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15 states are trying to make the electoral college obselete

nytimes.com

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Re: 15 states are trying to make the electoral college obselete

#871

Post by ascorbic »

krapp wrote: post #737
ascorbic wrote: post #691

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a false dichotomy. The alternative isn't tyranny of the minority, it's a system that takes account of the views of everyone, by forcing candidates to appeal to a wide spectrum of the electorate.

How do you take into account the views of everyone, when different segments of the electorate sometimes have irreconcilable desires and views, and not wind up with "tyranny" of some sort simply by having to set some policy that can't please everyone?

You can take account of everyone without pleasing them all. For example, in systems with run-offs or some kind of ranked choice, you need to appeal to voters who might not have you as their first choice, but whose second choice votes you need. That's better than being able to use a divisive strategy that appeals only to your base, and positively repels the rest.

Re: 15 states are trying to make the electoral college obselete

#872

Post by exclusiv »

screye wrote: post #815
exclusiv wrote: post #605

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's great about the electoral college is you need to have cross-regional appeal to win. So its less about which states are going to be battleground but that you generally can't just appeal to 1 or 2 regions and win. In a goal of preserving the union, it's better to have a system that pushes cross-regional appeal than a system based strictly on number of votes IMO.

Why is geography a factor in a democracy. Why is cross regional appeal of any value, if these region don't make up even 10% of the combined US population. If US states were divided by population it would be a different think all together. But California has 40 times as many people as Wyoming. Cross regional appeal is quoted as an obviously good thing to have, but the core assumption of equal distribution of populatio…

It's a critical factor for the United part of the USA and the fact that we're a republic.

Population isn't everything. We have states like Alaska, Hawaii and Wyoming which are national treasures with low populations.

Re: 15 states are trying to make the electoral college obselete

#873

Post by exclusiv »

jshowa3 wrote: post #787
exclusiv wrote: post #605

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's great about the electoral college is you need to have cross-regional appeal to win. So its less about which states are going to be battleground but that you generally can't just appeal to 1 or 2 regions and win. In a goal of preserving the union, it's better to have a system that pushes cross-regional appeal than a system based strictly on number of votes IMO.

What's the point of having "cross regional appeal" if you are appealing to virtually no one? This isn't some discrimination thing. Those people can still vote. They just aren't given more representation than they deserve. That's the con of the electoral college.

Can you elaborate? You can't win while appealing to "virtually no one". In cases where the national popular vote didn't win - we're talking about a few % points of a difference.

Re: 15 states are trying to make the electoral college obselete

#874

Post by dragonwriter »

smaryjerry wrote: post #848
exclusiv wrote: post #605

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's great about the electoral college is you need to have cross-regional appeal to win. So its less about which states are going to be battleground but that you generally can't just appeal to 1 or 2 regions and win. In a goal of preserving the union, it's better to have a system that pushes cross-regional appeal than a system based strictly on number of votes IMO.

There is two methods that can be done by removing the electoral college that have vastly different results. First, without "removing" the electoral college, just deem that all electoral votes from a state are proportionate to that state's popular vote. So if a state is split 50-50 then electoral votes are split 50-50. The 2nd method is awarding all the state's electoral votes based on who wins the popular vote. This…

> There is two methods that can be done by removing the electoral college that have vastly different results. First, without "removing" the electoral college, just deem that all electoral votes from a state are proportionate to that state's popular vote.

You can't do that with national effect by concerted state action with less than 100% of the states (you can simulate it by casting all votes for the candidate that would win by that rule with a bare makority, but that's just a chunky version of national popular vote.)

> I've seen more news about states leaning towards the 2nd option which is actually much worse than the electoral college in its current state.

It's worse if you care about the per-state vote and not the national outcome; it's better if you care about the outcome, since it produces the desired outcome of adopted by states with a majority of electoral votes (and the NPV only goes into effect in states adopting it when it has been adopted by states with a majority of electoral votes), while proportional allocation for electors needs universal adoption to implement it's effect.

Re: 15 states are trying to make the electoral college obselete

#875

Post by mtremsal »

Marazan wrote: post #705
hyperpape wrote: post #457

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it was pretty systematic. If you look at 538 ( https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/ ), they were pretty accurate predicted which states were most and least likely to vote Trump or Clinton. It's just that in several states where they thought Clinton had a small lead, she lost. Meanwhile, there were no states they thought Trump had a small lead but he lost. The comparative judgments (Wis…

Clinton's internal polling showed they were in trouble in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. In an act of self sabotaging 12-d chess they decided not to campaign there to give the impression they were safe. As a gambler betting on the election this cost me a lot of money.

> they decided not to campaign there to give the impression they were safe.

Fascinating. Would you happen to have a link or more details on the rationale?

Re: 15 states are trying to make the electoral college obselete

#876

Post by koboll »

squirrelicus wrote: post #539
koboll wrote: post #323

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only people who say that are those who want rural people's values to have an outsized influence in our elections. That is, conservatives.

I certainly am conservative but the things I said are not false. The USA government is not merely a representative democracy, it's more formally a republic. Consider this: the purpose behind the bicameral legislature is that in order for the federal government to act, it requires the consent of both the majority of the population and the majority of the states subject to it. If the population and the states can't agr…

>Consider this: the purpose behind the bicameral legislature is that in order for the federal government to act, it requires the consent of both the majority of the population and the majority of the states subject to it.

