The electoral college is a disaster for a democracy!

Nobody doubts your last sentence there. The election was carried out under existing law.

But, there is a RIDICULOUS disparity going on here.

In Wyoming, it's 3 electors represent 600,000 people - 200,000 people per elector.

If California had one elector for every 200,000 people they would have more than 190 electors!

But, they only have 55!

New York has 20 million people. If they had the same representation they would get 100 electors, not 29.


There may be some justification to add weight to tiny states, but what is going on today is absolutely ludicrous,.

Claiming we believe in democracy is rather ridiculous when we do stuff like this.

 

As is intended by the Constitution.

 

Wait a minute here. I understand with all the stuff you have to say, but I don't see you addressing why exactly so many people from both sides of the aisle are recognizing Trump as the winner. I am being objective in trying to understand where you are coming from, but I don't see where you are reciprocating this objectivity. It appears that all roads for you are leading to Hillary being made president, based on the alleged popular vote count. I have plenty of reasons for doubting the popular vote count accuracy, but I am putting those considerations aside for the sake of looking at your position objectively. Assuming that the vote count is indeed accurate, I do indeed agree that the popular vote means more in modern elections. Because of this, I would join political voices with you to get it changed. I do not support changing the current election results though, simply because there was good reason to expect the EC to be the deciding factor. We watched media do the math every single day, showing everybody various paths to 270, and we have watched the same thing over and over for each election. I would be interested in seeing if you can put your subjective goal aside for a moment and have an objective look at why the media pumped out math figures and illustrations to everybody that showed various paths to 270, and why Hillary conceded, and why TomFitz of the left and of this forum swears by the 270, and why lefty Peperminttwist "liked" TomFitz's post where he endorse the 270. Objectively speaking, can you see the plausible path to where it would be expected, in advance of the election, that the 270 would be the deciding factor? Can you see the implications of changing things after the fact?

 

You do know that we have the longest democracy in history?!

 

http://www.shmoop.com/constitutional-convention/alexander-hamilton.html

 

NOW you claim we're a democracy!!!

Hilarious!

 

The point is whatever we are doing seems to work.

 

de·moc·ra·cy
dəˈmäkrəsē/
noun
a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives.
"capitalism and democracy are ascendant in the third world"
synonyms: representative government, elective government; More
a state governed by a democracy.
plural noun: democracies
"a multiparty democracy"
control of an organization or group by the majority of its members.
"the intended extension of industrial democracy"

 

Not according to Trump. His whole campaign was about how crap we are.

 

It's pretty rare to find a right winger who admits we're at least attempting to be a democracy.

Today, our democracy fails to give equality in the value of a vote.

We attack that notion of democracy in a number of ways. There is the direct assault on allowing people to vote in the first place. There is the gerrymandering that denies equal representation within states and within the US House. There is the electoral college that gives those in Wyoming MANY TIMES the influence of those in California or New York.

That doesn't mean democracy is a central tenet of our belief.

But, it DOES say we have a ways to go to meet any rational measure of equality in the value of your vote.

 

Do you feel confident that you would have posted this if Hillary had won the EC and it was Trump who won the alleged popular vote? Be honest now...

 

I've posted this many times in the past - over a number of years.

I'm sure there are those here who know that.

 

He said he would accept the results if he won, he won. His campaign was about what a mess the establishment has made of things. Hillarys whole campaign was vote for me because Im a woman and Im not Trump

 

Democrats want democracy

Republicans want our current form of government

Democrats would end the republic if they could. Let the people decide. What then happens when the majority say homosexuality is a crime ?

 

Just like your dear leader.

"The electoral college is a disaster for a democracy. The phony electoral college made a laughing stock of our nation. The loser one! This election is a total sham and a travesty. We are not a democracy! Our nation is totally divided! The world is laughing at us. Our country is now in serious and unprecedented trouble...like never before

We can't let this happen. Lets fight like hell and stop this great and disgusting injustice! We should march on Washington and stop this travesty. He lost the popular vote by a lot and won the election. We should have a revolution in this country."

 

Ya think?

"We should march on Washington and stop this travesty. He lost the popular vote by a lot and won the election. We should have a revolution in this country."

Sure sounds like it's your Republican leader calling for the end of the republic to me.

 

a disaster??? Hardly, since 1) it just prevented a liberal from becoming president and 2) both sides have an equal opportunity to win in the electoral college.

The real disaster is that liberals are allowed to vote at all given the anti American nature of their lib socialist beliefs. Does any one think our founders wanted libsocialist govt. Of course not!!

 

You'll have to ask the pathological liar-elect why he says the EC is a disaster for democracy and called on people to march and revolt because the world was laughing at ut.

 

why ask him when he is a politician who must speak to a person of below average IQ. Can you think for yourself??

 

That was years later so hard to say. By then you had politicians entrenched in the basterdized system.

No, we are the United States of America. We are Americans. We hold yourself out to be a democracy.

Under a system where the states decide, you effectively disenfranchise millions of voters.

And you get situations were the will of the American people are denied, as has happened twice now in the past five elections.

Why should the action of the states be so important to the choice of the president?

Yes, but my vote for the president gets wiped out because every EC voter from Florida votes for the Republican.

