Posted on 12/03/2019 5:53:57 AM PST by Mr. Mojo
On Monday, Sen. Elizabeth Warren reiterated her view that the Electoral College should be abolished and U.S. presidents should be elected by popular vote. “My goal is to get elected—but I plan to be the last American president to be elected by the Electoral College. I want my second term to be elected by direct vote,” she tweeted.
In the accompanying video clip, she said, “Call me old fashioned, but I think the person who gets the most votes should win.”
Warren has a curious idea of what counts as “old fashioned,” since her position on the Electoral College puts her at odds with the decidedly old fashioned Founding Fathers, who rightly worried about what James Madison called the “tyranny of the majority.”
Democrats are apparently unbothered by this possibility, not least because they believe they’ve secured a permanent majority and, if they could just seize power, they would govern as benign rulers.
What’s standing in their way is nothing less than our constitutional system.
That’s why you see Democrats coming out against not just the Electoral College but also the Senate and the Supreme Court. Why should Wyoming or Iowa have two votes in the Senate, so the thinking goes, when so few people live there? Why should five Supreme Court justices decide contentious questions about, say, gun rights? (Expect to hear howls of protest from the left if the gun rights case the justices heard on Monday, New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. City of New York, doesn’t go their way.)
It’s not just Warren. According to one poll earlier this year, 60 percent of Democratic voters support abolishing the Electoral College, and much of the mainstream media seems to agree. After the 2016 election, The New York Times attacked the Electoral College as an “antiquated mechanism,” Time magazine published an article arguing the Electoral College was designed to protect slavery, and E. J. Dionne Jr. of The Washington Post compared it to a game of chance in a casino.
Since the 2016 election, 15 states (all of them blue) have joined the National Popular Vote movement, an interstate compact that would, if enough states joined it, award all of a state’s electoral votes to whichever candidate wins the national popular vote, regardless of who the voters in that state actually voted for.
Although it’s mostly been Democrats inveighing against the Electoral College for the past two decades, Donald Trump came out against it after President Obama won reelection in 2012, calling it a “disaster” and arguing for its abolishment, but changed his mind after 2016, calling it “genius.”
Warren Really Wants a New American Regime Warren’s opposition to the Electoral College is more principled than Trump’s. Although couched in the facile rhetoric of “every vote counts,” she means just the opposite. Under a system of direct democracy, votes in places like Wyoming, Iowa, and every other small state wouldn’t really count at all. The country would effectively be ruled by New York and California—and indeed by the residents of the largest cities in those states.
That’s what Warren and the Democrats really want, they just can’t say it. They know that most large cities are blue and that the ongoing urbanization of America would give them a huge advantage if they were able to run their votes up in those districts and ignore the rest of the country.
It certainly would have been enough to put Hillary Clinton in the White House. In fact, the collapse of Democrats’ “blue wall” in 2016 is largely what’s behind the current assault on the Electoral College. Competing for the votes of working-class whites in Pennsylvania and Michigan doesn’t appeal to progressive 2020 candidates like Warren for the simple reason that she’s unlikely to win their votes, and she knows it.
The argument against the Electoral College is therefore really an argument against the role of the states in our constitutional system, and against the scheme of federalism in general. The irony is that federalism is the one thing that might assuage rising political tensions in America.
The people of Oklahoma are going to arrange their affairs differently than the people of Oregon, and will likely seek different things in a presidential candidate. A system that requires candidates to appeal to the widest swath of Americans is more likely to produce a truly national candidate than a system that favors large cities over the rest of the country.
The alternative, what Warren and the Democrats would like to see, is exactly what Madison said it was: a tyranny of the majority. In this case, it would be a tyranny whose enormous power was concentrated in Washington, D.C., to an even greater extent than it already is.
Under a system based on direct democracy, federalism would wither and die. As the historian Allen Guelzo noted last year in National Affairs, once we eliminate the Electoral College, “there would be no sense in having a Senate (which, after all, represents the interests of the states), and eventually, no sense in even having states, except as administrative departments of the central government.”
No wonder progressives like Warren want to do away with the Electoral College. It’s the first domino in a chain reaction that would lead to the overthrow of our constitutional system and the beginning of a new American regime—one that knows no constraints on its power and has no mechanisms for protecting the rights of the minority.
Call me old fashioned, but I’ll take federalism and the Founders’ constitutional system any day.
This kind of disturbed thinking is what we got when the Kenyan illegally occupied our government.........
I can’t wait. I think, I predict, Pres Trump is going to win the so-called “popular vote” this coming election, whether he’s “impeached” or not.
Then all those idiotic states:California, Oregon, Washington, Maryland, New Jersey, Delaware, Colorado, New York, Massachusetts, Vermont, et al, who have SACRIFICED THEIR SOVEREIGNTY will have to give all their Electoral votes to Trump.
I can’t wait to see their legislators scrambling to rescind their idiocy before the Electoral College convenes (Dec 20?).
But at least half of them won’t make it.
I can see Republicans in those states using filibusters, and other parliamentary tactics to prevent the rescinding vote’s passage.
I can’t wait!
This ought to prove that she’s unfit to be president. Anyone remember 2000? Imagine if we had to have a *national* recount. And, remember, there is no federal law regarding who can and cannot vote - it’s a states right - so there would have to be a system unifying all elections at a national level, something that does not now exist.
If they want to scrap the Electoral College, I support elections where we count the winner of each county/parish as one vote. The more populated states will still get more votes but the rural areas will have strong representation. I keep advocating this on these threads because it is entirely fair and makes it much harder for one or a dozen counties to rig the election by vote fraud.
California could always generate enough bogus votes to swing the election. You might as well make Mexico the 51st state and give them voting rights in the US.
In her world, a stroke of the pen ought to be sufficient. Of course, some people might protest and say it's not as easy as all that. But those people will be ... dealt with.
Once the Electoral College is removed (requires a Constitutional Amendment) then there's really no reason at all for the South and Midwest to remain in the union. Federation is moot at that point.
How about a one way ticket to Venezuela, beatch?
Of course the Capital wants to rule the Districts. Two tributes a year for the Hunger Games will be Warren’s next proposal.
So, she is openly admitting that she is an enemy to the Constitution. AG Barr, have her picked up and thrown in the slammer.
So 'old fashioned' means states like California with their 20 million illegals get to choose the President?
Warren's a fool.
It's time to peacefully split the country in to two countries - one liberal - one conservative...
There is no more America if this specimen becomes POTUS.
She thinks she can get a proposed Constitutional Amendment eliminating the Electoral College passed in just four Years?
Lieawatha is sure smoking some good stuff in that Peace Pipe of hers.
Liz been hitting the Crazywater again?
Warren’s version of the Middle East saying, “One man, one vote, one time.”
not when the majority wants to and is willing to violate the natural rights of the minority
I wonder what they would say if President Trump wins the popular vote next year?
I’m optimistic about POTUS’s re-election chances too but Trump will win the popular vote in California when Hell freezes over. Same goes for New York, Oregon, and Washington at least.
Yeah asshat pocohontas wannabee, it just requires a change in the constitution. Care to guess how many states will ratify it?? The states that would be awarded the most electoral votes in any election you would win, would most certainly mostly those which have the largest apportionment. The others, not so much.
I’m still waiting for her to slip on an old sandwich and break her leg as she skitters around like a babbling lunatic.
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