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+---- Thread: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? (/Thread-How-big-of-a-vote-gap-would-it-take-for-you-to-drop-the-Electoral-College)
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - GMDino - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 10:55 AM)BmorePat87 Wrote: Yea, why should we vote on a Tuesday just because Congress said it was a good idea in the 1800's?
And when we don't have to travel for a whole day to get to polling locations.
Well, most of us. And as long as the GOP doesn't get their way.
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - CJD - 04-03-2019
Voting on Tuesday used to be so that people in the country could travel to the polls to vote without interfering with their religious commitments.
Sunday was church day, so you traveled on Monday, arrived on Tuesday to vote and returned home that evening.
Nowadays it's just a way to suppress the vote of people who work during weekdays and don't have benefits such as paid time off or the ability to come into work late/early.
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - Sociopathicsteelerfan - 04-03-2019
I view the EC in the same terms I view the Senate. It's designed so that states have a separate say in the election of who leads them. I've seen many posts lamenting the inflated importance of a vote in Wyoming compared to California. This is no different than pointing out that each senator from Wyoming represents a fraction of the citizens that a senator from California does. The tyranny of the majority was a legitimate concern for the Framers and both these institutions acts as a bulwark against that.
I've seen many post lamenting the few "swing states" that decide elections and get most of the attention from candidates. Abolishing the EC won't change this, it will only change the targeted areas. Instead of campaigning in Ohio, Florida, etc. you'll get campaigning in NYC, LA, Chicago, Boston and Miami. Rural areas will be utterly ignored as the time spent in them won't justify the potential votes earned. Essentially, abolishing the EC does not fix this problem it merely shifts attention to other places.
The United States is unique in many ways and one of those ways is that it is a collection of states with the ability to act autonomously to a certain degree. Population centers are naturally located near the coasts, but this not mean our inland states are any less important or any less a state than the coastal ones. The EC does an excellent job of giving each state their own, separate, say in who leads this nation. I think abolishing it would be an extremely poor decision and I do think this discussion is flavored with more than a little sour grapes (not here necessarily, but in general).
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - Belsnickel - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 11:57 AM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: I view the EC in the same terms I view the Senate. It's designed so that states have a separate say in the election of who leads them. I've seen many posts lamenting the inflated importance of a vote in Wyoming compared to California. This is no different than pointing out that each senator from Wyoming represents a fraction of the citizens that a senator from California does. The tyranny of the majority was a legitimate concern for the Framers and both these institutions acts as a bulwark against that.
Well, it is different. Because in the case of the Senate it is offset by the House of Representatives. There is no offset for the EC. The whole reason the EC was created was to have a body similar to Congress to make the decision, but not Congress because of separation of powers. However, the disparity between the populations was never as great as it is now, the number of individuals an Elector represented was never this great, and the winner-take-all system in place in most states makes it worse. This also gets into my argument in favor of a sizeable expansion of the HoR, though, so I'll stop here. Tl;dr: representation in this country is piss poor and needs to be fixed.
(04-03-2019, 11:57 AM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: I've seen many post lamenting the few "swing states" that decide elections and get most of the attention from candidates. Abolishing the EC won't change this, it will only change the targeted areas. Instead of campaigning in Ohio, Florida, etc. you'll get campaigning in NYC, LA, Chicago, Boston and Miami. Rural areas will be utterly ignored as the time spent in them won't justify the potential votes earned. Essentially, abolishing the EC does not fix this problem it merely shifts attention to other places.
Rural places are ignored, now, in the general. Campaigns focus their attention on where they will get the most bang for their buck. This won't shift the attention from one place to another, it will expand it. I agree it won't solve the problem altogether, but it isn't the wash you make it out to be.
(04-03-2019, 11:57 AM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: The United States is unique in many ways and one of those ways is that it is a collection of states with the ability to act autonomously to a certain degree. Population centers are naturally located near the coasts, but this not mean our inland states are any less important or any less a state than the coastal ones. The EC does an excellent job of giving each state their own, separate, say in who leads this nation. I think abolishing it would be an extremely poor decision and I do think this discussion is flavored with more than a little sour grapes (not here necessarily, but in general).
Would you agree that the winner-take-all system for Electors is an issue?
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - fredtoast - 04-03-2019
Sorry to jump in late but does the EC require that states can not split up their delegates. I have no prblem with the states getting votes based on seats in congress. I just disagree with the "all or nothing" allocation.
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - Belsnickel - 04-03-2019
When we talk about the intent of the Framers, I think of Hamilton's writing in Federalist 68. Almost every single thing that Hamilton points out as being of value in the Electoral College is moot, now.
He makes the argument that the electors would be the ones most capable of making the decision, yet they don't make the decision any longer. They are beholden to the vote of the people. This was because of a lack of information among the general public at the time, which is no longer the case, either.
The "transient existence" of the Electoral College to mitigate the risk of interference in the process is also moot. Again, as they do not make the decision it is irrelevant that it is a transient body. It also does not mitigate the risk of interference well enough, as we have learned.
There was the concern that the president would be beholden to Congress, so the EC kept it to the people. However, this was ignorant of the emergence of parties which has rendered this rationale moot.
The saddest part in re-reading these papers was how wrong he was about the type of person that would need to run for president and win. "It will not be too strong to say, that there will be a constant probability of seeing the station filled by characters pre-eminent for ability and virtue."
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - Belsnickel - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 12:43 PM)fredtoast Wrote: Sorry to jump in late but does the EC require that states can not split up their delegates. I have no prblem with the states getting votes based on seats in congress. I just disagree with the "all or nothing" allocation.
It does not. How a state allocates their Electors is left up to them.
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - michaelsean - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 11:01 AM)Crazyjdawg Wrote: Voting on Tuesday used to be so that people in the country could travel to the polls to vote without interfering with their religious commitments.
Sunday was church day, so you traveled on Monday, arrived on Tuesday to vote and returned home that evening.
Nowadays it's just a way to suppress the vote of people who work during weekdays and don't have benefits such as paid time off or the ability to come into work late/early.
Except for all the places you have like two months to vote.
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - Sociopathicsteelerfan - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 12:31 PM)Belsnickel Wrote: Well, it is different. Because in the case of the Senate it is offset by the House of Representatives. There is no offset for the EC. The whole reason the EC was created was to have a body similar to Congress to make the decision, but not Congress because of separation of powers. However, the disparity between the populations was never as great as it is now, the number of individuals an Elector represented was never this great, and the winner-take-all system in place in most states makes it worse. This also gets into my argument in favor of a sizeable expansion of the HoR, though, so I'll stop here. Tl;dr: representation in this country is piss poor and needs to be fixed.
The disparity in population you cite, correctly, is a cornerstone of my argument. I would have no problem with an expansion of the HoR to provide more equal representation in the form of EC votes. But eliminating it altogether would be a tremendous error IMO.
Quote:Rural places are ignored, now, in the general. Campaigns focus their attention on where they will get the most bang for their buck. This won't shift the attention from one place to another, it will expand it. I agree it won't solve the problem altogether, but it isn't the wash you make it out to be.
Hillary ignored rural areas and it cost her the election. I don't think you'll see future candidates make the same error, at least in the immediate future. A pure popular vote POTUS election will see the vast majority of states completely ignored by candidates and if you can safely ignore an area and still et elected what incentive is there for you to address the problems being faces by the peoples of those areas? If we're talking about compassionate people then there'd always be a humane reason for doing so, but forgive me for being a bit cynical about presidential candidates in this regard.
Quote:Would you agree that the winner-take-all system for Electors is an issue?
No, as proportioning the EC votes is almost the same as a popular vote total, it's basically a distinction without a difference. I like the current system as it prevents regionalism to the degree it is possible to do so. Also, let's be real about this, the only reason most people are even having this discussion is because they're bitter that Hillary lost. I know you're not one of those people but most of the people making the abolish the EC argument are. I'm never going to be in favor of changing the rules because the person I like didn't win under the current ones. It's the same reason I would vehemently oppose any SCOTUS court packing efforts should the Dems win in 2020.