It is not the same in a popular vote because every vote is counted to determine who wins.

and in the process by vote is wiped out because Florida does not allocate EC voters that reflect the will of its citizens.

Again, why should people who live in small states get super-votes?

Your history is wrong, as I've demonstrated. The compact to protect small states rights is the senate, where Rhode Island has the same voting power as California.

The EC does not protect small states. No one gave a crap about North Dakota, for example? How many times did the candidates go there, as opposed to say, Florida?

The EC has become a basterdized system where all the action is in a small handful of "swing states" with large populations. Everything else is ignored.

Funny, this guy doesn't want to adjust it.

The electoral college is a disaster for a democracy. The phony electoral college made a laughing stock of our nation. The loser one! This election is a total sham and a travesty. We are not a democracy! Our nation is totally divided! The world is laughing at us. Our country is now in serious and unprecedented trouble...like never before

We can't let this happen. Lets fight like hell and stop this great and disgusting injustice! We should march on Washington and stop this travesty. He lost the popular vote by a lot and won the election. We should have a revolution in this country.

Shoot, I doubt any of the even most ardent Clinton fans are calling for a revolution like he did.

 

That supports the Wiki article.

The founders did not intend the system we have today. It's been basterdized.

But unless we want to take the position that we cannot trust American voters, then there's no reason to keep it at all. Scrap it to the heap of bad compromises like the slavery and 3/5th rules.

- - - Updated - - -

Absolutely wrong.


Alexander Hamilton described the framers' view of how electors would be chosen, "A small number of persons, selected by their fellow-citizens from the general mass, will be most likely to possess the information and discernment requisite to such complicated [tasks]."[28] The founders assumed this would take place district by district. That plan was carried out by many states until the 1880s. For example, in Massachusetts in 1820, the rule stated "the people shall vote by ballot, on which shall be designated who is voted for as an Elector for the district."[29] In other words, the people did not place the name of a candidate for a president on the ballot, instead they voted for their local elector, whom they trusted later to cast a responsible vote for president.

Some states reasoned the favorite presidential candidate among the people in their state would have a much better chance if all of the electors selected by their state were sure to vote the same way – a "general ticket" of electors pledged to a party candidate.[30] So the slate of electors chosen by the state were no longer free agents, independent thinkers, or deliberative representatives. They became "voluntary party lackeys and intellectual non-entities."[31] Once one state took that strategy, the others felt compelled to follow suit in order to compete for the strongest influence on the election.[30]

When James Madison and Hamilton, two of the most important architects of the Electoral College, saw this strategy being taken by some states, they protested strongly. Madison and Hamilton both made it clear this approach violated the spirit of the Constitution. According to Hamilton, the selection of the president should be "made by men most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station [of president]."[28] According to Hamilton, the electors were to analyze the list of potential presidents and select the best one. He also used the term "deliberate." Hamilton considered a pre-pledged elector to violate the spirit of Article II of the Constitution insofar as such electors could make no "analysis" or "deliberate" concerning the candidates. Madison agreed entirely, saying that when the Constitution was written, all of its authors assumed individual electors would be elected in their districts and it was inconceivable a "general ticket" of electors dictated by a state would supplant the concept. Madison wrote to George Hay,

The district mode was mostly, if not exclusively in view when the Constitution was framed and adopted; & was exchanged for the general ticket [many years later].[32]

The founders assumed electors would be elected by the citizens of his district, and that elector was to be free to analyze and deliberate regarding who is best suited to be president.

Madison and Hamilton were so upset by what they saw as a distortion of the framers’ original intent, they advocated for a constitutional amendment to prevent anything other than the district plan: "the election of Presidential Electors by districts, is an amendment very proper to be brought forward," Madison told George Hay in 1823.[32] Hamilton went further. He actually drafted an amendment to the Constitution mandating the district plan for selecting electors.[33]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_College_(United_States)

The Founders' intent was that each electoral voter be chosen on a district by district basis -- in the case of Florida, for example, a number of electors would represent voters for Clinton and a number for Trump.

But the Founders' intent has been bastardized by the adoption of "winner take all" rules, giving us the anomalies we see now -- and something that is clearly *not* what the Founders intended.

 

I've never denied that Trump what the majority of the state elections. He did lose the popular vote.

So if we are going to go with an EC system, then recognize that the purpose of the EC system is because the Founders did not trust the rabble to choose a president, and recognize that the purpose of the EC is to avoid an "con man" pathological liar charlatan with zero experience from becoming president.

In which case the EC should do its damn job.

If you don't like the EC choosing the president, and think the people should do it (because after 240 years we either trust the people or hand it up), then there is zero reason to keep the EC and we should dump it like we did slavery and the 3/5 rule and some of the other bad compromises.

It EC voters aren't going to do their job, the EC serves no purpose other than depriving the people of their choice.

 

He's the one who said we should have a revolution.

I've articulated in detail my reasons for why the EC should do its damn job, or let's just get rid of it.

 

the usa is a federation of states with a federal govt not a national govt. Small states would not have joined the union if big states with big populations got to pick president. Do you understand.

 

electoral college is there in case people make stupid choice( which they just did) and to shield small states. It works perfectly and everybody has equal chance to win electoral college. I see no problem.