Should the US switch to popular vote vs. electoral college?

[Free Missouri]

And people who are physically incapable of such service get no say under that system. The majority of Americans don't meet the physical requirements for such service, and only partially as a result of their own bad choices. You willing to fund a program to help them meet those standards if willing? What about the physically infirm who will never be able to complete that type of service? Partially blind or deaf or bound to a wheel chair from birth would be left out of the process under your system. How is that fair to them? The fact is that not everyone gets the same starting point and even if they did, events outside their control could leave them maimed or otherwise unable to complete that sort of service you're demanding for the right to vote. They could have the greatest of minds in a generation and they won't be able to help us continue to advance as a civilization because their handicap keeps them from voting and participating in the process.

Not to mention those religiously opposed to military service.

I'm sure requiring people to violate their religious beliefs in order to have the right to vote goes against the spirit of the constitution. One of those pesky amendments would seem to apply there. An important one I think.

I've already fucking said: MIlitary Service would not be the only service. I've never heard of any religion which is opposed to uniformed service in disaster relief or humanitarian aid.

FOR FUCKS SAKE READ THE WHOLE DAMN THING BEFORE YOU COMMENT YOU JACKASSES.

[Hittanryan]

"I've said that you as an urban dweller should have no say on what I do on the farm."
Under our current system, it's uneducated farmers telling college-educated SJW's living in cities what to do so I wouldn't really complain if you're an American who lives in a rural area.

"Democracy is a failure."
Please give a government system/ideology that has achieved more progress in human development and wealth than democracy.

"ANd I've spent some time in urban areas, they disgust me, and people automatically think they are better/smarter than me because "oh you grew up on a farm, probably haven't ever seen ---------."
And us city people are disgusted when some redneck drives in with his lifted muddied up pickup truck, parks in 3 spaces and walks around and talk like some sort of un-mannered and uneducated hillbilly trash. You get what you do.

"That's why I'm disgusted by any system in which urban bureaucrats in far away cities are empowered by urban voters to press on with programs that hurt my area."
Guess what? Cities are the future, it doesn't take much of an education to know that more people equal less space. Why the hell should we develop policies that support the minority? Social Darwinism baby.

"You're less patriotic because you apparently wouldn't be willing to take a two year term of service in order to earn your franchise."
How is disenfranchising the majority of the American population anymore more patriotic? Hell if anything, you're less patriotic since you represent the smaller portion of America. Also the fact you don't support our democracy puts you directly as an enemy of the state since our nation was founded on those principles.

"statistically, far more likely to join the military."
Cities house more people so in total numbers there will always be more soldiers from cities than rural areas. Also we have a military draft so it really doesn't matter.

"and rural schools tend to put more emphasis on civics and civil responsibility,"
Never heard of such things. I went to Elementary and Middle School and currently in HS, all in a rural area and I ain't seeing any of this so called education you talk about.

more soldiers from cities, not a higher percentage, a far higher rate of attrition from cities and a far higher rate of enlistment from rural areas (and pacific islands).

My system would eliminate the draft. No reason for it.

And if you don't like the southern accent or someone's lifted pick up truck (or some person from the hoods idiotic drop-kitted car for that fucking matter), then fucking deal with it. It's called freedom. something which some of us hold higher and more important than your precious democracy which has fucked us over in every election since coolidge.

Why should we set policies to support the minority? Fine, even as a black person I'll say this: Get rid of bullshit like affirmative action and special black clubs and womens clubs and the special snowflakes in gender studies if you don't care about the minority.

And Democracy has failed, if anything the american experiment has shown the with the urbanization of people comes the higher likelihood that a democratic society will vote away their freedoms carelessly. Patriotism is love of your country always, not love of your government or it's systems. Obviously the constitution left too much leeway for the creeping tyranny of democratic society, and we need new solutions to save the experiment of freedom.

Care to outline in detail which freedoms have been voted away by urban people?

[Free Missouri]

more soldiers from cities, not a higher percentage, a far higher rate of attrition from cities and a far higher rate of enlistment from rural areas (and pacific islands).

My system would eliminate the draft. No reason for it.

And if you don't like the southern accent or someone's lifted pick up truck (or some person from the hoods idiotic drop-kitted car for that fucking matter), then fucking deal with it. It's called freedom. something which some of us hold higher and more important than your precious democracy which has fucked us over in every election since coolidge.

Why should we set policies to support the minority? Fine, even as a black person I'll say this: Get rid of bullshit like affirmative action and special black clubs and womens clubs and the special snowflakes in gender studies if you don't care about the minority.

And Democracy has failed, if anything the american experiment has shown the with the urbanization of people comes the higher likelihood that a democratic society will vote away their freedoms carelessly. Patriotism is love of your country always, not love of your government or it's systems. Obviously the constitution left too much leeway for the creeping tyranny of democratic society, and we need new solutions to save the experiment of freedom.

Care to outline in detail which freedoms have been voted away by urban people?

