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Do you understand the purpose of the electoral college? Do you agree with it?

How do you feel about the electoral college?

  • I understand the purpose of the electoral college and I agree with it.

    Votes: 77 67.0%

  • I understand the purpose of the electoral college and I disagree with it.

    Votes: 27 23.5%

  • I don't understand the purpose of the electoral college but I agree with it.

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • I don't understand the purpose of the electoral college but I disagree with it.

    Votes: 1 0.9%

  • Other - Please Explain

    Votes: 10 8.7%
  • Total voters
    115
Russell797 said:
The meaning of words is more important to you than the effect on people? It's that kind of dogma which I can't stand.
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Yes. Words matter. Our Founding Fathers understood this and that's why they were careful when they constructed our Constitution and designed our government.

The thing about your "effect on people" is that people are fickle. Attitudes, opinions and such can change in the blink of an eye. Basing a government on the "effect on people" is guaranteed to cause a government that has no stability.

I prefer a government that is stable and rooted in justice than a government that is mercurial and rooted in "how people feel".
 
ocean515 said:
How so? The people in the majority of States that comprise the United States of America selected who should be President of the United States.

This isn't ancient Rome, where the ruling class in Rome gets to pick for themselves how the rest of the citizens will be governed. The Electoral College insures all people have a voice.
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The EC ensures that some people have more of a voice than others. My vote did not count. My vote did not make the contest closer. It meant NOTHING.
 
RetiredUSN said:
Oh....you mean voting in which people elect officials within their individual states?

A very poor answer on your part.
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States are more localized. The EC is to prevent tyranny by a few densely populated cities dictating what happens in the rest of the country who may not share he same opinions or ideals. It sounds like you don't have a full grasp on both sides of this issue.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
SouthernDemocrat said:
Being they pay most of the taxes, why shouldn't they? Look at any state with a major city in the country and look at where majority of tax revenues come from. Take Texas for example, its a conservative state, but its tax base are its more liberal cities. Much of our wealth transfers in this country are not from rich to poor, but rather from urban areas to rural areas and from wealthy states to poor states.

The problem with the electoral college is that Wyoming has 3 electoral votes. Montana also has 3 electoral votes yet it has almost twice the population of Wyoming. So an individual's vote in Wyoming is worth twice as it is in Montana. An individuals vote in Wyoming is worth 3 times more than it is in Texas. So really, Texas should have 3 times more electoral votes than it does if we wanted to give its citizen's equal power in elections to those citizens in Wyoming. California would have even more.

Many Texans have talked about succession in the past. You really can't blame them when their individual votes have such little relative power to those of many other states, despite the fact that the residents of big states like Texas are the ones paying for everything.
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Union Of States.

Nuff said.
 
I would also point out that if anything, a national popular vote would result in presidential candidates moderating their positions as every vote in the nation would have equal power in deciding an election. Thus a Democratic candidate would have a strong incentive to moderate their policy positions and rhetoric so that they appeal to individuals in more rural areas and exurbs. A Republican candidate would have a strong incentive to moderate their policy positions and rhetoric so that they better appeal to individuals in more urban areas, inner ring suburbs, and more diverse areas.
 
After this election, I don't even know if I believe in Democracy as a whole anymore.
Democracy ceases to work when the populous proves incapable of determining the difference between fact and fiction.
 
Russell797 said:
Sorry but you own everything that Trump and the Republicans do to gut science and the EPA. One side or the other is responsible and it's not my side.
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I'm fine with the EPA getting gutted if it means Hillary is not president. Sucks that the EPA gets gutted but I voted against Hillary: and if that means president Trump then I'm fine with it, warts and all. Hillary must not become president. My point stands: If you don't like Trump then the DNC should have nominated Bernie Sanders.
 
Mycroft said:
Yes. Words matter. Our Founding Fathers understood this and that's why they were careful when they constructed our Constitution and designed our government.

The thing about your "effect on people" is that people are fickle. Attitudes, opinions and such can change in the blink of an eye. Basing a government on the "effect on people" is guaranteed to cause a government that has no stability.

I prefer a government that is stable and rooted in justice than a government that is mercurial and rooted in "how people feel".
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Now that's freedom for ya. Locked down by dogma. Freedom is dangerous, right? What the people want is what the people should get...the majority of people. If you don't trust the people to vote on the issues then why allow them to vote at all? I don't want the government to be stable and stagnant. It needs the flexibility to change on a dime if need be. Trapped by the dogma of the past is what is dangerous in an ever changing world where the pace of change is escalating rapidly.
 
I prefer not to have one. With that said, I believe the real problem is having super delegates. That is a complete scam!
 
SouthernDemocrat said:
I would also point out that if anything, a national popular vote would result in presidential candidates moderating their positions as every vote in the nation would have equal power in deciding an election. Thus a Democratic candidate would have a strong incentive to moderate their policy positions and rhetoric so that they appeal to individuals in more rural areas and exurbs. A Republican candidate would have a strong incentive to moderate their policy positions and rhetoric so that they better appeal to individuals in more urban areas, inner ring suburbs, and more diverse areas.
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You're wrong. Candidates would campaign heavily in the liberal bastion of the big cities and the rest of the nation would become little more than client states.
 
JRSaindo said:
States are more localized. The EC is to prevent tyranny by a few densely populated cities dictating what happens in the rest of the country who may not share he same opinions or ideals. It sounds like you don't have a full grasp on both sides of this issue.


