Elizabeth Warren says she wants to eliminate Electoral College

Should we do away with the Electoral College?

  • Yes

    Votes: 17 32.7%
  • No

    Votes: 30 57.7%
  • I need more study regarding the issue

    Votes: 5 9.6%

  • Total voters
    52

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Happy Cat
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Well a few poorly chosen presidents is a few too many.

But yeah, compared to the senate, youre right that the unjust effect doesnt often manifest.

It has already happened twice in my lifetime which means 2 out of the last 6 presidents since I was born, or 2 out of the last three if you were born in 2000.

So, it's had a radical effect on the actual trajectory of the country.
 
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Go Braves

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Happy to see the poll results so far regarding this thread.
M-Bob

Lol Bob, that's kinda like walking into an echo chamber & being pleased to hear what you want. There's not all that many active folks on this forum, & many who are fall right into Donald's core demographic for his base.
 
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Resha Caner

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Of course I'm open to better ways to govern. But the topic is the electoral system: how govt is chosen.

Are you trying to close the door to prevent opposition to your position? If how govt is chosen conflicts with other principles, then those principles become fair game for discussion.

In this case, namely, one of the issues is stability.

Do you think equal consent of the governed is a basic political value?

I think it's best if people have a way to engage with their government - have their concerns heard and addressed. IMO "equal consent" is too generalized an idea to be of much use. I used to have a very low opinion of Alexander Hamilton, but I have since decided I was wrong (for reasons completely unrelated to the musical).

Hamilton's political philosophy was essentially that there is no political philosophy. Good government is something you know when you see it, so it's best to let those who've proven themselves do what they're good at.

Do you have a better way to gauge it than popular elections?

Per what I said above, maybe you can see my view that no one generalized system is better than another. If it's working, leave it alone. If it has problems, maybe it's worth a tweak ... as long as you're willing to accept the inevitable pain of change.

My main reason for joining this thread was to oppose the idea that the EC is obviously wrong and that there are obviously better options. There's nothing obvious about it. I don't think most people have a clue what they would unleash. If I felt they better understood the potential downsides, I'd be more willing to listen to what they think are the potential upsides.
 
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Basil the Great

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The Electoral College issue may not go away, but it is very unlikely that the small states will ever agree to give up their relative power in Presidential Elections. Hence, a change in the Constitution is probably decades away, if it is ever changed.
 
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Pommer

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Andrew77

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Call me liar again and you will be reported. Your source supports my claims.

Reading from the source......

The Electoral College was created for two reasons. The first purpose was to create a buffer between population and the selection of a President. The second as part of the structure of the government that gave extra power to the smaller states.

The first reason that the founders created the Electoral College is hard to understand today. The founding fathers were afraid of direct election to the Presidency. They feared a tyrant could manipulate public opinion and come to power. Hamilton wrote in the Federalist Papers:

It was equally desirable, that the immediate election should be made by men most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station, and acting under circumstances favorable to deliberation, and to a judicious combination of all the reasons and inducements which were proper to govern their choice. A small number of persons, selected by their fellow-citizens from the general mass, will be most likely to possess the information and discernment requisite to such complicated investigations. It was also peculiarly desirable to afford as little opportunity as possible to tumult and disorder. This evil was not least to be dreaded in the election of a magistrate, who was to have so important an agency in the administration of the government as the President of the United States. But the precautions which have been so happily concerted in the system under consideration, promise an effectual security against this mischief.

No mention of slavery.
I stand by my prior post.
 
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Sparagmos

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That's like, your opinion man.

The purpose of the system is to prevent the country from sliding into mob rule, where the populace system can dictate to all the less populated.

Look at hunger games. That system is metaphor for what would literally happen in a total democracy, where 51% of the public, can enslave and abuse the 49%. The system is designed to diversify power.
If you think that’s bad, then the electoral college is worse. A minority can enslave the majority, and we aren’t talking about a minority of more qualified people. Just people who live in more rural areas.
 
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Belk

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Reading from the source......

