The question still is, would you rather have your Senate candidates lobby up and down your state to influence your locally elected assemblymen's votes, or would you want your Senator living comfortably in his home in DC getting his popular election campaign funds from Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer's PAC?
To whom would your Senator be more beholden, the locally elected assemblymen or Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer? Whose agenda would more likely be top-of-mind of your Senator?
-PJ
As a duly constituted [sic] Amendment, #17 is as valid as the original Article in defining the election of Senators, so unfortunately we’re stuck with it until it’s repealed (if ever). My hope is that it would become more straightforward for new States to be carved from existing ones that would be more representative of the people & areas involved.
In the case of Chucky Schumer for example, he seems to spend a lot of time in Western NY with nice speeches and goodies (e.g. aid for the Buffalo Bills) – he knows he has the votes of the 3/4 of the New York population from downstate locked up; at this point, you’ll never get popularly-elected Senators from this part of the State, but”protégés” of his like Kirsten Gillibrand…