Considering that all but one of the most recent presidents resided/resides primarily in urban areas, considering that 85% of the US Is urban, Every right that we have lost in the last half century,

from the decimation of the 4th Amendment under the drug regime and bush, to the rise of speech codes on college campuses, to the clamor for draconian gun laws because "the rest of the world has them" (yeah, so do a vast majority of the countries that are crime ridden.) You can say all you want about trump's dislike for the press but they've had enough problems under Dubya and Obama, being investigated for BS whenever they run afoul. The No-Fly List and any similar watchlist thereof which treats one as guilty until proven innocent and then offers no clear and open method for being removed from said watchlist. Civil Asset Forfeiture (that's about it there). The vast abused of Eminent Domain which was meant only to be used for necessary uses, not to sell the ground to some developer to build highrise apartments and parking garages. National Security Letters. The drone kill list and the killing of Anwar Al Awlaki and his son without trial.

I can even go on with executive overreach under the Obama administration with DAPA, the Clean Power Plan, the Waters of the US Rule, the EPA trying to arbitrarily and executively create Cap-and-Trade without congressional delegation of that power

[Great Nepal]

Nope ignoring the three extreme constituencies

Repeat your working with three most extreme US states excluded and compare.

Done, removed Wyoming, Vermont and Florida from the calculations (the constituencies were two small islands and one isle of white). The result with this is most overrepresented area, DC is overrepresented by 46.5% to the mean and area most underrepresented, North Carolina is underrepresented by 131% to the mean. You do manage to reduce the overepresentation by doing this; you also significantly increase underrepresention.

because there's actual valid reason why you'd not want people having to catch one of the four ferries that leaves the islands per day to meet their MPs who are supposed to be representing them; kinda why it'd be silly to lump Hawaii with Alaska and call it a state. No such argument exists for say Wyoming which shares contagious land area with other states nearby.

Administratively grouping islands together or grouping islands with mainland (Gibraltar is grouped with South West England for EU parliament elections) is far more plausible than abolishing Wyoming. Even the civil war didn't result in outright abolition of states, while British constituencies and local government areas have no constitutional status and are changed or abolished all the time.

You're outlining a political obstacle, not an actual one - problem with having MP from Gibraltar being same as one from Cornwall is no candidate could possibly represent these two areas adequately; no candidate could hold local clinics in an area such that it is convenient for all of their constituents - if there's logistical issue in carrying out a task thats an additional specification that must be considered, if the problem is 'oh no one would go for it' then that's not an actual argument.

Vote of someone in Ilford South being worth 2.27 less than someone living in Arfon counts as being broken; so does fact that party with ~30% of vote has absolute control over parliament.

Broken in that it doesn't reflect the peoples' will? But the system itself is the peoples' will. A greater proportion of the voters voted for this system than have ever voted for any party.

A system which doesn't fulfill the required specification is a broken system, regardless of popularity of the system - unless you think only requirement of a election system is that it should be popular.

[Hittanryan]

Care to outline in detail which freedoms have been voted away by urban people?

Considering that all but one of the most recent presidents resided/resides primarily in urban areas, considering that 85% of the US Is urban, Every right that we have lost in the last half century,

from the decimation of the 4th Amendment under the drug regime and bush, to the rise of speech codes on college campuses, to the clamor for draconian gun laws because "the rest of the world has them" (yeah, so do a vast majority of the countries that are crime ridden.) You can say all you want about trump's dislike for the press but they've had enough problems under Dubya and Obama, being investigated for BS whenever they run afoul. The No-Fly List and any similar watchlist thereof which treats one as guilty until proven innocent and then offers no clear and open method for being removed from said watchlist. Civil Asset Forfeiture (that's about it there). The vast abused of Eminent Domain which was meant only to be used for necessary uses, not to sell the ground to some developer to build highrise apartments and parking garages. National Security Letters. The drone kill list and the killing of Anwar Al Awlaki and his son without trial.

I can even go on with executive overreach under the Obama administration with DAPA, the Clean Power Plan, the Waters of the US Rule, the EPA trying to arbitrarily and executively create Cap-and-Trade without congressional delegation of that power

You seem to have a libertarian bent, yet you advocate that citizens forfeit their liberty to the state before giving them representation?

[Free Missouri]

Considering that all but one of the most recent presidents resided/resides primarily in urban areas, considering that 85% of the US Is urban, Every right that we have lost in the last half century,

from the decimation of the 4th Amendment under the drug regime and bush, to the rise of speech codes on college campuses, to the clamor for draconian gun laws because "the rest of the world has them" (yeah, so do a vast majority of the countries that are crime ridden.) You can say all you want about trump's dislike for the press but they've had enough problems under Dubya and Obama, being investigated for BS whenever they run afoul. The No-Fly List and any similar watchlist thereof which treats one as guilty until proven innocent and then offers no clear and open method for being removed from said watchlist. Civil Asset Forfeiture (that's about it there). The vast abused of Eminent Domain which was meant only to be used for necessary uses, not to sell the ground to some developer to build highrise apartments and parking garages. National Security Letters. The drone kill list and the killing of Anwar Al Awlaki and his son without trial.

I can even go on with executive overreach under the Obama administration with DAPA, the Clean Power Plan, the Waters of the US Rule, the EPA trying to arbitrarily and executively create Cap-and-Trade without congressional delegation of that power

You seem to have a libertarian bent, yet you advocate that citizens forfeit their liberty to the state before giving them representation?

