[EM] Electoral College (was Re: Voting by selecting a published ordering)

[Abd ul-Rahman Lomax]

At 10:15 PM 5/3/2006, Dave Ketchum wrote:
>HOW do you get a majority of voters in a state to volunteer to let anyone
>other than whoever they voted for become winner???

You think. Seems to be a severe shortage of thinking....

State Vote in Presidential Election:
Bush: 48+
Gore: 48
Green: 4

Oversimplified, of course.

Bush under the present system will win all the electoral votes. But a 
majority of voters would prefer, it might be true, Gore. These voters 
would be quite pleased to see this reform. And they may well be in 
the majority.

However, note that the system which is actually now before state 
legislatures in more than one place sets up a compact. It does not 
take effect unless enough states ratify it to constitute an electoral 
college majority.

Consider this:
Gore: 60
Bush: 35
Green: 5

Let's say that this is a large state. It's got lots of electoral 
votes. In this particular election, though, the peculiar composition 
of the college awards the election to Bush.

Don't you think that the voters in this state would approve this 
Compact? *They can't lose*

Not even the Bush people clearly lose, because we don't know what 
will happen in the next election. As the promoters of the compact 
have said, 60,000 votes in Ohio could have given 2004 to Gore, in 
spite of the turnaround that Bush would still have won the popular vote.

No, I think it is a brilliant idea, and one which apparently has 
created a lot of buzz and the introduction of actual legistlation. 
It's got money behind it, a major donor.

> > Note that there is a current reform movement that would do exactly this,
> > it's been getting quite a bit of press, and it has Republican and
> > Democratic politicians behind it. This is a similar proposal, but it
> > basically bypasses the electoral college as a true part of the process;
> > if successful, the college would become a rubber stamp for the popular
> > vote. Almost always.
>
>
>To change the law for the whole nation is a possibility - assuming a
>sensible proposal can be agreed to.
>
>Also leads to MASS RECOUNTING anytime you get near a tie.

Depends on the details. We deal with the so-called "mass recounting" 
issue in every other election.

This reform does *not* require any national legislation at all. It 
will happen when a majority of states, counting electoral votes, 
approve it. That could be as little as eleven states!

Of course, it will leave in place all the problems with plurality. 
I'd try to get Approval going at the same time, and Approval is 
*also* a state-by-state issue.


>You write "initiative" as an available tool.  Where is this true?

California is an example. Also Colorado, I know. I think there are 
many others. But this particular reform seems to have substantial 
support in the legislatures. It just passed the Colorado Senate. 
We'll know soon.
>How, other than campaigning, does a voter sort out which elector
>candidates qualify as "trustworthy"?

Depends on the system. Campaigning is one method, a very poor one, 
because it is easily manipulable by special interests. Perhaps you 
know the person personally. That's actually what I'm trying to set 
up, but it requires some ... changes. Proxy and proxy-like systems 
won't necessarily, by themselves, solve this problem. But they do 
make it possible. The key is that they don't waste votes, so small 
candidacies aren't essentially suicidal for the candidates and for 
those who vote for thems.

> > What a joke! How much contact does, say, GW Bush have with me? This
> > "contact" is an illusion, a one-way presentation of a carefully crafted
> > image....
>
>
>Whatever you call it, Bush has a lot more possibilities than Thomas
>Jefferson could possibly manage.

Sure. Obviously, this is why our Republic is currently so successful....


> >
> > If you actually use the College, the College could meet with the
> > candidates, face-to-face. It could interview them. I think one of the
> > basic defects in our democracy is the lack of deliberative process in
> > elections...
>
>
>This use of the college is what would have been possible per the
>
>Constitution - even candidates meeting with electors in multiple places.

Yes. So the question is how you choose the electors. If you choose 
electors who are already pledged to candidates, there is no point. 
The College has lost nearly all its function.