abolish the electoral college

[oldman420]

Washington, DC ? Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) today announced that she will introduce legislation to abolish the Electoral College and provide for direct popular election of the President and Vice President when the Senate convenes for the 109 th Congress in January.

?The Electoral College is an anachronism and the time has come to bring our democracy into the 21st Century,? Senator Feinstein said. ?During the founding years of the Republic, the Electoral College may have been a suitable system, but today it is flawed and amounts to national elections being decided in several battleground states.

?We need to have a serious, comprehensive debate on reforming the Electoral College. I will press for hearings in the Judiciary Committee on which I sit and ultimately a vote on the Senate floor, as occurred 25 years ago on this subject. My goal is simply to allow the popular will of the American people to be expressed every four years when we elect our President. Right now, that is not happening.?

Under the current system for electing the President of the United States:

Candidates focus only on a handful of contested states and ignore the concerns of tens of millions of Americans living in other states;
A candidate can lose in 39 states, but still win the Presidency;
A candidate can lose the popular vote by more than 10 million votes, but still win the Presidency;
A candidate can win 20 million votes in the general election, but win zero electoral votes, as happened to Ross Perot in 1992;
In most states, the candidate who wins a state?s election, wins all of that state?s electoral votes, no matter the winning margin, which can disenfranchise those who supported the losing candidate;
A candidate can win a state?s vote, but an elector can refuse to represent the will of a majority of the voters in that state by voting arbitrarily for the losing candidate (this has reportedly happened 9 times since 1820);
Smaller states have a disproportionate advantage over larger states because of the two ?constant? or ?senatorial? electors assigned to each state;
A tie in the Electoral College is decided by a single vote from each state?s delegation in the House of Representatives, which would unfairly grant California?s 36 million residents equal status with Wyoming?s 500,000 residents; and
In case of such a tie, House members are not bound to support the candidate who won their state?s election, which has the potential to further distort the will of the majority.
?Sooner or later we will have a situation where there is a great disparity between the electoral vote winner and the popular vote winner. If the President and Vice President are elected by a direct popular vote of the American people, then every American?s vote will count the same regardless of whether they live in California, Maine, Ohio or Florida,? Senator Feinstein said.

In the history of the country, there have been four instances of disputed elections where the President who was elected won the electoral vote, but lost the popular vote ? John Quincy Adams in 1824, Rutherford B. Hayes in 1876, Benjamin Harrison in 1888 and George W. Bush in 2000. According to some estimates there have been at least 22 instances where a similar scenario could have occurred in close elections.

?Our system is not undemocratic, but it is imperfect, and we have the power to do something about it,? Senator Feinstein said. ?It is no small feat to amend the Constitution as it has only been done only 27 times in the history of our great nation.?


I have never before supported a constitutional amendment but she does have a point

 

[Pliablemoose]

Originally posted by: oldman420
Abolish the electoral college

Yeah, mob rule.

:thumbsup:

 

[oldman420]

hey moose happy holidays

 

[Pliablemoose]

Originally posted by: oldman420
hey moose happy holidays

 

[orton]

it wii never happen. the amendment has to pass in the very states that will be loosing influnce.

 

[Genx87]

Destroy the system that determines the house of reps + presidency?

Why not just abolish the entire legislative branch?

I trust our founding fathers on this one over some dimwit senator from California.

 

[Stunt]

Originally posted by: Genx87
Destroy the system that determines the house of reps + presidency?

Why not just abolish the entire legislative branch?

I trust our founding fathers on this one over some dimwit senator from California.

Why not proportional representation of electoral votes.
ie. dems share NJ, CA votes and reps share FL, OH votes

This way you still get rural voice and millions of votes are not effectively destroyed through the process.

 

[wchou]

with electoral college, our votes are pointless. Just let them decide who should be our next president because they are god? they are perfect? electoral represent majority of the people? clueless aren't we?
Again why bother voting? Waste of our time and effort to even bother. Nothing more then a pawned game.
It's pitiful at best..:thumbsdown:

 

[wiin]

Democrats To Push For End To Electoral College

All Feinstein and Lofgren (and the perpetually clueless Lincoln Chaffee, representing Rhode Islanders who should be shaking their heads tonight) propose is a switch between those states and the big four or five: California, New York, Florida, Texas, and maybe Ohio or Pennsylvania. Ten percent of the states would determine the presidency, and probably produce all of the viable candidates for the office. Not coincidentally, Democrats do better in most of these states than anywhere else in the country. This isn't about direct democracy -- which the founding fathers deliberately avoided in order to give all the states a voice in the federal government.

