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Cuckoo bird brings (the Honorable) Hillary Campaign to a standstill
- Thread starter raptor10
- Start date
1. Because it works.
2. You're an idiot if you think that the electoral college renders campaigning useless. Yes, yes, we all know by now that popular vote doesn't determine the election. Guess what? They still have to win support. Unless you imagine that the electoral college will all of a sudden have a conscience attack and switch their votes to Ron Paul (I'm certain that the Paulbots believe this).
3. You make me ashamed of my native state.
P.S. if you vote for Ron Paul, you're wasting your vote. Does that mean the popular vote is broken too?
P.P.S. Actually all voting systems are broken - you can prove it mathematically. But the electoral college is a good, workable solution that is better than the alternatives and more importantly, appropriate for our REPUBLIC. There are better ones, but your average idiot wouldn't understand or accept it. If you have trouble understanding the electoral college, I'm not even going to try to justify ranked or instant-runoff voting.
Spekkio
He bowls overhand.
"Because it works." I like that one. Dictatorships, theocracies, and monarchies all "work" in that they are viable forms of goverment that maintain a stable and orderly society. We have a Democracy because our forefathers felt that it was a human right to have a say in the government (and if you want to be cynical about it, it's because we didn't like that our taxes were too high), and not because the other forms of government don't work.
The electoral college takes that say away. The best system we can have is direct election of the President, the same way that we have direct election of every other member of the executive and legislative branches of government, right down to the local level. Fundamentally, each citizen ought to have a direct vote over the members in government represting him. Moreover, instant-runoff voting does not necessitate an electoral college to work.
Saying that campaigning is useless is an exaggeration, of course, but you cannot deny that the electoral college inhibits the democratic process. Perhaps it was necessary to have it in 1892 (the first time a President ran with an opponent) when information was extremely limited and the population was largely uneducated. In 2008, it is not needed. Over 95% of our population has a high school education, and a good portion of people have some level of college education. Information spreads in seconds. The fact that the electoral college is in place in this day and age is a travesty to our government.
The only reasoning you've presented to defend the electoral college is "that it works," and then you proceed to insult me and make a bunch of assumptions about which political candidate I support. I made no mention of Ron Paul whatsoever, but I invite you to continue with your baseless assumption and make an ass of yourself further.
Oh, and nice highlighting of the word Republic, as if I didn't know that our government was listed as such. All that means is we elect people to represent us in government, and it has nothing to do with "electing" people to vote for those representatives.
Um, that's exactly what that means...
The electoral college 'inhibits' the democratic process in the same way that a flaps, rudder, and ailerons inhibit airflow around a jet, in a way that allows the whole to operate more efficiently.
Direct election of the president would be the worse thing for our republic to have. Ever heard of the bell curve? Thats who would be deciding the fate of the nation.
We have direct election because it is a simple system. Unfortunately, it ends up polarizing into our two-party system, which is not what our forefathers intended. That is a mathematical consequence of a simple plurality vote.
Clinton won in 1992 partly because Perot divided the Republican vote. Assume for a second that, say, just half of Perot's supporters would have voted for Bush if Perot weren't running. Bush would have won an instant-runoff election, and probably a ranked voting system, depending on how people ranked their #2 choice. But Clinton won as a result of our electoral process, though it's quite likely that more people preferred Bush to Clinton.
Yet you refuse to acknowledge that there may be better voting systems than the simplest. So much for education.
Ron Paul and his followers amuse me. If you can't find humor in bashing them, I have to wonder about you.
Think about that for a second. Very slowly......
Very well. Then to clarify, we are a FEDERAL REPUBLIC. So unless you consider the states to be an archaic construct, then there is a very good reason for the Electoral College. Besides, if you dismantle that, you might as well dismantle the Senate, too, since it's not fairly "representative".
Spekkio
He bowls overhand.
You have a severe problem with putting words in my mouth. I never said anything about more complex systems being better or worse than the simplest solution. I merely said that there should not be a "middle man" between the people's vote and the person elected. Instant-runoff voting is not incompatible with direct elections. Direct elections are when the people directly vote for the candidates. Instant-runoff voting is essentially giving people more than one vote, but allows them to prioritize them in order of preference.
Your comments about Ron Paul and his followers were made under the assumption that I was a Ron Paul supporter. Therefore, you were using that to insult me, regardless of whether or not I support him.
I also edited that last line in red before you posted to make it clearer. You should go re-read it.
ADDED: Yes, we are a FEDERAL REPUBLIC. I do not find that to be an "archaic" construct, and the existance and usefulness of individual states goes far beyond the election of our president. Moreover, the Senate has nothing to do with the electoral college. Each state sends electorates in accordance with its Representatives, not Senators. If anything, the system is trying to mimic a popular vote without actually being one.
Your comments about Ron Paul and his followers were made under the assumption that I was a Ron Paul supporter. Therefore, you were using that to insult me, regardless of whether or not I support him.
I also edited that last line in red before you posted to make it clearer. You should go re-read it.
