[Thought Prompt] The Electoral College

[Ryusei the Morning Star]

I'd have to agree (gasp) with Winter.  There do tend to be a lot of out of touch "liberal elites" in those areas.  

Just elites in general, the conservative ones are unbearable in a different way

[cr47t]

I actually have an idea to reform the EC -- but should I post it here or make a new thread?

[Dad]

I actually have an idea to reform the EC -- but should I post it here or make a new thread?

 

This is the Thread about the EC.  Post it here.

[cr47t]

This is the Thread about the EC.  Post it here.

Ok. My main idea, which I call the Electoral Senate, currently consists of 2 components;

 

1. Have each state have the same amount of electors regardless of population. So let's say we make the number 5, then each state will have 5 delegates. (Not sure what to do about DC as it's really just a town and probably has WAY less population than a state.) This is based on the US senate where each state has the same amount of senators, hence the name of my idea/system. A candidate still needs a majority of electoral votes to win the presidency.

2. Electoral votes in any given state/DC are awarded proportionally to each candidate's share of the statewide popular vote in that state/DC. So for example let's say a Democrat gets 60% of the popular vote in NH, a Republican the remaining 40% -- if NH had a total of 5 electoral votes, 3 of them would go to the Democrat while 2 would go to the Republican. This system also gives more leeway for third-party candidates to gain a hold in electoral votes (but not much).

 

If anyone has suggestions to improve this hypothetical system of mine, please share them -- I am willing to hear what you have to say.

[Ryusei the Morning Star]

Ok. My main idea, which I call the Electoral Senate, currently consists of 2 components;

 

1. Have each state have the same amount of electors regardless of population. So let's say we make the number 5, then each state will have 5 delegates. (Not sure what to do about DC as it's really just a town and probably has WAY less population than a state.) This is based on the US senate where each state has the same amount of senators, hence the name of my idea/system. A candidate still needs a majority of electoral votes to win the presidency.

2. Electoral votes in any given state/DC are awarded proportionally to each candidate's share of the statewide popular vote in that state/DC. So for example let's say a Democrat gets 60% of the popular vote in NH, a Republican the remaining 40% -- if NH had a total of 5 electoral votes, 3 of them would go to the Democrat while 2 would go to the Republican. This system also gives more leeway for third-party candidates to gain a hold in electoral votes (but not much).

 

If anyone has suggestions to improve this hypothetical system of mine, please share them -- I am willing to hear what you have to say.

Congressional districts. Do what maine and nebraska do

 

each COD is worth one ev

 

Statewide winner gets 2

[(GigaDrillBreaker)]

The attacks on a popular vote system fail to answer a pretty fundamental question to the discussion: Why should one person's vote carry a higher weight than another's?

 

The standard defense for this is "because otherwise elections would be determined by the states with highest population". This is funking bullshit. First off, it isn't supportable, as the population isn't as densely packed as the rhetoric implies. Second off, it runs under a false assumption that states are (and should be) distinctive bodies with comparable power. Someone's ability to influence national decisions like this should not be determined by where they live. That is blatant segregation. Finally, the point itself is funking stupid. Of course high population centers should have a strong influence on the election. That is where the funking people are. The presidency is q decision that affects everyone, even if "everyone" includes a majority who disagrees with you.

 

Conservatives argue for the electoral college because it is an unbalanced system that favors their viewpoint, and they pretend this twisted selfishness is a viable defense.

[Ryusei the Morning Star]

This is funking bullshit. First off, it isn't supportable, as the population isn't as densely packed as the rhetoric implies.

This is false, Trump won 3000+ counties, HRC won 56

 

Updated 3084 vs 57

[vla1ne]

Ok. My main idea, which I call the Electoral Senate, currently consists of 2 components;

 

1. Have each state have the same amount of electors regardless of population. So let's say we make the number 5, then each state will have 5 delegates. (Not sure what to do about DC as it's really just a town and probably has WAY less population than a state.) This is based on the US senate where each state has the same amount of senators, hence the name of my idea/system. A candidate still needs a majority of electoral votes to win the presidency.

2. Electoral votes in any given state/DC are awarded proportionally to each candidate's share of the statewide popular vote in that state/DC. So for example let's say a Democrat gets 60% of the popular vote in NH, a Republican the remaining 40% -- if NH had a total of 5 electoral votes, 3 of them would go to the Democrat while 2 would go to the Republican. This system also gives more leeway for third-party candidates to gain a hold in electoral votes (but not much).

 

If anyone has suggestions to improve this hypothetical system of mine, please share them -- I am willing to hear what you have to say.

good start overall, and i'd have to say, of the two, the second would be the better change since the first ignores population a bit too much. include a bonus for overall popular vote, to somewhat sate those obsessed with it, and you would have a relatively decent reformation of the electoral college. divided EC votes would encourage third parties to run, or even to team up to get a larger share of the pie, and would definitely remove some of the hard feelings from those who don't care for the EC.

 

The attacks on a popular vote system fail to answer a pretty fundamental question to the discussion: Why should one person's vote carry a higher weight than another's?

 

The standard defense for this is "because otherwise elections would be determined by the states with highest population". This is f***ing bullshit. First off, it isn't supportable, as the population isn't as densely packed as the rhetoric implies. Second off, it runs under a false assumption that states are (and should be) distinctive bodies with comparable power. Someone's ability to influence national decisions like this should not be determined by where they live. That is blatant segregation. Finally, the point itself is f***ing stupid. Of course high population centers should have a strong influence on the election. That is where the f***ing people are. The presidency is q decision that affects everyone, even if "everyone" includes a majority who disagrees with you.

 

Conservatives argue for the electoral college because it is an unbalanced system that favors their viewpoint, and they pretend this twisted selfishness is a viable defense.

to argue this, and that last paragraph,  I am not even arguing in it's favor as-is, but even as-is, it's leagues better than popular vote. i have gone on multiple times about it, but it bears repeating, popular vote is extremely susceptible to voter fraud (on either side). and the system as is, even if somewhat broken, averted that (fraud) from influencing the election in any major way. which in my eyes, is by far more important than having the popular vote win. i am all for reform of the EC, but i would never support popular vote, because it's essentially "whoever is willing to cheat controls the race". there have been multiple proposals throughout this thread to improve it, and even republicans aren' the happiest campers about the system, but it is still a better system than no system at all. because one city full of people (not state, city) should not be able to eradicate the voice on an entire other state. each state has different views, different ways of life, and different values. which is why each state has it's own share of votes to give towards each president. the voters within california or texas, should not be allowed to overshadow the entirety of multiple other states on the level that they would, should popular vote become the only means of winning. they still have insanely higher shares than the smaller states, is that not enough for you? the electoral college was made to prevent tyrrany of the majority. where the highly populated areas become the main choosers of an election. they still are, but the damage is mitigated by the EC, and voter fraud is curbed to an extent. i believe you said it earlier, but if 9 states give you their popular vote, by a decent margin, the other states will not be able to keep up. in other words, if you are in a close race, and you win any of the largest stats by a wide margin, you have effectively won the game. pop vote favors states with higher populations. it's not a balanced game, it's just a different kind of broken.  it's estimated that over a million illegal immigrants voted this election, and that doesn't even factor in the machines switching votes, people registered one place voting in another as well, ballots thrown out, and so-on. that doesn't sound nuts to you? under the electoral college, those problems are contained within the state, the fraud doesn't ripple. under pop vote, those instances would build together, into a potentially election swinging race.

 

winter's post refutes your first claim. as for your second claim as i said above, each state is i's own independent being. they are united, but they all play by different rules. why do you think there is "state" law and "federal" law? because they are a two layered system. they do not have comparable power, but their power is already measured out in the EC (even if the EC requires re-tuning, the concept itself is by no means wrong) it's segregation, but no, not all separation is bad, especially segregation that mitigates the damage of cheating. i don't want california being the key to the next election, especially when it's obvious that it rigs it's own elections. as for your last point. are you ignoring the farmers in the less densely populated states? those who farm in dakota (either dakota), those who raise cattle in kansas, or those who fish for the people in that extremely small state of maine? no, not every state is equal, but population is not the only value that each state brings to the table. EC may have an older way of relegating it, but they do have the right idea.

