Uhhhhh Electoral College :(

Originally Posted by Gechmir

If elections focused on populations, the folks who would most definitely win would just visit New England, California, and Texas. The electoral colleges make up for this by giving the remainder of the states which, albeit are typically much less in population, are still worth at least one Electoral. Sure, California is worth way more than North Dakota, but still, candidates will spend time there. In the population spectrum, California has 33,871,648 as opposed to North Dakota's 642,200.

You say that it helps candidates visit less populous states more, I say that it makes it so candidates never visit states which are obviously Republican or Democrat. North Dakota never gets visited by anyone because they know the three electoral votes will swing Republican. Bush won ND easily in 2004, 63%-36%, so what incentive would either candidate have had?

Imagine, on the other hand, if we had no electoral college. Bush would have come out of North Dakota with about 196k and Kerry with about 111k. Well, now Kerry and Bush both have incentive to visit North Dakota, because maybe one or the other could pick up another 20k-30k votes. When you consider the popular vote only differed in 2000 by 500k, that could be huge.

Instead, every close election year, the election comes down to a handful of states that are borderline red-blue, most recently Ohio, Florida, Pennsylvania, etc. All other states are ignored in the run-up, including both states from your example.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

In using the electoral college, third-party candidates basically have no chance in any state. Even if someone gets 7% of California, the main story is that the Democrat took all 55 electoral votes.

If we didn't focus on the electoral college, we'd at least get to say, "Hey, look, Joe Blow got 2% of the overall vote, thats pretty impressive for XX party!" much like we do in local elections.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

They do that already. The point is that the way the system is set up currently doesn't put an incredible financial strain on campaigns. Do you think that a third party ticket could get anything resembling legitimacy if it had to campaign in every single state? How would that be feasible even for the Repub and Dem tickets? If you win one state, you get the electoral votes. That's a much better indication of legitimacy than getting maybe 2 million voters nationally.

Ross Perot is remembered for getting 20% of the popular vote, but most people never consider that he didn't even win a single electoral vote. He was the most successful 3rd party-candidate in 80 years and he campaigned in all 50 states. No electoral votes.

I mean, you're telling me that the electoral college is legitimate because 1) candidates won't visit Wyoming because we know how the electors will vote and 2) candidates won't visit Wyoming because it is too expensive. That's two reasons why Wyoming, the least populous state in the nation, isn't focused on at all in presidential elections. And the funny thing is that those two reasons are also why California, the most populous state in the nation, isn't either.

I think the system is broken if a handful of states get all the attention.

And what Gech was arguing wouldn't mean that the most populous states get the most attention, but everyone gets equal attention according to their population density. Sure, in a popular election, Los Angeles would be more of a focus than, say, Columbus, OH, but why shouldn't 10 million people get more face time with the candidates than 700,000? He says that the most populous states get all the attention, I say the population centers, regardless of state, get all the attention. Now, it's just based on a formula.

I believe (and, certainly, this is how the job has evolved) the President should represent the people. Congress already represents the states and localities. The electoral college was largely designed because the framers felt going from the prime minister system to the popular system was too large a jump to take at once.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

This is my point though. In the current system, even the wealthiest candidate ever, even the most popular third candidate in the modern era of elections, wasn't able to get a single electoral vote.

You're saying the system is good because third-party candidates can get electoral votes to show some legitimacy. That's great in theory, but in practice, the chances of it happening are astronomically small.

(I'm with you on that the campaign process is broken.)

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

I like how you keep reiterating what the electoral college system is and use that as the reason why it is correct.

"How could you possibly think that there is a better system? The mere fact that it is the system we are using means you couldn't possibly be correct in suggesting that it doesn't work properly!"

If you are just going to state the obvious, then get the fuck out. Say something meaningful. Simply stating that it is in use doesn't mean it isn't broken.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Each California elector has to represent about 4.5 times as many people as a Wyoming elector. Each California elector also represents about 10-11 times as much GDP as a Wyoming elector.

I guess my problem isn't with the electoral college so much as the proportion of electors given to each state. I think that the extra two that they give out is a little silly. I mean, we say that population matters, which is why California has 55 and Wyoming has 3, but we're not saying that it matters too much, by value of the ratio above. I'm fine with states getting to decide how their electors vote (it doesn't have to be a winner take all, and the people of Colorado shot that idea down).

But when you consider how many more people are in California and how much more important their economy (among other things) is...Wyoming sure has a lot of weight in the presidential election.

Additional Spam:

Originally Posted by Guru

I'll take my chances with conspiracy theories versus being told my vote ultimately doesn't matter.

Your vote matters more than all of ours, though. You vote in the first primaries. :P

(Which is more absurd.)

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

They also thought black people sucked.

How ya doing, buddy?