The end of the Electoral College is near

Oliver

Penultimate Amazing
Oliver
Joined
Aug 12, 2006
Messages
17,396
The topic is a general election issue - so I didn't put it in "vote2008":

Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) introduced a constitutional amendment to abolish the Electoral College on Friday, less than a week after the Democrats settled on how to handle delegates from Florida at their national convention.

“It’s time for Congress to really give Americans the power of one-person, one-vote, instead of the political machinery selecting candidates and electing our president,” Nelson said in a release announcing the amendment.

Nelson had announced he would offer the legislation in an address to his state’s senate in March... *Snip*

Full Source: http://themoderatevoice.com/at-tmv/...will-we-see-the-end-of-the-electoral-college/
Click to expand...


Such a step certainly would be a major one for a more democractic election process in which the focus would shift towards the individuals votes rather than the stupid delegates/ superdelegates/ superduperhyperhyperdelegates*.

*Diebold


Discuss...
 
Not gonna happen. The current process gives extra influence (relative to their size) to small states, and they're not going to ratify an ammendment which will take that influence away. This ammendment has a snowball's chance in hell. You've demonstrated time and time again, Oliver, that you don't understand the mechanics and workings of the US system of government, and this is just one more in a long list.

Oh, and BTW, superdelegates are a feature of the Democratic party - the Republican party has no superdelegates. They are not a feature of US government itself, they would not disappear with this ammendment, but if the Democratic party chose to abolish them they could do so quite easily without any act of Congress.
 
Perhaps it will come as a surprise, but the Electoral College - yes, no or maybe - has no effect upon how the parties choose to select their delegates and/or candidates. If you are referring to something as nebulous as some kind of general run-towards-pure-democracy which will overtake the parties and somehow force them to accept what would amount to irrelevance, then, good luck, but don't hold your breath.
 
Oliver said:
The topic is a general election issue - so I didn't put it in "vote2008":




Such a step certainly would be a major one for a more democractic election process in which the focus would shift towards the individuals votes rather than the stupid delegates/ superdelegates/ superduperhyperhyperdelegates*.

*Diebold


Discuss...
Click to expand...

Well, good luck to the senator...he's going to need it.

And good luck to "The Hill"...they're going to need it for being so stupid for reporting this the way they did...with special ditto's to the Z man.
 
Last edited:
This doesn't actually have anything to do with Diebold or the selection of candidates, does it? Thought not.

Also, the abolition of the Electoral College will not necessarily make the election more democratic. Consider a three way contest between Clinton, Obama and McCain. The vote could look like this:
McCain 32%
Obama 31%
Clinton 31%
Bart Simpson 3%
911 was teh inside job 2%
Ron Paul 1%

McCain would win under the proposed reform with less than a third of the votes and almost two-thirds of voters prefering someone more liberal. Under the electoral college system, Obama's and Clinton's delegates could come together to get one or the other over the line.
 
Oliver said:
The end of the Electoral College is near
Click to expand...

You can see some of the hundreds of other amendments which have introduced just in the past 14-15 years here:

http://www.usconstitution.net/constamprop.html

Of particular note is one that was introduced in 2005-06

The "Every Vote Counts" Amendment - providing for direct election of the President and Vice President, abolishing the Electoral College
Click to expand...

Even more closely related to the topic,

http://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/electoral-tally/

Different opponents and critics of the present system have developed various alternatives over the years, beginning after the election of 1796 when Adams defeated Jefferson by three electoral votes. Since that time more than five hundred constitutional amendments to reform the Electoral College have been introduced to Congress, more amendments than for any other constitutional issue.
Click to expand...

The end is near, much like the Rapture is just around the next corner.
 
gtc said:
This doesn't actually have anything to do with Diebold or the selection of candidates, does it? Thought not.

Also, the abolition of the Electoral College will not necessarily make the election more democratic. Consider a three way contest between Clinton, Obama and McCain. The vote could look like this:
McCain 32%
Obama 31%
Clinton 31%

McCain would win under the proposed reform with less than a third of the votes and almost two-thirds of voters prefering someone more liberal. Under the electoral college system, Obama's and Clinton's delegates could come together to get one or the other over the line.
Click to expand...

How is your scenario an indictment of the popular vote? If Hillary Clinton decided to run as an independent now you'd get similar results, except the breakdown in the EC could have McCain winning upwards of 500 votes. In 1992 a majority of people wanted a candidate more conservative than Bill Clinton (Perot appealed to Bush voters, something that is often overlooked in the mythologizing of Clinton as the smartest politician in the whole wide world). In 2000 Gore got more votes than Bush. And if you count Gore + Nader in Conn., I think he got more votes to win that state. Or, I suppose you could count Gore + Buchanan voters in Miami Dade, and he'd win. The Electoral College is ********.

