly here. That means that the polls close soonest in these east-coast states, on what's known as Eastern Standard Time," he gestured to the states in question as they lit up. "We'll be getting results from them earliest, and it's here we'll probably hear a lot of British place names we recognise, as these are the original Thirteen Colonies of course."

"So the polls are closing at 10 pm in each time zone?"

"Yes. Historically each state could set its own voting hours, but there have been concerns that this has been open to abuse - for instance, closing early to deliberately exclude workers working certain hours from voting. This time, a federal 10 pm closing time has been enforced, but, as you say, what's 10 pm is different in New York to what it is in Ohio. Not usually something we have to worry about in the UK!"

"But couldn't the results in the east influence voters who are still voting in the west?"

"Well quite, but this has always been an issue with politics in the United States - California, the most populous state, often hasn't got to vote until the results of a nationwide election are basically already decided, which naturally leads to lower turnout. Not to mention Alaska and Hawaii! At least in this more granular constitutional system Mr Obama has fathered, their votes are more likely to make a difference."

"I see. Fascinating. I have to pause you there, as apparently North Carolina has only been slightly beaten out to their first declaration by their southern neighbour."

	NC-07		
	Nat          	98,334    	27.5%
	Lib          	85,508    	23.9%
	Cst          	63,700    	17.8%
	Prog          	57,301    	16%
	Con          	44,116    	12.3%
	All          	8,949     	2.5%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	357,908
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Cst

"In this case, as Emily was saying a little time ago about South Carolina, the Constitution Party has had some success - though still less than the Nationals when it comes to the right-wing vote. The Progressives, interestingly, only narrowly missed off obtaining a seat; conventional wisdom had suggested they did not have much of a shot in the southern states."

"But all our assumptions must be questioned on an election night like this, when everything is new and there really is no conventional wisdom."

"No, indeed. We will be talking to Nate Silver later, if he ever turns up. But in the meantime..."

	MA-07		
	Lib          	142,830   	47.3%
	Prog          	111,207   	36.8%
	Fus          	19,689    	6.5%
	Nat          	16,329    	5.4%
	All          	11,884    	3.9%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	301,939
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"Another result from Massachusetts, and this district does cover the city of Boston. Now, unlike its namesake in Lincolnshire, which politically these days seems to be known mainly for being a hotbed of support for Suzanne Evans' Independence Party, the American Boston is more associated with left-wing politics, generally."

"And also the classic sitcom Cheers is set there."

"Yes, well, a bit trivial, but if we're going to reference its past, probably better that than the time our troops shot some people there, then they dumped a load of tea in the harbour in revenge, or more recently when they funded terrorism that blew up British town centres. Which is almost as bad as destroying all that lovely tea. Anyway, this is the first New England result we've seen that favours the Liberals over the Progressives, so evidently Mr Sanders' party is not entirely having its own way in his backyard."

	NY-16		
	Lib          	148,841   	52.6%
	Prog          	63,803    	22.5%
	Nat          	36,432    	12.9%
	Fus          	27,158    	9.6%
	All          	6,880     	2.4%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	283,114
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Prog

"And a very similar result there for New York's 16th district, which is in the north of the city, where the Bronx is, and this place called Westchester County that, to be honest, I always thought was made up for the X-Men films."

"Yes, with that we can update our New York map..."



"Yes, all right, Jeremy," Neil sounded annoyed. "We don't have to zoom in on the map every single time a result comes in. That's a bit blank to draw any conclusions from yet, don't you think?"

"But New York is important because we're here Andrew. And so are some of the campaign headquarters. And people have tryptiches of it on their walls at home, and in the movie Ghostbusters 2, it--"

"Yes, yes. We've not even seen any results from Manhattan yet, Jeremy, and as we know, that's the only bit that actually matters. Come on."

	CT-04		
	Lib          	123,190   	37.5%
	Prog          	72,304    	22%
	Nat          	63,306    	19.3%
	Fus          	56,670    	17.3%
	All          	12,728    	3.9%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	328,198
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Nat

"That's our second result from New England where the Liberals have pulled ahead of the Progressives, and this time it's in Connecticut. Perhaps a bit of a worry for Mr Sanders and the Progressive supporters?"

"Well, it depends what you mean - we had some analysts saying that the Progressives would barely win any seats at all, so this early performance must surely be seen as a triumph against that background."

"Well, we'll be talking to spokespeople from the different campaigns later, if we can ever get a word in edgeways, but..."

	NY-06		
	Lib          	77,907    	37.6%
	Prog          	57,063    	27.5%
	Nat          	44,480    	21.5%
	Fus          	22,007    	10.6%
	All          	5,828     	2.8%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	207,285
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Nat

	NY-10		
	Lib          	135,640   	51.8%
	Prog          	69,474    	26.5%
	Fus          	27,507    	10.5%
	Nat          	21,672    	8.3%
	All          	7,652     	2.9%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	261,945
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"Two results back to back there from New York!" Vine uttered triumphantly. "And the tenth district even takes in a lot of Manhattan, so you can't complain. Very good results for the Liberals, as we would expect."

"Yes, now why couldn't you have waited till then to do that map," Neil grumbled.

	MA-01		
	Prog          	100,945   	29.7%
	Lib          	93,091    	27.4%
	Nat          	64,409    	19%
	Fus          	59,544    	17.5%
	All          	21,337    	6.3%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	339,326
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Lib
			Nat

"And yet more from Massachusetts as well. This first district is in the more rural western part of the state, far from Boston. Better news for the Progressives here, but again, a bit of a surprise perhaps from the third seat."

"Yes, we are used to thinking of Massachusetts as a left-wing state, but of course it does have a sizeable minority of right-wing voters, more on the liberal side of the Republican Party historically. So it's perhaps not surprising that this proportional representation voting system does give a seat to a party on the right, but it's curious that it's the Nationals rather than the more moderate Conservatives - though here, of course, they have joined the Constitution Party in a fusion, a move which does appear to have backfired in some states as voters saw it as a fix-up."

"Or just distaste for Mr Cruz and the Constitution message."

	CT-01		
	Lib          	106,860   	32.5%
	Prog          	88,445    	26.9%
	Nat          	68,818    	20.9%
	Fus          	50,577    	15.4%
	All          	14,074    	4.3%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	328,774
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Nat

"A very similar pattern there once again, this time in Connecticut's first district, which isn't geographically far away from the last result. But before we get swamped by more results, Katty, my apologies it's taken a while to get to you..."

"No problem, Andrew." Kay waved at her greenscreen, which showed a map of the USA coloured in red and blue. "As we all know, for over a hundred years the US has been divided between just two parties, the Democrats and Republicans, what are called big-tent parties." The map zoomed in and became granular, showing that the solid colours filling up the states were actually made of many pixels, vaguely human-shaped. "In reality, these seemingly monolithic parties had many different groups and opinions represented within them..." Shades of colour started to enter the image, with some blue figures tinting turquoise or lilac, and the some red ones tinting orange or purple. "But the winner-take-all voting system meant that these internal divisions were suppressed, exercised only in what were called party primaries, while the final vote on the day - the only part that many voters paid attention to - was always an all-or-nothing fight between Democrats and Republicans. Mr Obama argued that under that system, it was not necessary to actually appeal to the voters, merely convince them that they had to vote for them to stop the other side, seen as monstrous."

"Sounds familiar," Neil said dryly.

"Perhaps, but in the US the situation was worsened by a lack of regulation of political advertising. And the internet has made things worse, as we've seen in the UK as well. Suddenly, anyone can claim anything. Well, Mr Obama has argued, in a proportional representation, multi-party system, a party or candidate is competing with many others. It's not enough to merely throw mud at one opponent; they need to do something to rise above the crowd."

Kay gestured again, and the hints of colours within the pixel-people firmed up as cracks like fault lines began to split up the two parties. "Of course, one criticism made was that there was a game-theory disincentive for either of the two parties to break up. If one broke up and the other stayed united, it would obviously dominate thanks to vote splitting, which is still an issue even under PR. However, anti-trust laws were passed to try to break up monopolies. For example, it is illegal for any of the new parties to use the names or symbols of their predecessors. That has been controversial due to accusations that it violates free speech, and besides, the Liberals and Conservatives have sneakily managed to keep the colours people associated with the two old parties, as strictly those colours were never official symbols."

"Yes, it does look a bit odd to our British eyes, doesn't it - blue Liberals and red Conservatives?"

"Even stranger to our Canadian viewers, so I'm told. Explaining why red has come to mean right-wing and blue left-wing in the US would be a whole other discussion, but suffice to say that the Liberals are effectively composed of the old establishment core of the Democrats, while the Conservatives have attempted to do the same for the Republicans, but not so successfully. Ultimately the Republicans were disadvantaged by the fact that their former supporters were split between those who de facto accept the new state of affairs, if reluctantly, and those who really want to throw themselves in front of the train tracks over it. And that's before the Nationals entered the fray."

Kay coughed. "So, let's run down our six new parties in this brave new world..."

	NC-08		
	Nat          	83,643    	25.3%
	Lib          	82,523    	24.9%
	Cst          	66,728    	20.1%
	Prog          	53,709    	16.2%
	Con          	35,502    	10.7%
	All          	9,128     	2.8%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	331,234
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Cst

"I'm sorry Katty, I need to interrupt you there as we have another result from North Carolina..."

"Oh, that means we should update the map!"

"No, you don't have t--"



"There, what was the point of that? Now be quiet Jeremy while Katty finishes, or I'll send you to your room."

"Sorry, Andrew."

 

[Thande]

	FL-16		
	Nat          	107,662   	27.1%
	Lib          	107,284   	27%
	Con          	71,166    	17.9%
	Prog          	63,158    	15.9%
	Cst          	34,443    	8.7%
	All          	13,094    	3.3%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	396,807
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Con

"We have our first result from Florida. Now we in the UK like to think we know Florida, but there's a lot more to the state than just Disney World - other theme parks are available. Florida has a population of nearly twenty million, nearly a third of the population of the UK, and recently overtook New York as the third biggest state by population."

"Politically, of course, we all know Florida for the disputed 2000 election there, with all the recounts and the hangin' chads, you remember? Under the old two-party system, elections were often very close here. This sixteenth district is on the west coast, nowhere near anywhere that any of us would have heard of, but it gives us an insight into how things might stand now."

"Yes, some good news for the Conservatives at last, who take the third seat. Though in this home state of party co-leader Marco Rubio, they might have expected to do better; they were not far from losing the seat to the Progressives, whom analysts assumed would be a dead letter in areas like this. The Nationals still top the poll, with the Liberals sandwiched in between."

"All right - while we have a moment. Katty, better late than never - speaking of the Liberal Party - let's hear about them first."

Kay, looking mildly annoyed at the repeated delays, nodded. "When Barack Obama broke the American political landscape, he and Vice-President Joe Biden have been careful to remain neutral and never express an endorsement of the big six successor parties. However, it is clear to everyone that Mr Obama's heart is with the Liberal Party."

The screen beside Kay showed blue-tinted images of different locations, from inner-city urban areas to rusting industrial factories and small New England towns. "The Liberal Party has captured much of the old establishment of the Democratic Party, which until now was actually the oldest continuously-operating political party in the world - it was formally established even before the Conservatives and Liberals back home. Founded almost two hundred years ago in 1828 by President Andrew Jackson, the Democrats have always been a big-tent party that took in political interests from across the country." Images of past conventions diplomatically cut around some of the placards held by Southern delegates. "One bit of ideological continuity from the start, however, is that the Democrats have always been sceptical of big banking, and have always drawn support from New York City, no matter how the rest of their coalition may change."

Images of Ellis Island and Liberty Island. "For more than a century, the Democrats were the party of immigrants, the party of the dispossessed trying to reach that American Dream promise inscribed on the Statue of Liberty - 'Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free'. Originally about immigrants from Europe, they have been joined by those from Asia, Africa, and other parts of the Americas. From the 1960s when President Lyndon B. Johnson passed the Civil Rights Act, they also became associated with pushing for minority rights, often in the face of opposition."

Now images of Vietnam protests, the 9/11 attacks, and a man with a baseball cap and dark glasses holding an assault rifle in a gun store. "But ever since they turned on President Johnson for the unpopular Vietnam War, the Democrats also struggled to develop a coherent national security message. The Republicans constantly accused them of being weak on the military and protecting America. In 2004, incumbent Republican President George W. Bush, who had avoided military service, successfully defeated Democrat John Kerry, a Vietnam veteran, on such a message - showing how the impression could be more powerful than the reality. Gun ownership has also been a wedge issue used by Republicans to attack Democrats, as has abortion, stem cells, and BLT rights--"

"I think that's a kind of sandwich, Katty."

"Sorry, misspoke - the Republicans' message resonated in rural and small-town America, where the Democrats steadily lost support and were cut back to the cities in most places, other than New England, the west coast and parts of the Midwest. But that message was designed to appeal to the former winner-take-all system, and tonight we'll see how successful it is in this brave new world. But who are the Liberals? They--"

	MD-03		
	Lib          	130,126   	37.9%
	Prog          	85,416    	24.9%
	Nat          	55,759    	16.2%
	Fus          	55,012    	16%
	All          	17,096    	5%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	343,410
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"Sorry Katty, we have to interrupt you there again."

"Right, we have our first result from Maryland."

"It's pronounced 'Murrilund'."

"Yes, I know, but then the viewers at home would think I was having a stroke...anyway, this is a funny-shaped state trapped between bigger neighbours, one of the original east-coast Thirteen Colonies again...I could talk about Catholics and its funky flag, but all you really care about is that "The Wire" was based on stuff in Baltimore. This is a very gerrymandered district that looks like a child scribbling on a map with a felt-tip pen - Maryland is an example that gerrymandering in the US was formerly done by Democrats as well as Republicans. Taking in the capital Anap-anna-anpa-"

"Annapolis."

"-thank you - and also Fort McHenry, which is where the US national anthem was written, about the Royal Navy bombarding it with HMS Erebus and HMS Terror, which later became polar research vessels."

"These days we would have to bombard it with Boaty McBoatface, what a terrifying thought."

"Quite - well, anyway, this formerly heavily Democratic district gives one seat to the Progressives but two to the Liberals."

"And speaking of which, sorry Katty, back to you."

"Thank you. As I was saying, the Liberals have obtained most of the old Democratic apparatus. Ideologically, they draw support from the centre and right of the former Democratic Party, though still to the left of the national average, you understand? In the former system, the two parties in Congress were divided into 'caucuses' expressing different ideological commonalities or policy goals, and the Liberals have mostly drawn from the New Democrat caucus - the ideological descendants of Bill Clinton's pro-business liberal supporters from the 90s - and the so-called Blue Dogs, the remnant of the moderate and conservative Democrats from the real big-tent days."

	PA-17		
	Nat          	116,705   	38.1%
	Lib          	72,129    	23.5%
	Prog          	60,571    	19.8%
	Fus          	47,029    	15.3%
	All          	10,210    	3.3%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	306,644
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Prog

"That's our first result from Pennsylvania, but we'll come back to that state later - Katty, go on."

Kay hesitated. "The Liberals have also obtained the support of most high-profile BAME organisations within the old Democrats, who had caucuses devoted to black, Hispanic, and Asian-Americans."

"I think it's more that those could be joined by anyone, it's just the vast majority of those groups were in the Democrats."

"Ye-es...regardless, this commitment to diversity, to a rainbow America, has been at the heart of the party's message, and they have frequently attacked the rival Progressives, to their left, for allegedly being white-dominated." Kay coughed.

	NJ-05		
	Nat          	144,742   	39.7%
	Lib          	97,422    	26.7%
	Prog          	76,541    	21%
	Fus          	33,316    	9.1%
	All          	12,524    	3.4%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	364,545
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Prog

"And another first, from New Jersey, but go on."

"Kay nodded. Now, for each of the parties, we've asked high-profile candidates as well as ordinary activists to tell us why they're supporting their party. Roll the VT..."

The screen was filled with the earnest face of a young activist with a campaign button that was a simple blue circle with a rainbow-striped 'L' in it. The activist looked suspiciously like he had been designed by one of those TIME magazine algorithms designed to model what the 'American of the future' would look like by averaging out the ethnic mix. "Why am I a Liberal?" he asked.

The video cut away to images of community action groups helping people, of 'nonstandard' families which looked uncannily like they were more taken from advertising reels than the real world, of people looking only mildly cross at medical bills. Over the top of this appeared clips of Liberal politicians, some with similar campaign buttons to the activists.

"I'm a Liberal because I believe in freedom," said a man identified as Tim Kaine - Outgoing Virginia Senator. "I grew up in an ordinary Minnesota family where my dad owned an ironworking shop, and when I was a young man I worked in Honduras and saw the dictatorship there. That was the alternative. In America we often take our freedom for granted. Now we have a new opportunity to show what we mean by freedom."

"I'm a Liberal because I believe in equality," said Alison Lundergan Grimes - Kentucky Secretary of State. "I've fought for our message in the heart of so-called red state America with gun in hand! Now under this new voting system which has magically appeared from the empty White House with no-one in it, we have a chance to show them that there are no red states and blue states!" The camera mercifully cut away as she started firing her weapon in the air.

"I'm a Liberal because I believe in justice," said Kamala Harris - California Attorney General. "All our children deserve to grow up in a kind, decent and safe world in which everyone who's looked at me funny has been locked up forever without parole. America is the land of opportunity where people can come from anywhere and realise their dreams, and together, we can change that. Wait, no-"

"I'm a Liberal because I believe in identity," said a man whose banner read - 'Martin O'Malley? Fmr. Maryland Governor? Maybe?' "America should be a place where everyone can be themselves without prejudice. Specifically, I'm interested in finding out my own identity, as I forgot who I was and no-one will tell me--"

"And I'm a Liberal because I believe in prosperity," said Michael Bloomberg - Fmr. NYC Mayor. "I was not a member of the old Democrats, but I am firmly convinced that it is only the Liberal Party that can deliver the strong economy that will restore Americans' right to fife, fiberty and the fursuit of fappiness. Wait, who's tampered with this autocue-"

The VT cut back to the earnest activist from the start. "And our standard bearer for this fight for equality and tolerance is a woman who has stood with us from the beginning, who has fought for us every day of her life." A black-and-white picture of a very young Hillary Clinton as an activist on the campaign trail, which hadn't quite been cropped well enough in Photoshop to cut out all traces of the nearby 'Goldwater '64' sign. "Whether it be in her fight for healthcare reform in the 90s--" These images, on the other hand, unaccountably seemed to have cropped out the President standing next to her, "--or her work on the campaign trail in 2008 shattering the glass ceiling!" Images of Clinton and Obama debating. "As Secretary of State she repaired our great nation's image abroad after the failures of the last administration." Image of Clinton pushing a literal 'reset button' with Sergei Lavrov, and then - peculiarly - cutting to her white-water rafting in a river near Benghazi with some disadvantaged kids. "Hillary Clinton is, without a doubt, the greatest human being ever to have lived, and if you don't vote for her - I mean, the Liberals - you're a racist." A sigh. "And yet she still won't peg m--"

	PA-07		
	Lib          	109,497   	28.3%
	Nat          	94,067    	24.3%
	Fus          	87,388    	22.6%
	Prog          	81,102    	21%
	All          	14,285    	3.7%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	386,339
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Fus

"Well, I'm sorry we had to cut your VT slightly short there Katty - fascinating stuff, really - because we've got another result from Pennsylvania. With the Liberals topping the polls, no less - tenuous link."

"Yes, in this case it's another gerrymandered district, but this particular drunken spider was in the service of the Republicans who ran the state government. Pennsylvania was generally considered a 'blue state' due to its ethnically diverse cities of Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, as well as its declining mining industry and union membership - a part of the old Democratic coalition that Katty's VT didn't go into much."

"Oh come on, nobody cares about that anymore."

"Well, anyway, Pennsylvania may have been a 'blue state' overall, but it was also once described as two cities with Alabama or Kentucky in between - in other words, the rural parts with the Appalachian Mountains were strongly Republican-voting. We can see that dichotomy here with these two results. The Liberals and Nationals are jockeying for prominence, with the third seat going in the first case to the Progressives and in the second case to the Fusionists - is that their first seat success I think?"

"Yes, that's correct; it appears that the attempts to bridge the gaps between the Conservative and Constitutionalist parties have not been entirely futile, at least in this state. We have to remember that America is a federation of many very different states, and the precise circumstances will be different from state to state."

	NY-18		
	Nat          	101,361   	32.6%
	Lib          	77,840    	25.1%
	Prog          	68,347    	22%
	Fus          	50,782    	16.4%
	All          	12,144    	3.9%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	310,474
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Prog

"Rather less success for the Fusionists here in New York, though. This district is north of New York City and includes lots of towns you've never heard of, and also Poughkeepsie which was in the title of an episode of Friends and is therefore important."

	MA-09		
	Prog          	105,180   	26.9%
	Lib          	100,401   	25.7%
	Nat          	93,144    	23.8%
	Fus          	70,499    	18%
	All          	22,065    	5.6%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	391,289
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Lib
			Nat

"Back to Massachusetts with the 9th district, which takes in Cape Cod and God's gift to limerick writers, Nantucket."

"Again, it's striking that, unlike Maryland for instance--"

"Murrilund."

"--yes, that - Massachusetts, which is usually considered a pretty deep-blue state these days, is nonetheless giving its third seat to the populist Nationals. Most commentators had expected that if the right had won anything here, it would be the more moderate Conservatives - or the Fusionists in this case."

"Yes, but in order for the viewers at home to understand what a surprise this is, we'll need to look at more of the parties. Katty?"

"Wait, wait, can I update the New England map first?"

"...if you must."

 

[Thande]

	MD-02		
	Lib          	116,801   	37%
	Prog          	72,670    	23%
	Nat          	68,142    	21.6%
	Fus          	44,408    	14.1%
	All          	13,445    	4.3%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	315,467
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Nat

"Another result from Maryland - don't - and was I just saying that Maryland was going all to the left parties - well here, like Massachusetts, we can see a National MC being elected alongside a Progressive and a Liberal. The heavy gerrymandering of borders to shut out the old Republicans has failed under the new proportional system, though only just - the Liberals nearly took the third seat".

	PA-04		
	Nat          	114,994   	34%
	Fus          	83,577    	24.7%
	Lib          	66,418    	19.6%
	Prog          	59,343    	17.5%
	All          	14,354    	4.2%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	338,687
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Fus
			Lib

"And we were just talking about the conservative rural part of Pennsylvania in between the cities. This district includes the US Civil War battlefield of Gettysburg, and East Berlin - er, not that one. Here it's the left that's not far off getting shut out, and the Con-Con Fusionists have picked up another seat."

"That's a fair few seats from Pennsylvania now..."

"All right, Jeremy, stop making those puppy-dog eyes, we'll let you do the Pennsylvania map in a little while."

	CT-03		
	Lib          	94,693    	29.4%
	Prog          	85,139    	26.5%
	Nat          	84,522    	26.3%
	Fus          	45,446    	14.1%
	All          	12,037    	3.7%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	321,837
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Nat

"Similar to the others we've seen in the western part of the state, in Connecticut's third district the Liberals have come ahead of the Progressives. The New England map has now really started to fill up."

	NJ-03		
	Nat          	157,902   	43.2%
	Lib          	100,090   	27.4%
	Prog          	65,000    	17.8%
	Fus          	29,801    	8.2%
	All          	12,447    	3.4%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	365,240
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Nat

"Another third district, this one from New Jersey. Like neighbouring Pennsylvania, New Jersey was formerly considered a 'blue state' dominated by the votes of cities - the state is effectively crushed between New York and Pennsylvania, and contains cities that act as spillover suburbs to both New York City and Philadelphia. However, also like Pennsylvania, it has a small-c conservative rural bit in between."

"That's not surprising; what is surprising, and some might say concerning, is that it's not large-C Conservative. Instead, the right-wing vote there has gone overwhelmingly to the National Party, who win two out of the three seats. What might be the cause of this?"

"The popular incumbent Governor of the state, Chris Christie, has joined the Nationals and been one of their most prominent supporters...even so, this is an unexpected result."

	FL-02		
	Nat          	99,299    	28%
	Con          	70,136    	19.8%
	Cst          	65,556    	18.5%
	Lib          	64,707    	18.2%
	Prog          	43,929    	12.4%
	All          	11,322    	3.2%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	354,948
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Con
			Cst

"Speaking of right-wing districts...(!)"

"Yes, I think this is the first district we've seen where we have a total right-wing shutout, with all three seats going to the three parties on the right; we've seen the reverse, of course, in places like New York City and Boston. Florida's second district is in what is called the Panhande, in the northwest of the state. Surprisingly, it was won in 2014 by a Democrat in an upset victory against the trend of that night, but clearly such luck is not with the left tonight."

"And we can see the results coming in in Florida now..."

(sotto voce) "Who let him get hold of the remote?!"



"There it is. The National Party has topped the polls in all four districts to declare so far. Florida may be home to Donald Trump's holiday home Mar-a-Lago, but few, I think, had expected it to also be home to so many of his party's voters - particularly considering that this is the home state of Conservative co-leader Marco Rubio."

"Didn't you say that before?"

"Well, it's what he would have wanted."

"Quite. And speaking of which, it's time to go over...wait, one more:"

	NJ-10		
	Lib          	163,331   	59.5%
	Prog          	70,491    	25.7%
	Nat          	28,152    	10.3%
	Fus          	6,959     	2.5%
	All          	5,477     	2%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	274,410
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Prog

"Quite a contrast to our last result from New Jersey. This is a more typical urban district, taking in parts of Jersey City and Newark. Here, the Liberals take two seats - they weren't far off taking all three, in fact - and the Progressives take the third, with the right completely shut out. Another sign of gerrymandering?"

"Yes - I think we're going to have to have Jeremy explain gerrymandering at some point for the viewers at home, as we keep referring to it...but in the meantime, Katty, I think it's time for another political rundown. Who do you have for us this time?"

"Well, Andrew, we decided the order of these in advance, and like the polls suggested, the assumption was that the Conservatives would be in second, so we'll look at them next. Of course, the night is still young, and we have not yet reached the more right-wing states in America's western interior..."

	SC-04		
	Con          	68,645    	22.7%
	Lib          	68,547    	22.7%
	Nat          	60,256    	20%
	Cst          	52,734    	17.5%
	Prog          	35,428    	11.7%
	All          	16,137    	5.3%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	301,747
			
	MCs elected:		
			Con
			Lib
			Nat

"We haven't got there yet, but that was at least a positive sign for the Conservatives, in that they top the polls in a southern district for the first time I think - albeit by the slimmest of margins. But go on."

Kay nodded, and the screen cleared to show an image of a melting elephant that would probably have led Salvador Dali to write a strongly-worded letter to his lawyers. "Before Mr Obama changed politics, the Republican party - the Grand Old Party or GOP as it was often known, though actually slightly younger than the Democrats - was America's other big tent party." Images of Abraham Lincoln slowly fading into Ronald Reagan. "The Republicans began as a party opposing slavery, and the first Republican President, Abraham Lincoln, led the United States through the Civil War. The Republicans then became known as the party of big business and, later, hawkish foreign policy. Ronald Reagan, arguably the most transformative president of recent years until Mr Obama blew all records out of the water, was a Hollywood actor turned Republican Governor of California. The party most recently held the White House under the social conservative George W. Bush, who gained it in the controversial 2000 election which we all remember, then presided over the 'war on terror' and the equally controversial invasion of Iraq. Since Mr Obama's election, the Republicans have generally strongly opposed him, and his push for radical reforms to the US political system are no exception."

The melting elephant and images of past presidents faded away, leaving a red star symbol flanked by three red stripes on either side. "As Mr Obama's reforms have been realised against their will, the division of the Republicans was inevitable, yet paradoxically has become even more contentious due to how they approached their opposition to those reforms. The Conservative Party represents the heir to most of the Republican Party establishment, just as the Liberals are that to the establishment of the Democrats. However, there have been signs that the Conservatives have not been as successful in drawing the great body of the former Republicans' activists to them as the Liberals have with those of the Democrats."

"Something which might help explain what we've seen so far tonight," Neil interjected.

	NC-06		
	Lib          	85,142    	23.7%
	Cst          	80,756    	22.5%
	Nat          	79,749    	22.2%
	Prog          	63,582    	17.7%
	Con          	40,882    	11.4%
	All          	8,741     	2.4%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	358,853
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Cst
			Nat

"Perhaps, indeed. And that result you can see scrolling past there - another sign of that."

"Exactly. North Carolina, a closely-divided swing state which has seen so much struggle in recent years between a right-wing state government and left-wing activists - yet in this northern sixth district, the Conservatives find themselves in a distant fifth place, with the Progressives closer to gaining a seat than they are."

	NY-22		
	Nat          	82,903    	28.6%
	Fus          	76,010    	26.2%
	Prog          	63,895    	22%
	Lib          	50,121    	17.3%
	All          	17,025    	5.9%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	289,954
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Fus
			Prog

"And that result was from upstate New York, and area where the Conservatives should have been competitive - yet they ended up having to ally with the Constitution Party in the Fusion group and, even then, come behind the Nationals. But I believe you have a VT that should say more about this?"

"Yes. Roll the tape."

The production style of the VT was almost identical to the last one, except the barely-perceptible blue background tint had been replaced with a red one. Again, a young activist, this time a man in his early twenties who looked like he was auditioning for the lead role in 'The Book of Mormon'. "Why am I a Conservative?" he asked rhetorically.

"I'm a Conservative because I want our country to be strong and stand up to threats from those who would plot our destruction," said a man labelled Lindsey Graham - outgoing South Carolina Senator.

"I'm a Conservative because I want to honour those who worked their way up and built a life in this great country legitimately, and protect them from those who did not," said Marco Rubio - outgoing Florida Senator, who for some reason was sat in one of those comically oversized novelty wooden chairs. "And let's dispel with this fiction that Barack Obama doesn't know what he's doing - he knows exactly what he's--"

"I'm a Conservative because I don't want people to murder babies in the womb," said Michele Bachmann - former Minnesota Congresswoman. "I'd rather they grow up to at least six or seven before someone breaks into their school and shoots them."

"I'm a Conservative because I really hate Disney's Mulan, and now they're doing a live-action remake apparently, and that's just not on," said Mike Pence - Indiana Governor.

"I'm a Conservative because we need a balanced budget and corporations are people too, man," said Justin Amash - Michigan Congressman.

It cut back to the activist, who grinned, showing off teeth that would probably perceptibly glow under a black light. "And we have a great trailblazer to lead us in this great republic founded on government by the people, for the people and of the people, in rejection of hereditary monarchy and privilege, former Governor of Florida and living exclamation point, Jeb Bush!"

	MD-05		
	Lib          	160,176   	44.1%
	Prog          	72,933    	20.1%
	Nat          	67,822    	18.7%
	Fus          	48,994    	13.5%
	All          	13,693    	3.8%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	363,617
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Prog

The new result from Maryland mercifully covered up the VT coming abruptly to an end.

"Well, we have to leave things there, as of course that is now outdated," Kay said. "With Mr Bush's paper bag injury, the party is now being co-led by Marco Rubio, who we saw there briefly, and John Kasich of Ohio. "But, reading between the lines there, we can see some of the reasons behind the party's current difficulties. Despite all their rhetoric against Mr Obama, they have de facto accepted the new status quo of the parliamentary system. By contrast, the Constitution Party, which we'll hear from later, steadfastly rejects it on principle. Despite many commonalities of ideology otherwise, this point has been difficult to bridge, hence the only limited number of Fusionist alliances in certain states."

"And of course this mostly seems to benefit the former-Democratic left, whose split seems to be less severe."

"As we say there in Maryland's fifth district, which takes in the area just east of Washington DC. Washington itself did not use to have representation under the old system, of course, but that has now changed..."

	VA-05		
	Lib          	95,808    	26.2%
	Nat          	82,822    	22.7%
	Con          	68,682    	18.8%
	Prog          	58,857    	16.1%
	Cst          	43,686    	12%
	All          	15,548    	4.3%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	365,403
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Con

"And that's a good result there for the Liberals in this large, quite rural district in Virginia along the Appalachians. While there was a substantial Democratic vote there before, it usually went for the Republicans overall. Another sign of the damaging split in the right-wing parties, though at least the Conservatives have picked up the third seat."

	NY-27		
	Nat          	130,108   	37.5%
	Fus          	76,761    	22.1%
	Prog          	67,516    	19.5%
	Lib          	54,592    	15.7%
	All          	17,795    	5.1%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	FALSE          	0         	0%
			
		Total	346,771
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Fus
			Prog

"A contrast there in upstate New York, however, with the Liberals cut out altogether."

"Yes; this is another rural area, wrapping around the cities of Rochester and Buffalo. But why describe it in words when I can update...the map!"



"A trend emerging there. If we just look at the top parties, it's not dissimilar to things under the old two-party system. But rather than blue in the city and red in the upstate, now it's orange in the upstate as the Nationals have become the leading right-wing party here."

"What does that herald for the rest of the nation - and the watching world?"

"We don't know - but we can look at the current table for seats after thirty-nine districts and 117 seats - just under one-tenth of the total on offer tonight - have declared..."

	Seats declared
Lib	43
Nat	32
Prog 27
Con	7
Cst	4
Fus	4
All	0

"And the night is yet young."

 

[Thande]

"If you're just joining us, this is an American election night like no other. Under the new proportional voting system and party structure introduced by Barack Obama, the electoral map has become a rainbow of options - and some of the, er, more popular colours have defied the ability of the polls to predict."

"Later, we'll be speaking to some ordinary, everyday Americans about their reactions to these early results, as well as hearing more about the new parties. However, as a reminder, this election takes place across multiple time zones, and therefore the polls close at different times. Still within the Eastern Time Zone, but a fraction later, we're now seeing the first of the Midwest states, west of the Appalachian mountains and the original Thirteen Colonies of the eastern seaboard."

"That's right, and here is our first result from the state of Ohio."

	OH-14		
	Con          	106,428   	28.8%
	Lib          	87,502    	23.7%
	Nat          	70,413    	19.1%
	Prog          	68,100    	18.4%
	Cst          	21,043    	5.7%
	All          	15,788    	4.3%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	369,274
			
	MCs elected:		
			Con
			Lib
			Nat

"We were hearing, a short time ago, about the Conservative Party and its underperformance thus far compared to the polls. However, the Conservatives have topped the polls in this first Ohio district, in the north-east of the state on the coast of Lake Erie. Laura Trevelyan is in the nearby city of Cleveland, which paid host to the inaugural Conservative Party Convention recently. Laura, can you shed any light on these results?"

Trevelyan looked uncomfortable, standing in front of what was probably a green-screened shot of a large sign reading 'CLEVELAND' in italics, with the dusky, lit-up skyline of the city behind that. "Well, Andrew, the Conservatives are co-led by John Kasich, the popular incumbent Governor. Mr Kasich actually sought the old presidency way back in 2000, but he was only a Congressman back then and did not get very far."

"Quite a contrast to the new system, in which the most powerful offices of state will be occupied by Members of Congress."

"Yes. Well, although Mr Obama's new constitutional settlement has the stated aim of trying to move away from individualistic politics in favour of party platforms, it's clear that personal votes still mean something here in Ohio."

"Indeed. Now Ohio historically was an absolutely crucial swing state - they said 'as goes Ohio, so goes the nation' - to the point that many presidents and vice-presidents were recruited from here. Do you think Ohio will still forecast results elsewhere?"

"At the risk of being proved wrong, Andrew - I would say no, for that same personal factor we just discussed. But remember, the polls have not yet closed out west. It's possible that a good Conservative performance here might change the decisions of voters in right-wing-voting states out in the Plains and so on."

"I see. Well, thank you Laura, and we'll come back to you later..."

	MD-05		
	Lib          	160,176   	44.1%
	Prog          	72,933    	20.1%
	Nat          	67,822    	18.7%
	Fus          	48,994    	13.5%
	All          	13,693    	3.8%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	363,617
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Prog

"Another Massachusetts seat. This one is north of Boston and takes in the city of Cambridge, home to the famed universities Harvard and MIT. So in some ways it's similar to the Cambridge we know from back home."

"It's also home to Lexington, where the American Revolutionary War began with the famous 'shot heard 'round the world', well, famous in America, most people back home haven't heard of it. But we can see that it's dominated by the left-wing vote and the Liberals in particular."

"Even here, though, the Nationals weren't that far off taking the third seat..."

	TN-02		
	Con          	80,104    	27.6%
	Nat          	68,587    	23.6%
	Lib          	45,669    	15.7%
	Prog          	40,545    	14%
	Cst          	40,265    	13.9%
	All          	15,023    	5.2%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	290,193
			
	MCs elected:		
			Con
			Nat
			Lib

"Now, that's interesting. This is our first result from Tennessee, a state in the same polling time region as Ohio. And once again, the Conservatives have topped the polls here. Perhaps the party's success in this region is not only due to a personal vote from John Kasich, as we just heard."