The idea that this is a virtue that outweighs the effective disenfranchisement of hundreds of millions of people rests on the presupposition that it is virtuous that certain states should have an outsized voice. There are two obvious problems with this.

The first is that its central claimed virtue is false in practice. It does not actually reliably give smaller states more power, as many proponents claim. Voters' voices in certain areas of Florida matter much, much more than the voice of anyone in Wyoming.

The second is that states themselves were created either 1) somewhat arbitrarily, by the happenstance of where various colonial landing parties decided to set up shop, or 2) through explicitly political processes where the states' admissions were pushed through Congress, in no small part, to help win Presidential elections.

The system was arbitrary from the outset. It has been gamed ever since.

Re: 15 states are trying to make the electoral college obselete

#877

Post by [deleted] »

screye wrote: post #815
exclusiv wrote: post #605

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's great about the electoral college is you need to have cross-regional appeal to win. So its less about which states are going to be battleground but that you generally can't just appeal to 1 or 2 regions and win. In a goal of preserving the union, it's better to have a system that pushes cross-regional appeal than a system based strictly on number of votes IMO.

Why is geography a factor in a democracy. Why is cross regional appeal of any value, if these region don't make up even 10% of the combined US population. If US states were divided by population it would be a different think all together. But California has 40 times as many people as Wyoming. Cross regional appeal is quoted as an obviously good thing to have, but the core assumption of equal distribution of populatio…

[deleted]

Re: 15 states are trying to make the electoral college obselete

#878

Post by tekknik »

hyperpape wrote: post #302

There are discussions about the electoral college favoring small states. Some people think that's bad, some people think it's good. However, there's a more important issue: that's not really what the electoral college does. It gives a small edge to small states[0]. The much bigger effect is that in every given election, it favors a handful of battleground states over all the rest. If you live in Wyoming, the electora…

What I find interesting is this only came up after Trump got elected. What this says is it’s not about how “broken” the electoral college is and more so trying to elect more liberal presidents, since the densely populated areas tend to hive mind. We would have essentially 2 states voting in the new president, and both of these states are very liberal. Why didn’t this come up during Obama? This is an attempt at the liberal elite to get rid of a system that stops them from winning 100% of the time. This is how civil wars are started

Re: 15 states are trying to make the electoral college obselete

#879

Post by salawat »

munk-a wrote: post #822
s_y_n_t_a_x wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an American and a Texan, I find it sad you think patriotism is weird.

I find patriotism to be weird because it's so arbitrary - patriotic immigrants get a pass, but natural born citizens didn't ever make an active choice or put in the effort to become a citizen. I also fail to see why people in one country should be inherently given benefits that people in another country lack... Patriotism to me boils down to a weird form of elitism.

Such an odd sentiment. It's not elitism in the conventional sense. It's an investment in the System passed down to you by your forebearers, and faith in it being something of value to maintain and eventually pass down to your descendants.

>I also fail to see why people in one country should be inherently given benefits that people in another country lack...

Do you understand the underlying driving concept behind the concept of a country's sovereignty? It's an understanding that the people of a certain geographical region are free to establish their own political systems of governance to get stuff done. It's kind of complicated now, because of the whole corpus of International recognition and that whole jazz, but the fundamentals remain the same.

If you don't connect how patriotism comes out as a natural extension of investment with regards to the resulting structure that allows for the flexing of the country in question's capabilities to become greater than the sum of its parts...well... I can understand it to a point, but it strikes me as folding ones arms, sitting on a fence, and declaring everywhere is terrible.

Which is okay too I suppose. Though, it likely won't ingratiate you to anyone. Especially considering it demonstrates an unwillingness to make any type of fundamental value judgement or to accept a particular corpus or ideal of government as being the yard stick you measure with.

I.e. as an American, I measure other non-U.S. countries vs. how well their system guarantees freedoms enshrined in the national Bill of Rights . Heck, I judge my own country, and the various States that compose it at different time periods via how well it stays true to it's Constitutional intent, and the ideal of a government as laid out in the Declaration of Independence. Common Law divergence from Constitutional statute all have an impact, but I believe the system is about as good as it's going to get.

Anyway. Not sure if I've done anything to clear it up. Just... Didn't want to scroll by without leaving something in response to such a solitary viewpoint.

Re: 15 states are trying to make the electoral college obselete

#880

Post by jshowa3 »

exclusiv wrote: post #873
jshowa3 wrote: post #787

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the point of having "cross regional appeal" if you are appealing to virtually no one? This isn't some discrimination thing. Those people can still vote. They just aren't given more representation than they deserve. That's the con of the electoral college.

Can you elaborate? You can't win while appealing to "virtually no one". In cases where the national popular vote didn't win - we're talking about a few % points of a difference.

What I mean is the states that are overrepresented based on their population. In EC, every state, regardless of population gets 3 electoral votes. Meaning low population states get more say than they should because they get electoral votes for free. This has caused elections in the past to be won because of this overrepresentation when they wouldn't have if the electoral college didn't exist.

A few percentage points is a big deal in an election where every vote is supposed to count. And this overrepresentation isn't a narrow margin like Brexit, we're talking about at least 5% more represented.

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