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I do.....you do not.

Union Of States

Federation

Wiki the meanings.
 
reinoe said:
I'm fine with the EPA getting gutted if it means Hillary is not president. Sucks that the EPA gets gutted but I voted against Hillary: and if that means president Trump then I'm fine with it, warts and all. Hillary must not become president. My point stands: If you don't like Trump then the DNC should have nominated Bernie Sanders.
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The conversation has run it's course...no point in going in circles. We will agree to disagree.
 
Russell797 said:
Wrong. The EC ensures that the loser has no voice at all. Zero. It's winner take all. Not based on the will of the people, but rather on a convoluted system.

Why should the state of New Hampshire have more power in the election than my state when my state has far more people?

Also, the majority of nearly 60,000,000 voters is not the ruling class.
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Then your problem is the backwards two-party system we have in America and not with the Electoral College. You're concern should be to fix the "winner-take-all" approach. But since you're ignorant about the issues I suspect you're just venting because Hillary's cheat to win method didn't work.
 
Greenbeard said:
Swap every instance of "Massachusetts" and "New Hampshire" in the above and you have an accurate description of how things actually work today.
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And that is how it should be. The Founding Fathers realized there would be people who wish to promote the Tyranny of the Majority, and having seen examples of it, chose to insure all people had a voice, not just the simple majority.

It's interesting to see after these close elections, how many people are in favor of Tyranny.
 
ocean515 said:
And that is how it should be. The Founding Fathers realized there would be people who wish to promote the Tyranny of the Majority, and having seen examples of it, chose to insure all people had a voice, not just the simple majority.

It's interesting to see after these close elections, how many people are in favor of Tyranny.
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It's also interesting to see how many people haven't the slightest conception of what tyranny actually is.
 
RetiredUSN said:
This may qualify as the most nonsense I have ever read on here.
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That's because you care more for symbolism and appearance than reality. Hillary won by more than a half million votes. Those are real people. More people voted for Hillary than Trump but it doesn't matter. Spin it any way you want. The majority lost the election.
 
reinoe said:
You're wrong. Candidates would campaign heavily in the liberal bastion of the big cities and the rest of the nation would become little more than client states.
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Yep, like CA where general run-off elections occur between two demorats.
 
ocean515 said:
I live in California. You will get zero sympathy from me.
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I'm not looking for sympathy...I'm looking for justice and what is right. In California your vote (presumably for Trump) helped make the difference closer. Your vote mattered. My vote in Massachusetts mattered. I won, you lost. However, none of it mattered. You won the presidency despite loosing, and I lost the presidency despite winning. Because of the EC neither of our votes mattered.
 
Russell797 said:
Now that's freedom for ya. Locked down by dogma. Freedom is dangerous, right? What the people want is what the people should get...the majority of people. If you don't trust the people to vote on the issues then why allow them to vote at all? I don't want the government to be stable and stagnant. It needs the flexibility to change on a dime if need be. Trapped by the dogma of the past is what is dangerous in an ever changing world where the pace of change is escalating rapidly.
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LOL!!

And yet...things changed "on a dime" in this last election and you are ready to scrap our electoral process. :lol: That's what I was talking about...people are fickle.

It's not "dogma".

Dogma is a principle or set of principles laid down by an authority as incontrovertibly true. It serves as part of the primary basis of an ideology or belief system, and it cannot be changed or discarded without affecting the very system's paradigm, or the ideology itself.

Dogma - Wikipedia
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We aren't talking about a principle or set of principles laid down by an authority as incontrovertibly true. We are talking about a process for selecting our President that is defined by our Constitution. We can change our Constitution any time we want. Perhaps you should choose your words more carefully to describe you position. Dogma doesn't.

I disagree that...when talking about selecting our President...majority should decide. Our Founding Fathers disagreed with you, as well.

btw, freedom isn't dangerous...majority rule when selecting our President is.
 
Russell797 said:
I'm not looking for sympathy...I'm looking for justice and what is right. In California your vote (presumably for Trump) helped make the difference closer. Your vote mattered. My vote in Massachusetts mattered. I won, you lost. However, none of it mattered. You won the presidency despite loosing, and I lost the presidency despite winning. Because of the EC neither of our votes mattered.
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Justice? No you are not, you are looking for tyranny of the majority.

My vote counted as much as your vote. My candidate lost in my state. For the foreseeable future, my candidate will always lose. However, my state doesn't get to pick the President of the United States, any more than your State does. It's the combination of all States that gets to pick the President.

It's called the United States of America. How all those votes in each State go decides who will be President.
 
Painter said:
After this election, I don't even know if I believe in Democracy as a whole anymore.
Democracy ceases to work when the populous proves incapable of determining the difference between fact and fiction.
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Yes, and that's why the campaigns are driven by a race to the bottom. Who can out smear the other. The Republicans have traditionally done a better job at bludgeoning their opponent than have the Democrats.
 
ocean515 said:
Justice? No you are not, you are looking for tyranny of the majority.

My vote counted as much as your vote. My candidate lost in my state. For the foreseeable future, my candidate will always lose. However, my state doesn't get to pick the President of the United States, any more than your State does. It's the combination of all States that gets to pick the President.

It's called the United States of America. How all those votes in each State go decides who will be President.
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You are right, your vote counted as much as my vote. NOT AT ALL. You should have a say in who the next president will be. YOU DID NOT. And neither did I.
 
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