The Electoral College was created for two reasons. The first purpose was to create a buffer between population and the selection of a President. The second as part of the structure of the government that gave extra power to the smaller states.

The first reason that the founders created the Electoral College is hard to understand today. The founding fathers were afraid of direct election to the Presidency. They feared a tyrant could manipulate public opinion and come to power. Hamilton wrote in the Federalist Papers:

It was equally desirable, that the immediate election should be made by men most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station, and acting under circumstances favorable to deliberation, and to a judicious combination of all the reasons and inducements which were proper to govern their choice. A small number of persons, selected by their fellow-citizens from the general mass, will be most likely to possess the information and discernment requisite to such complicated investigations. It was also peculiarly desirable to afford as little opportunity as possible to tumult and disorder. This evil was not least to be dreaded in the election of a magistrate, who was to have so important an agency in the administration of the government as the President of the United States. But the precautions which have been so happily concerted in the system under consideration, promise an effectual security against this mischief.

No mention of slavery.
I stand by my prior post.

Who were the "smaller" states?

At the Philadelphia convention, the visionary Pennsylvanian James Wilson proposed direct national election of the president. But the savvy Virginian James Madison responded that such a system would prove unacceptable to the South: “The right of suffrage was much more diffusive [i.e., extensive] in the Northern than the Southern States; and the latter could have no influence in the election on the score of Negroes.” In other words, in a direct election system, the North would outnumber the South, whose many slaves (more than half a million in all) of course could not vote. But the Electoral College—a prototype of which Madison proposed in this same speech—instead let each southern state count its slaves, albeit with a two-fifths discount, in computing its share of the overall count.

The Troubling Reason the Electoral College Exists
 
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Sparagmos

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Seems to me the principle of one person one vote is essentially a moral matter.

If not, then what is it? A practical matter? I dont see any special logistical problem with apportioning voting power differently among individuals.

What kind of issue is it, fundamentally?
It is absolutely a moral issue. Morality is about what we deem right and wrong.
 
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Sparagmos

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Regardless, you are not supposed to have the power to damage other states. Why should people in California be able to dictate the lives of those in Idaho? They shouldn't. Which is something the electoral college is supposed to mitigate.

It's always funny how people try and justify tyranny over others, in the name of equality.
So your solution is for Idaho to “dictate the lives” of those in California?
 
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How incongruous it was to see and hear Sen. Warren making news with her appeal for doing away with the Electoral College...while speaking to an audience in Mississippi, a state that would never, ever see a candidate for president again if the Electoral College were abolished. And in her usual backwards manner of thinking, she was actually telling those people that it would have the opposite effect.
 
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cow451

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If you think that’s bad, then the electoral college is worse. A minority can enslave the majority, and we aren’t talking about a minority of more qualified people. Just people who live in more rural areas.
That’s a far stretch. The times like 2016 happen with razor thin voting margins. Ms. Clinton is the worst campaigner imaginable and her campaign made several strategic blunders. Blaming the EC is like blaming General Motors for being caught in rush hour traffic.
 
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durangodawood

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How incongruous it was to see and hear Sen. Warren making news with her appeal for doing away with the Electoral College...while speaking to an audience in Mississippi, a state that would never, ever see a candidate for president again if the Electoral College were abolished. And in her usual backwards manner of thinking, she was actually telling those people that it would have the opposite effect.
On the bright side, FL and OH wouldn't have to watch so many awful campaign ads.
 
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Silverback

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I'm sure they do. I may not like Warren, but she's not stupid. She's pandering - saying something she knows will never happen to get votes.

Warren is the typical Democrat elitists, she also lies a lot.
 
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Sparagmos

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That’s a far stretch. The times like 2016 happen with razor thin voting margins. Ms. Clinton is the worst campaigner imaginable and her campaign made several strategic blunders. Blaming the EC is like blaming General Motors for being caught in rush hour traffic.
I don’t blame Clinton’s loss on the EC at all. Not sure what you mean.
 
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