I advocate that the franchise, the thing which gives citizens the power to forfeit necessary liberty, be restricted for the good of the other liberties.

You can be a libertarian without being a democrat. (speaking in ideological terms, not party terms for any idiots out there.)

[Genivaria]

You seem to have a libertarian bent, yet you advocate that citizens forfeit their liberty to the state before giving them representation?

I advocate that the franchise, the thing which gives citizens the power to forfeit necessary liberty, be restricted for the good of the other liberties.

You can be a libertarian without being a democrat. (speaking in ideological terms, not party terms for any idiots out there.)

No you really can't.

[San Lumen]

You seem to have a libertarian bent, yet you advocate that citizens forfeit their liberty to the state before giving them representation?

I advocate that the franchise, the thing which gives citizens the power to forfeit necessary liberty, be restricted for the good of the other liberties.

You can be a libertarian without being a democrat. (speaking in ideological terms, not party terms for any idiots out there.)

So you can make sure only people you like can vote. I as a government worker aka ''bureaucrat" as you put it as well as a city dweller would be unable to vote so I can't enforce anything on you but can enforce your beliefs and polices on me. If thats not a dictatorship then please tell me what is?

more soldiers from cities, not a higher percentage, a far higher rate of attrition from cities and a far higher rate of enlistment from rural areas (and pacific islands).

My system would eliminate the draft. No reason for it.

And if you don't like the southern accent or someone's lifted pick up truck (or some person from the hoods idiotic drop-kitted car for that fucking matter), then fucking deal with it. It's called freedom. something which some of us hold higher and more important than your precious democracy which has fucked us over in every election since coolidge.

Why should we set policies to support the minority? Fine, even as a black person I'll say this: Get rid of bullshit like affirmative action and special black clubs and womens clubs and the special snowflakes in gender studies if you don't care about the minority.

And Democracy has failed, if anything the american experiment has shown the with the urbanization of people comes the higher likelihood that a democratic society will vote away their freedoms carelessly. Patriotism is love of your country always, not love of your government or it's systems. Obviously the constitution left too much leeway for the creeping tyranny of democratic society, and we need new solutions to save the experiment of freedom.

Care to outline in detail which freedoms have been voted away by urban people?

also I can't serve in the military because of a minor disability. I don't care about someone;s accent or their pickup. What I don't like is people like you judging me and my huge town as elitists who only want to destroy your farm and little village. Some of us like the city and its diversity and culture and not little towns and farms. This type of backwards thinking is why i left my small town behind and don't miss it one bit. And as a result according to you I should have to give my right to vote even though I work for the government and help preserve the natural environment

and care to explain how democracy has screwed over your little town since Coolidge? The country has changed since then demographically. Its less white and more urbanized and the electoral college unfairly benefits your little village and makes my vote count less. Your system does it even more because you don't like how the country is changed and you want to make it so you can enforce your principles and beliefs on me but i cant on you. In addition make sure only people you like and who agree with you can vote. How very dictatorial.

Please do elaborate on what freedoms us urban people have taken away from you.

[Galloism]

Not to mention those religiously opposed to military service.

I'm sure requiring people to violate their religious beliefs in order to have the right to vote goes against the spirit of the constitution. One of those pesky amendments would seem to apply there. An important one I think.

I've already fucking said: MIlitary Service would not be the only service. I've never heard of any religion which is opposed to uniformed service in disaster relief or humanitarian aid.

That would depend. Some are opposed to uniform services in general.

Those are rarer, admittedly.

FOR FUCKS SAKE READ THE WHOLE DAMN THING BEFORE YOU COMMENT YOU JACKASSES.

Flaming isn't cool, mmkay?

[Spirit of Hope]

It's not a question of "improving", it's a question of what counts as good representation.

Popular vote always reflects the plurality view, but the plurality can be highly geographically and socially concentrated; the electoral college system ensures that votes must be reasonably spread throughout the country, and favours a strong minority candidate like Trump over a weak plurality candidate like Clinton.

I am a British citizen and in Britain we elect our parliament and hence government by an "electoral college"-like system. This system was recently endorsed by a large majority in a national referendum. It is not an expedient solution to poor communications, it is a conscious choice to have governments that reflect a wide range of people rather than just the largest number.

Fairly, decent point and clear way to describe part of the reason for the weighting and electoral college over hear. Kudos!

Except the electoral college does none of those things. The electoral college makes the system reflect the views of less people, not more.

Most obviously it does this by concentrating the election on swing states. Which allows an absurdly small portion of the population to be the deciding factor in the election. Trump won the EC by less than 200,000 votes. While Hilary Clinton won the popular vote by something like 3,000,000 votes.

Further, in theory, the EC allows less than 20% of the population to win the presidency. At the same time it also allows only 11 states to determine the presidency. It in no way requires that the presidency has reflect a larger number of people, or that those people truly be more even distributed across the nation. It only looks that way because of current american politics.

I have been against the electoral college for years. I didn't vote for Clinton. A popular vote system would mean that candidates would have to campaign in the top 70 urban centers, minimum, to have a hope of winning. These urban centers are located across 38 states. The popular vote is more representative.

