What's the talk about the election not yet being decided? Trump is President whether you like it or not, end of story. Get over it. I got over it for the last 8 `years, it's your turn.
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Al, Trump is President-Elect until he takes the oath of office on January 20th...but that's not your question...it's "...what is the talk all about?"
I understand all the talk...Trump WILL most likely be elected POTUS by the EC, despite one of his opponents having gotten over 2,000,000 votes more than Trump got (nationwide). To a lot of us who believe strongly in the idea of "one man, one vote" the idea that the "loser" gets the job flies in the face of everything we were taught. IMHO it is just wrong, and it would still be wrong if H.C. were the "loser" about to be sworn in on January 20th.
It's a matter of principle!!
Cheers!
Doug
I understand all the talk...Trump WILL most likely be elected POTUS by the EC, despite one of his opponents having gotten over 2,000,000 votes more than Trump got (nationwide). To a lot of us who believe strongly in the idea of "one man, one vote" the idea that the "loser" gets the job flies in the face of everything we were taught. IMHO it is just wrong, and it would still be wrong if H.C. were the "loser" about to be sworn in on January 20th.
It's a matter of principle!!
Cheers!
Doug
So, you'd be fine with the idea of one state's population dictating to the population of the other 49 who the president of the entire country will be then?
E.g.: This is an extreme illustration outlining what the 'College is designed to prevent, but, for the sake of argument - just go with it for a minute.
Let's just say 51% of the entire U.S. population lives in California...and everybody in Cali votes for "candidate A". Let's just say everybody ELSE in every other state in the union votes for "candidate B". Candidate "A" would thereby win the popular vote and thus the election...and, thereafter, ONLY the interests of Cali residents would guide President A's domestic econ & social policy decisions if he wanted to be re-elected. Little if anything else of concern around the rest of country would be considered...even though the rest of the country would STILL be paying their "fair share" of taxes to support whatever Cali wanted...which probably would mean financially supporting measures detrimental to their own interests in many cases.
Question: Is THAT "just wrong"???
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Well, as I understand it, if 51% of the population of the USA lived in CA the number of representatives for CA would reflect that fact and therefore the number of EC votes held by CA would be enough to elect the POTUS if the EC were going to do the electing.
That is what happened already...under the Electoral College the electoral process is "rigged" so that the most populous states have an advantage in the number of electoral votes. This past election was decided by a few of the most populous states, most of which are in the northeast US. If we were to have a true "winner takes all" election, DT would not have been declared the victor because of the popular vote margin held by CH. The winner should be determined by popular vote ONLY, ditch the useless Electoral College!
The bottom line is that over 2,000,000 voters will feel like their votes didn't count. We should not feel that way, we should feel like our vote counts as much as the next.
There desperately needs to be some revision in the EC at the least, and the ideal situation would be for it to be abolished completely. We don't need either the process or the entity any longer with the technology we now have.
Doug
You've completely missed my point...and ducked my question.
Regardless, as to what you just said, remember that, as regards an Electoral College vote, each state regardless of population gets only one electoral vote for EACH senator, for a total of TWO votes for each state...which means Cali's two senator-based E.C. votes go up against the 98 senator-based E.C. vote total created by the sum of all the other states senator-based E.C. votes combined. And, since all the other states in the above illustration altogether also have 49% of the total population to boot...whadaya wanna bet the combined Electoral College vote total for those 49 states (senatorial and population) would TRUMP (sorry!) Cali's E.C. vote total?
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaah... :lipsrsealed:
It doesn't matter if she got 20,000,000 more votes it the electoral votes
...unless you are a believer in the "...one man, one vote" promise we were all force-fed as students...then it becomes a HUGE matter, Al!
Like RodKnock says...every other office for which any/all of us vote is decided by popular vote...why not the POTUS? We now have technology that can gather the vote tallies almost instantaneously, we no longer have to wait for the X number of representatives from Calif and Nevada and Oregon and....well, you get the idea...to ALL travel to Washington, DC or Philadelphia, PA, or where-ever the Electoral College gathered, so that the votes could be counted. The distances involved meant it took a long time to get clear back across the width of the U.S. and so the E.C. most likely met in early January, when those the furtherest from the capital could finally make it to the gathering. No wonder the inauguration had to be postponed until late January.
That brings up another issue...with our current status of technology, we could know almost instantaneously what the national popular vote is and have an inauguration much more quickly, no need to wait 2+ months for all the votes to be countable. As it is the current POTUS is a "Lame Duck" for almost 2 months...and nothing gets done.
The bottom line is that the EC is no longer necessary, and in fact is counterproductive if it is inaugurating a candidate who came in second in the popular vote...we need to get rid of it and hold our election for POTUS in the same manner we elect EVERY other representative/senator, etc.
Cheers for those who recognize the problem and endorse solving the issue!
Doug
If the proponents can get to the 270 electoral votes need for it to take effect, then I'm 100% sure someone will challenge it in court. And it will make its way to the Supreme Court. That's how the system works. I'm good with that.
I watched the news. In this election, all I heard about were the swing states: Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Iowa, Nevada, etc. Just about every other state was ignored, including red states like Texas, Oklahoma and Georgia. So, it's not just CA being ignored.
The population is moving away from the middle of the country and moving to Texas, Arizona, Florida, Colorado, Nevada. IMO, your vote should follow you around. You may have lived in ND, but now want warmer weather and better job opportunities. It shouldn't matter where you live. One person, one vote. The only elected office (or ballot proposition) in the country where it's not one person, one vote. We're not 13 colonies any more.
The difference being: The president will 'rule' over all of the separate, individual states collectively...or separate, individual nations collectively, if you will. Each of those individual states has its own specific interests/histories/economic base/laws/cultural makeup/customs, blah, blah, blah. So whereas a state, county, or city election deals with and affects ONLY those who reside in those particular jurisdictions - a presidential race will have an affect on everybody residing in every individual state in the country.
So, as has been mentioned ad nauseam, the 'College was set up to try to give each individual state (and by extension that state's interests) as equal a say in the outcome of a presidential race as possible since the individual states are what make up the United States as a whole. (We can beat the minutia to death regarding what led up to its final form...but, in the end that doesn't change its purpose.) Like you said, individual VOTERS can and DO move here and there on a whim...but, the borders of each individual state, and each individual state government, and the specific interests OF each state always stay right where they are.
Beyond that, at this point I'm at a loss to come up with a better way to 'splain' it...
:chug:
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It has always seemed strange to me that you guys seem to want a king to rule over you.
IMO you would be better off if your president was ceremonial head but with little to no power. TBH I am not even sure a president is even necessary.
The real power should be in representative government.
This arrangement would solve the situation for both sides wouldn't it?
I was always in two minds about the argument we had in this country about such things during the republic referendum discussions (just about the method for presidential appointment, not whether or not we should be a republic).
The US system and its consequences have convinced me that Malcolm Turnbull was right all those years ago.
Tim.
IMO you would be better off if your president was ceremonial head but with little to no power. TBH I am not even sure a president is even necessary.
The real power should be in representative government.
This arrangement would solve the situation for both sides wouldn't it?
I was always in two minds about the argument we had in this country about such things during the republic referendum discussions (just about the method for presidential appointment, not whether or not we should be a republic).
The US system and its consequences have convinced me that Malcolm Turnbull was right all those years ago.
Tim.
WRONG!!! Nothing could be further from the truth.
We prefer our 3 separate-but-equal branches of gov't, Tim!
One person, all that power... seems kind of king like to me, but ok...
And you said rule before I did. ;p
Tim.
"Rule" is just a figure of speech...
Doug, I understand how you feel, but it's not what you believe, it's what is the law, We operate on Electoral votes, not how many homes you own, or your gender or popular vote. Change it if you want, but that's what counts now.
With the stronghold the current two "reigning" political parties have on our system, I don't think it is possible, Randy.
What IS possible is for the independent candidates to "siphon" off votes from one or the other party...and, in fact, IMHO had it not been for the Libertarian presence in this past election I believe that H.C. would have won enough EC votes to be inaugurated as the new POTUS, which would be in accordance with the popular vote totals we see.
For a 3rd party to be "viable" it would need to have a VERY populous "message" for the voters...and I don't see them doing that, at least not yet. The "alternative" choices are (again, IMHO) not far enough from the two major parties in their message to voters.
I think most of us are for the most part pretty fed up with what the present parties have been forcing down our throats...but we'd need something SIGNIFICANTLY different from the current message and I don't think we're getting it...although I thought Bernie Sanders did a fair job of presenting a reasonable alternative. It's obvious the voters did not see that in large enough numbers, though.
Cheers!
Doug
What IS possible is for the independent candidates to "siphon" off votes from one or the other party...and, in fact, IMHO had it not been for the Libertarian presence in this past election I believe that H.C. would have won enough EC votes to be inaugurated as the new POTUS, which would be in accordance with the popular vote totals we see.
For a 3rd party to be "viable" it would need to have a VERY populous "message" for the voters...and I don't see them doing that, at least not yet. The "alternative" choices are (again, IMHO) not far enough from the two major parties in their message to voters.
I think most of us are for the most part pretty fed up with what the present parties have been forcing down our throats...but we'd need something SIGNIFICANTLY different from the current message and I don't think we're getting it...although I thought Bernie Sanders did a fair job of presenting a reasonable alternative. It's obvious the voters did not see that in large enough numbers, though.
Cheers!
Doug
We have 3 equal branches of government. That's the difference. The President doesn't "rule."
At this point, I'm at a loss to come up with a better way to explain one person one vote and state lines shouldn't matter when electing a President. Again, there aren't 13 colonies any more. It's not 1787 and no one legally owns slaves and we don't wear white wigs.
If all 125,000,000 voters in the US lived in San Francisco (pick any city), then the City and County of San Francisco will elect the next President. There's a reason they live there, probably jobs and the Dungeness Crab. And he'll hopefully make the rest of the country a National Park. :laugh:
Yes, Al we understand the law today.
But laws do change, say like women and people of color can vote. And this is one law that needs to change. And there are efforts under way right now, because the "loser" of the 2016 Election won the popular vote by 2,500,000 votes (and counting) or 2% of the vote. It wasn't even close.
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