"Tennessee is a state we in the UK mainly know for its music connections, but its political history is also interesting. The second district is in the eastern, mountainous part of the state, and unlike many states the numbering of districts has remained fairly consistent geographically over time. With that in mind, it's remarkable that this district has not elected a Democrat since before the US Civil War, reflecting the divide over, um, race issues at the time."

	NC-01		
	Lib          	153,795   	43.4%
	Prog          	85,790    	24.2%
	Cst          	43,240    	12.2%
	Nat          	40,970    	11.6%
	Con          	23,890    	6.7%
	All          	7,019     	2%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	354,704
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"Back to the east coast states with North Carolina."

"And actually the first district is quite close to that coast, in the north-east of the state. Now North Carolina is one of only a few states to actually redraw its boundaries for this election, but it was due to pre-existing factors rather than anything to do with the new voting system. Until now the boundaries were heavily gerrymandered, we'll discuss more about that shortly, but now they are less...well, squiggly."

"Is that a technical term? Regardless, this is a heavily left district for the region, and splits between the Liberals and Progressives."

	DE-00		
	Lib          	142,314   	32.2%
	Nat          	114,854   	26%
	Prog          	93,289    	21.1%
	Fus          	70,273    	15.9%
	All          	20,860    	4.7%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	441,590
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Prog

"Now, this is something quite different. Delaware is a small east coast state, perhaps best known nowadays for being home to Vice-President Joe Biden. As such a small state, it is only entitled to one three-member district, which we've named number zero."

"Isn't it more usual to call it AL for at-large?"

"Yes, but we've used that for something else. You see, in addition to all the districts comprising a state, there are two extra MCs awarded, which correspond to the two Senators under the old constitution which were equally assigned to each state. I think we slightly misstated matters earlier - rather than being awarded in any way proportionately, these extra MCs are simply both awarded to whichever party wins the most votes across the whole state. The intention is to provide a top-up reward for coming first, as we've seen many cases where the vote splits between three parties despite one being substantially ahead - the vagaries of a PR system with small districts."

"I see. So in the case of Delaware, as there was only one district to start with, we don't have to add multiple districts' votes up, now we already know the outcome of the top-up seats?"

"Yes...both going to the Liberal candidates."

	Delaware at-large		
	Lib          	142,314   	32.2%
	Nat          	114,854   	26%
	Prog          	93,289    	21.1%
	Fus          	70,273    	15.9%
	All          	20,860    	4.7%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	441,590
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib

"Of course, it was redundant to state the figures again in this case, but for most states we'll be waiting for all the districts to come in before the numbers can be summed. And here's a map..."



"...that's a bit of a wonky map, isn't it?"

"Well, the graphics boys - and girls, of course - had to sort of smush together all the states that are in between Virginia, Pennsylvania and New York to make them fit. But the important part is that you can see the extra Delaware seats on the little inset map with the statewide results. Eventually we'll see those filled in for all the states, even those with many districts.

"...Eventually."

	FL-03		
	Nat          	97,943    	27.8%
	Lib          	75,503    	21.5%
	Prog          	65,859    	18.7%
	Con          	55,541    	15.8%
	Cst          	43,995    	12.5%
	All          	12,848    	3.7%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	351,688
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Prog

"Another result from Florida. This is a large district in the north of the state - again, not near anywhere most of us will have heard of. In fact...a voice in my ear is telling them that it's larger than the whole of North East England, though it has only a fraction of the population, of course."

"Wales is more traditional, you'll be getting hate mail from the Geordies. Other northeastern tribes are available."

	NC-10		
	Nat          	94,520    	26.6%
	Cst          	82,597    	23.3%
	Prog          	66,180    	18.6%
	Lib          	63,052    	17.8%
	Con          	39,673    	11.2%
	All          	9,088     	2.6%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	355,111
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Cst
			Prog

"Back to North Carolina, and the tenth district takes in part of the state's south-west. This was considered quite a right-wing district and we can see that two of the seats have gone to the Nationals and to the Constitution Party - again a trend of that party seeing success in this state, at the expense of the Conservatives. But the same is also true of the Progressives, who have leapfrogged the Liberals to take the third seat."

"Quite remarkable, when most analysts had written them off outside of New England and the Pacific Northwest - which we won't get to for quite some time!"

	VA-06		
	Nat          	78,804    	22.8%
	Con          	75,299    	21.8%
	Lib          	63,563    	18.4%
	Prog          	57,033    	16.5%
	Cst          	52,200    	15.1%
	All          	18,601    	5.4%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	345,500
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Con
			Lib

"And that's Virginia's sixth district, right along the Appalachian mountains, bordering West Virginia, which is a separate state. Quite a right-wing district again, and once again the Nationals come first, but this time with the Conservatives in second."

"I've been speaking to our analysts, and one point our American experts keep coming back to is how different things can be from state to state. The old party organisations were always state-based, and so it could have very different results if some of the top local Republican people chose the Constitution Party over the Conservatives, say, and took their activists and donors with them."

"That does make sense - but we were told over and over during the campaign that the Nationals had been treated as a pariah by people like that, and yet..."

"Anyway, time for another map!"



"...will you stop doing that? At least wait till we've got a decent number of results in..."

	KY-06		
	Con          	68,687    	20.6%
	Lib          	66,025    	19.8%
	Prog          	65,246    	19.6%
	Cst          	58,593    	17.6%
	Nat          	54,861    	16.5%
	All          	19,600    	5.9%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	333,012
			
	MCs elected:		
			Con
			Lib
			Prog

"And I believe that's our first result from Kentucky. Very close between the top three."

"Kentucky, another place we in the UK mainly know through music...well, that and fried chicken, of course. Now the sixth district, which contains the state capital Frankfort with an O, was one of the more Democratic-friendly areas in the state - though that's not saying much, as Kentucky has strongly swung against the Democrats over the past few years. Nonetheless, even though the Conservatives topped the polls, two out of the three seats have gone to left-wing parties, showing that residual vote."

"Which was part of the intention of Mr Obama's new system, to ensure that a large minority vote - as in a party in the minority, not a BAME vote, I mean - did not go unrepresented."

	OH-12		
	Con          	124,586   	32.2%
	Lib          	84,989    	21.9%
	Prog          	77,256    	19.9%
	Nat          	51,524    	13.3%
	Cst          	29,774    	7.7%
	All          	19,151    	4.9%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	387,279
			
	MCs elected:		
			Con
			Lib
			Prog

"Our second Ohio result, from the same general area in polling closure time terms, but not that close...so quite interesting that the result is actually identical to that Kentucky district."

"Even though the top three are much less close to each other, but that's the vagaries of the small-district PR system we discussed. There is talk of this being revised next time for larger multi-member districts, but that might require further constitutional amendments."

	SC-03		
	Nat          	70,312    	24.7%
	Con          	64,633    	22.7%
	Lib          	58,648    	20.6%
	Cst          	55,594    	19.6%
	Prog          	23,879    	8.4%
	All          	11,282    	4%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	284,348
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Con
			Lib

"And, still filling in the east coast, that's South Carolina's third district, in the west of the state - what is known as the Piedmont to locals. The Conservatives are jockeying close with the Nationals to top the polls, with the Liberals in third."

"It'll be interesting to see which party comes top and gets the bonus seats here - it's not entirely obvious from the results we've had so far."

"No indeed. And here's a map!"



"All right - that's enough maps for now, or you'll become insufferable. I understand we have our audience panels to speak to, but before that, it's probably better if we discuss the elephant in the room - or, rather, the party we were told would be a fringe group, but in many places seems to be in the driving seat of the former Republican elephant, as it were."

"Oh, that's quite good."

"Thank you. Katty, can you tell us about the origins of the National Party?"

 

[Thande]

The cameras focused on Katty Kay once again. "When it became clear that Mr Obama's ambitious reforms could not be stopped, there were many commentators who thought that the American two-party system was, nonetheless, too entrenched to see a true multi-party system form." To her side, imagery of the former status quo appeared: the silhouette of the continental United States, divided into a blue half and a red half with a jagged fault-line down the middle. Each half had a faint, translucent white-grey silhouette of a donkey and an elephant, respectively, pointing towards each other as though facing off. "Perhaps some nuance might appear, the internal factions within the parties might become true parties, but the overall situation would be the same...

"However, this impression was rudely shattered in the heady summer of last year, 2015, which seems very long ago now - when the press were called to the lobby of Trump Tower in New York City..."

	FL-25		
	Lib          	92,255    	34.9%
	Con          	72,277    	27.3%
	Nat          	40,226    	15.2%
	Prog          	34,413    	13%
	Cst          	18,815    	7.1%
	All          	6,366     	2.4%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	264,353
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Con
			Lib

"Sorry to interrupt you there, Katty. That was one of Florida's districts with the most Cuban exiles, just like Conservative co-leader Marco Rubio, and perhaps he has played a part in getting their vote out in this, his home state."

Unruffled, Kay nodded. "As I was saying, Mr Trump's announcement..."

The screen zoomed in to show footage that, though less than two years old, seemed to carry a debatably mythic quality to it, like a contested Star Wars sequel. As Kay had said, the gilded lobby of Trump Tower was filled with the assembled press. A golden escalator, like some prosperity gospel loony's image of Jacob's Ladder, occupied centre stage. At its feet sat a lectern backed by American flags, on it an orange clenched-fist logo and a slogan reading 'FOR THE NATION'.

The BBC archive reel had obviously cut out interstitial material, awkward pauses, and the paramedics being called at one point. Still, the audience watched the same familiar images they had witnessed so many months ago. Trump, tie firmly taped into place, his debatable hair like the prow of a battleship, descended the escalator like something from a Ferengi religious text. The image was barely spoilt when he tripped halfway down, fell head over heels into a railing and over the side, only to be saved by his snagged suspenders and catapulted into the air. He bounced, with surprising parkour athleticism, on a horizontal flagpole and landed with a perfect, if unintentional, Fosbury flop straight into a gigantic taco bowl next to the lectern.

Delicious guacamole spattered the entire rank of nonplussed journalists like Vulcan blood; the NYT correspondent thoughtfully put his finger in his mouth and sucked. The impact force had shattered the edible tortilla shell, and Trump dragged himself from the wreckage, covered in cream cheese and salsa. "That," he pronounced, "was a bigly Mexican conspiracy! I love Club Penguin!" Confused applause.

More flashes of edits from the BBC archive team, so the viewers didn't get to see Trump getting licked clean by a group of conspiracy theorists, nor him actually stepping over to the golden statue of Lady Columbia wearing a g-string and not much else, only the line "I'm going to grab this country by the [BEEP]." They also cut out the line where he misidentified her as Liberty and then unfavourably compared the statue's attractiveness to that of his daughter.

"Obama wants to change this country. Well, let me tell you, this is a great country, it's the best country. And we're gonna change that. This will be a new party. I've done new parties before. The Reform Party. That was a great party. Ross Perot. Great guy. Little guy. Great little guy. But this will be the best party, 'cause it'll be Donald J. Trump's party. The best. I make great deals. I make great parties. The best parties. National Party. National. That's a word. I know words. I have the best words. And this will be the best party. It'll be great." Despite the BBC editor's best efforts, there was only so much repetition that could be cut out. "The Chinese and the Mexicans. They're gonna be jealous of this party, because it's the best party. Lemme tell you, when we get to Washington, I tell you what we're gonna talk about doing."

Trump angrily beat his fist on the lectern in time with his words. "We're gonna talk about building a wall. We're gonna talk about stopping the Mexicans from comin' here. We're gonna talk about stopping the Chinese from takin' our industry. We're gonna talk about makin' America great again. At no point will we ever do any of these things. Obama is a scam. Obama spends half his time playin' golf. I'm gonna get that percent higher. Belgium did 9/11. And let me tlel you, when you go home tonight and sleep with your wives, at that moment of sweet climax, I want you to picture my face. Thank you, and may God bless the United States of America." More confused applause. The screen froze on the image of Trump's self-satisfied face, slightly spoiled by the piece of lettuce still hanging from one ear.

	ME-02		
	Cst          	94,490    	26.8%
	Prog          	94,288    	26.8%
	Nat          	56,331    	16%
	Lib          	50,674    	14.4%
	Con          	30,348    	8.6%
	All          	26,211    	7.4%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	352,341
			
	MCs elected:		
			Cst
			Prog
			Nat

"Thank you Katty, one moment, and that was the second district in Maine, the rural northern one. Speaking of Mr Trump's National Party, there was some polling suggesting it might do well here in Maine, but actually - quite surprisingly, I think - Mr Cruz's Constitution Party has come first, just barely ahead of the Progressives, and the Nationals are actually worse off than they are in much of New England."

"Maybe all the National activists were eaten by Stephen King."

"Maybe. It does mean we can also calculate the party that came top across Maine, and therefore the two top-up seats..."

	Maine at-large		
	Prog          	230,303   	30.9%
	Cst          	157,285   	21.1%
	Lib          	127,432   	17.1%
	Nat          	110,422   	14.8%
	Con          	67,885    	9.1%
	All          	52,364    	7%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	745,692
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Prog

"And the Progressives take both by quite a margin. The Progressives are certainly performing well in New England. Perhaps you can tell us about them next, Katty."

"Perhaps, if I manage to finish anything without being interrupted," Kay said firmly but not waspishly. "Anyway, as I was saying, Mr Trump's announcement there - though you could be forgiven for, er, not actually realising what he was announcing - heralded the founding of a new political party. While it mostly drew on Republican activists and themes, the Nationals, even more so than the Progressives, have broken the mould of the two-party system. The Nationals are populist, anti-immigration, critical of free trade and the neoliberal global consensus."

"In that respect, can they be viewed as another arm of the anti-establishment and anti-immigration populist movements sweeping Europe?" Neil asked, doubtless prompting several Independence Party voters to send him death threats.

"Perhaps. There are unique aspects stemming from American political culture, however. Mr Trump has shocked the former Republican Party's establishment by effectively slaying many Republican sacred cows whilst having many former Republican voters flock to his banner, as well as some traditional Democrats who have grown disquieted by the party's focus on free-trade liberalism. This is not to say Mr Trump has not moved some of his own positions to meet those voters, such as abandoning his former opposition to assault weapons and his hostility to parts of the Republican media establishment, such as Fox News. Nonetheless, the National Party is accused of being a personality cult by its opponents, drawing on activists fanatically devoted to Mr Trump's message."

"Er, from that video...exactly what is Mr Trump's message?"

"They won't say."

	SC-02		
	Lib          	83,711    	26.8%
	Con          	65,593    	21%
	Nat          	60,720    	19.4%
	Cst          	49,672    	15.9%
	Prog          	36,880    	11.8%
	All          	16,049    	5.1%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	312,625
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Con
			Nat

"I'm sorry...back to the South there, South Carolina. Now that's interesting. Jeremy?"

"Yes Andrew. This district was Republican-held before, and the Conservatives and Nationals are jockeying for the former Republican vote, with the Constitution Party involved too. That actually means that the Liberals have come out on top."

"But it does mean there are two right-wing MCs and only one left-wing elected, no?"

"Correct, but as we just saw in Maine, it also matters which party comes top across the whole state. If the right is so divided in South Carolina, we could see its statewide seats going to the Democrats - something which has been unthinkable since that party was, erm, the situation was different," Vine said diplomatically.

	FL-09		
	Lib          	131,159   	36.8%
	Nat          	65,246    	18.3%
	Prog          	64,209    	18%
	Con          	54,904    	15.4%
	Cst          	29,201    	8.2%
	All          	11,810    	3.3%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	356,530
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Nat

"Florida again, but here Mr Rubio's Conservatives do not seem to have as much home-field advantage, to use the appropriate American phrase?"

"Ah, well, this district is quite different. It includes half of Orlando, which our viewers at home will know is the only important bit of Florida, where all the theme parks are. So two seats to the Liberals, and Mr Trump's Nationals get the third seat. Maybe people who want talking anthropomorphic mice to all go back to California."

"Don't try to be clever, Jeremy."

	OH-02		
	Con          	97,617    	27.5%
	Lib          	78,912    	22.2%
	Nat          	71,586    	20.2%
	Prog          	61,861    	17.4%
	Cst          	28,675    	8.1%
	All          	16,218    	4.6%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	354,868
			
	MCs elected:		
			Con
			Lib
			Nat

"More infighting on the right, this time in the south of Ohio. It appears Mr Kasich's personal vote may have played a role, just like Mr Rubio's, yet the third seat nonetheless goes to the Nationals once more."

	PA-12		
	Nat          	125,686   	34.6%
	Fus          	87,319    	24%
	Lib          	75,446    	20.8%
	Prog          	62,036    	17.1%
	All          	12,652    	3.5%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	363,139
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Fus
			Lib

"And another result from Pennsylvania. This is an area north of the city of Pittsburgh. As a reminder, Pennsylvania is one of only a few states which redraw its districts for this election, so we are really in the unknown here. The Nationals are well ahead, but the Fusionists have managed to pull a seat out here. And here's the map..."



"Some early successes for the National Party here in what is usually considered a 'blue state' formerly in the Democratic column, there will be concerns over whether Mr Trump's message about industry has cut into what is known as the 'rust belt'."

"What wonderfully exotic political terms the Americans have, can you imagine if someone tried to import them into British politics and ended up looking really stupid? Ah, never mind."

	NC-09		
	Lib          	94,354    	27.4%
	Nat          	82,456    	24%
	Cst          	68,994    	20.1%
	Prog          	52,718    	15.3%
	Con          	35,525    	10.3%
	All          	9,842     	2.9%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	343,888
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Cst

"And that's another seat from the Carolinas, this time the North, where the Constitution Party is again polling more strongly than expected. But, again, note that the Liberals are on top in what was a Republican district. Will that be significant for the statewide vote?"

	VT-00		
	Prog          	154,116   	48.9%
	Con          	51,454    	16.3%
	All          	41,132    	13.1%
	Nat          	33,848    	10.7%
	Lib          	24,457    	7.8%
	Cst          	10,060    	3.2%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	315,067
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Prog
			Con

"And...well, that is a result for the books. Vermont is one of the smallest, most rural, and most liberal states in the Union...or should I say most left-wing. This is, of course, the home state of Bernie Sanders, leader of the Progressive Party, who was formerly an independent left-wing voice in Washington for many years."

