You are damned right it is undemocratic. What this bozo doesn’t seem to comprehend is that we live in a Representative Republic, not a democracy!
They speak for all Americans?........not me!........
“AMERICANS DON’T like the Electoral College.”
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Oh, really? Now there is the classic opening statement from the Peoples Democratic Republic of San Freakcisco. Yes, I would agree that far-left liberals who want their big-city mindless masses to convert the voting system to squash the conservative bastions of America...THAT is WHO does not like the Electoral College syste...and I would certainly not call them Americans.
Nice try pinkos.
That's a bold statement. It doesn't surprise me that this idiotic assertion is not backed up by fact. But then again, "Americans" have only started "not liking" the Electoral College when Bush won in 2000. I'm wondering... had Kerry been able to steal the election in Ohio and win an electoral majority without winning a majority of the popular vote, would these same "Americans" be so gung-ho about changing a system which has served us very well for the past 200+ years?
Note that it’s in a currently dependable Democrat voting state they’re hesitant to get rid of the thing they claim to disapprove of. They’d be just fine getting rid of it in Arizona or Tennessee.
Imagine if the total nationwide vote count was really close. Then you would have to recount every single ballot in the country, as opposed to just having to recount in one state.
Excuse me, correct me if i am wrong but if every state used
this new California system to pick electors,given the
present ideological makeup of this country, a demoncratic
president would NEVER be elected.
The only thing that bugs me about the Electoral College is that being a Massachusetts resident, I know my vote doesn’t count at all. That can be frustrating. But I understand its purpose.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Look at Pennsylvania,California,Michigan,Illinois,Washington
and Oregon, all demoncrat states electorially.They would be neutered.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/politicselections/vote2004/countymap.htm
I like the idea of electoral votes being allocated by district. That way vote fraud in one precinct can change at most 3 electoral votes instead of all of the electoral votes in a state.
The strategy of the Democrats, one that is working well for them, is to pander to the “disadvantaged”, the ones they keep that way. They are concentrated in pockets in the inner cities. So, to win votes be they Electoral or popular, they simply keep pandering to those people.
However, the Electoral College makes this more difficult but not impossible. Some liberal states want the majority popular vote in their state to get all the electoral votes rather than have them apportioned according to county and precinct votes. That would effectively eliminate the Electoral College in practice. Eliminating the Electoral College would eliminate America as it was founded.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
OK. Did anyone run the numbers across the country for the last four Presidential elections, and see where this would fall?
Oh it is from California. No wonder. I love the electorial college. The last thing I want is a more powerful centeralizes National government. Bring back the FEDERAL government of the great REPUBLIC. I do not want to be ruled by the city folks. No way.
When Judge Bork was being attacked at his hearings the Swimmer asked him how he could say “one man, one vote” is not the law of the land. Judge Bork answered that if this country wanted “one man, one vote” they could enact it as legislation and then the Senate would be illegal. Captain Oldsmobile when into Ralph Cramden “humma, humma, humma” mode. Precious.
by John Samples, director of the Center for Representative Government, Cato Institute.
Critics have long derided the Electoral College as a fusty relic of a bygone era, an unnecessary institution that one day might undermine democracy by electing a minority president. That day has arrived, assuming Gov. Bush wins the Florida recount as seems likely.
The fact that Bush is poised to become president without a plurality of the vote contravenes neither the letter nor the spirit of the Constitution. The wording of our basic law is clear: The winner in the Electoral College takes office as president. But what of the spirit of our institutions? Are we not a democracy that honors the will of the people? The very question indicates a misunderstanding of our Constitution.
James Madison’s famous Federalist No. 10 makes clear that the Founders fashioned a republic, not a pure democracy. To be sure, they knew that the consent of the governed was the ultimate basis of government, but the Founders denied that such consent could be reduced to simple majority or plurality rule. In fact, nothing could be more alien to the spirit of American constitutionalism than equating democracy will the direct, unrefined will of the people.
Recall the ways our constitution puts limits on any unchecked power, including the arbitrary will of the people. Power at the national level is divided among the three branches, each reflecting a different constituency. Power is divided yet again between the national government and the states. Madison noted that these twofold divisions — the separation of powers and federalism — provided a “double security” for the rights of the people.
What about the democratic principle of one person, one vote? Isn’t that principle essential to our form of government? The Founders’ handiwork says otherwise. Neither the Senate, nor the Supreme Court, nor the president is elected on the basis of one person, one vote. That’s why a state like Montana, with 883,000 residents, gets the same number of Senators as California, with 33 million people. Consistency would require that if we abolish the Electoral College, we rid ourselves of the Senate as well. Are we ready to do that?
The filtering of the popular will through the Electoral College is an affirmation, rather than a betrayal, of the American republic. Doing away with the Electoral College would breach our fidelity to the spirit of the Constitution, a document expressly written to thwart the excesses of majoritarianism. Nonetheless, such fidelity will strike some as blind adherence to the past. For those skeptics, I would point out two other advantages the Electoral College offers.
First, we must keep in mind the likely effects of direct popular election of the president. We would probably see elections dominated by the most populous regions of the country or by several large metropolitan areas. In the 2000 election, for example, Vice President Gore could have put together a plurality or majority in the Northeast, parts of the Midwest, and California.
The victims in such elections would be those regions too sparsely populated to merit the attention of presidential candidates. Pure democrats would hardly regret that diminished status, but I wonder if a large and diverse nation should write off whole parts of its territory. We should keep in mind the regional conflicts that have plagued large and diverse nations like India, China, and Russia. The Electoral College is a good antidote to the poison of regionalism because it forces presidential candidates to seek support throughout the nation. By making sure no state will be left behind, it provides a measure of coherence to our nation.
Second, the Electoral College makes sure that the states count in presidential elections. As such, it is an important part of our federalist system — a system worth preserving. Historically, federalism is central to our grand constitutional effort to restrain power, but even in our own time we have found that devolving power to the states leads to important policy innovations (welfare reform).
If the Founders had wished to create a pure democracy, they would have done so. Those who now wish to do away with the Electoral College are welcome to amend the Constitution, but if they succeed, they will be taking America further away from its roots as a constitutional republic.
Source: http://www.cato.org/dailys/11-10-00.html
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LOL. After Al Gore lost the presidency because of the electoral college, you kept hearing the Dems saying how horrible it was. Now that a law may be passed to dilute it’s effect in CA, a democratic state, suddenly the SF Chronicle is horrified.
These people are so transparent.