Man, tell that to Al Gore and John Kerry.
I like it how it is too, to be honest. I say this because I have zero faith that any changes would be done with complete bipartisan overview. Somewhere, somehow, someone is going to get a leg up.
-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
Hawkian's Electoral Reform Series #1: Down With the Electoral College
- Thread starter Hawkian
- Start date
- Status
Man, tell that to Al Gore and John Kerry.
I like it how it is too, to be honest. I say this because I have zero faith that any changes would be done with complete bipartisan overview. Somewhere, somehow, someone is going to get a leg up.
Tallshortman
Member
Yeah I would get rid of it. I've lived in red states all my life (born in the north though) and I've leaned democrat for every presidential election. It really takes away motivation to vote when the state you're registered in is almost 70/30 red.
You shouldn't be stating that something is 100% false, when you're just responding with your opinion as well. Do you have facts stating the opposite?
In a popular vote, a candidate could cater their message strictly to urban populations and win.
Edit: Someone should do a quick calculation to see what the votes would have been like using the EC divided by state vote.
Tragicomedy
Member
Pure popular vote should be all that matters. If that means I agree with the dying fox on top of Donald Trump's head, so be it.
Every vote should count as one vote, period.
Every vote should count as one vote, period.
That's only a fantasy in the USA. It's the standard in every other democratic country.
jstevenson
Sailor Stevenson
Not necessarily, but I do think that the agreement between small and large states in terms of their power in selecting the president was agreed upon a long time ago, and I'm not sure why it needs to be changed (and even then, the smaller states would prevent that change to the constitution).
It was a compromise, and the big states still ultimately have the power, but you can't entirely ignore the smaller ones either due to it.
I guess my point is, it's well settled, well-enshrined, and as such it probably shouldn't be a part of the discussion about why the electoral college is bad.
(and going back to my other posts, my ultimate argument is that your complaint lies with the individual states' winner-take-all distribution, not with the balance of power between the states, not the philosophy of the states each holding their own election)
This is my view. The electoral college has a purpose in terms of keeping the big cities from totally dominating all political discourse, and in terms of protecting a state's interests in cases where something unforseeable artificially depresses turnout (like a hurricane, for example), but it needs to be proportional so everybody's vote counts.
This winner take all crap is totally undemocratic.
Deified Data
Banned
Excellent post, Hawkian. I am in complete agreement.
The EC is faulty even when it works out for the best. I'd provide an argument as to why if Hawk hadn't covered everything in the OP already.
The EC is faulty even when it works out for the best. I'd provide an argument as to why if Hawk hadn't covered everything in the OP already.
I will grant you that by saying 100% false I was employing hyperbole. But of course I have facts stating the opposite. Look at this graph I already posted.
Again, the states with small populations that were visited are indicated with arrows. How could the rural states be ignored more than they currently are? Candidates would "negative-visit" them?
I also have facts to counter the largely and likely false (better?) assertion that you just made about catering to urban areas only.
That's the 22 largest cities in the country. Even if a candidate won 100% of the votes in all of them (how?)- they'd have a total of only ~30 million votes. This is just under 10% of the population of the country. How on earth would this grant them a popular victory?
In fact, the population of the country is widely distributed through many urban, suburban, rural and checkered areas, and campaigning would be doing itself a massive disservice by targeting only cities.
DrForester
Kills Photobucket
And people who think this way is the problem, and why it won't change. The EC will always tilt to one party or another, and both sides will be hypocrites and not want to do away with it during their turn.
Honestly a Romney Popular win last night is about the only way I think change could have been made. Both parties being screwed in a short time might have done it, but alas.
Devolution
Member
Have you heard of these things called amendments?
rohlfinator
Member
Why do you say it's tilted toward the Democrats? Obama won it this time, but he also won the PV, and he might have won the PV by a larger margin if that was the goal.
jstevenson
Sailor Stevenson
I will grant you that by saying 100% false I was employing hyperbole. But of course I have facts stating the opposite. Look at this graph I already posted.
Again, the states with small populations that were visited are indicated with arrows. How could the rural states be ignored more than they currently are? Candidates would "negative-visit" them?
I also have facts to counter the largely and likely false (better?) assertion that you just made about catering to urban areas only.