"Yes, it was here that the Liberals conceded some months ago that the Progressives might win a seat...as in, one seat in the whole of the nation, Mrs Clinton is reported to have commented. The reality looks quite different, a lot of water under the bridge since then."

"Indeed. The Progressives have almost half the voteshare and two of the three seats, with the establishment Liberals way down in fifth place; vox pops here expressed a particular dislike for them. Interestingly, the third seat has gone to the Conservatives, perhaps reflecting Vermont's liberal Republican tradition--"

"Americans use 'liberal' to mean too many bloody things."

"--yes - and the Alliance were not far behind. Supposedly, according to our correspondent there, because they spread an inaccurate rumour that a vote for them was a vote for Mr Sanders."

"Remarkable. And as Vermont has only one district, I believe you can also fill in the statewide result with the same vote..."

	Vermont at-large		
	Prog          	154,116   	48.9%
	Con          	51,454    	16.3%
	All          	41,132    	13.1%
	Nat          	33,848    	10.7%
	Lib          	24,457    	7.8%
	Cst          	10,060    	3.2%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	315,067
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Prog

"Same results, of course, which means the Progressives get the two top-up seats too. Four full seats out of such a small state. It's greener than a Pepe meme of Caroline Lucas doing the two Kermits stare with the Dat Boi unicycling frog."

"...what does that mean?"

"I don't know, it's just something a teenager said to me."

	FL-10		
	Lib          	123,035   	39%
	Prog          	71,899    	22.8%
	Nat          	51,076    	16.2%
	Con          	37,403    	11.9%
	Cst          	21,583    	6.8%
	All          	10,615    	3.4%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	315,611
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"Um, well, this is the other Orlando district in Florida, the important one, and you can tell it used to vote Democratic - two seats go to the Liberals and one to the Progressives, none to the right."

"Surely this is the happiest place on earth."

	SC-05		
	Lib          	90,668    	29.6%
	Nat          	70,460    	23%
	Con          	56,396    	18.4%
	Cst          	48,535    	15.9%
	Prog          	28,123    	9.2%
	All          	12,018    	3.9%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	306,200
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Con

"Well, I don't know if the people of this district would agree. Once again, another former Republican-voting part of South Carolina, but look at that split. Again, will the Liberals actually top the polls across the state?"

	IN-06		
	Nat          	116,701   	38.7%
	Fus          	87,428    	29%
	Prog          	44,075    	14.6%
	Lib          	38,423    	12.7%
	All          	14,897    	4.9%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	301,524
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Fus
			Nat

"And that's our first result from Indiana. Indiana's sixth district, in the eastern part of the state. This is the former district of Governor Mike Pence, who we heard from earlier, when he was a Congressman."

"And it's very right-wing indeed, that's almost seventy percent of the vote going to either the Nationals or the Fusionists as they fight for supremacy!"

"Quite. Well, here's the map of Ohio and Indiana as these results come in..."



"Well. As we just saw that remarkable result for the Progressives in Vermont, perhaps now Katty can tell us about that party in turn?"

 

[Thande]

"But before we get to Katty's next party rundown, let's turn to some of the questions we've been getting from the viewers at home. Emily Maitlis is now standing beside a giant iPad - other touchscreen tablets are available - aren't you, Emily?"

A slightly ruffled-looking Maitlis nodded. "That's right, Andrew. As always, the viewers at home are seeking to contact us by calling in, sending SMS text messages via the Cellnet, and in one case a carrier pigeon from the Outer Hebrides containing a Ceefax letters page engraved on a single grain of rice. However, we have, of course, ignored all of these, because we all know that the only people we care about are those who post on Twitter. To that end, I have almost four questions here from the viewers at home. First of all, from user TungstenTexan, who writes: 'Every district so far has been split between more than one party - is it possible under hashtag you-ess election sixteen hashtag voting system for all three seats to go to one party?'"

"Well, is it? Jeremy?"

"It is certainly possible, Andrew, but it would require very high support for one party, and the support for the others to be split very granular...ly...is that a word? It is now! Uh, fragmented..."

"Could you explain more?"

"You'd have to go to one of our experts, even though, according to the Leader of the Conservative Party - our Conservative Party, I mean - we have apparently had enough of them. But in the meantime, we have our first result from the state of West Virginia."

	WV-02		
	Nat          	132,448   	52.9%
	Prog          	40,507    	16.2%
	Lib          	32,980    	13.2%
	Fus          	32,226    	12.9%
	All          	12,106    	4.8%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	250,267
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Nat
			Nat

"Well. Speak of the devil - other personifications of evil are available."

"...er, are they?"

"This is the BBC. As I was saying, the question from our metallic tweeter from the Lone Star State has been dramatically answered. Our first result from West Virginia, not merely the western part of Virginia, you understand, but a separate state..."

"Yes, well, from one metal to another, it's time to go over to one of our local native guides for the night, er, is that cute or offensive, anyway, it's Mr Nate Silver, who is speaking to us from his cryogenic capsule beneath Cheyenne Mountain. Mr Silver, can you explain this result?"

"Well, Andrew, the Cubs in the ninth inning scored a touchdown over the Packers, and because Lebron James was still in the sin-bin for smashing Michael Vick's face into the ice, there was a strike at home plate - Christian Pulisic's star play was foiled when he was knocked down by all ten pins--"

"No, I'm sorry, there may be some confusion, I was talking about the election."

"Oh - my apologies, I always get Michael Vick and Mitt Romney mixed up. Well, yes, West Virginia. This is a state that has been in economic decline for some time. Its industry is associated with coal mining, and the unions were powerful here, which tended to help the Democrats. But in recent years, both culture-war issues and views about climate change - which is itself a culture-war issue in some ways - have strongly trended the state towards Republicans. Mr Trump's declarations about talking about rebuilding American industry probably helped him here, whereas the Conservatives' laissez-faire approach, 'vulture capitalism' as it has been dubbed, has not seen much enthusiasm from these blue-coollar workers."

"That's fascinating - imagine if our disaffected coal mining areas started voting for the Tories, can you imagine. But can you explain why the voting system has given all three seats to Mr Trump's Nationals?"

"Well, as you guys from the BBC know, nobody in the world actually understands proportional representation voting systems, but I'll give it my best shot. See, think of it this way. The Nats get the first seat because they have the most votes. The formula then divides their starting number in two, but that's still higher than the second-placed party, the Progs, so the Nats get the second seat. Then it divides it in three, but that's still higher - so the last seat goes to them, too."

"All those numbers, amazing. So, as Jeremy said, it's not just that the, er, Nationals have a lot of support here, but that the opposition is divided?"

"Exactly. We've heard a lot on the campaign trail from President Obama about how this voting system gets away from tactical voting and settling for the lesser of two evils. But we can see here that it's still possible to have 'wasted' votes."

"A consequence of the use of only three-member districts, no doubt..."

	RI-02		
	Prog          	71,964    	30.2%
	Nat          	69,717    	29.2%
	Lib          	49,879    	20.9%
	Fus          	35,316    	14.8%
	All          	11,713    	4.9%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	238,589
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Nat
			Lib

"We have been interrupted there with a result from Rhode Island, the second and final district..."

"Yes, and a more typical one, with the vote largely split between three parties. If you follow the same method I just outlined, the Progs get seat one, then we divide their votes in two - now the Nats have the most, then we divide theirs in two - and the Libs on 21% or so have more than the 15% or so that the reduced Progs and Nats have."

"I see," Neil said, his face disagreeing with his words.

"And with both results from Rhode Island in, the additional statewide seats are also declared," Vine added.

	Rhode Island at-large		
	Prog          	141,261   	31.1%
	Nat          	116,029   	25.5%
	Lib          	111,264   	24.5%
	Fus          	64,514    	14.2%
	All          	21,637    	4.8%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	454,705
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Prog

"And as these are simple first-past-the-post, both go to the Progressives, who continue to perform well in Mr Sanders' home region - which we will come to in a minute, Katty."

"What were you saying about three-member districts before, Jeremy?"

"Well, if I understand the maths, it would be much harder for all four seats to go to one party if there were four. And it'd be less likely for a party on, ah, thirty percent to get the same one seat as a party on twenty percent, like we just saw with that second Rhode Island district."

"Ah, right. Nate?"

"Yes, Jeremy is right," Silver agreed, his surprised expression momentarily obscured by the large bubble floating past, one of many slowly moving upwards through his cryogenic pod. "More seats would lead to a more proportional result."

"So why has Mr Obama and his Article V convention gone for three-member districts?" Neil asked.

Silver ran a cyborg hand through his hair. "Well, the current model is based on just awarding three seats to each of the existing districts," he explained. "In theory, when the new Congress meets, this could be changed so that districts are merged and redrawn. For example, the two Rhode Island districts we've heard about could be merged into one six-member district. But..."

	FL-04		
	Nat          	125,740   	29.8%
	Con          	87,541    	20.8%
	Lib          	85,974    	20.4%
	Prog          	57,701    	13.7%
	Cst          	48,545    	11.5%
	All          	16,116    	3.8%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	421,618
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Con
			Lib

"Sorry to interrupt you there, Nate, that's another district in Florida, from the north-east of the state. Very close result between the Conservatives - again, perhaps Mr Rubio's personal vote? - and the Liberals, but once again the Nationals are out in front."

	NC-02		
	Lib          	100,063   	25.2%
	Cst          	88,809    	22.4%
	Nat          	73,796    	18.6%
	Prog          	73,068    	18.4%
	Con          	48,845    	12.3%
	All          	12,586    	3.2%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	397,167
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Cst
			Nat

"And also another from North Carolina. Another closely divided one, and the Progressives nearly nabbed the third seat. Er, I think this takes in the Raleigh suburbs."

"Rawley," a somewhat irritated Nate Silver corrected him.

"You Americans and your pronunciations..."

"This one is more period accurate than yours! Just ask Sir Walter Raleigh - I mean Rawley!"

"Fine, send a memo to, checks notes, Peter Capaldi and we'll ask him to go and check."

	VA-04		
	Lib          	156,652   	43.2%
	Nat          	56,911    	15.7%
	Prog          	56,025    	15.5%
	Con          	53,490    	14.8%
	Cst          	24,274    	6.7%
	All          	15,179    	4.2%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	362,532
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Nat

"And one more from Virginia."

"My apologies, Nate, please continue with what you were saying about multi-member districts."

Slightly mollified, Silver nodded, revealing the glinting circuitboard texture of his neck. "Of course. First, I should say that's an impressive result for the Libs in vee aye oh four, takes in half of Richmond and Petersburg but still--"

"Oh come on, I know your districts are gerrymandered, but you can't possibly have one that stretches all the way from Yorkshire to Russia."

"Be quiet, Jeremy. Nate, about the multi-member districts..."

"Thank you...as I was saying, it would be possible to create districts with more members, or even turn an entire state into a district...but the problem is the smaller states, such as Vermont which we've already seen. Their population only entitles them to a single district, and thus it would be impossible to give them more than three representatives, unless Congress was increased even further in size."

"Can't you just combine states together into one district?"

"Oh come on," said Silver, impatiently blinking one eye and cutting off the red laser beam in the shape of a skull and crossbones emerging from it, "you've got to be realistic."

"Nate Silver, thank you."

	NC-03		
	Nat          	94,063    	28.6%
	Lib          	73,438    	22.4%
	Cst          	66,023    	20.1%
	Prog          	47,657    	14.5%
	Con          	38,778    	11.8%
	All          	8,493     	2.6%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	328,451
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Cst

"Another result from North Carolina. This one takes in the coastline of the state. Again, closely divided between several parties there. And that should be enough to update the map..."

 

[Thande]

	FL-13		
	Lib          	106,909   	29.6%
	Nat          	83,854    	23.2%
	Prog          	71,983    	20%
	Con          	53,198    	14.7%
	Cst          	30,296    	8.4%
	All          	14,520    	4%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	360,760
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Prog

"That's another result from Florida. The thirteenth district, on the west coast. Interesting one, this. The old Democrats came very close to taking it in a by-election, what they call a special election here, two years ago. Then they decided not to bother contesting it at all in the general election. That's an interesting split of the vote, possibly caused by former governor Charlie Crist deciding to stand as a candidate for all parties simultaneously."

"Well, regardless of the cause, the Progressives have the third seat, ahead of the Conservatives - despite the alleged home state appeal of co-leader Marco Rubio which we have heard of. Is this a surprise, Katty, tenuous link?"

"Well, Andrew, yes it is. We've already seen in the last few weeks, and then again tonight, repeated, you might say, recalibration of the expectations management for the Progressives by their opponents. When the party was launched, senior Liberals openly claimed that they would be lucky to win one seat in Bernie Sanders' home state of Vermont. As we've seen tonight, the results have been drastically different. Not only have the Progressives done exceptionally well in the wider region of New England, but they have been electing MCs even in the more small-c conservative states such as, here, Florida."

"Perhaps you can tell us a little more about them..."

"I thought you'd never ask."

The screen next to Kay changed again, this time showing various green-tinted greyscale images of Bernie Sanders at different ages, standing behind lecterns, cutting ribbons, waving his fist, etc. There were also newspaper cuttings; prominent among them was a Guardian headline reading "Who Is Barney Saunders?" The word 'Progressive' and a green pine tree symbol in a circle overlaid the collage.

"We've already heard tonight about how the right-wing National Party has cut radically into the old Republican vote, which many expected to transfer wholesale to the Conservatives. Well, there is a parallel to how the left-wing Progressives have done the same to the Democrats, though the situations are somewhat different. Another parallel between the Nationals and Progressives, however, is that both have been accused of being one-man vehicles."

The screen shifted to show one of the more recent green-tinted photos of Sanders, now artificially facing off with an orange-tinted Donald Trump (at least, the photoshop backroom boys had probably had to apply a tint) across a dark void as though they were in an Alas Smith and Jones talking head sketch.

"But Mr Sanders has been swift to deny these accusations, as we can see here at a campaign rally..."

Sanders, elderly but vigorous, proclaimed his message to an excited crowd. "This is not about me! This is about us! And..." his accent momentarily strengthened, "it's about the unmatched taste of REAL! BROOKLYN! PIZZA! When the evils of capitalism attack, my Bernie Bros won't cut 'em no slack--" An aide diplomatically walked up behind him and gently slapped him back to normal. "And a new deal for the American worker..."

"As we just heard there, Mr Sanders was born in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, but he has built his political career in the small New England state of Vermont. Rising from mayor of the town of Burlington to Congressman and then Senator for that state, Mr Sanders historically refused to join the Democratic Party outright. He is one of very few successful US politicians of modern times to openly describe himself as a socialist. For decades that has been a dirty word in American political discourse, more associated with communist dictatorships than the welfare state democracies we tend to think of first. But there are signs of shifts in attitudes, shifts which have alarmed many more mainstream political figures."

"People are waking up," said a woman identified as Kshama Sawant - Seattle Councillor. "They can only label the mildest compromise with rapacious capitalism as 'socialism' for so long before it stops being a bogeyman. Now the workers of America are beginning to educate themselves."

Kay's voice cut back in. "With Mr Sanders' long-held positions becoming more openly considered by American voters, his new political party has drawn perhaps surprising levels of support. Though relatively few senior politicians have endorsed or joined the Progressives, a new generation of activists have been inspired by their message. The Liberals have hit back with accusations which the Progressives describe as mud-slinging. For example, when Mr Sanders walked across the surface of a lake to heal an injured swan, he was accused of breaking zoning regulations. The Liberals also claim the Progressives are dominated by white men in contrast to their own more inclusive membership, a claim which the Progressives deny. We spoke to Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, a campaign organiser for Mr Sanders who Mystic Meg told us to pay attention to, as well as investing in companies that make face masks, disinfectants and online soapboxes for conspiracy theorists. This is what Ms Ocasio-Cortez had to say."

"Capitalism needs to be confronted, not appeased," Ocasio-Cortez began. "I knew things had gone too far when nobody could say my name in the coffee place where I worked without activating Jeff Bezos' artificial intelligence. As for these claims we're not diverse enough - I have an asteroid named after me, your argument is invalid."

Back to Kay. "We still don't know what election night will hold for Mr Sanders and the Progressives, but one thing is clear: American politics will never be the same again."

	NY-03		
	Lib          	110,537   	32%
	Nat          	104,980   	30.4%
	Prog          	67,751    	19.6%
	Fus          	51,962    	15%
	All          	10,045    	2.9%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	345,275
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Prog

"Thank you Katty, that was very interesting. And we're seeing yet more signs of that success."

"Yes, our latest result there is from New York state - from the northern shore of Long Island. This was an area that's usually pretty reliable for the old Democrats, yet the two parties led by New Yorkers are getting representation as well as the one led by a former New York senator who wasn't born there."

"So good they named it twice."

	NC-05		
	Nat          	81,729    	22.8%
	Cst          	80,291    	22.4%
	Lib          	76,303    	21.3%
	Prog          	66,064    	18.5%
	Con          	43,328    	12.1%
	All          	10,307    	2.9%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	358,023
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Cst
			Lib

"Back to North Carolina, and a very divided district there in the north-western part of the state."

	NH-02		
	Prog          	110,084   	30.6%
	Nat          	77,734    	21.6%
	Lib          	65,098    	18.1%
	Con          	62,631    	17.4%
	Cst          	26,166    	7.3%
	All          	18,581    	5.2%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	360,294
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Nat
			Lib

"And...yes. You may remember, what seems like quite a while ago, New Hampshire's first district was the first one to report. Evidently they worked all their vote counters to death on the first one, as it's taken this long to get the second. But we have it now, a very similar result to the first, in fact. And as there are only two districts in the so-called Granite State, that means we can now also give the statewide seats."

	New Hampshire at-large		
	Prog          	214,335   	29.3%
	Nat          	166,864   	22.8%
	Lib          	134,191   	18.3%
	Con          	123,896   	16.9%
	Cst          	55,030    	7.5%
	All          	37,951    	5.2%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	732,267
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Prog

"The Progressives have indeed topped the polls here as they have in so many places in New England. The Liberals are in third behind the Nationals, which must be troubling to them. And we can update the map..."



"Indeed, they've actually topped the polls in every state to finish counting so far. Only Massachusetts and Connecticut remain."

"Admittedly, the Liberals have performed better in those two states. But it will still be an embarrassment, not only for Hillary Clinton, but for the many veteran former Democratic politicians who insisted that Mr Sanders' ideas were too 'extreme' to be electable. Here, in Mr Sanders' backyard, the Progressives seem to be not merely competitive, but dominant!"