ADDED: Yes, we are a FEDERAL REPUBLIC. I do not find that to be an "archaic" construct, and the existance and usefulness of individual states goes far beyond the election of our president. Moreover, the Senate has nothing to do with the electoral college. Each state sends electorates in accordance with its Representatives, not Senators. If anything, the system is trying to mimic a popular vote without actually being one.
Do you believe in Democracy (which is an inherent part of a Republic, mmx)? If the answer is yes, then that is part of what comes along with that form of government. If your answer is no, then how do we determine which side of the bell curve you are on?
@ Spekio: Frankly, I don't understand your objection to the EC. You claim there's some kind of loss of democracy, but you haven't really quantified what you're talking about. Even so, as has been previously stated here, our government was never designed or intended to be a direct democracy. Shouldn't we be interested in the intent of the Founding Fathers? We treat the rest of the constitution as sacrosanct, but for whatever reason, you feel like this portion of it should be disregarded?
The EC accomplishes several things:
By making each State's EC votes an all or nothing proposition, it forces the candidates to focus more on the smaller, more rural states and not just on the main centers of population. While the bigger states are still important to win, victory is not likely without winning many of the smaller ones as well. This increases the Federalism of our system and buffers the minority from undue influence of the majority. The net effect is to enfranchise a greater proportion of the populace during the electoral process. Don't forget that our system of government is as much about the desires of the majority as it is about protecting the minority from the majority. An important advantage over direct election which you've clearly overlooked. Without this feature, our society could become much more factionalized and divided to the point of separatism. You have only to look at places like the Former Soviet Union, or the Balkans to see what can happen when minority concerns aren't addressed.
Bottom line: Since any change in the constitution would require 2/3 ratification by the states, the EC system is not likely to ever change because the smaller rural states (which in sum make up the majority of states) will not vote themselves into a disadvantageous situation by reforming the EC.
Spekio - You don't like the EC because you don't understand the EC and why it was created by the Founding Fathers. That is precisely what I meant in my original comment to you.
Brett
The EC accomplishes several things:
By making each State's EC votes an all or nothing proposition, it forces the candidates to focus more on the smaller, more rural states and not just on the main centers of population. While the bigger states are still important to win, victory is not likely without winning many of the smaller ones as well. This increases the Federalism of our system and buffers the minority from undue influence of the majority. The net effect is to enfranchise a greater proportion of the populace during the electoral process. Don't forget that our system of government is as much about the desires of the majority as it is about protecting the minority from the majority. An important advantage over direct election which you've clearly overlooked. Without this feature, our society could become much more factionalized and divided to the point of separatism. You have only to look at places like the Former Soviet Union, or the Balkans to see what can happen when minority concerns aren't addressed.
Bottom line: Since any change in the constitution would require 2/3 ratification by the states, the EC system is not likely to ever change because the smaller rural states (which in sum make up the majority of states) will not vote themselves into a disadvantageous situation by reforming the EC.
Spekio - You don't like the EC because you don't understand the EC and why it was created by the Founding Fathers. That is precisely what I meant in my original comment to you.
Brett
and I blame that on our current Public Education system. Nobody teaches Civics any more, they are too busy trying to teach Diversity and acceptance of Homosexuality. I've seen the "My Two Dads" book, I haven't seen a Civics book in a long time.:icon_rage
Spekkio
He bowls overhand.
While this sounds nice because it is well-written, most of it is 100% bullshit.
Protection of the minority?! Firstly, we have that through checks and balances in our government, and it is most prominent in the Senate where the minority can invoke a filibuster. Secondly, if a candidate takes NY/CA/FL or any other big state by a 51/49 margin, how is awarding ALL the electoral votes to the winner "protecting the minority?" You're throwing the minority vote out completely. Thirdly, the if the electoral college enfranchises so many people, why are only less than 1/3 of Americans voting? Finally, your argument about the electoral college and Federalism would only hold true if there were many candidates running from specific regions, each with their own agendas. In today's two-party system, "increasing Federalism" to protect local interests is simply not needed. It also makes the wrongful assumption that most people in a given state are going to vote exactly the same way, which is false in today's society. A business owner in NYC working on Wall Street does not have the same interests as a union factory worker in upstate NY.
The situation in post-Soviet Russia and the Balkans is completely unrelated to this, and I dare say it's simply fear-mongering to illustrate a point. The FBI isn't going to start secretely arresting and executing people who support the minority party if we abolish the electoral college.
The only good point I see in there is that the electoral college does increase campaigning in "small states" because winning the "big states" by a landslide does nothing.
The electoral college was created because our founding fathers did not trust the populace to make informed voting decisions. That is also why we did not originally have direct elections of Senators. However, our founding fathers also realized that times can and will change, so they made the Constitution a dynamic document. Well, times have changed, and it's time to get rid of the electoral college.
What?! I've never, ever taken or seen a class offered on homosexuality throughout my schooling career, and I graduated High School less than ten years ago.
You really ought to blame people who fall asleep during their civics class, rather than the education system for not offering something that it does.
WheelsUpHeelsUp
Banned
If it weren't for the EC your CiC would be Pres Owlgore, THAT is a sickening thought.