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - fredtoast - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 01:57 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: I like the current system as it prevents regionalism to the degree it is possible to do so.
No it does not. In a state where most of the people live in big cities the rural areas will be ignored.
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - fredtoast - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 01:48 PM)michaelsean Wrote: Except for all the places you have like two months to vote.
Amazing coincidence that Republicans are also attempting to reduce early voting.
Funny how they always end up on the side of suppressing the vote.
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - hollodero - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 01:57 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: A pure popular vote POTUS election will see the vast majority of states completely ignored by candidates and if you can safely ignore an area and still et elected what incentive is there for you to address the problems being faces by the peoples of those areas?
But doesn't that argument go both ways?
I feel half the states, at least, could safely be painted red or blue on the EC map before the election. And hence can safely be ignored. No one campaigns in North Dakota or Massachusetts in a general election, or do they? In a way I do not see the difference.
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - Belsnickel - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 01:57 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: The disparity in population you cite, correctly, is a cornerstone of my argument. I would have no problem with an expansion of the HoR to provide more equal representation in the form of EC votes. But eliminating it altogether would be a tremendous error IMO.
The only way the EC should be kept is if all votes are equal among voters. If you have any state where it takes twice as many citizens to make up an electoral vote compared to another state, then it is an undemocratic institution. Right now we have states where it takes four times as many people as other states. This is an inequitable process. No person's vote should count more than another person's.
(04-03-2019, 01:57 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Hillary ignored rural areas and it cost her the election. I don't think you'll see future candidates make the same error, at least in the immediate future. A pure popular vote POTUS election will see the vast majority of states completely ignored by candidates and if you can safely ignore an area and still et elected what incentive is there for you to address the problems being faces by the peoples of those areas? If we're talking about compassionate people then there'd always be a humane reason for doing so, but forgive me for being a bit cynical about presidential candidates in this regard.
Clinton didn't lose for ignoring the rural areas, she ignored the rust belt. But the focus in the rust belt is still in more urban areas, the industrial centers. To go the rural route there is inefficient for a campaign. They just don't do it. There is no incentive to go to rural areas now, and no incentive for them to pay attention to their plights, now.
(04-03-2019, 01:57 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: No, as proportioning the EC votes is almost the same as a popular vote total, it's basically a distinction without a difference. I like the current system as it prevents regionalism to the degree it is possible to do so. Also, let's be real about this, the only reason most people are even having this discussion is because they're bitter that Hillary lost. I know you're not one of those people but most of the people making the abolish the EC argument are. I'm never going to be in favor of changing the rules because the person I like didn't win under the current ones. It's the same reason I would vehemently oppose any SCOTUS court packing efforts should the Dems win in 2020.
To be fair, my campaign against the EC began after Gore lost. That being said, that was also when I was 15 and really just starting to pay attention to these sorts of things. I was also a libertarian type in my teen years, so that was likely a big reason.
So by utilizing a winner-take-all system, we discount the votes of millions of people. A Republican in your state has a wasted vote. A Democrat in Mississippi has a wasted vote. This goes back to my viewpoint that every vote should count equally, which is the cornerstone of my position. Right now that does not happen.
In the spirit of the debates of the Constitutional Convention, how would you feel about allocation based on House District, with the two remaining Electors being allocated with a state overall vote, much like the way seats are handled in Congress?
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - Belsnickel - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 02:28 PM)hollodero Wrote: But doesn't that argument go both ways?
I feel half the states, at least, could safely be painted red or blue on the EC map before the election. And hence can safely be ignored. No one campaigns in North Dakota or Massachusetts in a general election, or do they? In a way I do not see the difference.
You are very correct. I was listening to some former campaign staffers talk about how about 90% of the campaign visits during the general election happen in something like 10 states. About half of the states do not see any candidate visit them during the campaign.
