Posted on 05/31/2006 3:09:09 PM PDT by BurbankKarl
Six years after Democrat Al Gore won the popular vote but lost the presidency to Republican George W. Bush, there's a new move afoot in the California Legislature and other states to ensure that such things never happen again.
The linchpin is a proposed "interstate compact," designed to guarantee that presidents will be selected by popular vote, without amending the U.S. Constitution or eliminating the electoral college.
Assemblyman Tom Umberg, a Santa Ana Democrat who chairs the Assembly Election and Redistricting Committee, said the basic premise is understandable even to children.
"When you're in first grade, if the person who got the second-most votes became class leader, the kids would recognize that this is not a fair system," he said.
Umberg's Assembly Bill 2948, proposing such a compact, passed the Assembly's elections and appropriations committees on party-line votes, with Republicans opposed.
"We have a system that's worked effectively for more than 200 years," said Sal Russo, a GOP political consultant. "We probably should be very hesitant to change that."
John Koza, an official of National Popular Vote, which is pushing the proposal, said sentiment has not split along party lines in other states.
"I don't think anyone can convincingly put their finger on any partisan advantage," said Koza, a consulting professor at Stanford University.
Though Republicans disproportionately benefited from the electoral college in 2000, when Bush edged Gore despite getting 544,000 fewer votes, Democrats nearly turned the tables four years later.
(Excerpt) Read more at contracostatimes.com ...
"Actually I did read it. Especially the part where the idea has been proposed. Not enacted, not voted on, just proposed. And if they try to place their proposal into action, especially where other states are involved, then they'll need Congressional approval before it can be enacted. Just like the Constitution says. Or hadn't you made it that far?"
Gosh, I hadn't read that part. I guess I better go back and make it all up out of thin air, just like you and your SCOTUS buddies do, then I can read it.
You might try it. Making it up out of thin air might work better than pulling it out of your...orifice as you've been doing so far. It'll leave more room there for other parts of your anatomy.
It does not matter how many states pass such a law, to the extent that it affects the power of non-cooperating states in the selection of the President, it is an unconstitutional confederation (Article I, section 10).
OF course, 2/3 of the states can call a convention, amend the constitution (If 3/4 of the states agree), and thereby git 'er done.
But the California proposal is unconstitutional.
By and large, the voters are woefully ignorant of our system and the reasons for its establishment. Most people don't even know that Senators were not elected by popular vote in the original Constitution.
Carolyn
It's not an end-run around the process described in the Constitution -- just around how it has conventionally been applied.
Even the most liberal, revisionist USSC Justice on the bench couldn't say that Article II is ambiguous or vague in it's instructions on how a president is to be elected.
The Constitution is clear about how electors are allocated to the states. It is, I believe intentionally, silent as to how each state divvies up the votes allocated to it. It doesn't take a liberal, revisionist or even activist judge to see the distinction.
How exactly did they turn the tables?
See the boldface word above? Bush won the popular vote by a little over 3 million. A 50,000-vote swing in Ohio, and the electoral vote would have gone to Kerry.
"Any state could become a member of the compact, and any state could withdraw from the group -- except during the final six months of a president's term.
However, IMHO if that scheme is implemented it will be a disaster for the voters of every smaller and more conservative state that may sign on to it. They would in effect be compelling their state's popularly chosen electors to carry out the will of the larger states' voters, which in most cases would be the opposite of the small state's. Why would any state assembly do something that irresponsible if it accurately represents the political makeup of the state as it is presumed to do?
That is a very good point. Fraud becomes more of an issue.
I also think though that no other state would be dumb enough to follow california, and this dumb Democrat idea
will get pulled real fast once they see Cali go for a Republican.
Yep. And as soon as a Republican wins and all those Californian electoral votes get cast for the Republican there will be a massive explosion of moonbat heads. As soon as California "turns red" these Democrat politicians are going to have to explain to the voters why their votes "didn't count".
I love the smell of schadenfreude in the morning.
Since when has CA had a majority of REPUB votes ..??
Even though most of the state is RED - the Blues (the minorities and elites) are in the cities where the population is more dense - and that's how they win elections. I've seen the state demographics .. it's really stunning. We are being held captive by a minority - probably most of whom are not even citizens.
It hasn't. But, under this proposal, if the TOTAL VOTE NATIONWIDE is for a Republican, then the state's electoral votes go Republican, if the GOP doesn't get a single vote.
Even worse is that rampant vote fraud in any one state can overwhelm the results in the others.
As it stands now, regardless of the the margin in California (for example), only the electoral votes for California are at risk.
But the "Popular Vote" initiative allows the cheaters in one state to "run up the score" enought that none of the votes in many smaller states will matter at all.
Let us all hope that none of the other (and necessarily smaller) states are dumb enough to follow.
Does the PM have to be a member of Parliament?
Who gets to vote on who's PM? The members or his or her party, or the entire Parliament?
I have said before, this situation would enable the big city vote cranking machines to go into high gear, that is their goal.
Most big cities are overwhelmingly Dem.
We have already seen it at the state level, largest county gets to report last because they are so big(they need to know how many votes to manufacture).
And why not? They're living in a place named after a Mexican General.
< ]B^!)
NY and New England is all they need
That would not be legal and would immediately be contested in court. The voter has a right to know how that vote will be counted before the vote is cast. If it turns out that these states, after the fact, don't like the results of the election and try to revert to the old way for just that election, there is nothing they can do about it until the next election because that would be changing the rules during the election.
Of course, that wouldn't stop them from trying...
-PJ
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