Oh No, The New Awesome Primary Thread

I agree this is pretty messed up, but the most totally fucked up part is after putting up with the stupidity of primaries and finally a national election, we have the electoral count that chooses the president instead of total votes.No wonder only idiots and narcissist psychotics run.

There is nothing stupid about the electoral college system, it's the only thing that preserves the integrity of the individual states that we have left; otherwise the low population states would just be swallowed up completely in the federal behemoth.

I disagree.

Tanypteryx writes: Is the population ratio to number of representatives fixed in the Constitution as it is today (about 758k per Rep)? We could double the number of Representatives by halving the the population ratio down to 376k, increasing the districts (which may have a side effect of ameliorating the gerrymandering badness). This would cut the power of Wyoming's 2 senators for it's Electoral College count in half.Kinda like the NRA arguing for more guns, I suppose, because we'd get 435 more Congress persons.Would this require an amendment to the Constitution?

"The only thing"? That's a bit of hyperbole. Enough to render the bit of truth in the statement a mere shadow of the what you intend.Yes, the formula for the electoral college does give the small states a little extra 'political kick' by giving them a disproportionate number of electoral votes. But in practice the boost scarcely matters and we get the same president we would get with a direct popular vote.Of course I can think of one very notable exception that does not make your case very well.And with regards to the "only" part, we should note that the senate is completely state-egalitarian with respect to its election. And there is the important distinction that each state actually does get its two senators, while with the president, if you back a loser you get nothing.Finally, there is the tenth and eleventh amendments and federalism. Those things also ameliorate the domination of the states by the federal government. Every state has its own state government and its own legislature. Many people both left and right find that state tyranny is every bit as real and in their face as federal tyranny. Historically, it has been often been the states that trod all over individual rights and the federal government that cleans up their evil.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Smaller districts are even easier to gerrymander than large districts

Exactly true. Slavery. Civil rights. Gay rights. When left to their own devices, states essentially gravitate towards mob rule. They often discount the Constitution (both State AND Federal) by pushing forward legislation that often goes counter to the foundational freedoms of our Republic.

The pubs will lose.Not because they are evil, but because they can not re-brand fast enough.

I will have to rethink my position on that.

There are so many fish in that barrel there's no room for the water.

Curiously I agree on this.More to the point I think that we could use the electoral college to better effect if we made it illegal to release the state ballot results until it is done in the electoral college. This would take away the media circus election night and give reason for western states - especially Hawaii - people to vote, AND it would give states a chance to fix election fiascos (think Florida in 2000) by re-running their election ... and we could require a revote whenever the margin between the top two candidates was less than the number of other votes (either discarded\damaged or for a third party).Enjoy

I understand the point you are trying to make but a rather substantial quibble here.When you go into the booth and vote for president you are, in actuality, voting for the slate of Electors pledged to vote for that candidate if elected to the Electoral College. In most states the majority popular vote will determine which slate of Electors will enter the Electoral College. In two states the slate of Electors may be split. The only way to determine which slate of electors will enter the college is by tallying the popular vote. You cannot have the Electoral College release the state voting result since the college has not yet been formed and cannot be formed until the results are released. That cannot be done in a media vacuum.Also, the Florida situation came about because the Florida courts, the Florida Supreme Court and the Florida legislature attempted to resolve their voting fiasco by invalidating parts of the Florida election code in place at the time after the election had commenced. Any change to the Electoral College system, even it's repeal, would not have resolved the Florida election problem.To maintain the distribution of political influence to the states with the Electoral College scheme yet give the appearance, at least, of a more popular election, one new scheme is to do away with this slate of electors stuff and award that state's X number of votes to the popular winner in that state. Exactly what we have now but without all this falderal of having electors meet, sending their votes in sealed envelopes to the Senate to be opened and counted thus giving a result we already know has happened. All that would be needed is for the state to certify their result to the Federal Election Commission who would certify the final count, which, barring another Florida, could be done the day after the election.

Curiously the constitution (as currently amended) only requires that :

quote:

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Article 2 - The Executive Branch
Section 1 - The President

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Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector.

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^(*) The Electors shall meet in their respective states, and vote by ballot for President and Vice-President, one of whom, at least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves; they shall name in their ballots the person voted for as President, and in distinct ballots the person voted for as Vice-President, and they shall make distinct lists of all persons voted for as President, and of all persons voted for as Vice-President and of the number of votes for each, which lists they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, directed to the President of the Senate;

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Note that this part of the process takes place within each state, and what they provide is a list of the votes for all the candidates with the numbers of votes for each candidate -- ie first choice, second choice, third choice, etc. for the state as a whole.This does not require a media circus, nor does it require that the results be released at that time. It is at this point that any problems with the voting -- as occurred in Florida -- would become evidence.Also at this time it should become apparent whether or not there is a clear and unambiguous count of votes, where the margins between the top three candidates are greater than the number of bad ballots.There is no need for announcing any votes from any state at this time, just whether or not a clean and unambiguous vote had been tallied, and IF not, then there is time to have a run-off election between the top three candidates (see below - "... the persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for ... ").Note that this withholding of results from the media is already done for absentee votes and for early votes (where those are allowed).You also have time to validate all votes, a process that should (imho) include a means for the people to validate that their votes have been properly counted, and corrections made where they aren't properly counted.Then you can proceed to the "electoral college" as required by the constitution^(*):

quote:

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The President of the Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certificates and the votes shall then be counted;

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The person having the greatest Number of votes for President, shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed; and if no person have such majority, then from the persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as President, the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President. But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by states, the representation from each state having one vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice. And if the House of Representatives shall not choose a President whenever the right of choice shall devolve upon them, before the fourth day of March next following, then the Vice-President shall act as President, as in the case of the death or other constitutional disability of the President.

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The person having the greatest number of votes as Vice-President, shall be the Vice-President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed, and if no person have a majority, then from the two highest numbers on the list, the Senate shall choose the Vice-President; a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two-thirds of the whole number of Senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice. But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.

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Note that at this point onward the presence of electors is not required, just the votes they have tallied, and that this could be interpreted to mean, or at least to allows, that the lists of votes are all counted as popular votes.Note also that there does not need to be a >50% majority in any state, just in the final tally of the "electoral college" joint session. The "electoral college" is not actually a thing required or established by the constitution. What is required is that the electors compile lists of votes and forward those to the president of the Senate, and that the votes are then opened and counted in a joint session of the House and Senate, and if all the votes tallied on the lists provided by the electors are counted then you have de facto a popular vote tally ... with no need for a constitutional amendment. This joint session would be the media circus event, not the all night circus we currently have. And if you start by counting the smallest states first, you can make as much drama out of this as you want.This can also be implemented state by state without affecting the outcome.What this does is utilize the existing constitutional provisions to provide a buffer period to properly count and validate votes, time within which a second election can be held if the first one is problematic, and it provides a path for all popular votes to be counted in the final tally.Now I also think that ALL ballots should be paper ballots, the same ballots that are used for absentee voting and early voting and the period of voting should be the same as for absentee and early voting (ie -- everyone votes by absentee ballot).And I would like to see ballots with first choice and second choice voting, including a "non-of-the-above" option. This too can be implemented state by state without affecting the outcome.Finally, as this is the "Awesome Primary Thread" I think that all primaries should be done with instant run-off ballots (ie - you vote for the order of the list of candidates by your preferences from best to worst).This too can be implemented state by state.By focusing on steps that can be taken state by state then we don't have to depend on congress fixing itself. These steps can also be promoted by voter initiatives in each state, bringing the process to the people.Enjoy
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* -- per Amendment 12 from this point to end of quotes.

What would all this accomplish?

a fair counting of the popular vote and the inclusion of all voters in the process and reduction of voting machine fraud.EnjoyEdited by RAZD, : .