"Quite so - we'll be speaking to some more local analysts about this in due time."

	FL-11		
	Nat          	148,766   	36.2%
	Lib          	85,148    	20.7%
	Con          	72,887    	17.7%
	Prog          	48,300    	11.8%
	Cst          	44,603    	10.9%
	All          	11,293    	2.7%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	410,998
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Nat

"Florida again, and the rural eleventh district, just to the west of Orlando, the only place we care about in Florida. Again, for all the claims of Mr Rubio's home state advantage, the Conservatives have lost out - with the Nationals even taking two seats out of three..."

	CT-05		
	Nat          	91,766    	28.4%
	Prog          	81,098    	25.1%
	Lib          	80,044    	24.8%
	Fus          	56,135    	17.4%
	All          	13,694    	4.2%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	322,737
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Prog
			Lib

"And back to New England. That's our last result from Connecticut, and the first time the Nationals have topped the polls anywhere in this part of the United States. That will be a shock to many people. But more importantly, it means we can now add the statewide seats for Connecticut. I should've waited to update the map!"

"Yes, you should have."

	Connecticut at-large		
	Lib          	476,408   	29%
	Prog          	421,164   	25.6%
	Nat          	401,528   	24.4%
	Fus          	271,687   	16.5%
	All          	71,517    	4.4%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	1,642,304
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib

"The Progressive shut-out for New England we just talked about didn't last long, then - Connecticut, at least, has seen the Liberals come out on top. Massachusetts is still counting for some seats."

	NY-11		
	Nat          	106,944   	43%
	Lib          	56,118    	22.6%
	Prog          	52,689    	21.2%
	Fus          	26,288    	10.6%
	All          	6,418     	2.6%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	248,457
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Nat

"New York again, this time the eleventh district, which takes in Staten Island and a chunk of Manhattan. This is the only part of New York City that tended to vote Republican, but even then, it's usually more associated with the more liberal Republicans. This tremendous vote for the Nationals, taking two seats out of three, is quite a shock."

"Indeed, another thing to discuss later as the night unfolds."

	NY-04		
	Lib          	111,997   	33.3%
	Nat          	97,438    	28.9%
	Prog          	67,848    	20.1%
	Fus          	50,031    	14.9%
	All          	9,497     	2.8%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	336,811
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Prog

"We're really seeing an avalanche of New York seats now...this is a more urban Long Island district and it's split three ways."

	FL-19		
	Nat          	114,037   	29.9%
	Lib          	92,900    	24.4%
	Con          	73,257    	19.2%
	Prog          	50,101    	13.1%
	Cst          	39,803    	10.4%
	All          	11,060    	2.9%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	381,158
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Con

"And Florida's not far behind. Another from the west coast. Finally another Conservative seat to put a quavering smile on Mr Rubio's little face."

"...have you reverted to Jackanory mode?"

"Er, not at all! Look, a map!"



"At least as far as the leading parties are concerned, Florida looks to be a fight between the Liberals and Nationals - little sign of that Conservative support, except in that they take second or third seats."

	MA-02		
	Prog          	114,639   	32.6%
	Lib          	82,853    	23.6%
	Nat          	65,499    	18.6%
	Fus          	63,938    	18.2%
	All          	24,494    	7%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	351,423
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Lib
			Nat

"We just mentioned Massachusetts, and the New England map continues to fill out with this district from the middle part of the state - at least in this part, the Progressives are still beating the Liberals."

	SC-01		
	Lib          	89,010    	26.7%
	Con          	75,777    	22.8%
	Nat          	64,433    	19.3%
	Prog          	45,675    	13.7%
	Cst          	37,843    	11.4%
	All          	20,283    	6.1%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	333,021
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Con
			Nat

"We haven't seen South Carolina for a while, but this is ironically better news for the Conservatives than Florida. This district has until recently been represented by Mark Sanford, who we'll see later as part of Emily's piece on how this campaign has inspired sex scandal practitioners across America."

	VA-10		
	Lib          	127,127   	31.5%
	Con          	89,549    	22.2%
	Prog          	83,565    	20.7%
	Nat          	52,418    	13%
	Cst          	28,613    	7.1%
	All          	22,549    	5.6%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	403,821
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Con
			Prog

"Another seat for the Conservatives there in Virginia, in the northern part of the state near Washington DC, which has trended towards the old Democrats in recent years. And indeed, though the Liberals topped the polls, the Progressives have won a seat as well."

"Oh, and that means I can update another map!"

"No, you ca-"

 

[Thande]

"You and your maps..."

	FL-01		
	Nat          	119,273   	31.4%
	Con          	79,692    	21%
	Lib          	63,524    	16.7%
	Cst          	57,644    	15.2%
	Prog          	43,539    	11.5%
	All          	16,428    	4.3%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	380,100
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Con
			Lib

"We were getting a lot of number one districts counting first earlier, but it's taken until now to get Florida's. This one is in the area known as the 'Panhandle' because, well, you can figure it out, and culturally has more of the long-lasting and traditionally 'Southern' population, as opposed to those who moved to Florida after air conditioning started being a thing and malaria stopped being one. The Conservatives will have had high hopes here, but once again, the Nationals have come out on top in Marco Rubio's backyard."

	MA-04		
	Lib          	123,588   	32.4%
	Prog          	102,388   	26.8%
	Fus          	69,740    	18.3%
	Nat          	63,965    	16.8%
	All          	22,086    	5.8%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	381,767
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Fus

"Only a couple of districts to go now in Massachusetts, and indeed the whole of the New England region. This one takes in an area south-west of Boston and includes the town of Taunton, which interestingly still has the Union Jack on its flag."

"Back home Taunton would be a Conservative-Lib Dem battleground, but quite different here, no?"

"Depends on how equivalent you consider party names, Andrew. The Liberals and Progressives are fighting it out - the Liberal lead candidate and former Democratic incumbent was Joe Kennedy III, of the Kennedy dynasty, who, quite remarkably, is somehow still alive - and the Fusionists have picked up their first seat in Massachusetts. This is usually considered a left-wing state, but there have been some right-wing candidates elected, as predicted under the PR system - it's just people did not expect the Nationals to be the main beneficiaries."

	NC-04		
	Lib          	148,145   	35.9%
	Prog          	133,372   	32.3%
	Cst          	46,088    	11.2%
	Con          	36,428    	8.8%
	Nat          	33,868    	8.2%
	All          	14,632    	3.5%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	412,533
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"Speaking of number four districts, here's North Carolina's. This one sits north of the city of - ah - 'Rawley' and takes in another name we're familiar with, Durham."

"What, Durrem as in Durrem? don't they pronounce it DURR HAMM or something?"

"No, because that's exactly what we'd be expecting them to do. Anyway, another Liberal-Progressive battleground, with - again as we've seen in this state before - surprisingly the Constitution Party leading the right. But too far behind. Anyway, the Prime Minister back home might be pleased to see a constituency whose name evokes a fellow Labour one near his own of South Shields going--"

"That's too tenuous even for us, let's move on."

	NY-07		
	Lib          	100,528   	49.2%
	Prog          	77,136    	37.7%
	Nat          	11,285    	5.5%
	Fus          	9,913     	4.8%
	All          	5,611     	2.7%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	204,473
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"Speaking of Liberal-Progressive battlegrounds, here's New York's seventh district. This one takes in parts of Queens and Brooklyn Heights, where there was a famous battle fought in the American War of Independence."

"What, didn't all the brownstone houses get in the way?"

"Er, they hadn't been built yet."

"What, are you saying it's possible to build houses? There's no place for ridiculous conspiracy theories on the BBC, Jeremy."

	SC-06		
	Lib          	148,841   	55.8%
	Nat          	35,238    	13.2%
	Prog          	29,318    	11%
	Con          	27,120    	10.2%
	Cst          	18,382    	6.9%
	All          	7,948     	3%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	266,848
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Lib

"That's the last result from South Carolina. The sixth district was gerrymandered by the old Republicans to put a large portion of the BAME voters together, but this has now had the side effect of delivering all three seats to the Liberal Party."

"I think that's only the second time we've seen that happen tonight. All three seats go to one party, I mean. We really are going to have to pause and explain what gerrymandering is at some point..."

"Yes, but before that - as we have all the results from South Carolina now, the statewide top-up bonus seats can also be awarded, and, well, that will be a bit of a surprise to many people watching at home."

	South Carolina at-large		
	Lib          	628,843   	29.9%
	Nat          	445,471   	21.2%
	Con          	408,001   	19.4%
	Cst          	301,917   	14.4%
	Prog          	226,530   	10.8%
	All          	92,265    	4.4%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	2,103,027
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib

"South Carolina was considered out of reach by the old Democrats for years, since the parties, um, shifted positions on, er, race. But now, with the right divided and the left more united behind the Liberals, that party has come out on top in voteshare with its appeal to BAME voters. Look at the state results."

"So do the Liberals have more seats from South Carolina than all the right-wing parties combined?"

"Not quite, due to the vagaries of the voting system. The Liberals have eleven, including those two crucial bonus seats for topping the polls statewide, while the Conservatives and Nationals both have six each, so twelve together. No seats at all for the Progressives, which was predicted, but it's curious that the Constitution Party has done noticeably worse here than in the neighbouring state of North Carolina. Most analysts expected it to be the other way around. Possibly things have been affected by the 'Moral Mondays' protests in North Carolina which may have polarised matters more there."



"And as you can see on the map, with all those results for South Carolina, we can display the statewide seats as well...though not for North Carolina, with three seats still to go."

"Perhaps you should wait till all the results come in before updating the map? It's not as if we have dead time here Jeremy, the results are coming in thick and fast..."

"Oh, perhaps..."

	MA-08		
	Lib          	120,769   	31.5%
	Prog          	110,587   	28.9%
	Nat          	70,861    	18.5%
	Fus          	60,763    	15.9%
	All          	19,937    	5.2%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	382,917
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Nat

"And speaking of which, here's the final result from Massachusetts. Again a close fight between the Liberals and Progressives for this district, south of Boston, which takes in more familiar names to us, such as Weymouth and Braintree."

"That'd be one big constituency if those were together back home!"

"Quite...but in this case the Nationals have managed to take the third seat. Which means we also have all the seats for Massachusetts and can tot up the statewide results..."

	Massachusetts at-large		
	Lib          	1,013,331 	31%
	Prog          	981,865   	30%
	Nat          	569,782   	17.4%
	Fus          	521,111   	15.9%
	All          	185,679   	5.7%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	3,271,768
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib

"Statewide, the Liberals have just edged out the Progressives. That means New England is divided. While Bernie Sanders' Progressives have outperformed expectations in his own backyard, the Liberals have put up a considerable fight in Massachusetts and Connecticut. But support has also gone to the Nationals and Constitution Party on the right - in contrast to expectations that the more moderate Conservatives would be the main right-wing beneficiary of PR in this left-wing-dominated region. The New England map is now complete!"



"That's more like it. One of our, slightly arbitrarily-defined I should say, regional maps is filled out. But there is much more to come. And we still haven't heard from Katty about the remaining two parties..."

 

[Thande]

	VA-07		
	Lib          	111,729   	28.5%
	Con          	84,849    	21.6%
	Nat          	72,897    	18.6%
	Prog          	60,815    	15.5%
	Cst          	40,286    	10.3%
	All          	21,592    	5.5%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	392,168
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Con
			Nat

"Before we go on, that's Virginia's inland seventh district. One of the few places where the Conservatives are edging out the Nationals on the right-wing side, though the Liberals are ahead overall."

	NY-13		
	Lib          	146,608   	58.1%
	Prog          	86,317    	34.2%
	Fus          	6,967     	2.8%
	Nat          	6,760     	2.7%
	All          	5,741     	2.3%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	252,393
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"And New York's thirteenth district. Interestingly, this is actually the smallest district in the US, geographically speaking, being based mostly on the northern part of the island of Manhattan. Projections suggested that all three seats would be going to the Liberals in these kinds of seats, but in fact there is a substantial vote for the Progressives, who are also getting some representation."

	FL-05		
	Lib          	143,356   	45.9%
	Nat          	55,491    	17.8%
	Prog          	47,838    	15.3%
	Con          	33,545    	10.7%
	Cst          	22,856    	7.3%
	All          	8,985     	2.9%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	312,071
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Nat

"And going down to Florida, this district in the north of the state is another case where the Liberals have slightly underperformed expectations - in this case the third seat going to the Nationals."

"Can we really say what expectations reasonably were in this brave new world, though?"

"Perhaps not - it is just that this was a Democratic-packed district by almost a two to one margin in the old times..."

	NY-23		
	Nat          	81,969    	28.3%
	Fus          	76,187    	26.3%
	Prog          	65,729    	22.7%
	Lib          	49,284    	17%
	All          	16,848    	5.8%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	290,017
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Fus
			Prog

"And back to New York, but quite a different part of the state indeed - a large rural district along the border with Pennsylvania, and here the Liberals language down in fourth place without representation. The Fusionists are just behind the Nationals, but it's the Progressives who take the third seat here. This district is home to the city of Ithaca..."

"Haha, like in that Simpsons episode from 1996."

"Yes, all right, that was a bit of a non sequitur, I suppose you could say it's relevant because President Obama appeared in the last episode of The Simpsons in 2009, but let's move on."

	VA-08		
	Lib          	177,868   	48.3%
	Prog          	92,547    	25.2%
	Con          	50,599    	13.8%
	All          	20,616    	5.6%
	Nat          	17,551    	4.8%
	Cst          	8,704     	2.4%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	367,885
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"The Liberals are on rather firmer ground here in Virginia, in a district right next to Washington DC. This is the area known as 'NoVa', for northern Virginia, which had been trending to the left for years as DC's suburbs expanded into it."

	NY-14		
	Lib          	87,933    	45.1%
	Prog          	63,474    	32.6%
	Nat          	26,616    	13.7%
	Fus          	11,944    	6.1%
	All          	4,956     	2.5%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	194,923
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"We appear to be ping-ponging from Virginia and New York. This fourteenth district is another urban one, taking in parts of Queens and the Bronx. I believe the Progressive candidate elected here is the young lady with an asteroid named after her whom Katty spoke to earlier."

"How lovely. Speaking of Katty, she's looking at me impatiently, but before we get to the next party, I was wondering - why haven't we had any results from Georgia yet?"

"Georgia on your mind, Andrew?"

"Don't try to be clever, Jeremy."

	VA-02		
	Lib          	98,030    	30.5%
	Con          	68,234    	21.3%
	Nat          	67,528    	21%
	Prog          	47,732    	14.9%
	Cst          	20,932    	6.5%
	All          	18,612    	5.8%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	321,068
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Con
			Nat

"Er...well, what was I just saying about Virginia...the Conservatives just barely ahead of the Nationals here, but again the Liberals in first...this district was drawn by someone who hates cartographers and wants them to suffer, as it includes that fiddly peninsula bit and two random chunks of the mainland."

"I blame King Charles' protractor."

	FL-17		
	Nat          	114,490   	32.4%
	Lib          	78,925    	22.3%
	Con          	64,938    	18.4%
	Prog          	44,994    	12.7%
	Cst          	40,728    	11.5%
	All          	9,786     	2.8%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	353,861
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Con

"And Florida again. Now this big chonky boi of a district--"

"There is such a thing as trying to be too in wiv da kidz."

"Sorry...but honestly, it's the size of Belgium...the Conservatives are lucky to get a third seat here."

	WV-01		
	Nat          	134,938   	55.3%
	Prog          	38,813    	15.9%
	Fus          	30,996    	12.7%
	Lib          	25,571    	10.5%
	All          	13,576    	5.6%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	243,894
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Nat
			Nat

"West Virginia's first district votes very similarly to the one we already saw, overwhelmingly National."

"Yes, evidently these dispossessed miners historically united by union labour to oppose exploitative plutocrats have decided that true change for their economic degradation can only lie in the hands of, checks notes, an exploitative plutocrat."

"Well, it's the last thing they've be expecting them to do. Also, here's a map."



"Sticks out a bit, doesn't it - even if there is a bit of commonality on the Virginia side of the border."

	NY-21		
	Nat          	78,476    	28.1%
	Fus          	72,005    	25.8%
	Prog          	69,875    	25%
	Lib          	41,885    	15%
	All          	17,197    	6.2%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	279,438
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Fus
			Prog

"Rural New York again, and this is another ch - another really big district. And this one is full of fun unpronounceable Dutch names. Anyway, to say this district actually went for the old Democrats not that long ago, a majority of votes going to the right-wing parties, with the Progressives grabbing the third."

"Andrew wanted news from Georgia, well, it appears we have news from Georgia. In fact, the Governor wants to speak to you right now."

"Ah, well that makes sense. Put him on the gigantic video screen." An annoyed Katty Kay stepped back to allow the screen to display a familiar face in front of Georgia's committee-designed flag that was just neo-Confederate enough to upset everyone else, while not being neo-Confederate enough to please the actual racists. "Governor Saakashvili, America is in the spotlight of the world here, why has your state been so long to count its votes?"

Mikheil Saakashvili frowned. "Well, that's a very confrontational way to put it, Andrew. You shouldn't forget time zones for a while, and then I had to stop the secretary of state just awarding all the votes to himself."

"Ah, you also brought him from a former Soviet republic, did you?"

"No, they're actually worse around here than Eduard Shevardnadze was," Saakashvili explained. "Or that stooge Putin has got running Tblisi these days."

"Good old Edward Shedwardnazi, yes. So those are the reasons for the delay?"

"Partly," Saakashvili said, stepping back to reveal a window behind him, "but also because of our corporate sponsorship deal, you see."

The window loomed large in the camera view, yet the view seemed dark and almost formless. Only very bright lights within were visible, dimly illuminating the fact that it seemed to be looking into a huge, cuboidal room like a hangar. Around the edges of the light glows, the dark mass turned them a golden-brown colour. It was, in fact, rather like the effect obtained when taking two pairs of red-green 3D glasses, reversing one so the red was on top of the green and vice versa, and looking through the result at a solar eclipse against the advice of medical professionals.

Except this seemed to have a lot more bubbles.

As the camera adjusted, it became dimly visible that the floor of the huge chamber was home to many tables. Around them were people wearing wetsuits and scuba gear, with bubbles pouring from their masks and joining the others already rising to the ceiling. They appeared to be counting votes and looking at voting machines.

