politics
Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!
Rules:
- Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.
Example:
- Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
- Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
- No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
- Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
- No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
That's all the rules!
Civic Links
• Congressional Awards Program
• Library of Congress Legislative Resources
• U.S. House of Representatives
Partnered Communities:
• News
view the rest of the comments
Everyone saying this can't happen and stuff but we already have started the process. There is a set of several states that signed a pact that make it vote for the majority. Can't think of the name of it but we only need several more states (not all of them) to meet needed electoral votes to basically bypass the electrical college.
NPVIC https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact
This. Thanks!
We would just need Wisconsin or Pennsylvania to adopt it if the currently "pending" states adopted it. This is actually a lot closer to being possible than I thought.
As usual, Republican states won't adopt this. And you can expect Republicans to appeal this all the way to the Supreme Court if it ever does get adopted, which the current conservative majority will almost certainly bend over backwards to find "unconstitutional."
The thing is that the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact is nothing until it’s all the way there. Having 95% of the necessary electoral votes has the same effect as 0. So there’s no reason for opponents to even care about it until it is within striking distance of the threshold. It seems to me that if we ever reach a point where it comes down to just a state or two, that legislation will be fought tooth and nail, not just in those last states, but there will be fights and legal challenges in states that have already entered the compact to reverse it too. And even if we manage to win the fight and it gets activated, we will still have to keep fighting in perpetuity because almost any state pulling out would undo the whole thing.
I’m not saying people shouldn’t even try, maybe some good comes of it regardless. It just doesn’t seem like a solution as much as a statement.
The real solution is to allocate delegates proportionally to how citizens vote, as is done in Nebraska and a couple other states. This achieves exactly the same purpose as the NPVC but is actually politically tractable.
No state has any incentive to assign its delgates to a person the citizens of the state didn't vote for. You can do what the NPVC does and make it contingent upon everyone playing along, but that requires everyone to play along and is incredibly tenuous. Even if it ever goes into effect, as soon as states allocate delegates to someone who wasn't the most popular candidate in their state they'll pull it, and the whole thing will fall apart.
Every state has incentive to allocate its delegates proportionally. That's exactly what people want. They want that more than winner takes all. It doesn't require a huge chuck of states to buy into it amd it isn't tenuous. But it accomplishes the same goal; if states allocate delegates proportionally to how they vote, then the most popular candidate gets the most delegates. If you're in one of the many states that has winner takes all, advocate to do what the few more democratic states have already adopted and are happy with.
This only solves it if you also make the number of delegates for each state be proportional to its population size. California has 68 times the population of Wyoming but only 18 times the number of electoral votes.
What you're describing has never resulted in the popular vote winner losing the electoral college. The popular vote winner has always lost because states allocate delegates as a winner-take-all system.
I’m not sure what you mean. Of course it’s never happened because we’ve never done it that way.
If you’re saying that if you go back and calculate previous elections, then it never would have made a difference, that doesn’t mean it could not happen. Growing up I learned that there was only one time in history that the popular vote didn’t match the EC, but now it’s become a constant threat. If it becomes a viable path then eventually it is bound to be exploited.
What you are talking about simply isn’t functionally equivalent to just straight up popular vote, for the reason I described. Votes are not worth the same amount in different places.
The fact that the number of delegates is not exactly proportional to the population of a state has never resulted in a popular vote mismatch eoth the college. It may happen, but it's incredibly unlikely. Every time there's been a mismatch has been because states allocate delegates in a winner take all manner. One of these this is a real problem amd one is a hypothetical problem. Solving the real problem is straightforward, and involes state level action of only a few states. The hypothetical problem is difficult to solve smd requires coordinated effort of many states at ones. You can spend your time solving a hypothetical problem and maybe achieve success in 70 years. Or you you address the real problem and succeed in 20 years.