There was a good article on the CNN site this morning that has since disappeared about the Electoral College. I have found a BBC story that addresses the issue: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-53558176
The Electoral College - in my opinion -totally outdated and archaic! When you read about how it came about, and its "intent" (basically that the populace just ain't smart enough or informed enough to go makin' decisions such as "who should be president" - including some basic racism factors).
Spare me the stuff about how California would be making choices for all Americans - they have the most Electoral College members!
I'm actually hoping that somebody more informed than myself will chime in here?
The Electoral College is made up of actual human beings (right?) from each state. These carbon based units are blessed with super human powers to actually vote for whoever the hell they feel like - screw the populace! Am I correct so far?
Even if I accept this - I want to know WHO these folks are. NAMES! I want some freakin' NAMES! If this is publicly available information, it's difficult to find.
My cynical self is alive and has consumed too much caffeine this morning! It just seems to be that the fact that primaries were held over such a stretch of time that the candidate (Democrat, this time) was CHOSEN before some of us regular stiffs (general populace) even had a say. Yes, I wrote in the candidate that I wanted (wasn't Joe) ... which had all the effect of spitting into the Grand Canyon.
So today ... or sometime this week ... this month, maybe - a group of unnamed super humans will assemble and make the final choice for me (all of us). To me, it makes all the campaign ads, all the voter intimidation, and even VOTING seem like a meaningless effort. And, yeah - I did vote.
Ah, screw it! I'm havin' some more coffee!
There are boards of electors picked for each candidate. They can vote for whoever they want but rarely break.
according to the interweb "There has been one faithless elector in each of the following elections: 1948, 1956, 1960, 1968, 1972, 1976, and 1988."
I agree though, the electoral college makes no sense in modern times. I live in MA, we all know which party will win that state. Why should someone who lives in a swing state have a vote that is more crucial than someone who lives in a blue state or a red state? Even worse, in 2000 and 2016 the winner of the popular vote lost the electoral college vote, so the less popular candidate became Prez. That may happen this year too.
the electoral college needs to go. unfortunately, the chances of it changing in our lifetime is just about zero
I agree, its purpose is outdated and it's un-Democratic. A vote in California is worth significantly less than a vote in Montana, it's not right. A slim margin in one state shouldn't silence millions of votes. The census from 10 years ago shouldn't be a factor in a Presidential election.
It's also made political creed deceptively provincial. A "Red" or "Blue" state are often so by a slim margins, sometimes 2 percentage points. Yes, that's a lot of people within those two points, but that's even more within the 46% slim minority whose vote is moot.
I hear the tired excuse that it keeps California and NY from deciding the election, but does that mean Pennsylvania, Iowa, and Ohio should? That was never its purpose.
Ok, I voted. It was about a 35 min wait. LOL, person in front and behind me were not wearing masks until they got to the door.
I'm in Indiana.
@porkchopbob When a candidate of any party beats a candidate of the opposing party by 2 million (popular) votes - and still loses - DEMOCRACY wasn't served. I'm neither a fan of Hillary or Donald - I'd make the same argument for either. Trump lost by 2 million votes by the PEOPLE and was awarded his presidency courtesy of the Electoral College. Again - simply not Democracy.
Good point. None of us actually voted for president today. You voted for the group of people who will actually cast the vote for president, and those people can actually vote for somebody else.
Watching the returns, Arizona still being in play is surprising.
Bill Clinton narrowly won Arizona in 1996, mostly thanks to Perot taking a good chunk of votes. Other than that, no Democrat has won Arizona since Truman in 1948.
How much does Trump's attacks on McCain factor into that?
Weirder and crazier yet - two states (Nebraska and Maine) can split their Electoral votes!
This is every bit as puzzling as that "half a cent" sales tax increase in Florida. What are they gonna do with the other half of that penny? Crazy chit! 😉
And if Biden lands exactly on 270, y'all can thank Omaha.
Nebraska is also the only state with a Unicameral and the only one that mandates all electric utilities are publicly owned. We get a lot of things right. Who'd a thunk?
"My friends say I'm ugly I got a masculine face." Tom Waits
^^^^^^^
All things some might think socialistic in a very conservative state. An interesting dichotomy.
"My friends say I'm ugly I got a masculine face." Tom Waits
As far as the state I live in my vote didn't count....but in the popular vote I made my mark. I'm a part of the majority as I was in the last election so even though my state voted red my vote counts in the overall perspective of our country and that is the only reason I cast a vote. To show I am a part of what "most people" want...the electoral college at this point in our countries history is a waste and allows the minority to rule. It stop progress and allows the ignorant to hold the rest of us back
Here's a graphic of the Presidential electoral map for over the years. Kind of interesting to see how it changed. Or, in '64 how the south immediately went Republican (and to Wallace in '68) in response to Civil Rights bills. Compare that to elections from the turn of the 20th century and the political divide is pretty clear.
