To be honest, I don't care. As I said I have already explained this in depth earlier in this topic. LMK when you've read that.


/e No one seems to have issues with the Electoral College, until it disagrees with the popular vote, which is NOT representative of ALL the States in the Union.


/ee As I said above, this is NOT a Union of people, it is a Union of States. If you keep that in mind, then the Electoral College makes sense.

This post was edited by Ghot on Oct 9 2017 10:25pm

the issue isnt the electoral college, itself, its the massive size difference between states coupled with a winner-takes-all system on the state level.


at the moment, the most pressing issue is big states like california, new york or texas being reliably blue/red, resulting in a ton of voters who dont really influence the outcome of the election.

but thats not the biggest issue. shit's really going down when one of those big states actually becomes a swing state. in that case, it majorizes dozens of potential swings in other states and the voters in that particular, large swing state suddenly have gigantic leverage. this was the case in the 1880s with new york, which was the tipping point state a couple of times in a row, with winning margins around 0.1-2%.

in 1884, a margin of 1100 votes in new york decided a state with 36 electoral votes at a time when there were just 401 electoral votes. or take 1888:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1888#Close_states

harrison defeated cleveland by 233 to 168 electoral votes. sounds like a solid victory, doesnt it? but he won new york by just 1.09%. so if just 0.55% additional voters in new york (around 7500) had voted democratic instead of republican, cleveland would have won the entire election by 204 to 197 electoral votes. so a swing of 7500 voters in a crucial place, out of almost 11 million votes cast nationwide, could have tipped a seemingly solid 233 vs 168 election!

the only time this issue has truly come up again since then was 2000, when the large state of florida was the tipping point state by an insanely narrow margin. (since then, the tipping point states have been ohio (04), colorado (08 & 12) and wisconsin (16)).

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Oct 10 2017 12:53am

And as I already explained, the Electoral College does nothing to improve the representation of the states.

This post was edited by Voyaging on Oct 10 2017 09:56am

the back-to-back Stanley Cup Champion Penguins are at the White House today. With Evgeni Malkin making the trip, finally there is irrefutable proof of Drumpf's ties to 'russia'

Collusion confirmed.

he attacks some awkward representations of arguments for the electoral college while avoiding the more common and less aggressive ones, uses extreme theoretically possible but practically impossible scenarios as the gauge of whether those arguments have merit, and ends with sweeping absolutist conclusions that arent proven by his arguments.

This post was edited by cambovenzi on Oct 10 2017 01:50pm

You're welcome to be more specific.

the first attacked 'argument': the idea that electoral college ensures the president is elected by the states
his rebuttal: well the several most populous states could theoretically all vote and elect a president.
who is arguing that isnt true?

then he starts talking about cramming everyone but 1 person into california then california would decide. ok?
then he talks about some think the electoral college means the majority of states decide, 'but it isnt'.

he claims it 'doesnt actually protect the small states' after this, even though we would both agree it does to a degree.
you were explicitly taking issue with the fact that they get more representation than their population ratio.

he misrepresents how electors are chosen and omits the fact that many are bound
then he starts the poisonous phrasing of 'you must accept' that they can take away "your victory" by protecting you from "yourself"
he admits this has 'never happened nor should it'
He never addresses any reasons for why this might be a good thing, just like he doesnt attack the real arguments for not using a popular vote.

then he calls the electoral college "crazy", claims it protects no citizens and protects no states so lets get rid of it.

ouch, hit the nail on the head. I really hope trump sees this and takes it for what it is: a wakeup call.

fully expecting some twitter insults against the host of that show instead XD