"We had some false starts because the acid was eating away at some of the machines," Saakashvili explained, stepping back into view.

"I see," Neil lied. "Um, exactly what is this sponsorship deal?"

"Simples," Saakashvili said, twitching. "The election here in Atlanta is sponsored by The Real Thing tee-emm, Coca-Cola--"

"--other cola-type soft drinks are available," Vine said automatically.

After several moments of Saakashvili's withering glare, he reluctantly added "but admittedly, most of them are quite shit."

"Anyway," Saakashvili continued, "as a result, the vote counting is taking place in rooms filled entirely with the delicious taste of this fine state's finest export, not counting the peaches. Although they do do Coke with peach now. Now that's shit." He glanced at his Google Watch. "Ah yes, looks like we do have our first result now."

	GA-12		
	Lib          	85,038    	31.8%
	Nat          	61,583    	23%
	Con          	49,757    	18.6%
	Cst          	40,864    	15.3%
	Prog          	23,899    	8.9%
	All          	6,534     	2.4%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	267,674
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Con

"Quite a mixed result there from Georgia's twelfth district, in the eastern part of the state. The Conservatives are hanging on, as in Virginia. Governor Saakashvili, any comments?"

"Tavisupleba and death to Putin!"

"Yes, that's fair enough."

 

[Thande]

"Didn't they already do that joke in "Partying Like It's 1999" but with cider and Herefordshire? Talk about running out of ideas..."

"What'd you say?"

"Nothing."

	FL-20		
	Lib          	184,654   	63.9%
	Prog          	46,942    	16.3%
	Nat          	26,689    	9.2%
	Con          	17,507    	6.1%
	Cst          	8,055     	2.8%
	All          	4,964     	1.7%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	288,811
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Lib

"Another result from Florida, and finally an all-Liberal district. This is another BAME-majority area which the former ruling Republicans gerrymandered into place as a packed district, but now they may be regretting it, as it means a significant number of right-wing votes are being wasted under the new PR system."

	NY-20		
	Prog          	93,051    	28.6%
	Lib          	82,333    	25.3%
	Fus          	67,774    	20.8%
	Nat          	63,783    	19.6%
	All          	18,140    	5.6%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	325,081
			
	MCs elected:		
			Prog
			Lib
			Fus

"And that's New York's 20th district, taking in Albany - don't - and some other surrounding areas. Interestingly, the Progressives have come out on top here, the first time in the state so far, as you can see on my map..."



"I believe we have something quite different now. Katty, I'm sorry to delay your party discussion again, but instead, could you tell us about why the result we're being told about is so historic?"

"Certainly, Andrew. One of the odd paradoxes of the United States is that its very seat of government, the District of Columbia - that's the DC in Washington DC - is not part of any state, and therefore is not entitled to representation in government. That might have been fine when it was just a few government buildings in a swamp, but has become a problem since it grew up into a significant city - especially as that city is majority black. There was a rather halfhearted rules patch, as the young 'uns say, in the 1960s, when people of DC were given the right to vote for the presidency - three electoral votes, same as the smallest state. But DC actually has more people than several states, and they still had no representation in the Senate or the House of Representatives."

"And now?"

"Now, DC has been given the same rights as the states - though the American territories like Puerto Rico have not yet been granted it yet, that is expected to follow. DC is treated as a single-district state, meaning it has three regular MCs plus the two top-ups."

"As there's only one district, we can give both at once now the results are here..."

	DC-00		
	Lib          	223,513   	71.8%
	Prog          	59,317    	19.1%
	All          	15,715    	5%
	Con          	9,356     	3%
	Nat          	1,774     	0.6%
	Cst          	1,594     	0.5%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	311,268
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Lib

"A pretty titanic vote for the Liberals there and almost nothing for the right-wing parties...who in fact come behind the Alliance Party! And the top-up seats are the same of course..."

	DC at-large		
	Lib          	223,513   	71.8%
	Prog          	59,317    	19.1%
	All          	15,715    	5%
	Con          	9,356     	3%
	Nat          	1,774     	0.6%
	Cst          	1,594     	0.5%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	311,268
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib

"So that's five more MCs for the Liberals from the voters of DC, an historic moment and one which will be pleasing to those who have campaigned for this right for years."

	FL-18		
	Nat          	114,379   	29.9%
	Lib          	113,758   	29.7%
	Con          	62,036    	16.2%
	Prog          	54,800    	14.3%
	Cst          	27,356    	7.2%
	All          	10,145    	2.7%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	382,474
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Con

"But we can't dawdle for long, as we have yet another result from Florida, on the eastern coast. A close fight between the Nationals and Liberals here, again with the Conservatives in third."

	NJ-11		
	Nat          	145,047   	38.1%
	Lib          	123,566   	32.5%
	Prog          	58,768    	15.4%
	Fus          	40,649    	10.7%
	All          	12,565    	3.3%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	380,595
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Nat

"We haven't heard from New Jersey in a bit, but the eleventh district...one of the most affluent in the region and formerly reliably Republican. Here there's a decisive break for the Nationals out of the new right-wing parties, something which will be worrying to many."

	OH-10		
	Lib          	87,789    	25.2%
	Con          	86,683    	24.9%
	Nat          	68,463    	19.7%
	Prog          	65,534    	18.8%
	Cst          	23,557    	6.8%
	All          	16,155    	4.6%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	348,181
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Con
			Nat

"That's another formerly reliable Republican district, in the southwestern part of Ohio...here, though the Conservatives are beating the Nationals as they generally are elsewhere in the state, the Liberals have pipped them to the post. That could matter when it comes to totting up the statewide totals for the top-up seats."

	FL-15		
	Lib          	88,395    	26.4%
	Nat          	74,515    	22.3%
	Con          	61,398    	18.4%
	Prog          	55,830    	16.7%
	Cst          	41,721    	12.5%
	All          	12,658    	3.8%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	334,518
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Con

"The Florida map is really starting to fill in now. This is an interior district, one full of places nobody has heard of, I'm not doing the British people only care about Orlando thing, I mean I think even people who live there haven't heard of them. Anyway, it's a very divided district - you can see there are substantial votes for other parties that don't get represented, like the Progressives and - the Constitution Party! Katty?"

(Muttered) "Even by your standards, that was a tenuous link..."

Kay stepped aside as the screen reconfigured to show new imagery. A purple circle with a scroll in it slowly grew and overlapped with images of Ted Cruz's face in a disturbing way. "Any hopes that the former Republican right would remain united in the face of Mr Trump and the National Party were dashed when Mr Cruz and his supporters walked out of the Conservative party convention earlier this year. Despite being a relative political neophyte, Mr Cruz has become an unlikely standard-bearer for those Americans who steadfastly reject Mr Obama's constitutional reforms."

Cut to Ted Cruz on a podium before a cheering crowd, with a white backdrop on which, strangely, appeared a grid of black, astrological-looking symbols. "We don't need no proportional representation, we don't need no vote control! This is the Domin - I mean the United States of Ca - America, the greatest country in the," he glanced down at his notes, "world, and we must unite against this assault on our freedoms, our motherhood and pout - apple pie, so our children can have a country to grow up in where they can ride their bobsleds to curling practice just like George Washington did! Eh?"

Flash of light, during which an aide had hastily removed Cruz's maple leaf toque. "As I was saying, this is a perfect constitution, unimpeachable in any regard, and anyone looking for reform is a dangerous popish radical trying only to undermine the Protestant religion and the person of King George, we must not grant representation to the colonies - wait, no, sorry, wrong speech." He turned the page. "As Patrick Adams said, ask not who cut down the apple tree, but what your country can do for fear itself."

Flash of light, after which the podium was now facing backwards. "As I was saying, the only documents we need to run this great nation by are the Founding Fathers' Constitution and this Bible!" An aide whispered in his ear. "What do you mean, there's a first amendment? Ah, anyway. That traitor Obama should read words like these and weep!" He opened the Bible at random. "'For the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes. He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing'..." Cruz frowned and flipped the pages. "'He will judge between many peoples and will settle disputes for strong nations far and wide. They will beat their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war any more'." His flipping got more desperate. “'Let not the wise boast of their wisdom or the strong boast of their strength or the rich boast of their riches'..." He shook his head. "Hey Markwayne, where's the bit about giving tax breaks to companies that make CFC-contaminated bottled water, or arming foetuses with assault rifles?"

Kay stepped before the screen. "Despite a number of gaffes, the Constitution Party has drawn some support, especially from the American interior. In some states, deals have been achieved to keep the Conservatives and Constitution Party factions together - what are described as Fusion deals. For example, in Pennsylvania a deal was negotiated here by former Senator Rick Santorum. Health warning: please be sure not to look directly at Mr Santorum's teeth. Look through a pinhole in a piece of A4 paper."

"Thank you Katty. So what might the results look like if the Conservatives and Constitution Party had stayed united?"

"A lot better for them and worse for the Nationals, that's clear. It will probably influence future elections..."

"Also, wasn't there already a Constitution Party?"

"No, that was one of the existing minor parties, it has no connexion to Mr Cruz's group, though it has sued him over the name...we'll be hearing from them in time, when I cover the Alliance Party."

"Thank you Katty, we'll get back to you when there's time..."

	NJ-02		
	Nat          	129,807   	40.4%
	Lib          	92,924    	28.9%
	Prog          	54,732    	17.1%
	Fus          	32,679    	10.2%
	All          	10,862    	3.4%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	321,004
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Nat

"New Jersey again, and another perhaps worryingly strong result for the Nationals. In this case it seems more like a split on the left which has harmed that side of the spectrum. This southern rural district was already right-leaning, but not to the extent this implies."

	MD-08		
	Lib          	155,781   	42.7%
	Prog          	81,036    	22.2%
	Fus          	56,690    	15.6%
	Nat          	54,695    	15%
	All          	16,209    	4.4%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	364,411
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"And that's another of Maryland's rather twisted-looking districts, taking in a lot of diverse areas...don't ask me for more details or I'll just fall into a Mandelbrot set forever."

	OH-06		
	Nat          	105,294   	32.9%
	Con          	84,833    	26.5%
	Lib          	46,488    	14.5%
	Prog          	39,025    	12.2%
	Cst          	31,726    	9.9%
	All          	12,700    	4%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	320,064
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Con
			Nat

"Ohio, and interestingly, even in this state the Conservatives aren't beating the Nationals everwhere. This district is on the eastern border of the state and starts to fall into the same Appalachian mountainous region as places like neighbouring West Virginia - we've already seen the appeal of the Nationals there."

	GA-14		
	Nat          	87,051    	34%
	Con          	62,234    	24.3%
	Cst          	42,564    	16.6%
	Lib          	34,197    	13.4%
	Prog          	22,316    	8.7%
	All          	7,510     	2.9%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	255,872
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Con
			Nat

"And our second result from Georgia is very similar to that one from Ohio. The fourteenth district, in the north-west, is again very right-wing, with the Constitution Party even in third ahead of the Liberals, though not getting representation. In fact, one might expect it to elect open conspiracy theorists."

"What?"

"Nothing! Also, here's a map!"

 

[Thande]

"We are still way before we fill out any more of our regional maps, as many of these east coast states are among the most populous. Probably when we enter the more sparsely populated interior of the United States, in coming hours as the polls close, we will conversely be filling in vast areas of land all in one go..."

	MD-01		
	Nat          	141,389   	38.6%
	Fus          	85,574    	23.4%
	Lib          	67,567    	18.4%
	Prog          	54,771    	15%
	All          	16,931    	4.6%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	366,231
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Fus
			Nat

"Maryland's first district. This used to be a generally Democratic-dominated state, as we have already discussed, and they gerrymandered the boundaries to look, well, horrible - but crammed all the Republican voters into this district in the eastern part of the state. The result is that all three seats have gone to right-wing parties..."

"Yes, about jeremyndering, Gerryman - I mean -"

	IN-03		
	Fus          	103,014   	35.4%
	Nat          	86,573    	29.7%
	Prog          	46,539    	16%
	Lib          	41,160    	14.1%
	All          	13,903    	4.8%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	291,189
			
	MCs elected:		
			Fus
			Nat
			Fus

"Speaking of right-wing districts, that's another one in Indiana and another rare success for the Fusionists. Evidently the endorsement of sitting Governor Mike Pence has played a role in shoring up the Conservative part of the Fusionists, because, as we know, a conventional social conservative like Mike Pence would never support Donald Tr-"

"Yes, we get it. Besides, Stephen Pound is a hundred times the politician Mike Pence is."

"...shut up."

	FL-22		
	Lib          	139,773   	39.2%
	Nat          	82,476    	23.1%
	Prog          	62,582    	17.6%
	Con          	47,505    	13.3%
	Cst          	16,248    	4.6%
	All          	7,898     	2.2%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	356,482
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Lib

"Florida again, and the twenty-second district is one of several small, densely populated districts taking in settlements on the southeastern coast, near the Everglades in the interior. Despite being right in the path of hurricanes, what used to be seen as a malarial swamp was transformed by air conditioning and immigration from northern retirees, Cuban exiles and others. That applies to southern Florida as a whole, I should say. This district was actually the area with that infamous recount we all remember from 2000."

"Oh yes. Swingin' Chad was my favourite, personally. At least we don't have to deal with that kind of vote counting now thanks to Mr Obama's reforms..."

"One might say Mr Obama made the butterfly ballot extinct, like, you know, he put it in a killing jar and now it's spread on a display in the Natural History Museum, you get it-"

"Alright, that's both tenuous and morbid, let's move on."

	GA-02		
	Lib          	115,539   	46.6%
	Nat          	50,833    	20.5%
	Con          	31,792    	12.8%
	Cst          	24,736    	10%
	Prog          	20,916    	8.4%
	All          	4,287     	1.7%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	248,103
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Nat

"And Georgia's second district, again a split between a Liberal majority and a National minority; this district has a BAME majority electorate but only narrowly so. If the Conservatives and Constitution Party had agreed to a Fusion arrangement here, they would have got the third seat instead."

"Assuming people still voted the same, of course - we've already seen some states where, in accordance with some vox pops we've heard, voters saw the Fusion arrangement as a so-called corrupt bargain and turned away from the parties because of that."

"Well, true."

	FL-24		
	Lib          	178,050   	67.1%
	Prog          	41,733    	15.7%
	Con          	21,982    	8.3%
	Nat          	13,843    	5.2%
	Cst          	4,992     	1.9%
	All          	4,575     	1.7%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	265,174
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Lib

"Yet another Florida district from that south-eastern coast, and this one was even more Democratic under the old system than before - an overwhelming vote for the Liberals and they obtain all three seats, a rarity for tonight. The Progressives would have had to increase their vote by half as much again to get the third seat. And here's an update to the Florida map..."



"Once again, it's striking that the only colours we see are blue and orange. Though the Conservatives have won a fair few seats, they haven't topped the polls anywhere, with Mr Rubio's - and the hospitalised Mr Bush's - apparent home state advantage seeming to vanish, in contrast to Mr Kasich, the other temporary co-leader of the party, in Ohio."

	NY-02		
	Nat          	123,960   	39.6%
	Lib          	75,833    	24.2%
	Prog          	61,847    	19.7%
	Fus          	41,948    	13.4%
	All          	9,698     	3.1%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	313,286
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Nat

"New York, and another Long Island district, so we shouldn't be surprised the right is on top, unlike in NYC proper. But perhaps we should be surprised that, again, the right-wing vote has overwhelmingly gone to the extreme Nationals."

"Well, Mr Trump's rant, I mean speech, about 'New York Values' on the campaign trail may have played a role. We also shouldn't forget that this district was formerly represented by someone who was either a Nazi or a terrorist funder, but I can't remember which King is which."

"Thank goodness they don't have our libel laws here."

	PA-13		
	Lib          	129,975   	39.1%
	Prog          	87,293    	26.2%
	Nat          	53,600    	16.1%
	Fus          	51,958    	15.6%
	All          	9,819     	3%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	332,645
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"To the neighbouring state of Pennsylvania. A voice in my ear is telling me to correct something I said before; the state did not redraw its district boundaries for this election, as the legal dispute over them has continued, and is still using its old gerrymandered ones. The thirteenth district is the northern part of the city of Philadelphia and part of an area called Montgomeryshire-"

"What, is there a dispute over whether it's Welsh or English?"

"...oddly enough, yes, sort of. Anyway, the left-wing parties are firmly on top here, but the Liberals don't have it all their own way, with one seat going to the Progressives."

	GA-01		
	Lib          	79,798    	29.6%
	Nat          	62,872    	23.3%
	Con          	52,679    	19.5%
	Cst          	36,446    	13.5%
	Prog          	30,392    	11.3%
	All          	7,382     	2.7%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	269,568
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Con

"Georgia's first district is on the state's only coastline, in the south-east, where Savannah is. Interestingly, this was considered a Republican district under the old system, but here the right-wing parties are so split in comparison to the left that the Liberals come out on top - albeit the two other seats going to the Nationals and the Conservatives. If this was a purely FPTP election, the Liberals would be sweeping up a lot of seats on a plurality due to a divided right."

"Would the same be true in reverse in some places?"

"Perhaps, as we've seen hints of in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, where the right has more united...albeit around the Nationals. Anyway, this isn't all theoretical, because it will matter for the statewide at-large seats where coming first - acorss the state, that is - is all that matters."

	NJ-08		
	Lib          	117,361   	51.1%
	Prog          	56,473    	24.6%
	Nat          	38,737    	16.9%
	Fus          	10,599    	4.6%
	All          	6,566     	2.9%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	229,736
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Prog

"Speak of the devil."

"Ah, the Jersey Devil?"

"...no. Anyway, this certainly isn't a part of Jersey where the right are helped, is it?"

"No. This district takes in oddly-shaped parts of Newark - not that one - Jersey City, and other places that exist purely for Bruce Springsteen to write songs about. Again, though the Liberals are dominant, the Progressives still take a seat."

	NY-08		
	Lib          	136,438   	53.5%
	Prog          	79,251    	31.1%
	Nat          	26,204    	10.3%
	Fus          	8,152     	3.2%
	All          	4,885     	1.9%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	254,930
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"A similar result in the eighth district, again, of neighbouring New York. This one takes in parts of Brooklyn and Queens in NYC, and was overwhelmingly Democratic. The right-wing parties don't get a look in, but the Progressives do."

