Posted on 03/17/2006 6:23:33 PM PST by ncountylee
In a recent article entitled, Flunking The Electoral College Once Again, Daniel Sobieski writes about a proposed election reform, “The Campaign for a National Popular Vote” in which, “a group of states would agree to award their state’s electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote, regardless of who carried their state.” Sobieski effectively dismantles any justification for this “scheme to improve” the electoral process by pointing out that if this was actually implemented, it would be the, “ultimate in voter disenfranchisement.” By asking the question, “How can it be fairer for a state’s electoral votes be given to the loser of that state’s popular vote?” I should think that he puts an end to any more discussion about this.
If anyone wants to continue arguing about it, he throws out a few more bones to chew on.
“If a presidential election is considered illegitimate because the winner of the popular vote is not the winner of the electoral vote, is legislation passed by the Senate also illegitimate because it was passed by senators representing a minority of the population? Wyoming’s two senators can cancel out California’s senators, who represent 69 times more people. Is that “fair”?
It seems like yesterday that Al Gore and the Democrats called foul after President Bush won his first term in office, based on the electoral vote. With all of the attention drawn to the issue of being able to win an election without a majority of the popular vote, I would have thought by now, in 2004, there would have been some substantial election reform in the offing.
(Excerpt) Read more at magic-city-news.com ...
Author is completely wasting her time going down this road. Smaller states would never agree to give up the disproportionate amount of power the constitution provides them. A complete non-starter.
We know how it would work out . . . it's spelled C-A-N-A-D-A, where 90% of the time, greater Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal tell the other 900 million square miles who's going to run the country.
You're right. The change we need to make is to stop the popular election of Senators. We must return to the original method of the State Legislatures electing them.
No, it isn't.
It staggers the mind that these people, Daniel Sobieski and the easily impressed Nancy Salvato, have absolutely no clue why the founders deliberately set up the Constitution that way. The example Sobielki cites does, in fact, represent the very reason that the legislative body, the Senate, was established in the first place - - to give every state a chance to defend itself from the tyranny of more populous states. This stuff should be learned well before graduating the sixth grade.
Imagine a system where ballot hijinks in bluest of the blue precincts in Chicago, Philly and New Orleans could change the results of an entire nation. That is what national popular voting will give you.
The Electoral College is great, and in fact should be expanded to the states so that rural areas can have more say. Right now in some states, one city can tell the entire remainder of the state what to do.
In what ways would this improve our system of government?
The fact is that the Presidential election is really 50 seperate Presidential elections. Somehow, I think that if Kerry had stolen Ohio last year, and became President despite losing the national popular vote by 3 million +, the Left would be lauding the wisdom of the founders (as well as saying it was "payback" for their self-created 2000 debacle).
The original purpose of the Senate was to restrain federal power. Since the Senators were appointed by the state legislators, not the people, they would be looking out for federal attempts to encroach on the powers of the state legislators. Look at how much the fed gov has grown since this changed in 1913
You know I was thinking of this the other day! Sort of a "weighted" Electoral system.
The Senate is beneath corrupt.
Repeal the 17th. NOW.
This issue irritates me more than most. One of the reasons for the electoral college form of electing the president is the following. In order to "elect" a president fraudulently it is rather simple if strict popular vote is tallied. Just go to a populous city and stuff an extra 10 million ballots! With the electoral college method, the miscreants have to stuff ballots in a BUNCH of particular locations. AND... it is very possible that one would NOT know all the correct cities that need stuffing until the night of the election, thus making it very difficult to pre-meditatively throw an election. It takes a lot of "machinery" to throw a national election (JFK was lucky that only a very small area was needed to "win".) /rant
The best thing about this is it would further reduce the power one or two large cities have in giving an entire state to one (usually Democrat) candidate.
At this point I'm ready to Force our senators to ride horses to DC for a month long session then they can return home and face their constituents as private citizens.
At this point I'm ready to Force our senators to ride horses to DC for a month long session then they can return home and face their constituents as private citizens.
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