Posted on 10/11/2018 12:06:03 AM PDT by beaversmom
Now that the Senate has confirmed Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court, some Democrats are turning their fire on the idea that each state should be equally represented in the upper chamber of Congress. "The idea that North Dakota and New York get the same representation in the Senate has to change," NBC national security reporter Ken Dilanian tweeted.
Others, like GQ correspondent Julia Ioffe, took issue with the Electoral College, which allowed Presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump to place four justices on the Court, even though Bush and Trump lost the popular vote in 2000 and 2016, respectively.
One politician who endorsed Ioffe's argument is Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the democratic socialist running to represent New York's 14th Congressional District:
It is well past time we eliminate the Electoral College, a shadow of slavery’s power on America today that undermines our nation as a democratic republic.
Ocasio-Cortez isn't the only high-profile Democrat to embrace this view. "I passionately believe it's time to abolish the Electoral College," Hillary Clinton wrote in The Atlantic last month. Clinton's view isn't surprising. After all, she earned nearly 3 million more votes than Trump in 2016, but still lost.
In their criticisms of the Electoral College, Ocasio-Cortez and Clinton fail to grapple with the reason we have such a system in the first place. By preventing the majority from getting its way all the time, the Electoral College ensures that views from every part of the nation are represented. That way, those in high-population states with large cities aren't the only ones who have a say. Instead, as David Harsanyi wrote in a November 2016 piece for Reason, the Electoral College helps "create moderation and compromise":
To some extent, the Electoral College impels presidents and their political parties to consider all Americans in rhetoric and action. By allowing two senators for both Wyoming, with a population of less than 600,000, and California, with a population of more than 38 million, we create more national cohesion. We protect large swaths of the nation from being bullied. We incentivize Washington, D.C.—both the president and the Senate—to craft policy that meets the needs of Colorado as well as New York.
This is especially important when considering that small states—even sparsely populated ones—play important industrial roles, particularly in agriculture. If those states "become marginalized and then coerced to embrace the policies favored by the people in urban areas, the nation loses valuable resourcefulness, imagination and brainpower," Harsanyi noted.
Abolishing the Electoral College in favor of a popular vote–based system might also have some unexpected results. Clinton won the popular vote in large part due to her margins in New York and California, where Republicans knew their votes didn't matter. Changing the system might motivate some of those Republicans who stayed home on Election Day to come out of the woodworks. Texas Democrats might do the same. It's impossible to know who would have won in 2016 absent the Electoral College, as both parties—to say nothing of both campaigns—would've likely had very different strategies.
It's easy to blame the system when you don't win. But that doesn't mean the system is actually broken, or that there's an objectively "better" one we should be using.
She’s right for once. Of course, she’s unaware we’re not a democracy.
Something tells me she wants Hispanics, legal or otherwise, to propel her into the White House like blacks did for Obama. She’s community organizing.
It undermines mob rule.
No bad for a first try. However, it could use a few more “umms” as I don’t think her original train-of-thought processes are as consecutive as you depicted them.
That is the exact reason the EC is in the Constitution; it undermines democracy taking root in place of our Constitutional Republic.
One of the dimmest of the dimwits from a school that used to have a high academic reputation.
She needs to go back to her street corner; her Johns are missing her.
FAD
Does this dingbat twit have ANY competition for the Congressional seat she is running for?
The "slavery" explanation is typical left-wing hogwash. Only one election may have turned out differently because of the formula that counted three-fifths of the slaves in determining representation, that of 1800. Possibly Adams would have won otherwise.
If Hillary had won and we now had a Supreme Court with 6 leftists, maybe the SC would try to declare the Electoral College unconstitutional.
An enemy of USConstitution, domestic.
She is a great cartoon of everything dim. She could be an even better vote draw for Republicans than Hillary. Maybe not in her home, but most everywhere else.
As a contrarian, I'm thinking about sending her a campaign contribution.
This woman’s too stupid to realize we live in a Republic. Either that or she thinks the people listening to her are too stupid to know that. Or both.
Eliminate the Electoral College? OK,fair enough.A majority vote in both Houses of Congress and then a “yea” vote from 38 state legislatures will do the trick.
But like...ummmm. you know it’s like....ummmm, totally ..ummmm... like...ummm..what? Oh Yeah! Go ....ummm Democratic Socialism!
This nation and all of her states are part of a REPRESENTATIVE REPUBLIC; not a "Democracy"...which only morons, such as Cortez calls us. And Cortez is NOT "calling for a "Democracy". A thorough course in remedial reading could help you, if it begins at grade 1 level.
Member of PETA, are you?
A REPUBLIC, any Republic, but especially ours, does NOT "...represents all life, even bears, tigers, horses, and cows." ! I'd explain what a REPRESENTATIVE REPUBLIC actually is; however, I believe that your last working brain cell is on life support.
Psssssssssssssssssst...there NEVER were indigenous tigers living in what is now the USA. Bears live in N.Y. state, in the wild, fox, bears, deer, and other such creatures HAVE made their way into NYC ( most boroughs...even into Manhattan ! ) and the animals living in the Bronx Zoo haven't lived behind bars in over 50 years.
The more you post replies to me, the more ignorant and stupider you expose that you are. Pity that.
You are dumb as a rock.
No diddums, that would be YOU and you’re also insane. Bless your heart....
If we were a democracy, yes, the electoral college would be the antithesis to it.
But we’re NOT a democracy. We’re a REPUBLIC, and thank God for that.
The Dems have consistently through the years never lost an opportunity to use the word Democracy in place of Republic, thereby brainwashing people into thinking America is a democracy. Our FF despised democracies, knowing they lead to destruction (according to Madison in the Federalist Paper #10).
Any Republican who calls our nation a Democracy should be called out on the spot.
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