Mine sure as hell did!
https://electoralvotemap.com/history-of-electoral-college-reform-efforts/
behindthescenes.nyhistory.org/the-evolution-of-the-electoral-college/
These will give you a little background of why the Constitution calls for electors to vote on the President.
Some states used to, 2 states still have, a proportional vote. If a candidate wins a district, they get the vote in that district. it's not a state wide popular vote election.
Also, did you know that the House has limited itself to 435 seats, no matter if a state has grown/lost in population? That means some states are over represented and some are under represented.
@jerry But don't they get "reset" every ten years with the census? Some states gain and some lose seats based on the census.
@jerry But don't they get "reset" every ten years with the census? Some states gain and some lose seats based on the census.
Correct, but just as important is that district's in some states have been so extremely gerrymandering that the districts in whole do not represent the will of the people in that state. Just look at states such as Pennsylvania that are fairly even with a slight Democratic lean, yet if you look at their districts you would think Pennsylvania is an extremely Republican state. In today's America, not only does non-populated land give states an extreme increase in influence over well populated cities, but extreme gerrymandering has failed to give the states with higher populations the advantage in the House that was supposed to be the equalizer. It seems like for the foreseeable future, the GOP has the advantage in influence in the federal government dispite a Republican winning the presidential popular vote only once in the last 30 years.
@jerry But don't they get "reset" every ten years with the census? Some states gain and some lose seats based on the census.
Correct, but just as important is that district's in some states have been so extremely gerrymandering that the districts in whole do not represent the will of the people in that state. Just look at states such as Pennsylvania that are fairly even with a slight Democratic lean, yet if you look at their districts you would think Pennsylvania is an extremely Republican state. In today's America, not only does non-populated land give states an extreme increase in influence over well populated cities, but extreme gerrymandering has failed to give the states with higher populations the advantage in the House that was supposed to be the equalizer. It seems like for the foreseeable future, the GOP has the advantage in influence in the federal government dispite a Republican winning the presidential popular vote only once in the last 30 years.
You are correct in that some districts get "reset" after each census, BUT the number of seats in congress stays the same. Rather than increase the number of seats which would provide proper representation, some districts lose voters and some gain voters. Some states lose districts, some gain, but it still remains 435 seats no matter what the change in population.
Our votes DO matter but there are things going on with manipulation. If you don't know about them check out programs called Hammer and Strategic, and Scorecard.
Also those Dominion voting machines.
Why an intelligence agency needs software to use on voting machines is beyond me. Maybe is a gentler approach to coups in other countries.
What has been revealed here is that in Pennsylvania between 2 am and 4 am there were irregularities occurring. Like at 2 an Trumps lead went down by 20,000 votes simultaneously when Bidens went up by 20,000. Then between 4 and 430 am 800,000 votes for Biden came in from mail in ballots. It has been asked how is it possible 100 per cent of the mail in ballots at that time were for Biden? Statistically that's not possible.
Someone related to George Soros built thise Dominion machines.
Did Trump legitimately lose? Hard to say, but he has said he will run again in 2024 if the results stand as they are now.
So he may have lost the battle but the war ain't over yet.
@jerry I always thought 435 seats was common knowledge. It's been 435 since the early 20th century, with distribution of seats based on the census since 1929 (just as electoral votes are reapportioned). It's not meant to increase because the population does, but redistribute representation as the population migrates. That way states aren't over or under represented.
You can find a map of the reapportionment in 2010: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_congressional_apportionment
Our votes DO matter but there are things going on with manipulation. If you don't know about them check out programs called Hammer and Strategic, and Scorecard.
Also those Dominion voting machines.
Why an intelligence agency needs software to use on voting machines is beyond me. Maybe is a gentler approach to coups in other countries.
What has been revealed here is that in Pennsylvania between 2 am and 4 am there were irregularities occurring. Like at 2 an Trumps lead went down by 20,000 votes simultaneously when Bidens went up by 20,000. Then between 4 and 430 am 800,000 votes for Biden came in from mail in ballots. It has been asked how is it possible 100 per cent of the mail in ballots at that time were for Biden? Statistically that's not possible.
Someone related to George Soros built thise Dominion machines.
Did Trump legitimately lose? Hard to say, but he has said he will run again in 2024 if the results stand as they are now.
So he may have lost the battle but the war ain't over yet.