That's the 22 largest cities in the country. Even if a candidate won 100% of the votes in all of them (how?)- they'd have a total of only ~30 million votes. This is just under 10% of the population of the country. How on earth would this grant them a popular victory?
In fact, the population of the country is widely distributed through many urban, suburban, rural and checkered areas, and campaigning would be doing itself a massive disservice by targeting only cities.
Those numbers are totally wrong, you need to be looking at metropolitan AREAS. Los Angeles is small compared to the entire county (which is part of the city)
1 New York-Northern New Jersey-Long Island, NY-NJ-PA MSA 19,015,900
2 Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana, CA MSA 12,944,801
3 Chicago-Joliet-Naperville, IL-IN-WI MSA 9,504,753
4 Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX MSA 6,526,548
5 Houston-Sugar Land-Baytown, TX MSA 6,086,538
6 Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, PA-NJ-DE-MD MSA 5,992,414
7 Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV MSA 5,703,948
8 Miami-Fort Lauderdale-Pompano Beach, FL MSA 5,670,125
9 Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Marietta, GA MSA 5,359,205
10 Boston-Cambridge-Quincy, MA-NH MSA 4,591,112
11 San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA MSA 4,391,037
12 Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, CA MSA 4,304,997
13 Detroit-Warren-Livonia, MI MSA 4,285,832
14 Phoenix-Mesa-Glendale, AZ MSA 4,263,236
15 Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA MSA 3,500,026
16 Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington, MN-WI MSA 3,318,486
17 San Diego-Carlsbad-San Marcos, CA MSA 3,140,069
18 Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL MSA 2,824,724
19 St. Louis, MO-IL MSA 2,817,355
20 Baltimore-Towson, MD MSA 2,729,110
21 Denver-Aurora-Broomfield, CO MSA 2,599,504
22 Pittsburgh, PA MSA 2,359,746
Win 100% of those 22 cities and you have 122 million votes.
So win half of those 22 cities and you have 61 million votes, more than either candidate got this year.
jstevenson
Sailor Stevenson
Why would the small states agree to reduce their power? It's a non-starter, and as such, a dead issue
Okay, metropolitan areas now... that 122 million people reflects roughly 38% of the entire country. You bet your ass candidates would target them. I'm not at all prepared to stipulate that that is the same thing as "cater their message strictly to urban populations" nor do I believe that even getting the entirety of the voting population in those areas would win you the election (as you stated, that 61 million is more than either candidate got; that's because not even a third of the country actually voted, not because of the density of cities).
But I have to note, while the #1 and #2 cities are in NY and California, none of #3-10 are. 3 are in traditionally "red" states; 1 is in a traditional swing state. What about the new status quo that would result in the scenario you're envisioning is worse than the current situation?
edit: fact-check, it was actually just over 1/3 that voted.
Devolution
Member
Why would larger states continually want to have reduced power while funds don't match up?
I don't understand the placing of importance on where the candidates visit. What does that even matter anymore? We live in the Information age with television and the Internet. Where the candidates are located physically is an archaic notion.
We can hear them and they can hear us without having to actually be in the same room.
We can hear them and they can hear us without having to actually be in the same room.
Small states would not have their power reduced by a popular vote. This is a myth. I used to believe it very strongly. I was taught it in school. But it simply doesn't hold water.
Again, I am not advocating ANY changes to the way representatives are elected and sent to Congress.
Hahaha... a fantastic point, and frankly I would love to see the candidates stop burning so much damn jet fuel just to get votes, but do you believe this fact is a point in favor of or against the electoral college?
Onion_Relish
Member
Counterpoint: America is too big for anything BUT the electoral college. People already don't like that the president starts his reelection campaign a year before the vote, with a most votes win policy they would have to campaign 24/7. Reforming the numbers in regards to proportionality in the EC seems like the best thing to do. Instead of only 538, there should be more electoral votes, thousands of them, so that the numbers are more indicitive of population rather than representation.
I am Canadian btw
I am Canadian btw
I'm intrigued but not sure I understand. The problem with a straight popular vote is that it would require candidates to campaign more?
Devolution
Member
If it did hold water it presents a failure of Federalism more than a voting problem.
Im fine with going to a pure popular vote, but I think we have more pressing issues with our voting process than the EC.