Let me put it another way. If the Democrats are so concerned about direct election, why don't they arrange their presidential primaries in the same manner? Until they hold all of their primary elections and caucuses on one day and name the biggest vote-getter the winner, the Democrats are just blowing smoke about a commitment to democracy. They're just desperate now that they can no longer compete under the system they ran for decades.



What democrats should do is look at the election results and increase their numbers in areas where the election results are not far apart by having democrats from Mass and Cali, for example, move into these areas.

 

[DevilsAdvocate]

Originally posted by: wchou
with electoral college, our votes are pointless. Just let them decide who should be our next president because they are god? they are perfect? electoral represent majority of the people? clueless aren't we?
Again why bother voting? Waste of our time and effort to even bother. Nothing more then a pawned game.
It's pitiful at best..:thumbsdown:

Because they are god? :roll:

A little overdramatic, aren't we?

Basically, your representation in the electoral college is tied to the number of congressmen that your state has. For example, Wyoming has 3 (1 rep and 2 senators...) It is proportional representation.

There are many good reason that liberals hate the electoral college, and would like to see it abolished. If the electoral college were abolished, they could campaign on a purely socialist agenda - a giveaway of entitlements for the urban "poor." Inevitably, a dictatorship of the havenots would be created, breaking the backs of taxpayers in the process. We have seen the Democrats try this type of campaigning in the last 2 elections (Rx drug giveaways, welfare cost of living increases, Social Secuity hikes, etc.)

Sorry, wchou. I trust the wisdom of our founding fathers on this one.

BTW, what is a pawned game?

 

[DevilsAdvocate]

Originally posted by: wiin
Democrats To Push For End To Electoral College

All Feinstein and Lofgren (and the perpetually clueless Lincoln Chaffee, representing Rhode Islanders who should be shaking their heads tonight) propose is a switch between those states and the big four or five: California, New York, Florida, Texas, and maybe Ohio or Pennsylvania. Ten percent of the states would determine the presidency, and probably produce all of the viable candidates for the office. Not coincidentally, Democrats do better in most of these states than anywhere else in the country. This isn't about direct democracy -- which the founding fathers deliberately avoided in order to give all the states a voice in the federal government.

Let me put it another way. If the Democrats are so concerned about direct election, why don't they arrange their presidential primaries in the same manner? Until they hold all of their primary elections and caucuses on one day and name the biggest vote-getter the winner, the Democrats are just blowing smoke about a commitment to democracy. They're just desperate now that they can no longer compete under the system they ran for decades.



What democrats should do is look at the election results and increase their numbers in areas where the election results are not far apart by having democrats from Mass and Cali, for example, move into these areas.

Here's an idea. The Democrats should try to avoid setting a socialist agenda that alienates the heartland.

 

[bsobel]

All Feinstein and Lofgren (and the perpetually clueless Lincoln Chaffee, representing Rhode Islanders who should be shaking their heads tonight) propose is a switch between those states and the big four or five: California, New York, Florida, Texas, and maybe Ohio or Pennsylvania. Ten percent of the states would determine the presidency, and probably produce all of the viable candidates for the office. Not coincidentally, Democrats do better in most of these states than anywhere else in the country. This isn't about direct democracy -- which the founding fathers deliberately avoided in order to give all the states a voice in the federal government.

That sums up my thoughts, it just movest he 'problem' form one handfull of states to another. Not that I wouldn't mind both parties thinking they might actually have to campaign here in California. I don't have a better solution, but I think this is more grandstanding by her than anything usefull.

Bill

 

[acemcmac]

Originally posted by: DevilsAdvocate

Originally posted by: wiin
Democrats To Push For End To Electoral College

All Feinstein and Lofgren (and the perpetually clueless Lincoln Chaffee, representing Rhode Islanders who should be shaking their heads tonight) propose is a switch between those states and the big four or five: California, New York, Florida, Texas, and maybe Ohio or Pennsylvania. Ten percent of the states would determine the presidency, and probably produce all of the viable candidates for the office. Not coincidentally, Democrats do better in most of these states than anywhere else in the country. This isn't about direct democracy -- which the founding fathers deliberately avoided in order to give all the states a voice in the federal government.

