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talkpoliticsInteresting arguments down there in this long-lasting debate about the usefulness of the Electoral College:
It’s time to abolish the Electoral College
"Having a president who loses the popular vote undermines electoral legitimacy. Putting an election into the House of Representatives where each state delegation has one vote increases the odds of insider dealings and corrupt decisions. Allegations of balloting irregularities that require an Electoral Commission to decide the votes of contested states do not make the general public feel very confident about the integrity of the process. And faithless electors could render the popular vote moot in particular states."
"Yet there is a far more fundamental threat facing the Electoral College. At a time of high income inequality and substantial geographical disparities across states, there is a risk that the Electoral College will systematically overrepresent the views of relatively small numbers of people due to the structure of the Electoral College."
Good points on all accounts. The Electoral College historically no longer serves the purpose it once had, there is no doubt. It is ironic that the Federalist Society, that so proclaims the US should go back to the intent of the Founders (not even going to say how that group of rich, almost all white men, feels that means), defends the Electoral College the way it works and is allocated. The EC was composed of electors who were the elite of their states, much like the Senators were chosen, and they were supposed to act as a bulkhead against the 'passions of the people'. That intent has been turned on its head. Most places now don't let electors vote against the person they are pledged to. More importantly, thanks to the winner-take-all, and the way electoral districts are gamed, you have an election decided by some swing counties in a few states, 50,000 people can decide the electoral college out of hundreds of millions of votes. The US now has elections that are designed by places that don't represent much of the country, you have counties that are older and almost purely white deciding the national election.
Now, many people think Congress is never going to be on board to eliminate the Electoral College.
However, I don't know why congress would not go along. The Senate is already grossly biased towards small-population right-wing states. But the Presidency does not depend on the same group of states as Congress. The presidency EC is swung by a 5-7 states whose population is very even in voting between the parties. Literally a few thousand votes going either way, out of millions, now decide the election. It is idiocy. So the candidates spend almost all their time and money in those states and rarely go anywhere else (except maybe to fund-raise, usually private events with billionaires). It is completely irrational.
Instead, if it was a popular vote the candidates would need to give some attention to all states, or at a minimum every region of the country, because the fact is most states are purple, not fully one or the other. In fact, any congressperson spending just a few seconds thinking about it should understand that having a candidate spend all their time NOT in their state is not good for them. So they need to get together with all the non-swing states and get it done.
It's mainly a job of voters to convince congresspeople, and their own legislatures that having the President effectively only consider 1/10 of the country when counting votes is a bad thing.
So yes, the electoral college must go, or at least be bypassed by the Popular Vote Compact. Then every vote in every state would matter, unlike the current situation in which a substantial number of voters who vote differently from the states in which they live have little incentive to vote at all. Also, there should be a nationally standardized ballot format with a preservable paper trail, a national Election Day holiday every four years (at most), and each participating voter should receive a $100 credit on their tax return. Those things would be a start. Then you need to revoke Citizens United and develop a system for public financing of political campaigns, and criminalize outright, demonstrable disinformation released into the public domain.
What would be more interesting to try would be to mandate free advertising by candidates. This would help squeeze money out of the election process. PACS, Citizens United and private fortunes would be muzzled. I'm not sure how this would play out, but free advertising would be an interesting experiment.
Now, I'm aware every system change in voting or anything similar is primarily and overwhelmingly seen as a zero sum game of red vs. blue. If it helps blue, it hurts red, and vice versa.
Given this, swing states have to be on board to change the system. But swing states get buried in pork and advertising spending and attention because they are swing states. Why would they ever agree to give up their huge advantage? Iowa and New Hampshire have not given up their favored position, and their role is not enshrined in the Constitution.
Then we have what happens when the 270 decide to exclude every other state, or a member wants to leave the pact after it votes opposite the NPV winner. The chances of an election ending up decided by SCOTUS seems enormous. This is the opposite of conferring legitimacy.
There is a concept in systems engineering called "good enough". It is probably not used too often in optimizing a consumer-goods supply chain or marketing algorithm, but it has a big role in keeping governments functioning.
And lastly, to all those proponents of "state rights" out there arguing for the status quo: people, not states, have rights. Simply put, by giving less populated states more clout in the electoral college and the Senate gives some people's vote more weight than others, and that is contrary to any notion that "all men are created equal". These arcane institutions were born of a need to bring 13 independent states together. Their purpose is historic only.
