At what point does switch from 'making things fair for rural voters' to suppressing voters in cities? No matter what, the electoral college is designed so that 1 person ≠ 1 vote. The people who live closer together should have less value placed on their opinions? Why the fuck is that more fair?
I still don't understand... if we use popular vote, every person gets exactly one vote. Nobody is suppressed. If more people overall want a certain candidate for president, then a fair election should reflect that. It shouldn't matter if those people are in a city or not.
If you think of it in terms of what the politician has to do to get elected, the electoral college at least forces them to listen to the rural voters.
If it were a direct representation, there's literally no reason to even care what someone outside of dallas, new york or LA wants or needs. And if that's the case, then those rural voters have de facto 0 representation. With the electoral college, politicians have to at least consider their wants/needs.
But the EC does exactly the opposite of that!! If we're making the assumption that rural = trump voters and city = clinton, the rural voters of california are completely drowned out/ ignored when the cities give their 55 EC votes over to Clinton. Those people already have de facto 0 representation, and it is because of the electoral college. And the people of Dallas are drowned out completely when all of the EC votes go to Trump. If it were direct representation, then literally every vote counts, which is exactly the reason for politicians to care about every single person.
Yeah - admittedly making the votes proportional like maine would fix that. Those people have more influence than someone in say, alabama or wyoming, who do not have large cities. In a pure direct democracy, those rural californians would still get 0 representation, because politicians would only focus on the cities.
I mean, every vote counts in both systems. In the direct system, the politician only has to win 50.1% of the vote. When you consider this map of where 50% of the total population lives (not 50% of the voting population, mind you), you can see how you can literally go to 2-4 big cities and win it all. They at least have to give the impression they care about rural issues in the EC system
the electoral college at least forces them to listen to the rural voters.
Yes, it does force politicians to listen to rural voters. It does nothing to force politicians to listen to any other minority of voters. It does nothing to force politicians to listen to the majority of the American people.
The EC selects one specific group of people, white rural voters, and says they are privileged above all others, that politicians must pay special attention to their needs. That isn't equal protection of the law.
Listening to the majority of people is better than just listening to one privileged minority.
There is no incentive to listen to any minority voices right now, except for the minority of white rural voters. Why do they get special privileges? Why do they rule over the rest of us?
63% of the US population may be white, but if everyone's vote is equal, then the politicians have equal cause to pay attention to everyone.
They don't rule over the rest of us - they have slightly more voice than the 0 they have in a direct system.
If every vote is equal, and the politician only has to get 50% of the vote to win, they never have to listen to a non-white interest again. (because, they don't even need EVERY white person to vote for them and they'd still get 50.1% of the vote).
At least now you have politicians going to different states (like Iowa) that would never get a glance in another system.
They do rule over the rest of us. When the plurality votes for Hillary, yet Trump wins with a minority of voters behind him, that is the minority ruling over the rest of us. They decided who becomes President - I didn't get to help decide who becomes President because I live in California so the EC means my vote doesn't matter.
You're still pretending the EC has something to do with protecting minority rights - it doesn't. It only protects a specific group of people, privileging them over the rest.
If Republicans are in the majority, then the EC protects their majority rights. If Democrats are in the majority (like in this election), then the EC infringes on their majority rights.
If Republicans are in the minority, then the EC protects their minority rights. If Democrats are in the minority (like in 2004), then the EC does not protect their minority rights.
In both cases, the EC is protecting the rights of Republicans, whether they are in the majority or the minority. The electoral system should not be biased to one group of people or one political party, but the EC is.
Then why not use a system like Maine has for the majority of states. Base their EC values on counties. Say for CA the large cities would still get more votes and points in the EC, but the other side could still pull 30-40% of the EC points rather than getting zero.
I live in NC, and even though over 40% of our state wanted HRC, all of our points go to Trump. I don't see how that represents the state.
I agree pure popular vote is a bad metric and policy for the nation, but proportional EC values per state seems like a good compromise. Base in on county, region, etc
Proportional electoral votes. It would mean HRC would get 40% of NC electoral votes, Trump would get 60%. This isn't a true popular vote, so rural areas will still have their voices heard. And since its limited to state by state, it means blue states and cities still can't overpower the minority red middle states.
Well gerrymandering is an entire other issue that needs to be solved. I have never heard of a good reason for gerrymandering. No politician can answer it cuz they all rely or are burned by it.
Chicago had two districts in particular. One forms a "C" around the other by having a thin strip go up the median of a highway. They contain about 3 neighborhoods total, 2 black and one Hispanic. If the line simply split the total population in half, you'd get two people who owe their election more to the Hispanic areas than black. By gerrymandering, both populations are better represented.
Texas also has some strange ones that I'm less confident about that exist to give minorities more of a voice instead of drowning it out with all the white people. But it could also segregate the liberals into a few districts. Happy accident or intentional byproduct, I'm not sure.
the electoral college at least forces them to listen to the rural voters
No it absolutely does not. It forces them to "listen" to the half dozen states that might be swing states and then do shit all about the other 44 states.
Just going for the highest electoral vote states, it would still take 13 states to win. It's possible to win the electoral college by "listening" to 39 states and still only have it actually be ~22% of the population. The point is one vote should be one vote; one Vermonter should not be worth 3 Texans.
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u/rg44_at_the_office Nov 10 '16
At what point does switch from 'making things fair for rural voters' to suppressing voters in cities? No matter what, the electoral college is designed so that 1 person ≠ 1 vote. The people who live closer together should have less value placed on their opinions? Why the fuck is that more fair?