In reply to: It’s about 40,000 votes in three states posted by gregmorrissey
You recount everywhere. Sounds like hell.
I think one, perhaps unintended, feature of the EC is that it limits the scope of challenges.
From now on, I want you all to call me Loretta.
What arguments, today, would you use to justify the voting power differential for individuals in different states?
For 250 years, the parties would hypothetically renegotiate and do what exactly? Wait we have a process for that. I wonder what it’s called.
today over a popular vote? Why?
Yes, laws at any level can change. A useful observation! Indeed, that's exactly what the compact would do -- states would change their laws in order to apportion their EC votes, a power generally left to the states in the Constitution. So now that we agree, states can make laws and take actions... maybe you can try answering?
If we're going to move to Popular vote, then I want the US 2-party system blown up.
The best way to do this is move to RCV across the board, for all candidates.
This *should* give third party candidates a reasonable shot and now the popular vote also incorporates the 50% Independent middle.
As someone downthread (maybe ElK? ) pointed out, are we ready to become the next EU?
proposal complies with the Constitution. States can decide how to award their electoral college votes which is why Nebraska and Maine award them by Congressional District. If that view prevails no amendment would be needed.
Movement. I won't accept faithless electors - not ad hoc as Trump wanted them when he didn't win, and not "legally" bound to how others outside my state vote as opposed to how my state voted.
That is a bridge too far. I don't want to be part of that version of the United States. And I will be in good company.
P.S. Porous borders + citizenship + this popular vote compact is quite the Democratic Party strategic plan.
they will be following the rules established by the State. My difficulty on this topic is there are two competing arguments. First, dont let CA or NY tell me how to live. Two, if NY OR CA change their rules for their state in a way I dont like I am out.
In my view something needs to give. The entire premise of the nation rests upon the acceptance of the winner as legitimate. If we cotinue to have popular vote winners who lose the the electoral college I am not certain how long we can sustain that.
We see it here in Illinois with the "Eastern Block" in the legislature who want to divide into two states because Chicago region controls everything and does not represent their values. However, they have far fewer representatives than the Chicago area because of course they have fewer residents.
I already live in your crooked shithole. But it isn't enough for you to control state and local - you want it all. And you want it with a radical change via no Amendment, just a 50+1 vote in each state. Completely unsurprising.
Positively trumpian language. Ffs, you're better than this.
A reasonable argument in support. Honestly have not given much thought to the idea so not certain where I would come down. I do think as a general matter more elections where the popular vote winner loses the election undermines faith in the process and that is a bad thing for the nation. It yes you know we well enough to know that I want to control the whole nation.
As for my crooked shithole you have the freedom to live in another state and still enjoy all the benefits of being a US Citizen to get away from me and my co-conspirators of course I don’t have the similar ability to move to another state and still not deal with EC and its impact on elections.
People in Chicago want guns banned because there's a crime/gang (not to mention prosecution) problem up here.
So for that reason, should farmers south of 80 not be allowed to have AR's to kill gophers that could maim their cattle with their holes?
Even Canadian farmers have guns. They don't ask for or need semi autos with high capacity. They don't need Carl spacklers c4.
Pistols are a more tangled web. Good people usually want them because bad people want them and they feel threatened.
This fuckers can go to fucking hell.
As Raoul said, if the electors exist, I want them to vote the way the people in my state voted, not the way people in another state voted.
workarounds. Alas, I think this workaround is the most likely.
on things like early voting, absentee voting, whether felons can vote, etc...
You need to Amend if want Popular Vote and then everyone has the same set of voting rules - for president at least. But right now it is 50 individual races with 50 sets of rules. Tying your electors to how the other 49 states voted is insanity and reduces the value of my vote, which was done in my state under the rules of my state.
Changed to a popular vote in the wake of the 1968 election. It fell apart because of southern opposition in the senate after house approval by large margins.
If it changes by the Amendment process, fine. That is not the compact.
consitently won the popular vote but lost the electoral college because CA and NY gave the Dems an enormous advantage? What if I dont want Oklahoma, Alabama, Mississippi and a host of other states to "govern me"?