I would like to see voting standarized and make mail-in voting standard for the entire nation. That should drastically cut down the lines in FL, Ohio, wherever else has crazy stupid voting lines. Voter suppression simply wouldnt work if it was federally standarized and we had mail-in voting
Instead of focusing on a few swing states, youd have to broaden your focus significantly. Simple way to combat that is to federally mandate campaign times, meaning you cant campaign 2 months before a primary or something
I would like to see voting standarized and make mail-in voting standard for the entire nation. That should drastically cut down the lines in FL, Ohio, wherever else has crazy stupid voting lines. Voter suppression simply wouldnt work if it was federally standarized and we had mail-in voting
Instead of focusing on a few swing states, youd have to broaden your focus significantly. Simple way to combat that is to federally mandate campaign times, meaning you cant campaign 2 months before a primary or something
rohlfinator
Member
Yeah -- I think an argument can be made that an in-person visit gives them a closer bond with their constituents, and as an Iowan I enjoy the spectacle of campaign visits, but I don't think either of those are particularly strong justifications for keeping the EC.
We can change it when the electoral map no longer benefits Democrats. I suffered years of the opposite, and now that the script has flipped, it's finally time to do away with it? Fuck that noise.
I personally don't like the electoral college as it stands now, but I can't help but be pessimistic towards the reasons behind the sudden interest in abolishing it.
I personally don't like the electoral college as it stands now, but I can't help but be pessimistic towards the reasons behind the sudden interest in abolishing it.
I did this for you, but holy shit was it not quick.
I am assuming that candidates cannot receive fractions of an electoral vote, as that would be kind of a nightmare- but it also makes close races very unsettling and ties downright problematic. In a state with an even number of electoral votes with a clear but small margin of victory (say Nevada), the EVs are split evenly. In a state with an odd number of votes but a razor-thin margin (Florida), the "winner" gets an extra EV even though voters in other states with fewer electoral votes more than made up the margin for the same candidate. After doing this calculation I remain very confident that it is an inferior method to the strict popular vote, though it is an improvement over what we have now.
1. WA - 7 O, 5 R
2 OR - 4 O, 3 R
3 CA - 32 O, 23 R
4 NV - 3 O, 3 R
5 ID - 1 O, 3 R
6 UT - 2 O, 4 R
7 AZ - 5 O, 6 R
8 MT - 1 O, 2 R
9 WY - 1 O, 2 R
10 ND - 1 O, 2 R
11 SD - 1 O, 2 R
12 NE - 2 O, 3 R (heh, this is really ironic)
13 KA - 2 O, 4 R
14 OK - 2 O, 5 R
15 TX - 16 O, 22 R
16 MN - 5 O, 5 R
17 IA - 6 O, 6 R
18 MO - 4 O, 6 R
19 AK - 2 O, 4 R
20 LA - 3 O, 5 R
21 WI - 5 O, 5 R
22 IL - 11 O, 9 R
23 MI - 9 O, 7 R
24 IN - 5 O, 6 R
25 KY - 3 O, 5 R
26 TN - 4 O, 7 R
27 MS - 3 O, 3 R
28 AL - 3 O, 6 R
29 OH - 9 O, 9 R
30 WV - 2 O, 3 R
31 ME - 2 O, 2 R
32 NH - 2 O, 2 R
33 VT - 2 O, 1 R
34 MA - 7 O, 4 R (as millions groan in agony)
35 RI - 3 O, 1 R
36 CT - 4 O, 3 R
37 NY - 18 O, 11 R
38 NJ - 8 O, 6 R
39 PA - 10 O, 10 R
40 DE - 2 O, 1 R
41 MD - 6 O, 4 R
42 VA - 7 O, 6 R
43 NC - 7 O, 8 R
44 SC - 4 O, 5 R (even louder groaning as this doesn't quite cancel out MA)
45 GA - 7 O, 9 R
46 FL - 15 O (?), 14 R
47 AK - 1 O, 2 R
48 HI - 3 O, 1 R
49 CO - 5 O, 4 R
50 NM - 3 O, 4 R
Total: 270 O, 268 R (Obama wins)
In this case, Obama's electoral total reflects 50.1% of the electoral votes available, versus Romney's 49.8%. Compare with the popular vote totals of 50%/48% (more votes still to come of course).
This method gives a much more representative picture of the desires of the electorate, and is thus preferably to the electoral college in its current form. It is however still less representative than a strict popular vote.