	GA-13		
	Lib          	167,317   	55.5%
	Prog          	46,618    	15.5%
	Nat          	31,651    	10.5%
	Con          	28,654    	9.5%
	Cst          	19,852    	6.6%
	All          	7,146     	2.4%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	301,238
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Lib

"On the other hand, here's a place where the Progressives are just too far behind and the Liberals have all three seats. This one takes in some of the outer parts on the south side of the city of Atlanta."

	NY-17		
	Lib          	118,398   	37.2%
	Nat          	73,855    	23.2%
	Prog          	68,039    	21.4%
	Fus          	48,484    	15.2%
	All          	9,444     	3%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	318,220
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Prog

"New York's seventeenth district takes in parts of Westchester County, which I'm still not convinced is a real place, and it's an interesting three-way split between Liberals, Nationals and Progressives."

	OH-13		
	Lib          	90,495    	28.3%
	Prog          	73,058    	22.8%
	Nat          	66,709    	20.9%
	Con          	62,164    	19.4%
	Cst          	13,928    	4.4%
	All          	13,524    	4.2%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	319,877
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Nat

"I mentioned before that Ohio was showing more support for the Conservatives than Florida was - well, this district is the exception, where the Conservatives don't get a look in - albeit it would only have taken a couple of thousand votes to change hands for them to get the third seat instead of the Nationals. This is a gerrymandered district intended to pack in Democratic voters around the town of Akron and surrounding areas..."



"Yes, about gerrymandering...no, actually. First, we should go back to Katty, because she still has one party to explain. Isn't that right, Katty?"

"Yes Andrew. They haven't had a good night so far, with no seats even under this PR system, but before election night, I spoke to the - er - collective leadership of the Alliance Party..."

 

[Thande]

"The Alliance Party is the wildcard in tonight's election," Katty Kay began as her giant screen shifted, now showing a multi-faceted array of yellow squares with different faces in them and a capital A stylised with stars and stripes. "All through the night, we've been talking about how, until Mr Obama's remarkable reforms, the United States was a two-party system, with those two parties being the Democrats and Republicans. But that was never entirely true."

The screen shifted, now showing a large and diverse array of party logos, many of them rather amateurish-looking and pixellated on the big screen. "These so-called third parties included the Libertarians, the Greens, the Constitution Party - not the same as the one being led by Ted Cruz - and a number of others. But it is important to understand just how marginalised and irrelevant these parties were, for the most part, in the old American system - hence why we usually called it a two-party system."

A wizened businessman behind a podium beside the familiar figures of Bill Clinton and the elder George Bush. "Arguably the best third party performance in the last few decades was businessman Ross Perot, standing in 1992 as an independent on a platform that echoes recent trends in British politics - opposition to economic integration with a wider body, in this case the North American Free Trade Agreement or NAFTA."

A few flashes of Perot speaking on stage. "A giant sucking sound--"

"Mr Perot came a strong third in the popular vote, but that meant nothing under America's old presidential system. He then founded his own party, called the Reform Party. In 1998 the Reform Party won a high-profile office, that of Governor of Minnesota, with celebrity candidate Jesse Ventura, a former professional wrestler." Scenes of Ventura behind the Governor's desk with one of America's many indistinguishable blue state flags behind him.

"But this breakthrough came to nothing. The two existing parties united to stymie Mr Ventura's efforts, in the same way that they force any third party or independent candidates elected to Congress - such as Bernie Sanders - to 'caucus', or group themselves with, one or the other or miss out on key legislative privileges. America's system did not merely encourage two parties, as first-past-the-post is often claimed to do elsewhere - it was deliberately set up to exclude any who sought to break this model."

An image of Hillary Clinton and John Edwards looking faintly ill behind a barbecue in 2008. "Another factor is that American parties were not like those we know in the UK. Whereas here, and in most countries, parties choose their candidates in small closed-door selection votes, in America Democrats and Republicans held mass votes in which anyone could register to participate - not only for president, the only ones we usually heard about, but for other offices as well. These were called primary elections, and in some areas where one party was dominant, they were more important than the actual general election itself. Because almost anyone could stand for either party and the party could not say no to them if they won the vote - there was little incentive for any serious politician to stand as a third party candidate, because it was much easier for them to win the primary selection of either party. In the case of Bernie Sanders, for example, he usually won the Democratic primary vote and then deliberately disclaimed the party label and ran as an independent."

Scenes of eccentric-looking people wearing cowboy hats, marijuana leaf T-shirts, or sometimes both. "So the only people who usually stood for third parties tended to be closer to the kinds of parties at home that challenge the Prime Minister in fancy dress and then lose their deposits, rather than the Liberal Democrats, English Democrats or the like. Despite this, there have been some minor successes. Due to the role of uncontrolled money in American elections - something else which Mr Obama has sought to reform - sometimes no Democrat would challenge a Republican for certain offices, or vice versa. Sometimes these elections went simply unopposed, leaving the voters of those districts or states with no more choice than a Cuban or Chinese citizen has on their ballot. However, sometimes a third party stepped into the breech. Other times, scandal might attach mid-campaign to a major party candidate and a minor party would benefit - as, for example, happened in Indiana recently, with some usual Republican votes going to a Libertarian instead."

An old election map by county, a sea of red and blue. "But we shouldn't exaggerate how minor those successes are. Only a handful of third party candidates have ever even won a county in an election, and those usually on personal vote; the Libertarians and Greens, the most consistent third parties, never have. There have been independent wins here and there, such as Mr Sanders, his fellow former Senator Angus King, and Rhode Island Governor Lincoln Chaffee, but they are very much the exception to the rule."

Barack Obama's silhouette intruded into the map, hand raised either in an inspiring gesture or just about to swat a fly. "But, as we've been hearing tonight so much, Mr Obama has introduced a form of proportional representation to the United States. Will this be the change of voting system needed to give these third parties a voice? No, claim many of their leaders, who say the current system still discriminates against them, and have pooled their resources to protest. They call their vehicle the 'Alliance Party', a mixed group united only by their support for further voting reform. I spoke to their leadership..."

	PA-10		
	Nat          	129,119   	41.7%
	Fus          	75,556    	24.4%
	Lib          	46,760    	15.1%
	Prog          	46,531    	15%
	All          	11,604    	3.7%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	309,569
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Fus
			Nat

"I'm sorry Katty, we'll get back to you shortly, but we have a few more results coming in first."

"Yes, this large and rural district in the north-east of Pennsylvania used to be strongly Republican, and all three seats are won by the right wing parties..."

	GA-07		
	Lib          	84,484    	28.6%
	Con          	64,198    	21.8%
	Nat          	49,875    	16.9%
	Prog          	47,528    	16.1%
	Cst          	36,771    	12.5%
	All          	12,115    	4.1%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	294,972
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Con
			Nat

"Georgia's seventh district covers the north-eastern part of Atlanta. A bit of a mixed bag; it has trended to the left in recent years, but two out of the three seats are won by the right even if the Liberals top the polls. The Conservatives are ahead of the Nationals here, which does seem to be the exception rather than the rule tonight..."

	NY-24		
	Lib          	77,641    	25.2%
	Prog          	73,380    	23.8%
	Fus          	72,442    	23.5%
	Nat          	67,321    	21.8%
	All          	17,790    	5.8%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	308,574
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Fus

"New York's 24th district, in the middle of the state around the city of Syracuse. This is a very divided area politically, and you can see that the top four parties are very close. Although this district used to have a Republican Representative, here two out of three seats go to the left parties, with the Fusionists just beating the Nationals to the third."

	PA-03		
	Nat          	114,894   	35.4%
	Fus          	83,069    	25.6%
	Lib          	61,414    	18.9%
	Prog          	52,151    	16.1%
	All          	12,682    	3.9%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	324,210
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Fus
			Lib

"And Pennsylvania's third district, in the north-west of the state, on the coast of Lake Erie. The opposite situation to the one we just saw - two seats go to the right-wing parties, but the Liberals managed to get the third."

	GA-09		
	Nat          	100,287   	33.7%
	Con          	71,991    	24.2%
	Cst          	58,915    	19.8%
	Lib          	34,167    	11.5%
	Prog          	23,301    	7.8%
	All          	8,553     	2.9%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	297,215
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Con
			Cst

"Back to Georgia for the ninth district. This was formerly a very Republican district, and all three seats go tothe right-wing parties. This is the first win for the Constitution Party in Georgia we've seen, interestingly - as you can see on the map."



"And with that, I think we have to curtail our efforts and apologise to Katty for our interruption. Um, tenuous link - one thing we all noticed with those results - the Alliance Party was nowhere near getting a seat, and in only one district did they break 5%. If that was back home, they would have lost their deposit every other time."

"Yes, well, Mr Obama's reforms do not extent to a deposit system like ours," Kay said, sounding more resigned than put out by this point. "But yes. Although America now has a form of proportional representation, small districts with three seats do tend to disadvantage parties whose support is more thinly spread over a wider area. As I discussed with the Alliance Party's collective leadership..."

 

[Thande]

The screen shifted to show a large room, perhaps a church community centre, with a circle - more of a rather bulgy oval - of seats occupied by eclectically-dressed, uncomfortable-looking people.

"They may not look like much, but these are some of the most significant players in America's old third parties," said the voice of the unseen Katty Kay. The voiceover didn't quite overrule the background noise of the ongoing argument in the background: "I meant what if the child consents to indentured servitude, you pervert!"

"We don't agree on much," admitted a man in a cowboy hat to Kay's microphone, giving it a suspicious look. He had the Preamble to the Articles of Confederation tattooed on his forehead in mirror writing. "But after some hard negotiation, we agreed that the platform should just require the FBI to give up the real secret of JFK's assassination, and agree to differ on whether it was Freemasons or aliens for now."

Cut to a woman in a cardigan made entirely out of marijuana leaves. "We always have to remember, like, that's just your opinion, man," she said dreamily. "Some of us want to save the whales and others want to eat them raw with their robotic Japanese girlfriends, but, like, there are things we have common ground on." ("Such as?" asked Kay off-camera) "Well, like, we all oppose US interventionist foreign policy, for different reasons maybe, but we got a two-thirds majority resolution that the platform should affirm our desire to suck Vladimir Putin's d-"

Merciful cutaway to the familiar - to Americans and viewers of Saturday Night Live, at least - set of Jeopardy! A striking, weathered-looking man, with the wobbly signature 'GARY' on the blue screen on the front of his podium, was answering Alex Trebek. "I'll take World Cities for six hundred dollars, Alex."

"Gary Johnson is considered one of the old Libertarian Party's most mainstream and credible figures," said Kay's voiceover, talking over the appropriate square on the column of blue screens matching the words Trebek read out: "It is one of the oldest cities in the world and the second largest in the Republic of Syria."

"He was elected twice as Governor of New Mexico, an important position, in the 1990s - as a Republican," Kay continued. "After changing parties, Mr Johnson clarified that while he stood as a Republican, he believes he governed as a Libertarian." In the background footage, Johnson frowned and then, with a moment of realisation, pressed his buzzer. "What is 'Aleppo'?"

The scene abruptly cut to Kay interviewing Johnson. "Mr Johnson, you stood as the Libertarian candidate for President in 2012 and won one percent of the vote. That may not sound very impressive, but it was the best score for any third party in years. Do you think there's a larger constituency of Americans out there willing to vote for the Alliance?"

Johnson frowned. "Well, Katty, you say it's not impressive, but yeah, we're in a climate where everything's one or the other, you have to vote Republican to beat the Democrat, or the other way around. So it's not surprising..."

Kay interrupted him, provoking the usual confusion from US politicians exposed to BBC reporting for the first time. "But under Mr Obama's reforms, it's not only two parties anymore. So why can't the Libertarians just compete with everyone else?"

There was a flicker suggesting an edit. "We do support the move towards voting reform," Johnson said, sounding reluctant. "But this form of government still discriminates against smaller parties. We urge the voters to back the Alliance as a vote for change that will truly make this government by, for and of the people."

"Well, that all sounds very sensible," Kay said, sounding faintly surprised.

"Sure does," Johnson said with a grin, opening his jacket to reveal an extraordinary array of items in his pockets. "Now, you wanna get high?"

Abrupt cut to Kay speaking to someone else, a grinning bald man in a dark suit. "Another of the major players in the Alliance Party is Evan McMullin, a former CIA agent from Utah. Mr McMullin, what has led you to lead the Alliance campaign among the Mormons?"

"Well, Katty, we deplore the fact that Trump's fascist campaign has been allowed and hasn't been censured," McMullin said, "and if I had my way I'd put a bullet in the back of-" (another abrupt cut) "-have a really hurtful hit musical written about him," said an unconvincing dub-over while his lips moved differently.

"But why not just continue with the Conservatives, as the primary successors to the Republicans?" Kay asked.

"I'm not happy with how much the Conservatives have let Trump's rhetoric influence their own campaign," McMullin declared, "and the decent folk of the West aren't going to stand for it. Call it a protest vote if you want, but we want to show them we can't be taken for granted."

"Well, that also sounds very sensible," Kay said. "Wanna cuppa?"

Abrupt cut. "I somehow appear to have mortally offended Mr McMuffin there, but you can see the diversity of opinion among the Alliance Party. They come from all across the political spectrum. Virgil Goode, from the Constitution Party, recently came a narrow second to the UK's own Geoffrey Cox in the International Best Politician's Voice competition, and he isn't happy about Mr Cruz stealing his party's name."

"I tell you, the boy ain't right," Goode said in his magnificent drawl. "Back in ol' Virginny, we'd have hung him upside down in the ol' molasses pit till he tell us where the bodies are buried. Look, we need compromises to get our way. I beat Weed twice back in the day, but these fine gentlemen don't hold that agin me."

Another abrupt cut. "And Jill Stein was the Green Party nominee in 2012," Kay continued. "Green parties outside the US tend to emphasise environmentalism, renewable energy and/or claiming to be so while actually stopping nuclear power plants and building coal ones. I attempted to ask Ms Stein about how she reconciled this with her more right-wing partners, but I'm afraid we had to cut our interview short when a giant zombie ape grabbed her and took her up Chicago's Trump Tower. Thus far Mr Trump himself has denied any responsibility, but that doesn't necessarily mean he was responsible. We await updates on what has happened."

Cut back to the room full of arguing third partiers. "The Alliance Party will hold together only as long as it needs to," Kay concluded, "or until all its candidates die from those asbestos vapes they were handing out at the front desk. The question remains: even combined, will the small voteshares of America's old third parties lead to any results on election night?"

The screen faded to black. "And the answer appears to be 'no'," live-action Kay concluded. "As you said, thus far the Alliance has struggled to break five percent in most parts of the country, and has yet to win any seats. But perhaps that might change when we reach the areas in which Mr Johnson and Mr McMullin have been campaigning in."

"Perhaps. For now, inevitably, we have more results."

	PA-14		
	Lib          	127,184   	36.3%
	Prog          	104,368   	29.8%
	Nat          	55,424    	15.8%
	Fus          	51,676    	14.7%
	All          	12,121    	3.5%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	350,774
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"Pennsylvania's fourteenth district takes in the city of Pittsburgh - or a gerrymandered chunk of the centre of it - which was named, of course, after William Pitt the Elder. Fairly close there between the Liberals and Progressives, closer perhaps than was projected."

	NY-25		
	Lib          	95,327    	28.9%
	Prog          	87,569    	26.6%
	Nat          	65,933    	20%
	Fus          	63,022    	19.1%
	All          	17,592    	5.3%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	329,443
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Nat

"This New York district is nowhere near the city of New York, but rather takes in the town of Rochester on Lake Ontario - another familiar name from home, of course. Whereas the Rochester at home has been in the news for Mark Reckless' defection to the English Democrats, this one is more left-wing, though the third seat has gone to the Nationals."

	MD-04		
	Lib          	183,567   	56.5%
	Prog          	67,362    	20.7%
	Nat          	32,549    	10%
	Fus          	31,524    	9.7%
	All          	10,078    	3.1%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	325,081
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Prog

"Another of Maryland's nightmarishly-gerrymandered districts, a place where again, we might have expected all three seats to go to the Liberals, but in fact the Progressives have just managed to snatch the third."

	GA-11		
	Con          	84,167    	25.5%
	Lib          	69,736    	21.2%
	Nat          	68,946    	20.9%
	Prog          	46,721    	14.2%
	Cst          	45,699    	13.9%
	All          	14,345    	4.4%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	329,615
			
	MCs elected:		
			Con
			Lib
			Nat

"Georgia's eleventh district, in the northwestern part of the edge of Atlanta's built-up area, another fairly rare win for the Conservatives, their candidate Barry Loudermilk topping the polls."

"...as opposed to what, quiet milk?"

"Don't ask."

	NY-12		
	Lib          	160,975   	52.5%
	Prog          	94,626    	30.8%
	Fus          	23,316    	7.6%
	Nat          	18,068    	5.9%
	All          	9,925     	3.2%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	306,910
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"This one, on the other hand, does take in a big part of the core of New York City, including large chunks of Manhattan and Brooklyn and a little of Queens. Another area where we might have expected a Liberal blowout, yet again, there's a substantial Progressive vote and one seat goes to them."

	TN-06		
	Nat          	90,948    	30.5%
	Con          	64,919    	21.8%
	Cst          	60,594    	20.3%
	Lib          	45,354    	15.2%
	Prog          	25,194    	8.5%
	All          	10,957    	3.7%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	297,967
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Con
			Cst

"And another result from Tennessee - we've not seen many of those so far. This is a strongly right-wing district in the middle part of the state, and all three seats have gone to all three right-wing parties. Perhaps enough results to update the map?"



"Frankly, no...put that thing away! But one thing you can update us on is how many seats are now declared, as we continue to fill in the East Coast."

"Very well...we have just reached 411 seats declared, which is nearly thirty percent of the whole. And here are the current totals..."

	Current totals		
	Lib          	162    	
	Nat          	111    	
	Prog          	74    	
	Con          	37    	
	Fus          	15         	
	Cst          	12    	
	All          	0    	

			

"But things could still change and there is much still to play for as more and more Americans cast their votes..."

 

[Thande]

"We have more results coming in from Virginia, with the third district, taking in the familiar-sounding name of Portsmouth..."

	VA-03		
	Lib          	146,497   	45.3%
	Prog          	59,249    	18.3%
	Con          	49,703    	15.4%
	Nat          	37,837    	11.7%
	Cst          	15,524    	4.8%
	All          	14,612    	4.5%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	323,422
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Prog

"High support for the left-wing parties here. This district also includes Newport News, which, ironically, is the oldest English city name in the Americas - so old nobody actually remembers why people in 1621 saw fit to name a town after what sounds like a local paper."