The Constitution is set up as it is set up, and there's an established process to amend it.
If people want it changed, change it that way. Don't short-circuit things because reasons or gridlock or Trump or whatever.
Has the constitutional authority to make the change. If enough states pass it someone will
Challenge and the Supreme Court will make a decision. If they uphold the change then it wasn’t short circuiting the process. If they rule it violates the Constitution it won’t take affect.
mean that they're governing you as opposed to the "the president desired by the most voters" governs you?
I'd be happy to split NY into two states - NYC + Long Island vs the rest. Maybe the NYC people can keep Westchester too.
I would hate to lose upstate NY. Its a beautiful place. But, boy do you think you are in the south the more north you drive away from NYC.
If you took everything north of about Calera up through the border with Tennessee, it'd likely be in the top half of the country in things like median income, probably top 10 in growth, probably top 15 or so in innovation per capita, etc. Huntsville (especially), the southern half of Birmingham, Tuscaloosa, Florence / Muscle Shoals, and Madison / Decatur are all nice places to live with a good bit going on. Anniston / Oxford is a shithole, to use the term above, but it's not much than a waystation to Atlanta or a place to sleep after a night at 'Dega for most people.
Central and south central Alabama are...tough. The old Black Belt towns are about as rough as it gets in the U.S. Driving to the Pandhandle beaches from Montgomery is bleak until you get near the coast. Only saving grace in that part of the state are Lake Martin (which is very, very nice - probably among the top handful of lake towns in the Southern U.S.) and Auburn.
On the coastal part, the Mobile side of the bay has some nice parts and some rough parts but overall, I would strongly prefer the Baldwin County side of the bay. Baldwin County, especially Fairhope, is very nice and is among the fastest-growing parts of the country. If I had cash to spare, I would buy property there right now. Gulf Shores and Orange Beach are a lot different than they were 20 years; much more bougie and upscale and trending even more that way.
Pittsburgh in the west, Philly in the east, and Alabama in the middle.
We can even name the place N. Alabama
A Republican in CA, IL, or NY would have far more incentive to vote. Same for a Democrat in WY, UT, or OK.
In a real sense, with a popular vote, the entire nation would collectively decide who governs the nation. That approach makes sense to me. And you would get more of a say in that case, not less.
As it is now, the matter is decided state by state. In that system, whether your vote matters at all depends on where you live. And that's true in at least two ways. First, I think it's relatively safe to say a Republican's vote doesn't much matter in CA, IL, or NY. Same for a Democrat's vote in WY, UT, or OK. The result will be the same whether that voter votes or stays home. Second, the electoral college creates a relative weight problem that gives more power to certain states. For example, CA gets one vote in the electoral college for every 718,909 people. MT gets one for every 360,000. It's as though every vote in MT really counts for two CA votes.
I'm not convinced there is anything obviously superior about the electoral college. And I am not convinced, at all, that a popular vote would somehow mean CA and NY would govern the entire nation.
Version of the eu.
Because they don't rule anything in the individual countries. The EU is subject to treaties among the members, currently the Treaty of Lisbon, ratified in 2009. They typically need to have unanimous consent to do anything with the force of law.
Since they're in the news, as just one example I invite you to compare the current governments of Sweden and Hungary.
There is absolutely no comparison to the President of the United States in any capacity in the EU. The President of the European Commission is a completely different position with a completely different purpose. It's an appointed position. The EU also has no military aspect whatsoever (it can provide military aid, as it has to Ukraine, but it has no military). And there is still no ratified European Constitution. If there ever is one (the last vote on one failed in 2006 when France and the Netherlands voted it down; there were other member states who hadn't voted yet), it's likely a very long way off.
Like the others, I genuinely don't know what point he's trying to make. I get the sense he doesn't know what point he's trying to make either.
Does the EU elect a chief executive that is anything at all like the President of the United States?
You think the manner of the presidential election controls how we function as a country?
Sorry, but you'll have to walk me through this one a bit more. I'll note that it seems like a very different point than the one El Kabong was making (and I was responding to).