Let me put it another way. If the Democrats are so concerned about direct election, why don't they arrange their presidential primaries in the same manner? Until they hold all of their primary elections and caucuses on one day and name the biggest vote-getter the winner, the Democrats are just blowing smoke about a commitment to democracy. They're just desperate now that they can no longer compete under the system they ran for decades.



What democrats should do is look at the election results and increase their numbers in areas where the election results are not far apart by having democrats from Mass and Cali, for example, move into these areas.

Here's an idea. The Democrats should try to avoid setting a socialist agenda that alienates the heartland.

just as the neo-cons could avoid setting an agenda that alienates anyone who has ever studied international politics or basic economics.

 

[DZip]

I have another way to maintain our representative democracy and do away with the Electoral College. Use the county by county results instead of the state "winner take all" electoral votes. By using a broader cross-section of our population, we will have a better idea of how America thinks. To make thing fair we need to change the colors, use red for the democrat's and blue for republicans, that way the next election will finally show blue counties in the majority.

 

[Stunt]

Originally posted by: DZip
I have another way to maintain our representative democracy and do away with the Electoral College. Use the county by county results instead of the state "winner take all" electoral votes. By using a broader cross-section of our population, we will have a better idea of how America thinks. To make thing fair we need to change the colors, use red for the democrat's and blue for republicans, that way the next election will finally show blue counties in the majority.

what do the colors have to do with anything...
mind you...here in canada, conservatives are blue, liberals red and new democrats orange.
orange has always been the social color, i don't understand why the GOP uses red.

 

[TheBDB]

Argh, I sure hope people understand how much better a popular vote would be. I think it would increase voter turnout because EVERY VOTE WOULD MATTER. I also think it is funny that people think it would help the Democrats. If nationwide polls had Bush ahead of Kerry, and everyone voted, BUSH WOULD STILL WIN. All a popular vote would do would make the minority party in each state vote more, but it goes both ways. Democrats in Wyoming, Texas, etc. would vote more, and so would Republicans in Massachusetts, New York. In the end the candidate who could muster up the most votes out of all 50 states would win, not the one that could get a slim majority in a couple swing states.

 

[Stunt]

Originally posted by: TheBDB
Argh, I sure hope people understand how much better a popular vote would be. I think it would increase voter turnout because EVERY VOTE WOULD MATTER. I also think it is funny that people think it would help the Democrats. If nationwide polls had Bush ahead of Kerry, and everyone voted, BUSH WOULD STILL WIN. All a popular vote would do would make the minority party in each state vote more, but it goes both ways. Democrats in Wyoming, Texas, etc. would vote more, and so would Republicans in Massachusetts, New York. In the end the candidate who could muster up the most votes out of all 50 states would win, not the one that could get a slim majority in a couple swing states.

I think the reason the EC will never die is because even though the dems or reps lose, they are destined to win...

If you have popular vote, it opens the door to new parties which just won't do for either side.

 

[DragonMasterAlex]

This is a TERRIBLE idea and only shows your IGNORANCE of the purpose and function of the Electoral College. The EC works to ensure that the large, populated states with more people do not always dominate elections. Without the electoral college, 80% of the states would have, in effect, NO VOICE in electing the President of the United States.

SHAME on you for trying to cash in on people's ignorance of this GREAT and well thought out system adn trying to destroy it.

Jason

 

[DragonMasterAlex]

Originally posted by: wchou
with electoral college, our votes are pointless. Just let them decide who should be our next president because they are god? they are perfect? electoral represent majority of the people? clueless aren't we?
Again why bother voting? Waste of our time and effort to even bother. Nothing more then a pawned game.
It's pitiful at best..:thumbsdown:

You obviously have NO IDEA how the EC works. For starters, the instances of state Electors voting differently than the popular vote can be counted on ONE HAND. To continue, 26 of 51 states (District of Columbia counts) have laws that FORBID the Electors from voting differently than the popular vote. http://www.archives.gov/federa...oral_college/laws.html.

Must electors vote for the candidate who won their State's popular vote?

There is no Constitutional provision or Federal law that requires electors to vote according to the results of the popular vote in their States. Some States, however, require electors to cast their votes according to the popular vote. These pledges fall into two categories -- electors bound by State law and those bound by pledges to political parties.

Which States bind electors to popular vote results? Refer to Electors Bound by State Law and Pledges to find out.

