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[breakfastchampion]

I think a lot of people are going to look back at this as a huge missed opportunity. Here we have baked into our system a peaceful check to prevent demagogues like Trump from being elected.

We still have time. We can still insist electors vote with the best interest of the country and prevent whatever crimes against humanity his administration will be responsible for.

 

[Chichikov]

Get over it. Everyone knew the rules of the game.

While I do think that this is a pipe-dream that will never happen, the rules of the game not only allow for it, they were specifically designed for just such case.

 

[Klotera]

Nothing is changing for this election. However, it can change for the future. Technically, the only thing that can eliminate the EC is a constitutional amendment. However, some states have proposed laws that would pledge their delegates to the popular vote winner. These would kick in when enough states to get get 270 electoral votes enact a similar law. This is a backdoor to getting a popular vote and the most likely chance to accomplish it.

 

[theignoramus]

Whatever you do, I can tell you what NOT to do is call up electoral voters in Arizona and Michigan and threaten them with death & verbal abuse, as others have done. NOBODY is gunna bend to that kind of shit.

 

[Azure Dream]

"Why weren't you talking about ditching the Electoral College before?"

Because most of the time it managed to generally reflect the popular vote. 2000 was seen as kind of a fluke. But now it's diverged from the popular vote twice out of the last five elections, and way worse this time. Maybe two million more people voted for Clinton, but that doesn't count because of the geographic distribution of those votes? The EC disguised this fault before, but this election widely exposed how broken it ultimately is.

It's going to be an uphill battle.

It's been an uphill battle, and the hill just got impossibly steep for the majority of our lifetimes. Even with just 4 years, the long-lasting damage Trump will do will scar this country for a long time.

 

[Cat Party]

You're still in stage 1, OP.

lmao

 

[Bruce Springsteen]

it will never change, the southern politicians would have to willingly give up power LMAO, not in our lifetimes

 

[xenist]

It's profoundly undemocratic. It literally ignores THE basic tenet of a democratic system. The more I learn about your system the more laughable it seems to me.

 

[Pai Pai Master]

You can't force change like this. It has to be done by communicating and allowing people to self reflect and understand the error of their choice. Acting out against the EC because we didn't get what we wanted isn't the answer.

 

[Inuhanyou]

Hillary lost. Wait until next time to eliminate super delegates and the electoral college.

Instead of worrying about that, the Dem party should be examining why they lost and why they got far less votes than Obama's elections.

 

[Treo360]

It's profoundly undemocratic. It literally ignores THE basic tenet of a democratic system. The more I learn about your system the more laughable it seems to me.

but we're not a democracy.

 

[NoMoreTrolls]

but we're not a democracy.

Yup. It seems like every time a Republican gets in office, tons of people suddenly learn we are a representative Republic.

 

[Kevinroc]

Hillary lost. Wait until next time to eliminate super delegates and the electoral college.

Instead of worrying about that, the Dem party should be examining why they lost and why they got far less votes than Obama's elections.

Gonna be hard considering what happened to the VRA and what will happening to the VRA.

 

[Korigama]

Hillary lost. Wait until next time to eliminate super delegates and the electoral college.

Instead of worrying about that, the Dem party should be examining why they lost and why they got far less votes than Obama's elections.

Even without superdelegates, she still would've been the nominee anyway by nearly 4 million votes. Furthermore, the DNC never said anything about eliminating them.

 

[GoldenEye 007]

There have already been threads about this.

 

[Regulus Tera]

There are people who have been vouching for it for a while. They are just not numerous enough.

 

[citroen-e402]

Maybe the winner of a state would get the percentage of the points instead of all them

 

[And_Gignac]

After what happened to Al Gore i would have thought obama would have maybe pushed for a change when he became president but obviously he didnt

Obama? Change? LMAO.

 

[Condom]

Even without superdelegates, she still would've been the nominee anyway by nearly 4 million votes. Furthermore, the DNC never said anything about eliminating them.

Nah you'd have a different kind of election in that case.

 

[SL128]

Because it helps racist whites.

 

[FLAguy954]

Hillary lost.

If you want to talk about moving away from the Electoral College for elections going forward, I'm on board. In 16 years this fucking thing has given us George W Bush and Donald Trump. It needs to go.

All of this. Fuck the Electoral College. We need to restructure it or get rid of it before the next election.

 

[Korigama]

Nah you'd have a different kind of election in that case.

What do you mean?

 

[Rentahamster]

Why isn't anyone discussing it? Lots of people are. Did you not notice the multiple threads?

 

[TheUntamedLegend]

People should really be pushing for that interstate popular vote agreement. I am shocked that I have heard so little about it in the wake of the election.

It is the only realistic option. A constitutional amendment is not happening.

 

[StudsMcKewl]

I feel like this is all people are talking about right now.

 

[Ishan]

Gore made sense here nope

 

[Dehnus]

A good first step would already be stopping with the "winner takes all", let it be a popular percentage per state. That would already have made the entire thing so much fairer.

 

[JordanN]

It really doesn't work like that. People would have to die for trump not to be president.

And more will die later under Trump.

Historians are going to look back and wonder "why did the people of 2016 do nothing to stop Trump? They even had an electoral college right there to remove him".

 

[Dalibor68]

As long as the US is a federal union of 50 different states of very different population and landmass sizes, I don't see popular vote alone happening.

 

[xevis]

I think a better question to ask is why America hasn't switched to a parliamentary democracy, like the rest of the sane world. Might want to add preferential voting to your todo list as well.

 

[Frankfurter]

As long as the US is a federal union of 50 different states of very different population and landmass sizes, I don't see popular vote alone happening.

Why? Just why? There are tons of federal republic on earth, with their respective states having different population and landmass sizes, yet none of them (atleast that I'm aware of) use a system like the EC.

 

[Breads]

Get over it. Everyone knew the rules of the game.

We don't have to get over shit.

 

[KonradLaw]

Electoral system makes sense for a country like USA when usually one party takes all the power.
If you would want to remove it ensuring multi-party systems should go first.

 

[FyreWulff]

You should have been discussing this before the election. Only then, you didn't have a problem with the system.

Hillary lost, she conceded. Trump won. It's done.

Most people against the EC have been against it for a while now.

If Hill got in with the EC but not the PV, you can bet your ass the discussion would be "the first female president got in under a sham method"

 

[MIMIC]

We've definitely been talking about it, OP (there have been several threads and news stories). But doing this would effectively destroy American democracy. We've already started the transition of power and there is no way Obama would even consider ways to give the election to Hillary just because we don't legally have to give Trump the presidency.

 

[Glass Joe]

Because it helps racist whites.

Drive-by posts like this don't enrich the conversation at all.

Hell, I remember plenty of posts talking about how Trump had no chance BECAUSE of the electoral college (i.e. no way he'll take blue states like New York, California, Florida, Pennsylvania, Michigan! It's mathematically impossible!).

Changing it or overturning it in the future is a valid discussion to have. The random "white people are racist" comment just shouldn't be supported by this forum IMO.

 

[FyreWulff]

Drive-by posts like this don't enrich the conversation at all.

Hell, I remember plenty of posts talking about how Trump had no chance BECAUSE of the electoral college (i.e. no way he'll take blue states like New York, California, Florida, Pennsylvania, Michigan! It's mathematically impossible!).

Changing it or overturning it in the future is a valid discussion to have. The random "white people are racist" comment just shouldn't be supported by this forum IMO.

Well, the EC was implemented to literally give racist white slave owners the power of counting their slaves as population without letting black people actually vote, so

yeah

it helps racist whites by design

 

[DrForester]

Drive-by posts like this don't enrich the conversation at all.

Hell, I remember plenty of posts talking about how Trump had no chance BECAUSE of the electoral college (i.e. no way he'll take blue states like New York, California, Florida, Pennsylvania, Michigan! It's mathematically impossible!).

Changing it or overturning it in the future is a valid discussion to have. The random "white people are racist" comment just shouldn't be supported by this forum IMO.

Trump can objectively be called a racist, and he's already named two white supremacists to his cabinet. It's also much easier to type out "those racist Trump supporters" than "Those Trump supporters who are totally not racist but just support his racist policies"

 

[RainForce]

It's not a 0% chance that they won't, but the possibility of it happening is really really REALLY low.

And if it does, be prepared for a civil war (though that may be happening anyway).

