2. From a less esoteric perspective, the Electoral College limits the range of vote fraud. A given state can generate a zillion fraudulent ballots, but that doesn't give them any more electoral votes. With a "National Popular Vote" scheme, fraudulent votes affect the entire country.
Under pure mob rule democracy, rights exist at the whim of the mob.
In 1960, John F. Kennedy narrowly beat Richard Nixon in the popular voting, 49.7 percent to 49.5 percent, a smaller margin than Cleveland had over Harrison. But wait: Nixon won more states (Nixon 26, Kennedy and others 24). But no: Kennedy, who won bigger states, went on to win the electoral balloting, 303 to 219. This time we, the people, did not strike out. The popular-vote winner became president.
That puts the lie to what has oft been stated, that vote fraud in Chicago, won the election for Kennedy. Illinois electors would not have changed the out come, even if they had gone for Nixon.
Consider the election of 2000 and we had direct popular vote elections. Had J. "I was in Viet Nam" Kerry, won 49 states by a margin of 50,000 votes each and Bush had only won Texas by a margin of 2,500,000 votes, Bush would still have won the election. I know that is a highly unlikely scenario but it illustrates the point