The Supreme Court has held that the Constitution does not require that electors be completely free to act as they choose and therefore, political parties may extract pledges from electors to vote for the parties' nominees. Some State laws provide that so-called "faithless electors" may be subject to fines or may be disqualified for casting an invalid vote and be replaced by a substitute elector. The Supreme Court has not specifically ruled on the question of whether pledges and penalties for failure to vote as pledged may be enforced under the Constitution. No elector has ever been prosecuted for failing to vote as pledged.

Today, it is rare for electors to disregard the popular vote by casting their electoral vote for someone other than their party's candidate. Electors generally hold a leadership position in their party or were chosen to recognize years of loyal service to the party. Throughout our history as a nation, more than 99 percent of electors have voted as pledged.

How the EC works

Try speaking from some knowledge rather than the blind, IGNORANT common opinion of your fellow retards.

Jason

 

[DragonMasterAlex]

Originally posted by: DevilsAdvocate
BTW, what is a pawned game?

You know, it's when you're broke so you take your Playstation game down and get it pawned for a few bucks

Jason

 

[DragonMasterAlex]

Originally posted by: acemcmac

Originally posted by: DevilsAdvocate

Originally posted by: wiin
Democrats To Push For End To Electoral College

All Feinstein and Lofgren (and the perpetually clueless Lincoln Chaffee, representing Rhode Islanders who should be shaking their heads tonight) propose is a switch between those states and the big four or five: California, New York, Florida, Texas, and maybe Ohio or Pennsylvania. Ten percent of the states would determine the presidency, and probably produce all of the viable candidates for the office. Not coincidentally, Democrats do better in most of these states than anywhere else in the country. This isn't about direct democracy -- which the founding fathers deliberately avoided in order to give all the states a voice in the federal government.

Let me put it another way. If the Democrats are so concerned about direct election, why don't they arrange their presidential primaries in the same manner? Until they hold all of their primary elections and caucuses on one day and name the biggest vote-getter the winner, the Democrats are just blowing smoke about a commitment to democracy. They're just desperate now that they can no longer compete under the system they ran for decades.



What democrats should do is look at the election results and increase their numbers in areas where the election results are not far apart by having democrats from Mass and Cali, for example, move into these areas.

Here's an idea. The Democrats should try to avoid setting a socialist agenda that alienates the heartland.

just as the neo-cons could avoid setting an agenda that alienates anyone who has ever studied international politics or basic economics.

Translation: They should try not to offend those who are more concerned with kissing the asses of Socialists the world over than in taking care of their own country.

Jason

 

[DragonMasterAlex]

Originally posted by: TheBDB
Argh, I sure hope people understand how much better a popular vote would be. I think it would increase voter turnout because EVERY VOTE WOULD MATTER. I also think it is funny that people think it would help the Democrats. If nationwide polls had Bush ahead of Kerry, and everyone voted, BUSH WOULD STILL WIN. All a popular vote would do would make the minority party in each state vote more, but it goes both ways. Democrats in Wyoming, Texas, etc. would vote more, and so would Republicans in Massachusetts, New York. In the end the candidate who could muster up the most votes out of all 50 states would win, not the one that could get a slim majority in a couple swing states.

If there is ONE lesson and one lesson ONLY that you should learn from the GREEKS, it is that DIRECT DEMOCRACY IS A BAD THING.

Majority Rule is NOT consistent with the idea that all men are created equal and that EACH man has inalienable rights.

Jason

 

[HombrePequeno]

Originally posted by: oldman420

In most states, the candidate who wins a state?s election, wins all of that state?s electoral votes, no matter the winning margin, which can disenfranchise those who supported the losing candidate;

That hasn't always been the case. Back in the day (beginning of the country) states would regularly split their votes up between candidates. It'd be a lot better if all of the states did that so that it would more accurately reflect the popular vote while still having a representative type electoral system.

 

[Stunt]

Originally posted by: DragonMasterAlex
This is a TERRIBLE idea and only shows your IGNORANCE of the purpose and function of the Electoral College. The EC works to ensure that the large, populated states with more people do not always dominate elections. Without the electoral college, 80% of the states would have, in effect, NO VOICE in electing the President of the United States.

SHAME on you for trying to cash in on people's ignorance of this GREAT and well thought out system adn trying to destroy it.

Jason

I agree with this statement. Here in Canada 8.2 million people live in southern ontario. This represents well over a third of our population. To have one small region become the voice of a country is just wrong.
(southern ortario has 70 seats out of a total of 308 seats)

This is why i support a sharing of the EC votes based on percentage of votes.
You get the rural voice and millions of votes are not voided.

 

[her209]

A brief history of the Electoral College (PDF)