	NC-11		
	Nat          	92,461    	25.4%
	Cst          	87,171    	23.9%
	Prog          	69,322    	19%
	Lib          	54,485    	15%
	Con          	50,370    	13.8%
	All          	10,247    	2.8%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	364,055
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Cst
			Prog

"And to the south, in North Carolina - haha, confusing - continuing strong support for the Constitution Party, but they don't quite edge out the Nationals, and the Progressives take the third seat."

"This district is in the Appalachian mountains, which was always the most Republican part of the state - it's definitely interesting that the Progressives edged out the Liberals to take the minority left-wing vote."

"And that the Conservatives are way behind in the fight for the right-wing vote, but well, that's a story we've already seen before."

	NJ-09		
	Lib          	115,623   	41.8%
	Nat          	78,224    	28.3%
	Prog          	62,331    	22.5%
	Fus          	13,472    	4.9%
	All          	7,089     	2.6%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	276,738
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Prog

"Back to New Jersey, and this is a district in the northern part of the state, north of New York City even. Again, that's a strong vote for the Nationals, who dominate the right-wing vote here - this is definitely one case where the attempt to unite the other right-wing parties as the Fusionists has backfired."

	FL-07		
	Lib          	108,759   	29.9%
	Prog          	77,899    	21.4%
	Nat          	70,172    	19.3%
	Con          	58,504    	16.1%
	Cst          	31,502    	8.7%
	All          	16,350    	4.5%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	363,186
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Nat

"Florida is now almost complete - a far cry from those recounts back in 2000! - and once again, it's mostly a fight between the Liberals and Nationals in the district near Orlando, which is the only part of the state we care ab-"

"Yes, alright, you've done that joke to death by now."

"It's a big state, there's a lot of districts! Anyway, this was formerly a close swing district between Democrats and Republicans, which, er, Florida didn't have many of thanks to gerrymandering. Now it's more diverse, and even the Progressives get what I think is their fourth seat here? Once again, scarcely resembling those Liberal predictions about the party's supposed lack of appeal, winning here even far from Bernie Sanders' New England home."

	GA-04		
	Lib          	169,982   	56.9%
	Prog          	54,925    	18.4%
	Con          	27,368    	9.2%
	Nat          	23,256    	7.8%
	Cst          	15,808    	5.3%
	All          	7,323     	2.5%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	298,663
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Lib

"Another rare case of all three seats going to one party - the Liberals again - in Georgia's fourth district, which takes in the eastern part of Atlanta and is a heavily BAME district. Once again, a former gerrymandering policy by the Republicans may have backfired under the new voting system."

"Yes, well, Jeremy, you really must-"

	KY-02		
	Nat          	77,870    	24%
	Cst          	73,402    	22.6%
	Con          	67,881    	20.9%
	Prog          	46,455    	14.3%
	Lib          	43,108    	13.3%
	All          	15,797    	4.9%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	324,512
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Cst
			Con

"Kentucky's second district, another heavily Republican one under the old landscape, a rural area south of Louisville," he momentarily forgot and pronounced it 'Louie-vee' as though it was in France. "All three seats go to the right-wing parties, and the Conservatives finally get thrown a bone - though they're still in third place..."

	NY-19		
	Nat          	96,972    	30.4%
	Prog          	82,511    	25.8%
	Fus          	65,293    	20.4%
	Lib          	58,007    	18.2%
	All          	16,669    	5.2%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	319,452
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Prog
			Fus

"And back to New York for the nineteenth district. This is a big one in the area of the Catskills, whatever they are, they always mention them in old novels, right? Anyway, another rural win for the New York Fusionists here, but the Progressives have also secured a seat. Their candidate was Zephyr Rain Teachout, who first came to public attention two years ago when she challenged--"

"Look, Jeremy, you can't just make names up, this is the BBC. Or if you do make them up, at least make them something like 'Metebelis III' or 'Guto Bebb'. But I was meaning to say-"

"Also the map's nearly finished!"



"Stop it with the m - look, before you go on - this is getting too chaotic. Jeremy, for the love of God, will you please explain for all the boys and girls at home what gerrymandering is?"

"I thought you'd never ask!"

 

[Thande]

"Gerrymandering," Jeremy Vine pontificated, "was a term coined in 1812. In the old days, if you were Elizabeth I, you didn't have to mess around with borders to manipulate the vote - just create more parliamentary seats for your supporters based on no-name villages. Rotten boroughs. But here in America, a very strict rule of the constitution is that their districts have to be jolly nearly equal in population."

"So they could never be manipulated?" Neil obligingly asked theatrically.

"So you might think!" Vine said. "But it turns out that it doesn't just matter how many voters you put in a constituency or a district - it matters what kind of voters they are. How you draw the boundaries."

A familiar 1810s political cartoon appeared behind him, its Wikipedia watermark not quite cropped off. "As I said, the term was coined in 1812 when boundaries were drawn in Massachusetts under Governor Elbridge Gerry. They drew lines to put all the towns that supported one party or candidate in this district, even though they're far apart. Someone compared it to a salamander - a gerrymander!"

"Never mind that Gerry himself was against the practice, apparently. Poor chap, having his name applied to it for all eternity."

"Well, he did sign the bill. And that's the point, Andrew. Here in America, they don't have a neutral Boundary Commission. Legislative bodies draw their own boundaries. You can imagine how that goes. One party gets a one-seat majority, they push through new boundaries so next time the exact same votes give them a sixty-seat one."

"Yes, that does seem appalling. But how precisely do they do it?"

"Well!" Vine said enthusiastically, calling up more graphics. Twelve blue dots sat at the centre of a rectangle of twelve red dots. "Let's say this is a blue-voting city in the middle of red-voting countryside. Say it warrants three seats under the rules. If we were like the Boundary Commission, we'd look at which areas belong together as natural communities-"

"-before ignoring that and deciding a road that joins two villages would make a good border, while a motorway that cuts across two should be in the middle of a district," Neil nodded in understanding. "But in theory, yes."

"Yes, without looking at how people vote. That pretty much never happens here. Or if we wanted to make an election as competitive as possible, we could do this," and lines appeared dividing up the city so each district had four blue and four red dots. "But usually parties want to do the opposite. Say the red party is in power and wants to exclude the blue party from power, er, we totally chose these colours at random. They can do what's called pack 'n' crack."

"Isn't that an illicit drug sold by Harry Enfield in blackface pretending to be Nelson Mandela?"

"...no. They can draw boundaries like this..." new lines shifted, "to make one district that's all blue in the middle, and then get two red districts by ensuring the other blue voters are in the minority. It doesn't matter that the middle district is 100% blue, it gets the same representation to if it was 51% blue. So they ensure the blue party gets fewer MPs or representatives for the same votes."

"I see, that's very sinister. What about the opposite?"

"Well, if the blue party's in charge, they would draw districts like these..." more lines, "so long trailing tails out of the middle city, ensuring there's always more blue than red voters in each, and pack the other red voters into a big rural district."

"Very well. I'm surprised this practice hasn't got banned by Mr Obama's reforms."

"It probably will, eventually, but he's had to pick and choose his battles, of course. The interesting thing, though, as we were saying, is that this three-member PR system has broken the gerrymanders. Those packed blue districts are now electing three Liberal MCs," Vine continued, forgetting his example was meant to be theoretical, "while the cracked ones meant to deliver a narrow red majority are now split between multiple parties. Or vice-versa. Gerrymandering may actually come around and hurt those who implemented it."

"Well, that'd certainly be exciting to see. We must speak to some American politicians in a bit to hear them foam at the mouth, once the translators have arrived. But first, I think we have more results."

	WV-03		
	Nat          	133,939   	61.2%
	Prog          	31,224    	14.3%
	Fus          	24,824    	11.3%
	Lib          	19,699    	9%
	All          	9,204     	4.2%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	218,890
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Nat
			Nat

"No gerrymandering required in this place. West Virginia has gone more overwhelmingly for one party than any place we've seen outside of DC. The Nationals-"

"Wait, did you just say 'anyplace'? Have you gone native?"

"I can give it up any time I like...and anyway, we can do the top-up seats as well for West Virginia now. No prizes for guessing who they go to..."

	West Virginia		
	Nat          	401,325   	56.3%
	Prog          	110,544   	15.5%
	Fus          	88,046    	12.3%
	Lib          	78,250    	11%
	All          	34,886    	4.9%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	713,051
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Nat

"Eleven full seats for Mr Trump's Nationals from this former mining area. Quite a shocking display of populism, of the same pattern that is proceeding across Europe, and strangely seems to gain more support the more we report on it..."

	GA-06		
	Lib          	93,415    	28.2%
	Con          	87,473    	26.4%
	Prog          	61,661    	18.6%
	Nat          	44,917    	13.6%
	Cst          	27,633    	8.3%
	All          	16,147    	4.9%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	331,246
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Con
			Prog

"And conversely, down in Georgia's sixth district in the northern suburbs of Atlanta, the Nationals don't get any seats at all, with the Conservatives ahead of them for the one right-wing seat."

	NY-09		
	Lib          	134,538   	53%
	Prog          	77,274    	30.4%
	Nat          	21,441    	8.4%
	Fus          	15,159    	6%
	All          	5,377     	2.1%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	253,789
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"New York's ninth district, in Brooklyn..."

"One of your all-blue districts from your example, Jeremy. But this one, like a lot of them, isn't electing three Liberals. One seat keeps going to the Progressives."

"Yes, something which I think the Liberals did not foresee."

	KY-03		
	Lib          	109,074   	32.1%
	Prog          	77,476    	22.8%
	Con          	55,833    	16.4%
	Nat          	40,986    	12.1%
	Cst          	38,895    	11.4%
	All          	17,780    	5.2%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	340,043
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Con

"We were just talking about Louie-vee, or as a voice in my ear is telling me, Loovel, well, this district is centred on it. This was the only Kentucky district that still elected Democrats under the old system. Here, we've got a split between the Liberals and Progressives, and again it's the Conservatives that get the third seat."

"Perhaps Mr Bush's party is getting their second wind after all."

	TN-01		
	Nat          	88,349    	33.3%
	Con          	67,249    	25.3%
	Cst          	48,070    	18.1%
	Lib          	27,372    	10.3%
	Prog          	24,868    	9.4%
	All          	9,585     	3.6%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	265,493
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Con
			Cst

"And Tennessee's first district, in the Appalachian region. Historically very loyal to the Republicans, and here all three seats go to the right-wing parties - although, unlike similarly Appalachian West Virginia, they are at least split three ways."

	VA-11		
	Lib          	151,565   	42.4%
	Prog          	87,417    	24.5%
	Con          	55,629    	15.6%
	Nat          	28,007    	7.8%
	All          	19,850    	5.6%
	Cst          	14,586    	4.1%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	357,054
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"And another two blue one green district. Virginia's eleventh is another one in the 'NoVa' area we mentioned, with spillover from Washington DC."

"Interestingly, this district is considered the most wealthy in the nation, in part due to the number of rich lobbyists who live there. Conventional wisdom would suggest that this would correlate to a right-wing vote, and yet it's voting just the same as plenty of poor urban districts we've seen elsewhere."

"Remember that the Liberals, although we've counted them under the left, also include quite a number of business-focused former Democratic factions..."

	GA-08		
	Nat          	75,512    	28.4%
	Lib          	69,793    	26.3%
	Con          	52,380    	19.7%
	Cst          	40,301    	15.2%
	Prog          	21,568    	8.1%
	All          	5,961     	2.2%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	265,514
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Con

"And this is a large rural district in the middle of Georgia. It does include some smaller cities, though. In fact, this is an example of one of the 'cracked' districts we were talking about, where a...er, blue minority was denied representation by the first-past-the-post system. But look how split it is now! And we can update the map, too."



"As we increasingly wrap up the east coast states, then, perhaps it's time to ask some of our American counterparts what they think to this remarkable election..."

 

[Thande]

"And...are you feeling alright there?"

"Sorry, I just felt a disturbance in the Force, as though millions of voices cried out and were silenced. It's as though some major, relevant world event happened and the author cannot think of a tasteful way to address it in-universe."

"Yes, but enough about your lunatic stalker from Youtube. What's the next results?"

	NJ-07		
	Nat          	132,735   	35.7%
	Lib          	114,917   	30.9%
	Prog          	65,613    	17.7%
	Fus          	43,651    	11.7%
	All          	14,677    	3.9%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	371,592
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Nat

"Well, er, similar to other results we've seen from New Jersey, there's a rather surprising lead for the Nationals, given past experience before the new party system. This is a more rural part of the north of the state, but even so..."

	FL-14		
	Lib          	127,568   	38.6%
	Prog          	61,302    	18.6%
	Nat          	54,749    	16.6%
	Con          	50,643    	15.3%
	Cst          	23,405    	7.1%
	All          	12,766    	3.9%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	330,433
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Lib
			Prog

"Quite a contrast to Florida's fourteenth district, which is dominated by the left. This one is centred on Tampa..."

"Other sanitary products are av - sorry, that one just slipped out."

	NC-13		
	Lib          	89,687    	24.6%
	Nat          	82,522    	22.7%
	Cst          	71,454    	19.6%
	Prog          	70,317    	19.3%
	Con          	40,193    	11%
	All          	9,677     	2.7%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	363,851
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Cst

"We are close to filling out the map of the Carolinas. This is quite mixed district in the western part of North Carolina, around the town of Salisbury."

"Oh, they've got a lovely cathedral."

"Not sure if this one has, Andrew. Anyway, the Progressives came very close to taking the third seat, but were pipped to the post by the Constitution Party by a margin of just over a thousand votes. It shows you that, even in a voting system like this one, every vote really does still count."

	TN-03		
	Con          	72,861    	26.4%
	Nat          	70,341    	25.4%
	Lib          	52,809    	19.1%
	Cst          	37,730    	13.6%
	Prog          	30,714    	11.1%
	All          	12,001    	4.3%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	276,457
			
	MCs elected:		
			Con
			Nat
			Lib

"From North Carolina to a district in Tennessee that borders it...tenuous link. Another rare poll-topping for the Conservatives, who seem to be making something of a fightback in the inland Upper South region."

"Oh, that sounds very authoritative terminology, tell me more."

"Er..."

	NY-09		
	Lib          	134,538   	53%
	Prog          	77,274    	30.4%
	Nat          	21,441    	8.4%
	Fus          	15,159    	6%
	All          	5,377     	2.1%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con           	0         	0%
			
		Total	253,789
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Lib

"...back to New York, to Brooklyn, and another left-wing district. It looks as though Bernie Sanders coming from the area originally only goes so far, as the Liberals are still firmly on top."

"Speaking of Tennessee-"

	TN-07		
	Nat          	76,001    	26.1%
	Con          	72,090    	24.7%
	Lib          	54,542    	18.7%
	Cst          	48,757    	16.7%
	Prog          	27,771    	9.5%
	All          	12,400    	4.3%
	Fus          	0         	0%
			
		Total	291,561
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Con
			Lib

"...here's another result? Here it's the Nationals who have edged it over the Conservatives, more in the western part of the state in an area with a lot of military presence...and I can update my map."



"No, I meant something else. We've had a few tweets, and probably a million messages by other methods which we have ignored, asking if we're going to be speaking to any local Americans about the elections. Well, things did get delayed by how many results we had unexpectedly early, and Katty's explanations about the parties. But, of course, we are going to speak to some American experts and voters. And we'll start with two people who already happened to be in the building, Rich Hall and Reginald D Hunter!"

The large screen cut away to Emily Maitlis speaking to the two panel show regulars. "Now, you're two of the most regular American faces on British TV. What do you make of all this?"

"You do know we don't actually live here anymore?" Hunter intoned sonorously.

"I spend some time on a ranch in Montana every so often, actually, writin' s - stuff," Hall corrected him. "But seein' as my neighbours live three miles away, don't ask me how they plan to vote."

"Um..." Maitlis was briefly flummoxed. "But what do you think of the changes President Obama has made to the voting system?"

"Listen, as long as we don't have no more hangin' chads an' recounts, that's got to be a step up," Hall replied.

"Less material though," Hunter observed. "It's like I said to them (bleeps) at the bleep, this bleep gonna keep doin' the same bleep stories for years if I can still have that free healthcare."

"Um...yes," Maitlis said. "Reginald, why does your lapel mike keep emitting regular loud sound effect bleeps?"

"It's easier for the live broadcasts," Hall explained, "just in case he slips and says n-"

The broadcast was mercifully interrupted by a blast of static. When it cleared, a vaguely-familiar looking, bespectacled man in a suit was there. "Attention BBC!" he squawked. "Do not adjust your sets! I am taking control as the only British person allowed to commentate on America! Trump has a stupid name! It is 2015! I am cool and edgy and say bad things about the Queen! Pay attention to me me me me me-" The screen cut off.

"Well I'm sorry to the viewers at home there, we appear to have been interrupted by ah...who was that strange sad man?"

"Failed panel show contestant I think, probably jealous of Rich and Reginald getting screentime. Well, let's move on."

	NY-26		
	Lib          	91,821    	30.2%
	Prog          	83,515    	27.4%
	Nat          	73,794    	24.2%
	Fus          	41,764    	13.7%
	All          	13,546    	4.4%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	304,440
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Prog
			Nat

"Another New York seat, from the upstate, this time, and this one actually takes in Niagara Falls, interestingly - or at least the American side of it. Unlike some parts of the upstate, the left is still in the ascendance here."

	NJ-01		
	Lib          	122,315   	37.2%
	Nat          	91,418    	27.8%
	Prog          	77,071    	23.4%
	Fus          	27,462    	8.3%
	All          	10,922    	3.3%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	329,188
			
	MCs elected:		
			Lib
			Nat
			Prog

"This New Jersey district is urban and straight across the river from Philadelphia in Pennsylvania, part of the same conurbation really, so it's striking that the results are quite different - the Nationals really do seem to have more support in New Jersey. Even though they've also scored some strong votes in Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia itself they're way behind."

	PA-15		
	Nat          	99,905    	29.8%
	Lib          	75,962    	22.7%
	Fus          	73,692    	22%
	Prog          	72,118    	21.5%
	All          	13,192    	3.9%
	Cst          	0         	0%
	Con          	0         	0%
			
		Total	334,869
			
	MCs elected:		
			Nat
			Lib
			Fus

"And speaking of Pennsylvania...perhaps the difference is just that the Fusionists have done a better job of splitting the right-wing vote here, as they've obtained another seat. And another map update..."