To an outsider, it looks like a voting scheme designed to protect slavery. That fact, alone, without further argument, should be enough to warrant repeal. But, we know that it will not. The US might find the political will (power) to do so at some point if they eliminated gerrymandering and had more equitable representation within each State. They might then get enough political power in the States to force or coerce Federal action. But there's a long road to there.
The Electoral College, gerrymandering and allowing partisan legislatures to draw up district lines, limited polling places and hours, convoluted requirements to register to vote, ballots without paper backup, limitation on who can vote, should all be abolished. These are the ultimate threats to US democracy, and they stem from special interest, whose purpose is to subvert democracy to their own benefit.
There should be one uniform standard for the voting process throughout the nation with the intent to maximize voter turnout in addition to abolishing the Electoral College. Why should a state with low voter turnout have as much influence as a state with high turn out like Minnesota? This is not the 18th century and one could argue the US hasn't chosen wise men to choose a president since the early 19th century. Rather, they get a bunch of political hacks with a winner take all approach in nearly each state. In the 21st century, you've got widespread literacy, fast communication, ease of travel and a reliable system of mail. America is one nation, after all, not 13 wannabe nation/states in the 18th century. And it's time for the anachronistic institutions that were designed to perpetuate that status quo, to finally go.
It’s time to abolish the Electoral College
"Having a president who loses the popular vote undermines electoral legitimacy. Putting an election into the House of Representatives where each state delegation has one vote increases the odds of insider dealings and corrupt decisions. Allegations of balloting irregularities that require an Electoral Commission to decide the votes of contested states do not make the general public feel very confident about the integrity of the process. And faithless electors could render the popular vote moot in particular states."
"Yet there is a far more fundamental threat facing the Electoral College. At a time of high income inequality and substantial geographical disparities across states, there is a risk that the Electoral College will systematically overrepresent the views of relatively small numbers of people due to the structure of the Electoral College."
Good points on all accounts. The Electoral College historically no longer serves the purpose it once had, there is no doubt. It is ironic that the Federalist Society, that so proclaims the US should go back to the intent of the Founders (not even going to say how that group of rich, almost all white men, feels that means), defends the Electoral College the way it works and is allocated. The EC was composed of electors who were the elite of their states, much like the Senators were chosen, and they were supposed to act as a bulkhead against the 'passions of the people'. That intent has been turned on its head. Most places now don't let electors vote against the person they are pledged to. More importantly, thanks to the winner-take-all, and the way electoral districts are gamed, you have an election decided by some swing counties in a few states, 50,000 people can decide the electoral college out of hundreds of millions of votes. The US now has elections that are designed by places that don't represent much of the country, you have counties that are older and almost purely white deciding the national election.
Now, many people think Congress is never going to be on board to eliminate the Electoral College.
However, I don't know why congress would not go along. The Senate is already grossly biased towards small-population right-wing states. But the Presidency does not depend on the same group of states as Congress. The presidency EC is swung by a 5-7 states whose population is very even in voting between the parties. Literally a few thousand votes going either way, out of millions, now decide the election. It is idiocy. So the candidates spend almost all their time and money in those states and rarely go anywhere else (except maybe to fund-raise, usually private events with billionaires). It is completely irrational.
Instead, if it was a popular vote the candidates would need to give some attention to all states, or at a minimum every region of the country, because the fact is most states are purple, not fully one or the other. In fact, any congressperson spending just a few seconds thinking about it should understand that having a candidate spend all their time NOT in their state is not good for them. So they need to get together with all the non-swing states and get it done.
It's mainly a job of voters to convince congresspeople, and their own legislatures that having the President effectively only consider 1/10 of the country when counting votes is a bad thing.
So yes, the electoral college must go, or at least be bypassed by the Popular Vote Compact. Then every vote in every state would matter, unlike the current situation in which a substantial number of voters who vote differently from the states in which they live have little incentive to vote at all. Also, there should be a nationally standardized ballot format with a preservable paper trail, a national Election Day holiday every four years (at most), and each participating voter should receive a $100 credit on their tax return. Those things would be a start. Then you need to revoke Citizens United and develop a system for public financing of political campaigns, and criminalize outright, demonstrable disinformation released into the public domain.
What would be more interesting to try would be to mandate free advertising by candidates. This would help squeeze money out of the election process. PACS, Citizens United and private fortunes would be muzzled. I'm not sure how this would play out, but free advertising would be an interesting experiment.
