Texashiker
Lifer
- Dec 18, 2010
- 18,811
- 197
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spark serious discussion of the equity of our democracy.
The US is not a democracy, and hopefully never will be.
spark serious discussion of the equity of our democracy.
Ha! Have you really thought about it?
Oh. Let's not give the STATES an equal bearing on the presidential election then!
Of course they didn't. Why would they? If a democrat won the presidency and lost the popular vote, I'd be on the same side of the argument too.The Founding Fathers rightfully feared foreign intervention in our elections, did not trust the whims of the masses and also needed to secure the support of the smaller states by assuring a balance to counter the larger states. The electoral system preserves that intent. As I said earlier in the thread, Democrats certainly didn’t have a concern over the electoral college when they won the White House.
You clearly prefer an oligarchy. Or perhaps military dictatorship?The US is not a democracy, and hopefully never will be.
This is a legitimate concern but has more to do with poorly run (perhaps even intentionally) voting mechanisms in many particularly red states more than the actual concept of a popular vote. It doesn't actually decrease the merit of the popular vote concept but certainly is something that many states and likely the federal government would have to address.Silly idea. Imagine the Florida recount fiasco but now for the entire country. Candidates would camp out in New York and L.A. and would rarely venture a few miles inland.
The US is not a democracy, and hopefully never will be.
It's almost like you have no argument to make in favor of the EC and so regurgitate meaningless phrases.The US is not a democracy, and hopefully never will be.
Did you read the link I posted? What is your argument against it?Why? Because the GOP would have to adopt a better party message to garner a majority of votes? Oh the horror. Can you name one other thing in life where you’d enjoy minority rule to be law?
Did you read your own link?
Democrats certainly didn’t have a concern over the electoral college when they won the White House.
That's an easy one. Your vote counts as a single vote, exactly the same as every other vote in your state. The president is elected by the states, not by the people.
, , , eliminating the EC is a bad idea.
The Founding Fathers rightfully feared foreign intervention in our elections, did not trust the whims of the masses and also needed to secure the support of the smaller states by assuring a balance to counter the larger states. The electoral system preserves that intent. As I said earlier in the thread, Democrats certainly didn’t have a concern over the electoral college when they won the White House.
Did you read your own link?
Interesting (incorrect) conclusion.Yes. States are not countries.
Interesting (incorrect) conclusion.
A "state" is literally a country. You're blinded by the term "state" because the individual states that joined this "United States" union don't always act like individual countries in certain matters. Each state in this union agreed to give up control of specific inter-state and inter-national responsibilities to a federal government.
The Tenth Amendment clarifies:
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people."
The federal government was only supposed to regulate inter-state commerce, inter-national commerce, and national defense (oh yeah, and the postal system too). In regards to our indivudial lives, your state should have far greater control than the federal government. Local government should have greater powers than your state. Finally, you should have absolute power over your private property unless it violates the rights of others.
Basically all of the federal government power grabs and over-stepping boundaries are based on an old court case regarding the inter-state commerce clause. The federal government was able to force a man to grow less corn. Why? Because the corn might find its way into other states or otherwise affect demand for corn from surrounding states, even if the farmer sold his corn exclusively within his own state. That started a slow erosion of personal freedom and eventually this government will fail as badly as all the most powerful civilizations have.
Interesting (incorrect) conclusion.
A "state" is literally a country. You're blinded by the term "state" because the individual states that joined this "United States" union don't always act like individual countries in certain matters. Each state in this union agreed to give up control of specific inter-state and inter-national responsibilities to a federal government.
The Tenth Amendment clarifies:
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people."
The federal government was only supposed to regulate inter-state commerce, inter-national commerce, and national defense (oh yeah, and the postal system too). In regards to our indivudial lives, your state should have far greater control than the federal government. Local government should have greater powers than your state. Finally, you should have absolute power over your private property unless it violates the rights of others.
Basically all of the federal government power grabs and over-stepping boundaries are based on an old court case regarding the inter-state commerce clause. The federal government was able to force a man to grow less corn. Why? Because the corn might find its way into other states or otherwise affect demand for corn from surrounding states, even if the farmer sold his corn exclusively within his own state. That started a slow erosion of personal freedom and eventually this government will fail as badly as all the most powerful civilizations have.
This is a bafflingly ignorant post. A state is any territory unified under a political government. Some of those are countries, some are not. I’m not ‘blinded’ to anything, I’m simply telling you that your definition is unarguably wrong.
States, insofar as the term applies to the United States, are not countries. They do not enjoy a monopoly over the use of force within their boundaries, they do not control their own foreign policy, etc. they are not countries. Period.
Your state does hve far greater power over your day to day life than the federal government does. Very few of the laws that govern your daily living are federal ones.
As far as local governments having more power than the state that’s impossible as all of their powers are derived from the state.
You seem to be ranting about what you wish the distribution of power between the states and the feds would be, not what it actually is.
Before you start lecturing other people on our system of government I suggest you learn the basics of how it works first.
Yes. Exactly. Today we have the Dems and Republicans. Tomorrow we may have the whigs and the Federalists and copperheads again.I'm in favor, not because of which political party it might favor, which will probably change over time anyway, but because it will mean that presidential candidates can no longer ignore people in "safe" states.
The only reason the GOP favors the EC is that it made their loser the winner of two out of three of our last Presidencies. It's just another way for them to game the system, like gerrymandering, voter suppression & whatever else they can get away with.
It's like they don't want honest democracy at all. And it's not like those presidencies have been smashing successes for this country, either.
You're right, but, as has been pointed out several times, the USA is NOT a democracy. We are a federal republic and a constitutional representative democracy.
The US is a democracy. A representative democracy is still a democracy.
If the US is not a democracy then they do not exist.
But a true democracy is "majority wins." Obviously, that's not the case here...