The popular vote is only marginally more representative for most probable "upset" cases. In order for it to be significantly more representative, which is what any major change de facto or de jure to the previous method to be worth the fairly major and time consuming effort of the change, you'd need to revoke the 12th Amendment (so the runner up becomes VP), empower the Vice President with some duties taken from the President and a third to one half of the cabinet appointments, a new method of selecting a Vice President in case something happens to them like some form of selective vote similar to the presidential primaries, and appropriate checks and balances prevent moderate to severe gridlock with the paradigm change in the executive branch of the federal government.

If you're going to use better representation as an argument you have to realize that we elect the two top positions of the executive branch of the federal government and the top officials that get appointed/approved for many positions. Giving the plurality (like the 48% Senator Clinton got) 100% of the executive branch is not representative by any reasonable stretch of the imagination. Especially when a slightly smaller minority (they're all minorities this race) didn't vote for them.

There are a number of fixes I would be willing to allow to help make the presidency more representative using a popular vote. My favorite is the instant run off system, which you could further tailor to require the president wins with a margin larger than 50%.

Shacking up the powers of the president and the VP is something I would be against, though it would be interesting to discuss it further. I just don't think this is the thread for it.

But my major point is that basically any popular vote system would be far better at representing all people than the current system, which basically causes everyone not in a swing state to be ignored.

You haven't really presented an argument for the EC but rather pointed out how the popular vote isn't all that much better than the EC. By your own logic the popular vote is still better than the EC. Because the EC allows a candidate who got second place in the vote, potentially as low as 20% of the population, to win the entirety of the executive branch.

[Free Missouri]

You seem to have a libertarian bent, yet you advocate that citizens forfeit their liberty to the state before giving them representation?

I advocate that the franchise, the thing which gives citizens the power to forfeit necessary liberty, be restricted for the good of the other liberties.

You can be a libertarian without being a democrat. (speaking in ideological terms, not party terms for any idiots out there.)

Libertarianism, noun

an extreme laissez-faire political philosophy advocating only minimal state intervention in the lives of citizens.

Democracy, noun

a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives.

One is a philosophy, the other a system of government. I would note my system would technically still be a democratic republic, just a limited democracy based on service. Not necessarily military, but also humanitarian service and other services that would be decided on.

[San Lumen]

I advocate that the franchise, the thing which gives citizens the power to forfeit necessary liberty, be restricted for the good of the other liberties.

You can be a libertarian without being a democrat. (speaking in ideological terms, not party terms for any idiots out there.)

Libertarianism, noun

an extreme laissez-faire political philosophy advocating only minimal state intervention in the lives of citizens.

Democracy, noun

a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives.

One is a philosophy, the other a system of government. I would note my system would technically still be a democratic republic, just a limited democracy based on service. Not necessarily military, but also humanitarian service and other services that would be decided on.

And limit the vote to only those who agree with you. Anyone who doesn't or lives outside a farm or small town doesn't get the right to vote

[Genivaria]

I advocate that the franchise, the thing which gives citizens the power to forfeit necessary liberty, be restricted for the good of the other liberties.

You can be a libertarian without being a democrat. (speaking in ideological terms, not party terms for any idiots out there.)

Libertarianism, noun

an extreme laissez-faire political philosophy advocating only minimal state intervention in the lives of citizens.

Democracy, noun

a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives.

One is a philosophy, the other a system of government. I would note my system would technically still be a democratic republic, just a limited democracy based on service. Not necessarily military, but also humanitarian service and other services that would be decided on.

Decided on by the people already in power I presume.

[Post War America]

Libertarianism, noun

an extreme laissez-faire political philosophy advocating only minimal state intervention in the lives of citizens.

Democracy, noun

a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives.

One is a philosophy, the other a system of government. I would note my system would technically still be a democratic republic, just a limited democracy based on service. Not necessarily military, but also humanitarian service and other services that would be decided on.

And limit the vote to only those who agree with you. Anyone who doesn't or lives outside a farm or small town doesn't get the right to vote

To be fair, he didn't actually say that, and he does make a valid point regarding national service. However, I am of the opinion that people should serve their country because they are citizens, not making service a condition of citizenship. But then, I don't really care for "Liberty" as defined by Missouri.

[Longweather]

The popular vote is only marginally more representative for most probable "upset" cases. In order for it to be significantly more representative, which is what any major change de facto or de jure to the previous method to be worth the fairly major and time consuming effort of the change, you'd need to revoke the 12th Amendment (so the runner up becomes VP), empower the Vice President with some duties taken from the President and a third to one half of the cabinet appointments, a new method of selecting a Vice President in case something happens to them like some form of selective vote similar to the presidential primaries, and appropriate checks and balances prevent moderate to severe gridlock with the paradigm change in the executive branch of the federal government.

If you're going to use better representation as an argument you have to realize that we elect the two top positions of the executive branch of the federal government and the top officials that get appointed/approved for many positions. Giving the plurality (like the 48% Senator Clinton got) 100% of the executive branch is not representative by any reasonable stretch of the imagination. Especially when a slightly smaller minority (they're all minorities this race) didn't vote for them.