See Conspiracy Theory 101.
Trump lost, Trump is a loser in more ways than one can count, Trump has made losers of the the GOP as almost all sold what little souls they had, Trump will tie up the GOP & pad his wallet for the next 4 years with "will he run or he will not run". The others will be spinless to speak out against him. What a great 4 years to be a consumer of the GOP - Trump, lies, & conspiracies.
The good news is if Trump starts a TV station and battles FOX. That will be worth sitting on the sidelines and watching how FOX responds to Trump. He's upset as we speak with State Run TV, and that is very sad.
better news would be if Trump ends up in the big house, where he belongs.
I think Roger Stone should be charged with Treason ... as soon as Trump is no longer President and can't pardon him.
https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/13/business/stop-the-steal-disinformation-campaign-invs/index.html
@jerry I always thought 435 seats was common knowledge. It's been 435 since the early 20th century, with distribution of seats based on the census since 1929 (just as electoral votes are reapportioned). It's not meant to increase because the population does, but redistribute representation as the population migrates. That way states aren't over or under represented.
So what happens to the INCREASED population due to births? Where is their representation? People didn't stop having babies in 1920 did they?
How about the baby boomers? How were the areas that population doubled in due to births from 1946 to 1956 represented? From 1940 the US population went from 132.2 million to 308.7 million in 2010, a little short of tripling and we still had 435 seats.
What did they do, just add people to each district? With even 700,000 in a district, that left over 4 million people not represented, or the equivalent of almost 3 congressional districts.
@jerry It's based on percentages. The Electoral College total of 538 hasn't increased since 1964 either. Both the EC and congress are reapportioned at each census based on population shifts. Each Congressman represents a greater number of people than they did 100 years ago, it's designed to be relative. Districts are constantly being redrawn based on population shifts (well, supposedly).
For instance, WI went from 11 electoral votes to 10 after the 2010 census. Not due to a great decrease in its own population, but due to relative increases in other states.
Arizona has gone from 1 Rep in 1912 to 9 Representatives today, but the total number of representatives in DC hasn't increased. If the number of seats grew as population increased, you'd eventually have 5000 representatives drawing a salary today. They'd have to build a new wing to the capitol.
Here's an interactive map showing the reapportionment: https://www.census.gov/2010census/data/apportionment-data-map.html
The population of Atlanta has grown from 1.4 million in 1960 to 4 million today but that hasn't increased the number of baseball teams that represents its population.
Our votes DO matter but there are things going on with manipulation. If you don't know about them check out programs called Hammer and Strategic, and Scorecard.
Also those Dominion voting machines.
Why an intelligence agency needs software to use on voting machines is beyond me. Maybe is a gentler approach to coups in other countries.
What has been revealed here is that in Pennsylvania between 2 am and 4 am there were irregularities occurring. Like at 2 an Trumps lead went down by 20,000 votes simultaneously when Bidens went up by 20,000. Then between 4 and 430 am 800,000 votes for Biden came in from mail in ballots. It has been asked how is it possible 100 per cent of the mail in ballots at that time were for Biden? Statistically that's not possible.
Someone related to George Soros built thise Dominion machines.
Did Trump legitimately lose? Hard to say, but he has said he will run again in 2024 if the results stand as they are now.
So he may have lost the battle but the war ain't over yet.
Lots of already debunked conspiracy garbage in that post.
You never disappoint.
George Soros says "Boo!"
Dominion is a company based in Toronto and Chicago. No relation to Venezuala or Soros.
In PA, the state legislature (run by GOP) had previously set the law - the envelopes of mail in ballots were not to be opened or processed until 11/3 (some states allowed them to be opened and verified before that, just not counted). All of that is done by hand, according to the law.
Democrats believed in Covid and were scared and tended to mostly vote by mail, Republicans did not. There is a ton of data to back this up.
So - the in person votes made on election day were counted 1st - by law. The absentee ballots, mostly democrats, were counted later.
NO evidence in court demonstrated fraud. The presiding judge in the PA case is a republican and he wrote a scathing 37 page decision comparing the Trump legal case to Frankenstein.
Even in court, the GOP lawyers say there has been no fraud. 2 law firms, with long standing relationships to the GOP and Trump quit in the middle of this because it's garbage. They only complain on TV the internet. In front of a judge they have no evidence.
BTW, there was a bill introduced earlier this year to standardize the election across all 50 states. Guess who blocked it?
McConnell.
The legal team isn't even trying to present anything in court, they know they have nothing. It's only the press conferences that are providing sound bites for his base. It's about spreading misinformation, not about legal action.
It's deplorable behavior by an administration.
