Why We Are A Republic, And Not A Democracy

They get a vote. They don't get a say. The obvious effect of that is it discourages people in states that aren't competitive from voting.

Why does "state representation" matter? What is independently significant about it? What makes it matter more than each person's vote mattering?

 

Correct. I didn't suggest that they spend time in North Dakota. That's a strawman. I said if North and South Dakota were the only states that could realistically go either way, you bet they would spend time in North Dakota. How do I know this? Because California is worth over 3 times as many electoral votes as North Carolina, yet Republican presidential candidates will spend a lot more time in North Carolina than California.

Size is always important, but it is always secondary to whether or not a state is a genuine battleground state as far as campaign strategy is concerned.

You know what else is middle school civics stuff? Knowing how the number of electors per state are determined.

Why don't you answer these two questions?
1. How are the amount of senators by state decided?
2. If it’s the same number for every state, why bother adding the same total number for every state?

Answer those two questions then get back to me.

 

Each person's vote does matter, even under the current system.

State representation is still independently significant because tyranny of the majority is still a flaw in pure democracy. Viewing each state as something with its own will and its own interests that need to be preserved suggests that both state representation and popular representation should play a role in presidential elections. Otherwise, we can have a situation where 30% of the states control the fate of the other 70% despite making conscious decisions to not be part of that 30% of states. Popular vote deciding presidential elections could potentially betray the interests of federalism, in that we should give people and states the opportunity to choose where they live and what rules they live by without forcing (as a general rule) one small portion of the country dictating terms for everyone else.

 

Do you even know what you're arguing against?

This was where we started:

Then you were like, "no they also have to have large populations."

Then you backtracked and said they just have to have large populations relative to swing states.

Then you said politicians won't bother in a swing state even if no other states are up for grabs if that swing state is too small.

Now, we're back to "swing states with large populations."

You have flip flopped more times in this conversation than a burger at a busy fast food joint.

 

It's winner take all in each state. And there are plenty of states that aren't competitive. The people in the minority know their vote doesn't matter. This broken system discourages them from participating and caring. It also deters the political parties from caring about those people's votes.

We already have anti-majoritarian checks, so getting rid of the EC wouldn't change this country to a pure democracy.

You need 270 electoral votes to win. In 2020, the 11 largest states combined had 270 electoral votes. That means 22% of the states could control the fate of the other 78%. And no, a popular vote system doesn't "betray the interests of federalism." States already get to have their own wills and interests by having their own governments, their own U.S. senators and representatives, and protections in the Constitution from the federal government overstepping.

 

So let's say we had a popular vote system in 1984. Do the votes of Reagan opposers "not matter" because that wasn't a competitive race? Winner takes all in the election, right? So the fact that the race wasn't competitive discouraged Reagan opposers from participating or caring.

You just don't like winner-take-all at the state level. That's fine. You're entitled to your opinion. I definitely don't mind it. And I don't think that means that the votes in those states "don't matter" any more than the country-wide votes of Mondale supporters in 1984 didn't matter.

So you think under a popular vote system, it would require the influence of more states to control the fate of the remaining states? If not, then what's your point?

Also, you're a lawyer. A federal law contradicts a state law, all else being equal, which law wins? I just want more state protections, you want more influence based on population. That's completely reasonable, but only one of us is pretending like one of the electoral college and a popular vote system for presidential elections is completely unreasonable. I don't think a popular vote system is completely unreasonable, I think it's flawed and I just disagree with it. But it's not like the electoral college is perfect.

 

Not necessarily. They didn't know going into the election that it wouldn't be competitive.

A Democrat in Alabama or South Carolina or West Virginia knows their vote doesn't matter. A Republican in California or New York also knows their vote doesn't matter. How many people do you think choose not to vote because they know it won't make any difference?

Competitive elections make people more likely to engage with the process and vote. That is a good thing. And doing this wouldn't just benefit Democrats. There are plenty of states where Republicans are in the minority and are discouraged from voting due to the lack of competitiveness.

My point is simple. You are defending the Electoral College, but it doesn't actually protect the things you say it does.

How does the Electoral College protect states in any sort of general way?

 

I still think it does, but I definitely misspoke with the percentages I offered of "30% of states controlling the fate of the other 70%." I was trying to be conservative, but it turns out I was way off.

You are correct that under the electoral college, it would have taken winning the 11 largest states to win the general election, or 22%.