This bill won't get any traction, of course. You need a string of Republican losses in the EC, probably owing to the children of immigrants from the South. It's OK for rural white people to have extra voting power -- I mean, that goes back to what the Founding Fathers intended -- but you get non-crazy Spanish speakers swinging elections and all bets are off.
 
Ziggurat said:
Not gonna happen. The current process gives extra influence (relative to their size) to small states, and they're not going to ratify an ammendment which will take that influence away. This ammendment has a snowball's chance in hell. <snip the personal stuff>.
Click to expand...
Zig's 100% spot on. But this does have a chance since it is not a constitutional amendment. It has already passed a few states.
 
Cain said:
How is your scenario an indictment of the popular vote?
Click to expand...

I don't mean to indict the popular vote; I just want to point out that it is not necessarily a better reflection of the will of voters.

Personally (and speaking as an Australian), I would recommend some variety of preferential voting. Under the standard Australian system, voters place a 1 beside their preferred candidate, 2 beside their second preferred candidate and so on. The candidate with the least number 1 votes is eliminated and their votes are passed onto the other candidates according to the number 2 votes. This continues until two candidates are left. In my example, the majority of Obama voters and Clinton voters would probably have put the other candidate second and so one or the other would end up winning the election. The Australian system has been extended to optional preferential voting where you do not have to number each candidate and, for Senate elections and the like, preferences can be split (which is similar to having several candidates with the same preference number - 1,2,3,3,3,6,7).

Cain said:
If Hillary Clinton decided to run as an independent now you'd get similar results, except the breakdown in the EC could have McCain winning upwards of 500 votes.
Click to expand...

It is a possibility but I think that assumes that McCain would win the vast majority of states, right? Why do you think that is more likely than Clinton or Obama outpolling McCain in a majority of states?

Cain said:
In 1992 a majority of people wanted a candidate more conservative than Bill Clinton (Perot appealed to Bush voters, something that is often overlooked in the mythologizing of Clinton as the smartest politician in the whole wide world).
Click to expand...

So the results would have been:
Electoral College: Clinton
Popular vote, first preferences only: Clinton
Preferential voting: Bush (Perot eliminated last and assumes most of his votes passed onto Bush not Clinton).

Cain said:
In 2000 Gore got more votes than Bush. And if you count Gore + Nader in Conn., I think he got more votes to win that state. Or, I suppose you could count Gore + Buchanan voters in Miami Dade, and he'd win. The Electoral College is ********.
Click to expand...

So the results would have been:
Electoral College (plus courts etc): Bush
Primary votes: Gore
Preferential voting: Probably Gore.

Cain said:
This bill won't get any traction, of course. You need a string of Republican losses in the EC, probably owing to the children of immigrants from the South. It's OK for rural white people to have extra voting power -- I mean, that goes back to what the Founding Fathers intended -- but you get non-crazy Spanish speakers swinging elections and all bets are off.
Click to expand...

Not sure about this bit.
 
SezMe said:
Zig's 100% spot on. But this does have a chance since it is not a constitutional amendment. It has already passed a few states.
Click to expand...

And it will unpass as soon as a state finds itself electing a president its residents didn't vote for, and as soon as small states realize that they're giving up power to the big states. The incentive to back out is too strong, and there's no method to prevent it.
 
Ziggurat said:
And it will unpass as soon as a state finds itself electing a president its residents didn't vote for, and as soon as small states realize that they're giving up power to the big states. The incentive to back out is too strong, and there's no method to prevent it.
Click to expand...
It's not without its problems. I'm not even sure I'm for it. I was just pointing out that this approach at least has a chance while the Constitutional Amendment simply does not.

BTW, the small states can go piss up a rope as far as this idea is concerned. By the table below, only 11 of the biggest states would have to pass this to put it into force:

<Edit: My simple table won't format right and I'm not about to learn tables here just for this post.>
 
Last edited:
It's very difficult to significantly change any aspects of the voting system, such as the EC, since those who would have power to change it to something new were put in power by the old. Changing it would be to admit they might not be in power if the system were different (or would lose the power they have).
 
gtc said:
So the results would have been:
Electoral College: Clinton
Popular vote, first preferences only: Clinton
Preferential voting: Bush (Perot eliminated last and assumes most of his votes passed onto Bush not Clinton).



So the results would have been:
Electoral College (plus courts etc): Bush
Primary votes: Gore
Preferential voting: Probably Gore.
Click to expand...


Interesting, but the psychology of the individual voters would have been different if different election systems were in place.
 
Oliver said:
Such a step certainly would be a major one for a more democractic election process in which the focus would shift towards the individuals votes rather than the stupid delegates/ superdelegates/ superduperhyperhyperdelegates*.

*Diebold


Discuss...
Click to expand...
Let's hear it for Mobocracy. Go for the full Nelson, and force all laws to require a referendum to pass. Go, Bill, go.

Regarding the OP:

Oliver, why do you care, since you don't, by your own admission, vote in your own nation's elections? Glass houses and stones.

DR
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom