Election fairness
Campin_Cat
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19 Jan 2017, 1:36 pm
EzraS wrote:
Exactly. Every single one of those 3 million extra votes Hillary got, could have all been cast in extremely blue and heavily populated California. Which means 1 state out of 49 would have been the decider.
EXACTLY----except "1 state out of 50", plus D.C (wink); but, yeah.....
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Campin_Cat
Veteran
Joined: 6 May 2014
Age: 62
Gender: Female
Posts: 25,953
Location: Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.A.
19 Jan 2017, 1:41 pm
EzraS wrote:
Meh too confusing. It should be left up to a personal contest between the two. Perhaps something Hunger Games style.
LOL I'd vote for that!!
_________________
White female; age 59; diagnosed Aspie.
I use caps for emphasis----I'm NOT angry or shouting. I use caps like others use italics, underline, or bold.
"What we know is a drop; what we don't know, is an ocean." (Sir Isaac Newton)
20 Jan 2017, 3:52 am
Campin_Cat wrote:
EzraS wrote:
Exactly. Every single one of those 3 million extra votes Hillary got, could have all been cast in extremely blue and heavily populated California. Which means 1 state out of 49 would have been the decider.
EXACTLY----except "1 state out of 50", plus D.C (wink); but, yeah.....
1 from 50 equals 49, so.... eh never mind.
20 Jan 2017, 8:21 am
The_Walrus and Campin_Cat wrote:
Firstly, having a president is stupid and inherently unrepresentative. You can't elect a President that is 50% Republican 50% Democrat (let alone representing other parties). Get rid of it and give their powers to Congress.
I hope, then, that you are ALSO an advocate of getting rid of your Prime Minister, and giving her powers to parliament.
I hope, then, that you are ALSO an advocate of getting rid of your Prime Minister, and giving her powers to parliament.
The Prime Minister is very different to the President. We don't elect the PM. Theresa May is basically Paul Ryan, not Donald Trump or Barack Obama. I think you should create a role similar to a Prime Minister i.e. the leader of the dominant party is the top dog.
Quote:
The popular vote means that every state and every vote counts. The electoral college means that only a few states count. A president could theoretically get elected by appealing to 50% of people in the 10 largest states. The other 50%? The other 40 states? You can ignore them. In reality, with the system as it is, both parties ignore "safe" states of either shade and focus on about 10 "swing" states. The other 40 states, once again, get ignored.
LOL You just defeated your own argument that the popular vote, is BEST----because it's TRUE that an election could be decided, by only 10 states; therefore, NOT every state / person would count!!
Whereas, there might be a scenario where a candidate had 269 electoral votes, and then here comes Wyoming (the very least populated) with their 3 electoral votes, and puts the candidate over the top, and claims a voice in the election----whereas, they WOULDN'T have a voice, in a Democracy (popular vote election).
LOL You just defeated your own argument that the popular vote, is BEST----because it's TRUE that an election could be decided, by only 10 states; therefore, NOT every state / person would count!!
Whereas, there might be a scenario where a candidate had 269 electoral votes, and then here comes Wyoming (the very least populated) with their 3 electoral votes, and puts the candidate over the top, and claims a voice in the election----whereas, they WOULDN'T have a voice, in a Democracy (popular vote election).
You have got that completely wrong. This is possibly the single worst argument I have seen someone make on WrongPlanet.
Firstly, yes, you can never have a system where literally every vote counts. Popular Vote (or ideally Alternative Vote) is the best you can do for a winner-take-all system like a Presidential election.
Under the popular vote, terms like "decided by 10 states" are meaningless. It doesn't matter where people live, and why should it? But something like that would be much less likely to happen.
Your nightmare scenario is 100% of the people in 10 states voting for Candidate A while 100% of the people in 40+1 states vote for Candidate B. Whether that happens in the electoral college or popular vote, Candidate A wins.
But if 50%+1 of the people in 10 states voted for Candidate A and everyone else voted for Candidate B, then under the electoral college Candidate A would win, but under the popular vote then Candidate B would win.
There's absolutely no reason why Wyoming couldn't tip the balance under the popular vote either.
Quote:
Under the popular vote, Republicans have a reason to visit California and Democrats have a reason to visit Texas. Both parties have reasons to visit Wyoming and DC.
Again, you've defeated your argument for the popular vote, because NEITHER candidate would have a reason to visit Wyoming and D.C. (the no.1 and no.3 least populated areas, respectively).
Again, you've defeated your argument for the popular vote, because NEITHER candidate would have a reason to visit Wyoming and D.C. (the no.1 and no.3 least populated areas, respectively).
There are people in Wyoming and D.C. In fact, D.C. is quite a big and dense city, so it would be one of the places that candidates would be most likely to visit. The small size of the territory compared to Florida makes no difference, and it doesn't matter if some of the people you campaign to actually live in Maryland or Virginia. As the 22nd biggest city, it would probably benefit at the expense of Iowan cities which currently hold disproportionate power.
Wyoming is a bit harder to justify, but there would be more reason to go there then there is currently. There are people in Wyoming and getting them out to vote would mean something. At the moment it doesn't really, both parties take it for granted that it will vote Republican.
I think you just fundamentally don't understand this conversation.
Quote:
EzraS wrote:
Exactly. Every single one of those 3 million extra votes Hillary got, could have all been cast in extremely blue and heavily populated California. Which means 1 state out of 49 would have been the decider.
That's not how it works at all.
Clinton couldn't have won without the support of people in something like 45 of the 51 territories, including some very very red ones.
Why, not? PE Trump only needed 29!!
Because under the popular vote, you need support from more states than under the electoral college.
Quote:
The amount she won by doesn't matter, just that she won at all. She doesn't start off on the same number as Trump and then magically add Californians. In fact, California would be less helpful for the Democrats because there are millions and millions of Republicans in California. At the moment, all those Republicans effectively "count" for the Democrats, a ridiculous situation.
They DO both start-off at the same number - ZERO!!
California would NOT be "less helpful for the Democrats", because, IIRC, California has 15% MORE Democrats, than Republicans----and, that entire bunch, plus some, would have to defect (their party), for California to be "less helpful"; and, since California has been a historically Democrat-voting state, well..... LOL
They DO both start-off at the same number - ZERO!!
California would NOT be "less helpful for the Democrats", because, IIRC, California has 15% MORE Democrats, than Republicans----and, that entire bunch, plus some, would have to defect (their party), for California to be "less helpful"; and, since California has been a historically Democrat-voting state, well..... LOL
OK, I meant to say that Clinton doesn't start out on the total that Trump finished with, which was what Ezra's argument implied. I thought that was pretty obvious from context.
Currently, California is 100% Democrat for the Presidential Election. Every electoral vote it casts goes to the Democrats. However, lots of people in California vote for the Republicans. Under the popular vote system, only 57.5% of California's votes would go to the Democrats, a huge cut. Assuming your "15%" number is right.
Quote:
If three million Californian Democrats switched their vote then Trump would have won the popular vote. But by that logic, if 400,000 Texan Republicans had switched their vote then Clinton would have won the electoral college. The electoral college distorts power much more than the popular vote would do. Edit: actually it's 1.5m Californians.
Geez, I thought MY math was bad----PE Trump won Texas, by almost 9% of the votes; that means well over 800,000 Republican Texans would've had to have jumped-ship (abandon their party), for Hillary to win the Electoral College, given that logic.
[/quote]Geez, I thought MY math was bad----PE Trump won Texas, by almost 9% of the votes; that means well over 800,000 Republican Texans would've had to have jumped-ship (abandon their party), for Hillary to win the Electoral College, given that logic.
Yes, your math is bad. Trump's lead was 800,000. He had 4.6m to Clinton's 3.8m. If 400,000 abandoned him and switched to Clinton, then Trump LOSES 400,000 and goes down to 4.2m. Clinton GAINS 400,000 and goes up to 4.2m.
20 Jan 2017, 9:18 am
I wish they would dispense with the Electoral College altogether.
I understand why it was promulgated---so "large" states" wouldn't dominate "small" states.
But I don't find this to be very applicable to these times.
Pure popular vote is probably best.
I've always thought this, by the way. Nothing to do with Trump's "victory."
20 Jan 2017, 1:22 pm
On one hand the Electorial College is an out dated relic of when the nation formed from a union of 13 preexisting states. The small states had to be placated with extra power to voluntarily join with the big population states in the new nation, so they concocted this extra layer on top of the popular vote for elections. No other democracy has anything quite like the electorial college.
On the other hand the electorial college ends up working out to be pretty much the same as the Parliamentary system Britain and other countries have.
The average Brit doesnt cast a vote for/against a Margaret Thatcher, or a Blair, or a Cameron. The average Brit voter votes for their rep to the House of Commons. And that rep in turn convenes with other members of his/her party to elected the leader of their party. Which ever party wins the most seats in the election gets to have their party leader be Prime Minister. So the chief executive is not chosen directly by the regular voter in the UK either.
20 Jan 2017, 6:33 pm
naturalplastic wrote:
On one hand the Electorial College is an out dated relic of when the nation formed from a union of 13 preexisting states. The small states had to be placated with extra power to voluntarily join with the big population states in the new nation, so they concocted this extra layer on top of the popular vote for elections. No other democracy has anything quite like the electorial college.
On the other hand the electorial college ends up working out to be pretty much the same as the Parliamentary system Britain and other countries have.
The average Brit doesnt cast a vote for/against a Margaret Thatcher, or a Blair, or a Cameron. The average Brit voter votes for their rep to the House of Commons. And that rep in turn convenes with other members of his/her party to elected the leader of their party. Which ever party wins the most seats in the election gets to have their party leader be Prime Minister. So the chief executive is not chosen directly by the regular voter in the UK either.
On the other hand the electorial college ends up working out to be pretty much the same as the Parliamentary system Britain and other countries have.
The average Brit doesnt cast a vote for/against a Margaret Thatcher, or a Blair, or a Cameron. The average Brit voter votes for their rep to the House of Commons. And that rep in turn convenes with other members of his/her party to elected the leader of their party. Which ever party wins the most seats in the election gets to have their party leader be Prime Minister. So the chief executive is not chosen directly by the regular voter in the UK either.
Yes, but your electoral college do nothing except choose the President. There's no difference between winning a narrow majority or a landslide, and there's no way a second or third or fourth party can be represented. You can also end up in the weird situation you've been in for the last 6 (?) years where the executive and the legislature can't agree on anything so nothing much gets done. If that happened in a parliamentary democracy then we'd get a new executive.
All in all I think that's a strange comparison. The issue isn't that the votes aren't direct, it's that they're unrepresentative.
Personally I think AV+ is the best system for a lower house with any upper house being elected on straight STV. No direct election of the executive and certainly not of the judiciary.
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