 

[FyreWulff]

It's not a 0% chance that they won't, but the possibility of it happening is really really REALLY low.

And if it does, be prepared for a civil war (though that may be happening anyway).

there's an inter-state compact where if enough states join it, they switch over to awarding all 270+ of their EVs to the popular vote winner.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact

If people work to vote in people that will support this, we don't even need an amendment.

 

[plagiarize]

While I do think that this is a pipe-dream that will never happen, the rules of the game not only allow for it, they were specifically designed for just such case.

Agreed, and I don't think it *should* happen.

But it would be 100% completely constitutional.

And I wonder how people who had voted for Trump would feel about the electoral college *then*.

 

[faisal233]

Agreed, and I don't think it *should* happen.

But it would be 100% completely constitutional.

And I wonder how people who had voted for Trump would feel about the electoral college *then*.

The house and Senate can object to ANY irregularities in the EC vote. They can then change the EC vote.

Congress is GOP controlled.

 

[DrForester]

there's an inter-state compact where if enough states join it, they switch over to awarding all 270+ of their EVs to the popular vote winner.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact

Not a single swing state or GOP state will join that now that they know they have no path to the White House except by using a loophole to defy the will of the people. I wish people would stop bringing this up like it will ever have any impact at all.

 

[Striek]

Do any countries just use popular vote? I feel like most countries use number of reps elected to parliament, in which case, you still lose, since Republicans control the house and senate. Something you can't blame on the EC.

Why should America have a democratic president when it elected republicans to control the legislature?

 

[Amikami]

Get over it. Everyone knew the rules of the game.

Believe it or not, the rules of the game allow for the electors to choose against Trump. There are many reasons for the electors not to and reasons for why they shouldn't but them doing so wouldn't be against the rules. Its part of the game. People need to stop using this phrase .

This election shows just how little people know about American politics. I also blame the way the country blow our horn. We aren't truly democratic, and at the end of the day, electors can legally elect who they want but not without a huge battle which is what keeps them in line.

Not that I'm advising for them to do it, but if ever there was a reason to give electors that power, it was Trump. Trump are the type of presidents that were in mind when electors were given the power. Its not just about bigoted attitudes. It's about Trump's overall lack of experience and qualifications to be the president which the popular vote and even the representative vote can elect. This is the time to use the power but it won't happen, and for honestly good reasons as much as I don't want a Trump presidency

 

[FyreWulff]

Not a single swing state or GOP state will join that now that they know they have no path to the White House except by using a loophole to defy the will of the people. I wish people would stop bringing this up like it will ever have any impact at all.

That's why I just said people need to start caring about offices not the President. Because then you'd actually effect change.

You need state legislatures that will vote it through and have Governors that won't veto it.

Here in Nebraska we have to constantly block people trying to get rid of our proportional EC system.

 

[Goro Majima]

OP must have been asleep the first week after the election where this constantly came up time and time again.

 

[DrForester]

That's why I just said people need to start caring about offices not the President. Because then you'd actually effect change.

You need state legislatures that will vote it through and have Governors that won't veto it.

Never happen. Democrats (as a party) have proven they're too lazy to care about anything but the Presidency. They're really just a more functional third party at this point. Put in no effort for four years, then expect to take the presidency.

 

[BennyBlanco]

Hillary conceded. Donald J Trump is our president for at least 4 years.

 

[Random Painted HIghway]

Believe it or not, the rules of the game allow for the electors to choose against Trump. There are many reasons for the electors not to and reasons for why they shouldn't but them doing so wouldn't be against the rules. Its part of the game. People need to stop using this phrase .

This election shows just how little people know about American politics. I also blame the way the country blow our horn. We aren't truly democratic, and at the end of the day, electors can legally elect who they want but not without a huge battle which is what keeps them in line.

Not that I'm advising for them to do it, but if ever there was a reason to give electors that power, it was Trump. Trump are the type of presidents that were in mind when electors were given the power. Its not just about bigoted attitudes. It's about Trump's overall lack of experience and qualifications to be the president which the popular vote and even the representative vote can elect. This is the time to use the power but it won't happen, and for honestly good reasons as much as I don't want a Trump presidency

No, I meant rules of the game as in the popular vote doesn't matter. One of ops points was to get that overturned which is changing the rules midstream, that is what I was talking about there.