 

 

This is false, Trump won 3000+ counties, HRC won 56

 

Updated 3084 vs 57

while that's both correct, and hilarious, you have to give some credit to gerrymandering for that massive divide. both republicans and democrats fight like animals over who gets to redraw the lines each time said decisicion comes, which is why we have such weird ass compositions on some states 

[VCR_CAT]

In regards to how the vote for this election worked out, and because it's very relevant to the discussion, I feel like it needs to be pointed how "winning counties" relates to actually winning votes. So, let's take a look at the typical map of the US according to how the election went that everyone and their dog is going to cite:

 

[spoiler=maps]

That's the election results based on counties won, and boy howdy that's a lot of red!

 

But what if we looked at the map, instead, based on votes and not won counties?

 

Suddenly, things aren't looking so red anymore. This is, of course, using a gradient to make it more clear the representation of votes within each given county, and things aren't looking so clear. Now the problem with this is, it's still just a geographic map; it represents voter percentage based on where they live, but not at all the quantity of voters or the variance of population density. So what if we took the map, and skewed the proportions based on population density?

 

mmmmmmm now isn't that interesting.

Here's another version that uses a different colour scaling to make it more clear how the vote was represented:

 

Source: http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2016/

 

 

 

Of course there are problems with going purely popular vote, but there are problems with the electoral college there is today. There's merit to giving a voice to the farmers and people in less dense regions, but this doesn't make it instantly better and that nothing needs to change. If we're talking democracy, where the results are the voice of the people, then some sort of change should be considered; if not a totally popular vote, then something to take into account that having a majority government based on a minority vote isn't a very good thing.

[Ryusei the Morning Star]

In regards to how the vote for this election worked out, and because it's very relevant to the discussion, I feel like it needs to be pointed how "winning counties" relates to actually winning votes. So, let's take a look at the typical map of the US according to how the election went that everyone and their dog is going to cite:

 

[spoiler=maps]

That's the election results based on counties won, and boy howdy that's a lot of red!

 

But what if we looked at the map, instead, based on votes and not won counties?

 

Suddenly, things aren't looking so red anymore. This is, of course, using a gradient to make it more clear the representation of votes within each given county, and things aren't looking so clear. Now the problem with this is, it's still just a geographic map; it represents voter percentage based on where they live, but not at all the quantity of voters or the variance of population density. So what if we took the map, and skewed the proportions based on population density?

 

mmmmmmm now isn't that interesting.

Here's another version that uses a different colour scaling to make it more clear how the vote was represented:

 

Source: http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2016/

 

 

 

Of course there are problems with going purely popular vote, but there are problems with the electoral college there is today. There's merit to giving a voice to the farmers and people in less dense regions, but this doesn't make it instantly better and that nothing needs to change. If we're talking democracy, where the results are the voice of the people, then some sort of change should be considered; if not a totally popular vote, then something to take into account that having a majority government based on a minority vote isn't a very good thing.

The point is 

 

1) Popular vote promotes the tyranny of the coastal majority

 

2) America is very purple

[(GigaDrillBreaker)]

The point is 

 

1) Popular vote promotes the tyranny of the coastal majority

 

2) America is very purple

Tyranny? Don't you think that is a bit of a hotword?

 

How should the place someone lives determine their ability to influence the election? Why should some people's views carry more weight than others? What makes their opinions worth tipping the balance in favor of?

 

Also, the county argument is silly. There are so many counties with an insignificant population that boasting numbers like that really has no meaning.

[Ryusei the Morning Star]

Tyranny? Don't you think that is a bit of a hotword?

How should the place someone lives determine their ability to influence the election? Why should some people's views carry more weight than others? What makes their opinions worth tipping the balance in favor of?

Also, the county argument is silly. There are so many counties with an insignificant population that boasting numbers like that really has no meaning.

Because LA doesn't understand the pains of middle America

[Dad]

Because LA doesn't understand the pains of middle America

 

There are plenty of middle class Americans in LA.  Poor argument.

[Ryusei the Morning Star]

There are plenty of middle class Americans in LA.  Poor argument.

Let me put it this way, the policies LA tends to vote for, don't at all address what the people in Middle America want/need

 

There's a massive coastal disconnect 

[VCR_CAT]

The point is 

 

1) Popular vote promotes the tyranny of the coastal majority

 

2) America is very purple

 

No it's not. The point is that you elected a majority government with a minority vote, and there's a lot of problems with that.

 

 

 

Let me put it this way, the policies LA tends to vote for, don't at all address what the people in Middle America want/need

 

There's a massive coastal disconnect 

 

And there are policies that Middle America tend to vote for that don't address what the inner-city people want. The disconnect goes both ways, and middle america isn't automatically more important to the point of having such a dramatically weightier vote. Just because you're more concerned with your own interests, does not mean the interests of others don't matter just because you disagree with them; the map shows that there's significant population that essentially had a significantly decreased say in the election for the arbitrary reason of where they live.

 

Should the vote just be popular vote? No. I understand the merit in giving the less-dense regions a louder voice; people are still people and both sides should be listened to, but the way the electoral college operates now grants them a significantly dis-proportioned voice. If a government is elected in with a minority vote, then they should have a minority representation; there's a large portion of the population that still should be listened to and represented, and the way your two-party system works always ensures a divided us-vs.-them narrative.

 

At the very least, the electoral college should be rethought with population representation taken into better account. No, I'm not asking for Middle America to have no voice, but geographical location isn't a strong enough basis alone for this system.

[Ryusei the Morning Star]

Clinton didn't get a majority vote either buddy, she hasn't broken 50% nor will she

 

You also don't understand how big of a voice cali already has. That's 1/5 of the total you need given to you at the start

 

The only change that should be made is maybe maine'ing the whole system to work by congressional district, but I doubt that's what you want since Trump would actually have done better in a system like that

[VCR_CAT]

Clinton didn't get a majority vote either buddy, she hasn't broken 50% nor will she

 

You also don't understand how big of a voice cali already has. That's 1/5 of the total you need given to you at the start

 

The only change that should be made is maybe maine'ing the whole system to work by congressional district, but I doubt that's what you want since Trump would actually have done better in a system like that

 

The point of my argument isn't so much to keep Trump out of office. The point is to work towards something that better reflects the voice of the people, and yeah Cali has a huge voice because a lot of people live there, but there's merit to listening to what people have to say.

 

I mean, there's a lot of issues with your election system, and the EC is only one of them. I could go on about the merits of a minority government and how it's by and for the more democratic system; because it means even if a ruling party is voted in, they still need to listen to the other parties and appeal to them to pass bills and do their job. It means that after the election, the "losers" still have a voice and everyone's being listened to.

 

With a 2-party system and a clear winner/loser agenda, even if it's a total popularity win of 51 to 49, be it Demo or Repub, then that's 49% of the population that won't be considered when it comes to the government's actions and functionality; and that's really bad. I'm an English major, so obviously my knowledge is very limited, but something needs to be changed or done to better represent the will of the people, and as it is now I definitely feel like giving some people an arbitrarily larger voice isn't good.

[vla1ne]

The point of my argument isn't so much to keep Trump out of office. The point is to work towards something that better reflects the voice of the people, and yeah Cali has a huge voice because a lot of people live there, but there's merit to listening to what people have to say.

 

I mean, there's a lot of issues with your election system, and the EC is only one of them. I could go on about the merits of a minority government and how it's by and for the more democratic system; because it means even if a ruling party is voted in, they still need to listen to the other parties and appeal to them to pass bills and do their job. It means that after the election, the "losers" still have a voice and everyone's being listened to.

 

With a 2-party system and a clear winner/loser agenda, even if it's a total popularity win of 51 to 49, be it Demo or Repub, then that's 49% of the population that won't be considered when it comes to the government's actions and functionality; and that's really bad. I'm an English major, so obviously my knowledge is very limited, but something needs to be changed or done to better represent the will of the people, and as it is now I definitely feel like giving some people an arbitrarily larger voice isn't good.

i agree that the EC needs improvements and updates, and i believe we pretty much all agree that popular vote isn't the best system, the discussion at this point (and what seems to be the disconnect) is what would be the best way to rebuild the EC without having to resort to solely popular vote. As it stands, the EC has only been against the popular vote what? three times in history? that's an insanely good track record for such an old system. saying it's (completely) busted is simply wrong. personally, i think the shares being divided among the participants would be the best manner of doing so, with a bonus share(s) for the winner of the overall popular vote. the question in my head past that though, is what number of shares would be distributed, and how. the presidency is an all-or-nothing race, much of the countries gonna get ignored no matter who wins. but a better way to divide the shares of EC votes is the question that needs to be figured out.(alongside how best to punish and discourage voter fraud on all levels) 

 

as for the 2 party system thing, that's not the fault of the EC, that's the fault of people who believe it's useless to vote for the third and fourth running parties. america could easily get a third and fourth party if the voters wanted it, the problem is that the two parties currently in power would be damned before they placed a third party on anything resembling a pedestal. the power's too comfy, and the people are too blind to see the value in additional parties, or understand that you have to be willing to lose an election or two  if you want a third party to win one. this election should have been the wake-up, but as you can see, not enough people put their votes towards the third party yet.

[Ryusei the Morning Star]

^^ I second this

 

If you look at Clinton and Kasich, two of the "ideal" picks for the parties, they're basically the same. That's the "choice" the two parties gave us. Donald Trump is America's first independent president. The only real way for an independent to win is to hi-jack a major party. We saw that with Sen. Sanders on the left and Donald Trump on the right.

 

Beyond that we see the degradation of minor parties. Johnson barely got 3% of the voter, and stein only managed 1%

 

Remember when people thought that due to the unavailability of the two parties that Johnson and Stein could get a combined 15%?

 

Good times

[(GigaDrillBreaker)]

 i believe we pretty much all agree that popular vote isn't the best system, the discussion at this point (and what seems to be the disconnect) is what would be the best way to rebuild the EC without having to resort to solely popular vote.

Except we don't? There are essentially 2 people in this thread supporting the electoral college.

As it stands, the EC has only been against the popular vote what? three times in history? that's an insanely good track record for such an old system. saying it's (completely) busted is simply wrong.

I don't see the meaning to this point. Saying it only contradicted the popular vote so many times doesn't mean there isn't an issue with it. You are arguing that, since it almost always lines up with popular vote, it is very good. You know what always lines up with the popular vote? The popular vote.

[Aerion Brightflame]

Technically Trump is the third independent president. George Washington predates parties, and John Anderson was expelled by his party shortly after coming into office, and remained without a party for the rest of his term. 

 

as for the 2 party system thing, that's not the fault of the EC, that's the fault of people who believe it's useless to vote for the third and fourth running parties. america could easily get a third and fourth party if the voters wanted it, the problem is that the two parties currently in power would be damned before they placed a third party on anything resembling a pedestal. the power's too comfy, and the people are too blind to see the value in additional parties, or understand that you have to be willing to lose an election or two  if you want a third party to win one. this election should have been the wake-up, but as you can see, not enough people put their votes towards the third party yet.

 

Or you know a FPTP voting system and the fact that the major third parties in America don't actually bother as much as they should with the bits of American politics they should care about. And the fact that both of the major third party candidates this election were still really s*** so it wasn't like voting third party was the better choice either. (To call Greens fiscally irresponsible is an understatement, and Libertarians have this really weird niche when they aren't just being the home for conservatives who find the Republicans distasteful)

 

Look at the two major third parties currently in the US politics, Greens and Libertarians: 

• Neither party holds any seats in the senate, in the House, any governorship, any seats in the lower house, or any seats in any of the territories of the US. 
• Libertarians hold a single seat in the Upper House, Green hold none. 
• Greens have around 100 candidates in other elected offices, and Libertarians about 147. 

What part of that makes it seems like either party could achieve much in office given how obstructionist both parties are being in current US politics. Obama has shown that reaching across the Isle to achieve compromise doesn't work that well, imagine trying to do it for both parties for every single thing that the president wants enacted. 

 

Third Parties have to get seats in the legislature before they can considering having a realistic chance at the office, in part to build local support when voting happens, and in part to allow the president to achieve things in office. Of course winning the local seats is still a hard job because of really low turnouts and the parties lack of a solid base, but it's a better place to focus on than the presidential election. 

 

I just don't think the issue is as simple as 'Oh the people didn't vote third party so it's there fault it's a two party system'. A large part of being a two party system is because of the voting method, because everywhere other than Canada that's what FPTP does. And the rest of it is because third party candidates are simply nonviable in presidential elections in there current states because they have no support in the other branches and they have fairly weak policies. 

 

As for the issue of the Electoral College: 

 

I don't think that there is a system that could accurately cover the will of the people when it comes to the presidential election. In a more complex system (I.E. significantly more candidates) then a proportional representation system where you weight candidates could in theory be viable. But currently that doesn't exist, and you have a two party system because whatever way you break it currently you marginalise someone. Whichever way it ends up, the majority of the nation probably won't vote for a given candidate, and even in a best case half the country gets disappointed. 

 

But I think, because of the fairly unique set-up of US politics that's kinda fine. I don't think you need a full Proportional representation system in place for the president per say. I guess the currently system technically marginalises everything but a select few middle states and a f*** tonne of voters in the other areas. And that Winter's idea that the states have a pair of votes that go to the winner and then the rest are split proportionately has a lot of merit, especially if one of those has some form of population weighting (I.E. bigger states get more votes). 

 

The reason I say it's kinda fine is that because of US political structure, a president elected non proportionately wouldn't matter that much assuming that the legislative branch was. And if one wants Proportional representation that is the area that one should campaign for it, in the votes for the legislative branch. 

 

Alternatively you could abandon the current US political structure and adopt Parliamentary democracy, the greatest form of democracy. I'm only like half serious here. 

 

EDIT: I also agree with VCR when he talks about minority governments being a good thing, if only when you have more than two parties. Because having to reach compromises means you can satisfy more people, which means you better fufil the will of the people, which means you actually do your job of governing in an arguably better way.

[vla1ne]

Except we don't? There are essentially 2 people in this thread supporting the electoral college.

I don't see the meaning to this point. Saying it only contradicted the popular vote so many times doesn't mean there isn't an issue with it. You are arguing that, since it almost always lines up with popular vote, it is very good. You know what always lines up with the popular vote? The popular vote.

we are not supporting it as-is, we are saying even as-is, it's better than just the popular vote. and not just because of what is known as "tyranny of the majority" but because the popular vote is so easy to hijack, and without the EC(or some other form of separation), it's extremely easy to commit major fraud (in multiple forms) across states, and have it completely flip over the election. EC isn't the best system as is, but even still, it's better than popular vote as-is.

 

the point is that the EC, even if it isn't perfect, isn't completely broken. we knew the rule of the game well beforehand, and nobody decided to campaign about the EC prior, the only issue now is that cali didn't completely turn over the election, and i'm glad it didn't. because this is what the EC was made to help prevent. and i don't much care that the popular vote is not as valuable as you want it to be, because until you can fix voter fraud, i will not trust popular vote at all. look at this election. bernie won popular vote in multiple states, and there's multiple videos with testimony of as much, including a man who suddenly "committed suicide" with two bullets to the back of his head after the video of him against the board of elections in cali got out. till that kind of s*** stops happening, f*** popular vote as anything but a side bonus. we all knew the rules of the EC before this election started, and we all saw how the game was played countless times prior. the end result is not the sole fault of the EC.

 

[spoiler=bright]

Or you know a FPTP voting system and the fact that the major third parties in America don't actually bother as much as they should with the bits of American politics they should care about. And the fact that both of the major third party candidates this election were still really s*** so it wasn't like voting third party was the better choice either. (To call Greens fiscally irresponsible is an understatement, and Libertarians have this really weird niche when they aren't just being the home for conservatives who find the Republicans distasteful)

 

Look at the two major third parties currently in the US politics, Greens and Libertarians: 

• Neither party holds any seats in the senate, in the House, any governorship, any seats in the lower house, or any seats in any of the territories of the US. 
• Libertarians hold a single seat in the Upper House, Green hold none. 
• Greens have around 100 candidates in other elected offices, and Libertarians about 147. 

What part of that makes it seems like either party could achieve much in office given how obstructionist both parties are being in current US politics. Obama has shown that reaching across the Isle to achieve compromise doesn't work that well, imagine trying to do it for both parties for every single thing that the president wants enacted. 

 

Third Parties have to get seats in the legislature before they can considering having a realistic chance at the office, in part to build local support when voting happens, and in part to allow the president to achieve things in office. Of course winning the local seats is still a hard job because of really low turnouts and the parties lack of a solid base, but it's a better place to focus on than the presidential election. 

 

I just don't think the issue is as simple as 'Oh the people didn't vote third party so it's there fault it's a two party system'. A large part of being a two party system is because of the voting method, because everywhere other than Canada that's what FPTP does. And the rest of it is because third party candidates are simply nonviable in presidential elections in there current states because they have no support in the other branches and they have fairly weak policies. 

 

As for the issue of the Electoral College: 

 

I don't think that there is a system that could accurately cover the will of the people when it comes to the presidential election. In a more complex system (I.E. significantly more candidates) then a proportional representation system where you weight candidates could in theory be viable. But currently that doesn't exist, and you have a two party system because whatever way you break it currently you marginalise someone. Whichever way it ends up, the majority of the nation probably won't vote for a given candidate, and even in a best case half the country gets disappointed. 

 

But I think, because of the fairly unique set-up of US politics that's kinda fine. I don't think you need a full Proportional representation system in place for the president per say. I guess the currently system technically marginalises everything but a select few middle states and a f*** tonne of voters in the other areas. And that Winter's idea that the states have a pair of votes that go to the winner and then the rest are split proportionately has a lot of merit, especially if one of those has some form of population weighting (I.E. bigger states get more votes). 

 

The reason I say it's kinda fine is that because of US political structure, a president elected non proportionately wouldn't matter that much assuming that the legislative branch was. And if one wants Proportional representation that is the area that one should campaign for it, in the votes for the legislative branch. 

 

Alternatively you could abandon the current US political structure and adopt Parliamentary democracy, the greatest form of democracy. I'm only like half serious here. 

 

EDIT: I also agree with VCR when he talks about minority governments being a good thing, if only when you have more than two parties. Because having to reach compromises means you can satisfy more people, which means you better fufil the will of the people, which means you actually do your job of governing in an arguably better way.

 

 

 

FPTP (maybe with a few edits here and there) would work for me. i'm not deadlocked to the idea of the EC, just extremely against the idea of "only popular vote matters" and yeah, the third parties in america weren't the best this time around, but i'm not advocating they win just yet, just that the people look towards them more often to see what their options really are, and even if they don't like them, to at least use them to send the message that the first two parties suck. i know a lot of people who didn't even realize that third parties existed.

 

you're right, i thought something similar a while back. but as far as the top seats go, this would have been a nice time to see people just tell the two above parties to buzz off. the greens and libertarians have yet to work their way into the foundation like the other two parties have, and that's probably their largest weakness (ignoring policy at the moment) i'm not advocating them for their victory (not yet) what i meant was they'll get no help from either of the top two, and the people themselves are far more concerned with wasting their votes than they are with voting their conscience.

 

agreed that they have to work from the ground up, but keeping somebody up there to try for that 15% is still a smart move overall. i really think they should put their teams together for now just to get the 15%, but that's not something i think they'd be willing to share.

 

neither do i, i was just listing off a few reasons why the third parties won't easily get the numbers they need at the top. probably should have posted a few solutions alongside that particular statement to avoid confusion though.

 

presidential race is winner takes all in any case. there are going to be a lot of people disappointed no matter how it turns out, dividing it up better is just to minimize the end salt. i'd be a bit salty had Clinton won, but holding the L and moving on comes into play at that point. i assume even your country has similar issues from time to time.

 

 

that's pretty much what the EC does though, aside from splitting, which is one of the things that was constantly mentioned in this thread, i said it a few times. splitting the EC votes would be the best method of going about the elections. the question i had in my head though was how best to split said numbers evenly according to the votes in each race, and how to prevent voter fraud from digging in deeper upon doing so.

 

if elections keep going like this, the people just might adopt a parliament. this whole thing was a circus. luckily the clown i liked more got the tiny car (and i really don't like either clown).

 

he's right there, there's too much obstruction in the house as is, and there's very little being shared across the board. which is where i think a lot of the countries problems are coming from right now. the checks and balances system works so long as everybody in the room is playing like an adult, but too many senators are regressing to an "if i don't like it it's not allowed to pass at all" state of mind. compromise is something that should go without saying, but i'm starting to think there may need to be a law requiring some percent of the opposite side to support your bills before they can pass (hopefully better than the filibuster system though). that way house majorities can't just trample over the minorities at will, and would still have to appeal to a number of them to get anything through.

[Ryusei the Morning Star]

 

The E.C.-popular vote split isn't really about California, Trump won Appalachafornia just as much--AL/MS/LA/AR/OK/TN/KY/WV.

 

Difference is Trump got a lot of E.V. for gains in the Midwest/Northeast. Clinton got no Electoral Votes for her gains in Sun Belt/Utah

 

Big picture: the EC/PV gap is more about Trump strength in the Midwest than Clinton strength in California

 

Basically we were all wrong