Gotcha, and co-signed on all counts (including improving voting access being a more important issue; believe it or not, that's not going to be part of this series of threads simply because it is something we may see practically applied in a few years. Catch that drop in during the victory speech?
). Stop taking all the good ideas.Also co-signed. I'm for an enormous amount of campaign reform personally. I think that there should be a hard cap on donations and anything given to the candidate beyond that is rolled into the federal budget for the winner or returned to the constituents of the loser. But entirely other topics
DrForester
Kills Photobucket
If they were to split, I think the better way to do it would be the Winner rounds up, loser rounds down, regardless. So even if there's a 49.5% vs 50.5 percent and the state has 10 EC, winner gets 6, and the loser gets 4.
metalslimer
Member
But the flip isn't scripped. Obama easily (comparatively) won the popular vote.
That's what I did in all cases to get the numbers; now conceive of a state like that in which one candidate gets 50.1% and the other 49.9%. In this case the votes are split evenly in my model- are you suggesting they should not be even with that thin a margin? In Florida it is a ~.5% difference between the two candidates at the current tally (a full half of the difference in your example), but it has an odd number of votes and giving the extra to the winner seems right.
DrForester
Kills Photobucket
It's called Hypocrisy, and both sides are suffering a lot of it in the debate now.
Certainly easier in an odd numbered state, but I think it should apply in even numbered states. Someone won, someone lost.
Someone also mentioned doing by congressional districts, which I also think is a reasonable idea.
This I don't understand. I'm bringing it up now because supporters of the candidate I opposed are talking about it, as I expected
You'll see that using the method by which votes are split, my candidate receives far fewer electoral votes in the election we just witnessed, but I'd still prefer it to the status quo.I see what you mean; get as close as you can with the percentages then give the winner one vote. It's practical and solves a lot of the math problems involved; then again it's not quite representational. Though compared to what we have now, it's Athens
That's probably how it would happen if it ever did; it's how NE and ME currently split up their votes. I simply do not have anywhere close to the time to work it out.
Though I do foresee problems with this method in bigger states. Moderate counties with the most districts would be sought after because there'd be a cluster of votes in them but only one vote more per district would be needed to claim them all; thus swing states would be largely traded for dozens of swing counties. Again, still better than what we have.
Also co-signed. I'm for an enormous amount of campaign reform personally. I think that there should be a hard cap on donations and anything given to the candidate beyond that is rolled into the federal budget for the winner or returned to the constituents of the loser. But entirely other topics
Im a huge proponent of primary reform as well. Right now, the most extreme are usually the ones that get elected, which is just totally messed up since that simply doesnt represent the electorate.
Id much rather see a primary system like they now have in Washington (and possibly Cali) where the top two vote getters in the primary go on to the general election. So that if you are in a heavy democratic area, you could have a very liberal dem and a moderate dem. Likewise for a republican district.
I'm talking about having an electoral advantage in terms of the demographic distribution.
I think he's referring to states which are not quite swing states and show signs of having "democratic normals" when things cool down, such as PA, IA and WI, which might serve as electoral insurance in future elections. You never really know though. A scandal in the next election could totally swing the voters of Pennsylvania. It's much easier to use polling data than to rely on possible events, instincts or "intangibles."
Still, it's one more (lesser) problem of the electoral college- regions of the country or individual states that settle into voting a certain way can become entrenched. It's hard for me to relate to living in Florida but I mean there was this at one time, the year after i was born:
How are you doing those numbers. My values are quite a bit off. I have Obama winning with 278 EVs to 260 for Romney. 51.6% to 48.3%
Lets take Nevada where you have the 6 EVs divided evenly.
According to NYTimes, Obama got 52% and Romney got 46%.
With 6 EV votes, each candidate gets 1 vote for every 16.666% (100/6) of the popular vote.
This gives Obama 3 EV votes and Romney 2. Neither candidate has enough votes to get the final vote, Obama gets it for winning the popular vote. (Basically every state will have the final EV go to the popular winner regardless of how close the other candidate is).
Obama with 4 EVs and Romney with 2.
All my equations are here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0At4DNVmpX33odGhweU9ERmdsVDZuZ0QxM01ibUdBdGc
Gary Johnson comes reasonably close to picking up an EV in California.
The electoral college is the NUMBER 1 reason why most of my friends dont vote, or at least feel that their vote dont count. Get rid of it. I would feel much better about voting if my vote went directly to who I was voting for, instead of my state's pledged voters. Whatever, though. I dont know much about politics, dont grill me for stupidity GAF.
your method uses the popular vote as part of an equation to achieve a winner. I assume the popular vote would correlate extremely highly with electoral college wins in your system because there were a lot of "remainder" margins that I had to decide what to do with. I've never seen that proposed before, and it's a good idea. To an extent the electoral college is no longer making the final decision in a close race nationally, the popular vote is.
This is perhaps the cheapest method to getting it done with a more representational approach. I like it. Entrenched states won't want to give up their secure electoral totals but that will be the case in basically any conversion.
edit: If I'm interpreting it right, in a sense the popular vote accounts for 49 extra EVs using your model- is that right?
CornBurrito
Member
Couldn't you just move?
I'm super confused. Why do people keep making posts implying that Obama didn't win the popular vote.
I'm using the popular vote of the state. Not the total popular vote. You'd end up with 50 EVs (my model just had a rounding issue in one of the states) decided by the popular vote of the state, unless somehow the votes EXACTLY matched the percentages but that would never happen due to write-ins/3rd parties.
Since they have no electoral votes, residents of the U.S. territories (Guam, Virgin Islands, stc) cannot vote for president in any way. In fact, even full natural-born U.S. citizens who move to the territories cannot cast a vote for president, which makes them the only place in the universe an American is not allowed to vote. You can vote while traveling abroad to any foreign country to be sent to your home state, and you can vote from motherfucking space. "Hawkian, is that even a big deal?" 2.2 million people live in the territories. That's more votes than the popular vote margin for Gore in 2000... and a hell of a lot more than the 537 that (sort of) determined the electoral winner.
I want to clarify that there are more than 2.2 millions people living in the territories; Puerto Rico alone have an estimate of 3.7 millions people.
I want to clarify that there are more than 2.2 millions people living in the territories; Puerto Rico alone have an estimate of 3.7 millions people.
In SC, the ratio worked out such that there was no extra, no?
Squirrel Killer
Member
Absolutely. I think I'm sort of the champion of the EC on this forum. *
I'm a bit wiped by the election season, but I will say a couple of quick things...
The Electoral College makes everyone's vote more effective.
The inequality between the power of various state's voters is miniscule in the grand scheme of things and is rather minimal once you stop comparing CA to WY.
The hard cap of how many EC votes a state has prevents the inequality from getting too out of hand. Would you rather have a 1 in 1,000,000 chance of influencing 3 EC votes or a 1 in 5,000,000 of influencing 55?
By letting candidates focus on swing states, it make campaigns cheaper.
Swing states also change over time.
The scenario he lays out is so outrageously unlikely that your one vote influencing the vote in a national popular vote election is more likely. Literally. Also, he overstates how few votes you need to win. You could theoretically win with just 11 votes. That actual votes, not EC votes.
Here's one compromise that I haven't seen bandied about too much... remove the Senatorial EC votes. That is, assign EC votes just based on the number of House of Representatives, that would get rid of most of the inequality while preserving the advantages of the EC. Also, I'd make the Electoral College vote more perfunctory, get rid of the possibility of faithless electors.
What I think is more fucked up is Washington DCs lack of representation in Congress
That was rounding by NYTimes. Romney won 54.6% of the vote and Obama won 44%. Romney would earn the popular EV vote anyways.
Squirrel Killer
Member
He didn't imply that. He said that the EC practically guaranteed Obama's re-election. Romney had no chance to win the right combination of states to get to 270 EC votes. He did have a chance (though slight) to sway the popular vote.
CornBurrito
Member
I guess I'm reading too much into it.
Gotcha, I was only using integers for the percentages of the popular vote as well.
Out of curiosity, if the national popular vote was used instead for these "extra" votes, I wondered how it would go, just for funsies; appears that would make it 303-237. Interesting
Joe Shlabotnik
Banned
This occurred to me too, or at least the practicality of a wide-open playing field. Is it even possible to campaign in every state? Would there be any real use in the candidates visiting all fifty? Isn't that functionally equivalent to visiting none of them?
- Status