I don’t know all the answers to your questions but there is a general methodology that I am advocating.
Of course a “fair” system is desirable. But that is not simply most votes equates to all delegates.
The process is designed for discovery. The long process exposes who a candidate is over time and under stress.
I still wonder if we used your formula of winner take all— where would Cruz and Trump sit in delegate count?
It might favor Cruz more to have all his states count absolutely in his favor— especially Texas.
What happens to silly problems like candidates dropping out where Rubio and Kasich win states that are not really theirs.
I do not believe that a conspiracy has robbed Trump of delegates.
I believe Trump is the master of mob mentalities where he stirs up a backlash to any negative result he encounters and says “the people” are being cheated.
This is NOT a direct democracy and I would never want it to be one.
This is a Free Republic and the difference needs to be both appreciated and defended.
I didn’t state that I prefer winner-take-all in all states.
I think that a state should have the flexibility to choose WTA or WTM - and if the latter, how to apportion those delegates (i.e. by district, by state, both, whatever).
I DO, however, believe that a big change in how this is done must be accomplished - because it destroys faith in the system. When a candidate (anyone, I don’t care who it is) can win more than half of the votes, and wind up with considerably less than half of the delegates, that’s patently unfair and everyone knows it. Such a result is as damaging to the credibility of the system as the 55 MPH limit was to the concept of abiding by the law.
FYI, where Cruz has won has USUALLY been in the smaller states (TX, of course, being the huge exception), and mostly those with a caucus instead of a primary. I’m not sure that he’d be leading the delegate count if every state was WTA or WTM.
As for the >50% requirement (1,237 delegates this time around), I think that it makes sense in most cycles, as those who drop out usually do so early enough to earn only a few delegates - so it doesn’t matter what happens to their delegates. This cycle, with 17 candidates, I think that it hasn’t worked out well (so far, at least - this may change). Perhaps - PERHAPS - there should be a different rule based on how many people were in the race by, say, Janary 1 of the election year. What exactly the formula should be, I don’t know, but the subject needs to be discussed...IN THE OPEN.