A lot more people are pushing for popular vote rather than overhaul of executive because it doesn't require constitutional amendment; so as long as states making up majority in electoral college agree to interstate popular vote compact - arrangement whereby those states assign their electoral votes based on national popular vote, it is done. I think it has 170ish/270 required atm

As an engineer by trade and training I hate half-assed solutions like the NPVIC. I'd rather my state, California, have the electoral slate be representative of us now by having the allotment be proportional than to wait and hope that eventually enough states join a half-assed solution.

If people were truly dedicated to representation, they'd support an idea for the popular vote similar to mine because it is vastly more representative in our governance than now or with the NPVIC which is a lot of waiting and hand-wringing for only a slightly more representative "solution."

Fairly, decent point and clear way to describe part of the reason for the weighting and electoral college over hear. Kudos!

Except the electoral college does none of those things. The electoral college makes the system reflect the views of less people, not more.

Most obviously it does this by concentrating the election on swing states. Which allows an absurdly small portion of the population to be the deciding factor in the election. Trump won the EC by less than 200,000 votes. While Hilary Clinton won the popular vote by something like 3,000,000 votes.

Further, in theory, the EC allows less than 20% of the population to win the presidency. At the same time it also allows only 11 states to determine the presidency. It in no way requires that the presidency has reflect a larger number of people, or that those people truly be more even distributed across the nation. It only looks that way because of current american politics.

The electoral college essentially mildly diminishes the power of the more populous states, like my home state of California, while mildly increasing the representation of the less populous states. It gives the states the same elective power for the federal elective branch as they have federal legislative power. It generally works with having the winner of the popular vote win but upsets like the current election can generally occur with a combination of the weighting, two-party system, and the states' idiotic winner-takes-all allotment of their electoral slates. The more improbable and less representative possibilities are due to the states allotment of their electoral slates and is less an issue of the system but of the states themselves. They can be solved with a proportional allotment of the electoral slates.

The focus on swing states is mostly due to how split the specific states' populations tend to be. However, as shown in this election, our assumptions as to what can swing and flip can be wrong.

The popular vote is only marginally more representative for most probable "upset" cases. In order for it to be significantly more representative, which is what any major change de facto or de jure to the previous method to be worth the fairly major and time consuming effort of the change, you'd need to revoke the 12th Amendment (so the runner up becomes VP), empower the Vice President with some duties taken from the President and a third to one half of the cabinet appointments, a new method of selecting a Vice President in case something happens to them like some form of selective vote similar to the presidential primaries, and appropriate checks and balances prevent moderate to severe gridlock with the paradigm change in the executive branch of the federal government.

If you're going to use better representation as an argument you have to realize that we elect the two top positions of the executive branch of the federal government and the top officials that get appointed/approved for many positions. Giving the plurality (like the 48% Senator Clinton got) 100% of the executive branch is not representative by any reasonable stretch of the imagination. Especially when a slightly smaller minority (they're all minorities this race) didn't vote for them.

There are a number of fixes I would be willing to allow to help make the presidency more representative using a popular vote. My favorite is the instant run off system, which you could further tailor to require the president wins with a margin larger than 50%.

Shacking up the powers of the president and the VP is something I would be against, though it would be interesting to discuss it further. I just don't think this is the thread for it.

But my major point is that basically any popular vote system would be far better at representing all people than the current system, which basically causes everyone not in a swing state to be ignored.

You haven't really presented an argument for the EC but rather pointed out how the popular vote isn't all that much better than the EC. By your own logic the popular vote is still better than the EC. Because the EC allows a candidate who got second place in the vote, potentially as low as 20% of the population, to win the entirety of the executive branch.

My position is one of basically making things vastly more proportional or removing the more ridiculous outcomes of the electoral college to prevent a massively unrepresentative executive branch. I am against any move to switch to the popular vote without a massive rework of the executive branch to force it to also represent the people (because the difference such as this election had in the popular vote, 2.1%, means that roughly equal amounts of people wouldn't have wanted either Senator Clinton or President-Elect Trump). Since most don't consider the overall representation of the federal executive branch, more that their side wins and gets to choose the path of the nation, I cannot just blindly side with it. However, I would be willing to fix the more outrageous potential, even if improbable, outcomes of the Electoral College as they're per state issues and could actually be done/worked on instead of waiting and hoping for the awful NPVIC (I view it as awful because it is a half-assed solution in my book).

I'm only for each system with changes to them. That's my stance, I'm against keeping things the same with the electoral college and against the popular vote without a massive rework of the federal executive branch of government.

[San Lumen]

And limit the vote to only those who agree with you. Anyone who doesn't or lives outside a farm or small town doesn't get the right to vote

To be fair, he didn't actually say that, and he does make a valid point regarding national service. However, I am of the opinion that people should serve their country because they are citizens, not making service a condition of citizenship. But then, I don't really care for "Liberty" as defined by Missouri.

Well then how do you interpret what he said because thats how i read it. His rural country should legislate for my city but my city cant legislate for them. I should get less of a voice in government then his county. That's what Free Missouri said.

[Post War America]

To be fair, he didn't actually say that, and he does make a valid point regarding national service. However, I am of the opinion that people should serve their country because they are citizens, not making service a condition of citizenship. But then, I don't really care for "Liberty" as defined by Missouri.

Well then how do you interpret what he said because thats how i read it. His rural country should legislate for my city but my city cant legislate for them. I should get less of a voice in government then his county. That's what Free Missouri said.

I do believe that Missouri's exact desire would be to limit voting franchise to those who have completed a civics class and a tour in uniformed services. Nothing about that explicitly was for disenfranchising urban persons for the sake of disenfranchising urban voters. (Their disdain for urban voters is concerning but nowhere did Missouri specifically say they wanted to disenfranchise urban voters). That being said I don't agree with Missouri's position on citizenship and franchise. However your argument fails to actually combat the points that Missouri is actually making.

[San Lumen]

Well then how do you interpret what he said because thats how i read it. His rural country should legislate for my city but my city cant legislate for them. I should get less of a voice in government then his county. That's what Free Missouri said.

I do believe that Missouri's exact desire would be to limit voting franchise to those who have completed a civics class and a tour in uniformed services. Nothing about that explicitly was for disenfranchising urban persons for the sake of disenfranchising urban voters. (Their disdain for urban voters is concerning but nowhere did Missouri specifically say they wanted to disenfranchise urban voters). That being said I don't agree with Missouri's position on citizenship and franchise. However your argument fails to actually combat the points that Missouri is actually making.

And his system would make is so you could pick and choose who gets to vote and that only those who agree with him could vote.

How do you interpret Missouri saying his little village in his rural county should be able to legislate for my city but my city cant legislate for his? How could Albany possible do what they are suggesting? My city has more seats in the state legislature because we have the most population and therefore a certain party controls the legislature and often the statewide officers.

What Missouri wants is a system that makes my vote count less so his side always wins.

[Post War America]

I do believe that Missouri's exact desire would be to limit voting franchise to those who have completed a civics class and a tour in uniformed services. Nothing about that explicitly was for disenfranchising urban persons for the sake of disenfranchising urban voters. (Their disdain for urban voters is concerning but nowhere did Missouri specifically say they wanted to disenfranchise urban voters). That being said I don't agree with Missouri's position on citizenship and franchise. However your argument fails to actually combat the points that Missouri is actually making.

And his system would make is so you could pick and choose who gets to vote and that only those who agree with him could vote.

How do you interpret Missouri saying his little village in his rural county should be able to legislate for my city but my city cant legislate for his? How could Albany possible do what they are suggesting? My city has more seats in the state legislature because we have the most population and therefore a certain party controls the legislature and often the statewide officers.

What Missouri wants is a system that makes my vote count less so his side always wins.

Since Missouri is arguing a literally impossible political platform, there is "his side".

[San Lumen]

And his system would make is so you could pick and choose who gets to vote and that only those who agree with him could vote.

How do you interpret Missouri saying his little village in his rural county should be able to legislate for my city but my city cant legislate for his? How could Albany possible do what they are suggesting? My city has more seats in the state legislature because we have the most population and therefore a certain party controls the legislature and often the statewide officers.

What Missouri wants is a system that makes my vote count less so his side always wins.

Since Missouri is arguing a literally impossible political platform, there is "his side".

Missouri is also talking about a certain political party always winning as a result of his system and not liking urban areas because we have different values and therefore should have no say in issues that affect the state and his little village in his little rural county.

[Post War America]

Since Missouri is arguing a literally impossible political platform, there is "his side".

Missouri is also talking about a certain political party always winning as a result of his system and not liking urban areas because we have different values and therefore should have no say in issues that affect the state and his little village in his little rural county.

While the later is true, Miss, also explicitly stated their disdain for the GOP, the DNC, the Greens, and at least a very large segment of the Libertarian Party. They have no actual horses in the race.

[Spirit of Hope]

Except the electoral college does none of those things. The electoral college makes the system reflect the views of less people, not more.

Most obviously it does this by concentrating the election on swing states. Which allows an absurdly small portion of the population to be the deciding factor in the election. Trump won the EC by less than 200,000 votes. While Hilary Clinton won the popular vote by something like 3,000,000 votes.

Further, in theory, the EC allows less than 20% of the population to win the presidency. At the same time it also allows only 11 states to determine the presidency. It in no way requires that the presidency has reflect a larger number of people, or that those people truly be more even distributed across the nation. It only looks that way because of current american politics.

The electoral college essentially mildly diminishes the power of the more populous states, like my home state of California, while mildly increasing the representation of the less populous states. It gives the states the same elective power for the federal elective branch as they have federal legislative power. It generally works with having the winner of the popular vote win but upsets like the current election can generally occur with a combination of the weighting, two-party system, and the states' idiotic winner-takes-all allotment of their electoral slates. The more improbable and less representative possibilities are due to the states allotment of their electoral slates and is less an issue of the system but of the states themselves. They can be solved with a proportional allotment of the electoral slates.

What you basically seam to be arguing for is the states handing out their electoral college votes proportionally instead of winner takes all. I question how this is really any better than a popular vote system for handing out the power of the executive branch if that is your worry.

The focus on swing states is mostly due to how split the specific states' populations tend to be. However, as shown in this election, our assumptions as to what can swing and flip can be wrong.

The focus is on the swing states because they are how you win the election, all other states are safely assumed to swing one way or the other. There is no point for either candidate to campaign in California, New York or Texas, despite the fact the together they represent a quarter of the US population. In this last election those three states combined got two visits, and almost no money spent.

What this election showed is problems in how polling is handled, the swing states determined the election by a margin of less than 200,000 votes.

There are a number of fixes I would be willing to allow to help make the presidency more representative using a popular vote. My favorite is the instant run off system, which you could further tailor to require the president wins with a margin larger than 50%.

Shacking up the powers of the president and the VP is something I would be against, though it would be interesting to discuss it further. I just don't think this is the thread for it.

But my major point is that basically any popular vote system would be far better at representing all people than the current system, which basically causes everyone not in a swing state to be ignored.

You haven't really presented an argument for the EC but rather pointed out how the popular vote isn't all that much better than the EC. By your own logic the popular vote is still better than the EC. Because the EC allows a candidate who got second place in the vote, potentially as low as 20% of the population, to win the entirety of the executive branch.

My position is one of basically making things vastly more proportional or removing the more ridiculous outcomes of the electoral college to prevent a massively unrepresentative executive branch. I am against any move to switch to the popular vote without a massive rework of the executive branch to force it to also represent the people (because the difference such as this election had in the popular vote, 2.1%, means that roughly equal amounts of people wouldn't have wanted either Senator Clinton or President-Elect Trump). Since most don't consider the overall representation of the federal executive branch, more that their side wins and gets to choose the path of the nation, I cannot just blindly side with it. However, I would be willing to fix the more outrageous potential, even if improbable, outcomes of the Electoral College as they're per state issues and could actually be done/worked on instead of waiting and hoping for the awful NPVIC (I view it as awful because it is a half-assed solution in my book).

I'm only for each system with changes to them. That's my stance, I'm against keeping things the same with the electoral college and against the popular vote without a massive rework of the federal executive branch of government.

I'm just curious why you are so against a popular vote system, yet appear to be alright with proportionally awarding the EC votes. The later basically creates the former, though with votes in smaller states being more powerful than votes in larger states.

Under either system the executive branch is going to only really represent whoever wins, unless you change how the executive branch is set up. Arguing about how the executive should be set up isn't really for this thread, but I would like it if you elaborated on why you don't think the executive needs to be changed if we use a proportional electoral college.

[Longweather]

I'm just curious why you are so against a popular vote system, yet appear to be alright with proportionally awarding the EC votes. The later basically creates the former, though with votes in smaller states being more powerful than votes in larger states.

Under either system the executive branch is going to only really represent whoever wins, unless you change how the executive branch is set up. Arguing about how the executive should be set up isn't really for this thread, but I would like it if you elaborated on why you don't think the executive needs to be changed if we use a proportional electoral college.

This is all I'm quoting as it's the most relevant and easy way for me to format the response.

I'll admit that I'm approaching this problem from the view point of an engineer trying to deal with or fix somebody else's design. The two main complaints that I see against the electoral college is that it can lead to a president (ignoring the vice president and repercussions throughout the executive branch with cabinet members) that does not win the national popular vote and can theoretically result in outrageous unrepresentation (the ~20% figure often used). Since the system is, by design, based around giving the states the same elective power of the federal executive government as they have federal legislative power the first figure strikes me as a less than necessary issue to deal with.

However, I can easily see the issue with a mildly weighted system potentially producing the result of an extremely weighted system. That seems to be against the design which warrants some fixing. Since it's pretty much an issue of the states, and D.C., deciding their electoral slates based upon a first-past-the-post, winner-takes-all system which is nonsensical when allotting multiple points the fix to that issue seems obvious. It's pretty much fixed by having the slates allotted in proportion to the states' citizens votes, while also being somewhat easier to achieve as it requires campaigning individually instead of hoping for something like the NPVIC.

I disagree with calling this solution as leading to a popular vote as it still retains the slight weighting in the current system.

As for my disagreement with just going to the popular vote, my disagreement is based upon the representation argument. While 3 million more people voting for the losing candidate might sound like a lot, it's only a 2.1% difference relative to the amount of votes cast. With the exception of the 1824 election (excluded due to it being a 4-way race with the House of Representatives choosing the winner), the other 4 upsets were by similarly small percentages. In general, the system produces a winner by the popular vote but the mild weighting, pretty much due to the Senate and the size of the House of Representatives being frozen, allows for such upsets in reality. To change the system to a popular vote would result in, at best, a slight increase in representation. The two main methods to achieve this would require either a constitutional amendment or waiting and hoping for the NPVIC to kick in. Essentially, the argument is to put a lot of work/hope/waiting in for a mere slight return which doesn't alter the system too much.

Since getting a de facto or de jure popular vote for the presidency and vice presidency requires time and fairly major effort to achieve (NPVIC being more of the former than the latter with some hoping and hand-wringing added) then getting the executive branch to be more representative seems to be a worthwhile goal. Basically, I think the executive branch of government could use rework regardless of whether we keep the electoral college or go to the popular vote. However, as the latter option requires significant time, work, effort, and some hope sprinkled in the mix for one of the solutions, I want more bang for my buck. The effort and time put into getting slightly better representation is not worth it but doing so on a grander scale would be.

