2: Usually I stay away from politics, but here's something to chew on.
Both major political parties have diverse, complex, and often contradictory platforms that go far beyond the simplistic conservative/liberal split. What is interesting is how they take sides when an issue is not addressed by the traditional party platform.
To whit: the electoral college. Republicans typically support it, and Democrats typically oppose it. Both sides can come up with long lists of lofty ideals that support/oppose it, but what it comes down to for both sides is that the electoral college elected a Republican twice in a row.
In the electoral college, most states use the Winner Takes All method but two states [Maine (D x4) and Nebraska (R x5)] use an alternate approach that arguably gives better direct representation. The Democratic Party proposed switching Colorado (R x9) to the new system in 2004, and failed.
Now it seems Republicans are all about more direct representation in the electoral college, but only in California (D x55). And who is defending the status quo? Yeah, the Democrats.
Conclusion: Only losers want election reform, but only the winners have the power to do it.
- Z
Actually the irony is that if GWB hadn't won Ohio, he would have lost the electoral college but won the popular vote by 3.5 million. I can't recall how large of a difference was represented in the popular vote in 2000 but I don't remember it being larger than 3.5 million on Gore's side.
This is the major problem - its obvious, and we've spoken about this plenty of times, that when there is a big discrepency between the popular vote and the electoral college the entire system's credibility is called into question, and rightly so.
I think elimination of the electoral college, or modifications of the rules, would make things very interesting. After all, in 2004 40% of NYS voted for President Bush. Being one of the states with the largest number of electoral votes, distributing these votes in proportion to the popular vote would make things very, very interesting indeed.
I'd be interested in reading a study, if there was one out there, that would determine the outcome of the presidential elections in the past had the electoral college votes been in proportion to the percentage of the popular votes, state by state.
The thing about this country is we are not a democrocy we are a representive democrcy. Basiclly the people have no control we pick people to have control for us and then they do what ever they want. If they have morals then they try to get done what the people who elected them elected them for, but often they follow who paid for them to run or even special interest groups. The electoral college is an example of indirect Democraticy but I can understand why people want it. It helps fight fraud. Say I'm running and in Buffalo, New York, Albany and Rochester I get the votes of everyone who died in that year then it doesn't matter that I got 100,000 (or any number) more then my enemy because I only get so many points. But I'm sure there are better ways to stop illegal votes.
But here is one of the problems with it. Lets say (e:josh) was running for president and in NY he is leading and people on TV see that so they don't vote cause it doesn't matter since there guy say (e:ajay) can't win so josh gets all the points an ajay gets nothing. But if those people would have voted then the proportion the ajay would have been behind josh would be much lower and he would be closer. Just the opposite is true also if someone gets 99% of the votes in a state it doesn't matter how many more people voted for them cause the only get the points. That is why you can win the popular vote and not become president it doesn't make any sense.
There is another reason why it should be gotten rid of and that is so you can have more then 2 people running for president. Currently all 3rd party people do is take voters away form some one else and cause them to lose states that the 3rd party can't win. I will use my self as an example Yes I liked Ross Perot and voted for him but all that did was take votes away from someone else and I'm sure a lot of people did that (i hope I'm remembering right that he was 3rd party). But if it is most votes wins then a 3rd party guy or gal could win because they could get the most votes. I'm not saying it would happen but it sure seems like a much more fair way of doing things.
Yes, yes, it's about the time to let the gamesmanship begin! The most important thing, and the only real important goal is to attain and keep power.
The thing I find most insulting is that the parties pretty much proudly out themselves as hypocrites, using each others' arguments depending on their relative strength. You see it all the time nowadays, and we will continue to see it. Turnabout is fair play, it seems, and the fanbois pile right on top of it.
I agree that doing this proportional electoral college vote thing state-by-state is just not a good idea, but I'm also not a lawyer and can't say what the recourse is. Maybe it's time to relegate "flyover" country to the worthless status everyone on the coasts wants for it. That certainly would ensure that one party ruled from now until the end of time. Depending on who we root for, that is either a no brainer or an outrage, damn the hypocrisy.
No, this has nothing to do with direct representation or popular elections or real election reform. This has to do with which party wants to be in power in 2008. California will not go for any of the GOP candidates in 2008. But in this new system 20 of CA's 55 electoral votes will go to the Republicans. That is one hell of a deficit for the Dems to make up and probably would not win the election. This is just a power grab, knocking out the biggest bloc of voters for Dems.
The electoral collage has to go, but doing it state by state is a stupid way to do it. If they do it and Mitt Romney is President there sure as hell wont be any movement to split Texas or other large GOP strongholds.
And Governor Schwartzeneger, a Republican, opposes this reform as well. So it isn't GOP vs. Dems on this issue as a rule.