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - CJD - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 01:57 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Hillary ignored rural areas and it cost her the election. I don't think you'll see future candidates make the same error, at least in the immediate future. A pure popular vote POTUS election will see the vast majority of states completely ignored by candidates and if you can safely ignore an area and still et elected what incentive is there for you to address the problems being faces by the peoples of those areas? If we're talking about compassionate people then there'd always be a humane reason for doing so, but forgive me for being a bit cynical about presidential candidates in this regard.
How much do you think the rural New York areas were heard in this past election?
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - michaelsean - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 02:17 PM)fredtoast Wrote: Amazing coincidence that Republicans are also attempting to reduce early voting.
Funny how they always end up on the side of suppressing the vote.
Reduce it to what? 2 weeks?
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - fredtoast - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 01:57 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Also, let's be real about this, the only reason most people are even having this discussion is because they're bitter that Hillary lost.
And to be real the only people who argue "I am in favor of democracy as long as my vote counts more than someone else's" are the ones glad Trump and Bush won.
How can anyone be in favor of democracy yet argue some people's votes should count more than others?
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - TheLeonardLeap - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 08:32 AM)Belsnickel Wrote: Even in those states where Trump got about half the votes Clinton did, shouldn't he have gotten something out of that? Instead, no EC votes.
That is a state-by-state decision. Any state can choose to split up their EC votes based off vote %, or as most states do, can just go winner-take-all.
Nebraska and Maine both split their EC votes. State's choice.
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - Sociopathicsteelerfan - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 02:28 PM)hollodero Wrote: But doesn't that argument go both ways?
I feel half the states, at least, could safely be painted red or blue on the EC map before the election. And hence can safely be ignored. No one campaigns in North Dakota or Massachusetts in a general election, or do they? In a way I do not see the difference.
Yes, but not in the same way. Safe states still get attention from candidates though, Clinton certainly campaigned in both CA and NY. Even so, why exacerbate an undesirable situation?
(04-03-2019, 02:47 PM)Crazyjdawg Wrote: How much do you think the rural New York areas were heard in this past election?
To the same extent they always have. Are we now advocating to abolish the concepts of states as well?
(04-03-2019, 02:57 PM)fredtoast Wrote: And to be real the only people who argue "I am in favor of democracy as long as my vote counts more than someone else's" are the ones glad Trump and Bush won.
An utterly specious statement. The EC has been the law of the land for over a century, there is no argument necessary to maintain what we've had in practice for so long.
Quote:How can anyone be in favor of democracy yet argue some people's votes should count more than others?
So you're in favor of abolishing the Senate now too? Wow, you far left types can't stop finding things about this country you want to utterly change.
RE: How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College? - fredtoast - 04-03-2019
(04-03-2019, 02:55 PM)michaelsean Wrote: Reduce it to what? 2 weeks?
Different measures in different states.
https://prospect.org/article/22-states-wave-new-voting-restrictions-threatens-shift-outcomes-tight-races
After the 2008 election, support for early voting eroded among Republican legislators in the South and Midwest. What changed? For the first time, African Americans had begun voting early at high rates. In Southern states, early voting by African Americans nearly tripled between 2004 and 2008, overtaking early voting by whites by a significant margin. In North Carolina, for example, seven in ten African Americans voted early in 2008, as compared to half of white voters. And while Republicans have traditionally been more likely to vote early, in 2008 Democratic early votes exceeded Republican ones.
Just as early voting has become successful among minorities and lower-income voters, it has become a target. Since 2011, eight states that saw recent increases in minority early voting usage have sharply cut back on early voting hours and days—Florida, Georgia, Nebraska, North Carolina, Ohio, Tennessee, West Virginia, and Wisconsin. Generally, the days and hours most likely to be slashed were those most popular with minorities and hourly workers, like Sundays and evenings. According to a 2008 Ohio study, 56 percent of weekend voters in Cuyahoga County, the state’s most populous, were black.