EDIT: Essentially, to put an imperfect analogy into the mix, I either want to patch up the potential bugs in the software or majorly change things so its substantially better.

[Lavochkin]

"I've said that you as an urban dweller should have no say on what I do on the farm."
Under our current system, it's uneducated farmers telling college-educated SJW's living in cities what to do so I wouldn't really complain if you're an American who lives in a rural area.

"Democracy is a failure."
Please give a government system/ideology that has achieved more progress in human development and wealth than democracy.

"ANd I've spent some time in urban areas, they disgust me, and people automatically think they are better/smarter than me because "oh you grew up on a farm, probably haven't ever seen ---------."
And us city people are disgusted when some redneck drives in with his lifted muddied up pickup truck, parks in 3 spaces and walks around and talk like some sort of un-mannered and uneducated hillbilly trash. You get what you do.

"That's why I'm disgusted by any system in which urban bureaucrats in far away cities are empowered by urban voters to press on with programs that hurt my area."
Guess what? Cities are the future, it doesn't take much of an education to know that more people equal less space. Why the hell should we develop policies that support the minority? Social Darwinism baby.

"You're less patriotic because you apparently wouldn't be willing to take a two year term of service in order to earn your franchise."
How is disenfranchising the majority of the American population anymore more patriotic? Hell if anything, you're less patriotic since you represent the smaller portion of America. Also the fact you don't support our democracy puts you directly as an enemy of the state since our nation was founded on those principles.

"statistically, far more likely to join the military."
Cities house more people so in total numbers there will always be more soldiers from cities than rural areas. Also we have a military draft so it really doesn't matter.

"and rural schools tend to put more emphasis on civics and civil responsibility,"
Never heard of such things. I went to Elementary and Middle School and currently in HS, all in a rural area and I ain't seeing any of this so called education you talk about.

more soldiers from cities, not a higher percentage, a far higher rate of attrition from cities and a far higher rate of enlistment from rural areas (and pacific islands).

My system would eliminate the draft. No reason for it.

And if you don't like the southern accent or someone's lifted pick up truck (or some person from the hoods idiotic drop-kitted car for that fucking matter), then fucking deal with it. It's called freedom. something which some of us hold higher and more important than your precious democracy which has fucked us over in every election since coolidge.

Why should we set policies to support the minority? Fine, even as a black person I'll say this: Get rid of bullshit like affirmative action and special black clubs and womens clubs and the special snowflakes in gender studies if you don't care about the minority.

And Democracy has failed, if anything the american experiment has shown the with the urbanization of people comes the higher likelihood that a democratic society will vote away their freedoms carelessly. Patriotism is love of your country always, not love of your government or it's systems. Obviously the constitution left too much leeway for the creeping tyranny of democratic society, and we need new solutions to save the experiment of freedom.

"more soldiers from cities, not a higher percentage, a far higher rate of attrition from cities and a far higher rate of enlistment from rural areas (and pacific islands). "
- That doesn't matter in warfare. You think in war we'll care about who is giving a higher percentage of soldiers? No we just want more and quicker. Why do you think us and other countries defend their cities much more heavily than rural areas in war?

"My system would eliminate the draft. No reason for it."
- Besides the fact that we don't have the worlds largest military by size and we're #3 in world population and 4x smaller than China?

"then fucking deal with it. It's called freedom"
- Right back at ya. If you won't stop acting like idiots then we won't stop treating you like idiots. If you don't like what we do to you, it's called freedom.

" It's called freedom. something which some of us hold higher and more important than your precious democracy which has fucked us over in every election since coolidge."
If it's fucked you over since the 1920's then why the hell are you living here? I heard Russia needs a few farmers who don't mind being interrogated by the FSB every few weeks. Oh and there's no democracy! Just made perfectly for you!

"Get rid of bullshit like affirmative action and special black clubs and womens clubs and the special snowflakes in gender studies if you don't care about the minority."
Hey I ain't arguing for that and I won't. I do agree affirmative action is racist and BS and gender studies should be integrated into health and it's related studies.

"And Democracy has failed, if anything the american experiment has shown the with the urbanization of people comes the higher likelihood that a democratic society will vote away their freedoms carelessly."
And so instead of reforming it you want to start clean and deal with another 100 years of trial and error? If my cars broken I would fix it, not buy an entirely new car.

"Patriotism is love of your country always"
And what defines a country? You clearly don't love the majority of the people living here which created the American culture, or the government and it's history. The only thing left to make you a patriot is our geography. Tell me, do you love our green fields and mountains enough to die for it? Because if not I'm afraid you're our worst enemy.

"Obviously the constitution left too much leeway for the creeping tyranny of democratic society, and we need new solutions to save the experiment of freedom."
Correct me if I'm wrong. But didn't you want some kinda dictatorship that helps the minority? How is that any ways freedom for a country when the mass majority are being oppressed?

[Northern Federation of Korea]

She lossed by roughly 1,ooo votes, because 3,ooo of the people who voted for her were illegal immigrants. I don't believe their votes count at all.