Now, I'm aware every system change in voting or anything similar is primarily and overwhelmingly seen as a zero sum game of red vs. blue. If it helps blue, it hurts red, and vice versa.
Given this, swing states have to be on board to change the system. But swing states get buried in pork and advertising spending and attention because they are swing states. Why would they ever agree to give up their huge advantage? Iowa and New Hampshire have not given up their favored position, and their role is not enshrined in the Constitution.
Then we have what happens when the 270 decide to exclude every other state, or a member wants to leave the pact after it votes opposite the NPV winner. The chances of an election ending up decided by SCOTUS seems enormous. This is the opposite of conferring legitimacy.
There is a concept in systems engineering called "good enough". It is probably not used too often in optimizing a consumer-goods supply chain or marketing algorithm, but it has a big role in keeping governments functioning.
And lastly, to all those proponents of "state rights" out there arguing for the status quo: people, not states, have rights. Simply put, by giving less populated states more clout in the electoral college and the Senate gives some people's vote more weight than others, and that is contrary to any notion that "all men are created equal". These arcane institutions were born of a need to bring 13 independent states together. Their purpose is historic only.
To an outsider, it looks like a voting scheme designed to protect slavery. That fact, alone, without further argument, should be enough to warrant repeal. But, we know that it will not. The US might find the political will (power) to do so at some point if they eliminated gerrymandering and had more equitable representation within each State. They might then get enough political power in the States to force or coerce Federal action. But there's a long road to there.
The Electoral College, gerrymandering and allowing partisan legislatures to draw up district lines, limited polling places and hours, convoluted requirements to register to vote, ballots without paper backup, limitation on who can vote, should all be abolished. These are the ultimate threats to US democracy, and they stem from special interest, whose purpose is to subvert democracy to their own benefit.
There should be one uniform standard for the voting process throughout the nation with the intent to maximize voter turnout in addition to abolishing the Electoral College. Why should a state with low voter turnout have as much influence as a state with high turn out like Minnesota? This is not the 18th century and one could argue the US hasn't chosen wise men to choose a president since the early 19th century. Rather, they get a bunch of political hacks with a winner take all approach in nearly each state. In the 21st century, you've got widespread literacy, fast communication, ease of travel and a reliable system of mail. America is one nation, after all, not 13 wannabe nation/states in the 18th century. And it's time for the anachronistic institutions that were designed to perpetuate that status quo, to finally go.
(no subject)
Date: 7/7/20 11:13 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 7/7/20 16:08 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 7/7/20 16:56 (UTC)The easiest way to sort this out would be to have a revolution.
(no subject)
Date: 7/7/20 17:56 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 7/7/20 18:26 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/7/20 02:40 (UTC)Don't even get me started on "states' rights". Before things like same-sex marriage was legalized all across the US (and may get overturned again if Trump wins 2020, it's on the Republican platform), it could be that two same-sex partners could marry and have that be valid and recognized in one state and if they moved out of state, no. Right now, marijuana is illegal in Indiana where I live, if you cross the border to Michigan it's legal. I don't like the 50 states being treated like their own little countries where things that are legal to do / possess in one state are not in another. Makes no sense to me.
My country is ass-backwards.
(no subject)
Date: 9/7/20 16:50 (UTC)Every small state that breaks republican in the electoral college, obscuring the votes of democrats within, would be overwhelmed by the republican votes that suddenly become relevant in California if it were to drop the electoral college. And vice-versa with Texas.
One valuable trait of the electoral college is it gives individual states flexibility in how they contribute to the election of a president. There are already movements working their way through the country compelling individual states to divide up their electoral votes directly along the lines of the popular vote within. How much traction those gain is a matter of the political environment in each state.
As an example, California votes about 2/3 Democrat. If Californians embrace the popular vote approach, they’d be adding about eight million Republican votes into the mix. That’s more Republican votes than the total population of Wyoming, Vermont, Alaska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Delaware, Montana, and Alaska combined, voting or otherwise. The state legislature is largely Democrat. Why would they shoot their own party in the foot that way?
As an outsider you may think there aren’t significant differences, or there isn’t significant competition, between the US states. That’s only a little less outlandish than Americans believing France, Germany, and Spain all have the same economy and political issues because they’re in the EU. Or believing that China really is one big monolithic Communist political apparatus.