I did a little math, however, and found (approximately) that if all of the voters in the 9 largest states voted for Biden, he would not have gotten all 81,000,000, but he would have edged Trump's figure of about 74,000,000.

I've already said that it provides representation through a combination of population (through counting electors) and state representation (through 2 automatic electors granted to every state due to Senate representation). I would also add that the "winner-take-all" general element of the electoral college (though rogue electors do exist and are bad) protects the interests of the states because it's a way of saying that "State X picked candidate Y and all of our electors are going to candidate Y." This makes presidential elections a battle of states as much as it is a battle of individual votes, which is as it should be.

 

Okay, but all the voters in the 9 largest states aren't going to vote for Biden. That's what separates the popular vote from the EV's winner-take-all approach. Regardless, we can agree that neither scenario prevents the large states from having the ability to dominate the small states in presidential elections.

But why does that matter? People vote, not land. If the majority of Americans live in X% of the states, why shouldn't those states carry more weight in presidential elections?

None of this speaks to how it protects states generally. Uncompetitive states are ignored in the Electoral College system. And the parties have no reason to care about minority populations in uncompetitive states. Instead, they spend a massively disproportionate amount of their resources trying to persuade a small percentage of people in the small percentage of "swing states." How does that protect states generally? How is that a good thing?

 

ah, cute. Planky now has faith in systems. This is the guy/gal who emphatically declared that if Trump did not prevail in 2020, we'd now be a Marxist country (notwithstanding Trump's 4 years of lefty policies, of course). Seems his faith in systems is very dependent on which way the wind blows. Amazing that he/she is so able to bullshit him/herself so throughly.

 

I can also say that the 11 largest states aren't going to vote for one candidate either under the electoral college system. Unless of course it's a complete landslide like 1984 or 1936 or 1972. But we haven't seen one of those since '84. And even if we do see one, the difference in those elections is not popular vote vs. electoral college.

We can agree that neither scenario prevents the large states from having the ability to dominate small states in presidential elections. I'm just saying it's more important whether a state is purple under the electoral college as far as campaign strategy is concerned than if a state is large. It needs to be purple before it's even on the table to win or lose.

The bigger states do carry more weight from a raw electoral votes perspective in presidential elections, the electoral college just balances the playing field a bit, which is fine because "states matter too."

An additional two electors pretty overtly protects the interests of small states. Frankly, so does everything else I mentioned but that is the most plain and obvious example.

Every system will involve certain people getting pampered and certain people getting neglected. You want it to be more of a case where the most metropolitan areas get pampered, I want it to be a case where it's a combination of that and states that are genuinely up for grabs for either candidate.

 

Not rilly in this debate, but you seem to care more about states than people. that seems weird....isn't a state an inanimate thing?

 

No, I just think states should have a say as well. I don't think presidential elections should be exclusively decided by population. I think states should have a role as well.

 

states should have a say in addition to what/who? Not following? What do you mean that a state should have a say? Should a nice guitar have a say?

 

I'm saying states as a whole which are comprised of governments run by people and elected by people should have a say in presidential elections in addition to individual people throughout the country.

The electoral college sort of integrates everything, albeit imperfectly.

 

As a real conservative, not a pub/CINO, I'd always been a states rights guy & I still am, but less so that I used to be. I have a problem with giving dirt so much power. For ex. we have only 9 SC judges & they are powerful & their decisions affect us all, no? It seems wrong that dirt has so much say in a body that can crush the rights of PEOPLE.

 

They don't have an additional two electors. Every state gets those two electors. Small states have more electoral votes relative to population, but it's not a significant enough difference to affect campaign strategy in any sort of relevant way.

No, I want it to be the case that every vote counts equally and every person's vote matters (technically speaking). I don't think there are any real benefits to giving a small percentage of swing states disproportionate power and attention. I think our nation would benefit from candidates going after their voters, not a limited number of people in a limited number of specific states.

 

The truth here is simply that one party can’t win without the EC at this point, and is what has allowed them to get away with coalescing around their base and not meaningfully expanding their tent, which helps to create government dysfunction.

If it was a majority vote, they would be forced to actually compete for a majority vote of US citizens, which would make us all better off in the long run.

That party would rather have states secede, than have to compete for a majority of votes.

 

Literally my first post and only point. The entire time.

You keep pretending I'm saying things that I haven't. It's pretty disingenuous.

 

A modern tragedy, in 7 parts: