End the Electoral College?

[Joe Fan]

If anyone watched CNN during the past couple weeks, you saw them go into maximum pimping of the flipping elector angle. It's been constant go-to story for them. And on the days leading into the vote, it was basically full-time.

Below is one of their recent reports. As we all now know, Hillary was the one who lost a record faithless electors, not Trump. Meaning there was never anything to this story (as some of us in here pointed out from the outset). And so the media made something out of nothing in an attempt to grab better ratings.

So, did this media hype qualify as "fake news?" Are these the people who are supposed to be trusted to decide between fake news and real news?

One last thing, watch how also attempt to conflate the alleged Russian hacking story with the Electoral College story. Also fake.

Is CNN the king of fake news?

 

[Joe Fan]

Is every attempt to amend the Constitution unprincipled?....

Repeal of Prohibition was obviously principled, even if somewhat inebriated.

You appear to be operating under the mistaken premise that the Amendments are reversing something seen as bad in the original document. This is not usually the case. For example, the first 10 Amendments did not change anything, and were passed concurrently with the base document. Indeed, the original document would not have passed but for the Bill of Rights. Most Amendments make needed clarifications, expand rights/create new ones, or deal with bad Supreme Court opinion. The SCOTUS cannot amend the Const itself, but via interpretation, they have come close to effectively amending it.

 

[NJlonghorn]

I do think the effect is over-magnified though. The "winner of this state with 50.1% takes all electoral votes" is fine, but the electors should be apportioned according to population, just like the house is. "Electors = house reps" would make more sense than "Electors = house reps + 2".

I understand the point, but I disagree because that would give small states very little influence over national politics. The current allotment is a brilliant and workable compromise between "one person, one vote" as you are advocating for and the equally viable "one state, one vote".

Plus, your proposal would give the Democrats a structural advantage (or, more precisely, would remove a structural advantage for the Republicans). By carrying 31 states, compared to 20+D.C. for Clinton, Trump earned 62 of the 102 "bonus" electors. That 22 electors spread wasn't necessary this year, but it could matter in the future.

 

[Joe Fan]

Despite the relentless coordinated media campaign, what actually happened?

Trump lost two electoral votes due to faithless electors (both in Texas).

What about Hillary? She set a new all-time record for faithless electors. On Election Night, she got credited with 232 electoral votes. However, she lost 5 of those on Monday. That broke the 119-year old record for flipped electors. Those 5 elector votes were no small thing as they represent the equivalent of the entire state of New Mexico.

But wait, there's more -- Hillary actually lost a 8 electors total, but 3 were taken back by the respective states.

Not only did Hillary come out of this with egg on her face, but the entire media complex now looks pretty silly (or corrupt if you prefer). This was a massive media campaign across all fronts. And they failed. Miserably.

Once again, we are shown why Americans have no faith in our media. Of the ~10% who still trust the media, probably close to 100% of them are lefties. And those people, once again, just had their trust thrown back in their faces as their dreams were crushed.

 

[Seattle Husker]

Nope...you don't get it. It's like you didn't even read my post.

I come from a family of engineers, and I worked 100+ hours a week as an investment banker (even if I worked 167 hours a week, it still wouldn't be as much as a rancher). So what?

Haha. YOU equated how hard a Google engineers works to a farmer/coal miner/roughneck. And you didn't mean it figuratively like, "this is war," you meant that literally. That is a very insulting thing to say about farmers/coal miners/roughnecks.

Apologies if the internet is too tough for you. When someone posts that an engineer at Apple (have you ever met an engineer at Apple?) works as hard as a Rancher/Farmer/Coal Miner/Roughneck, I'm just calling a spade a spade. That is stupidity in the very formal sense of the word, and you are trying to normalize stupid ways of thinking. You have to challenge stupidity.

And I was marginalizing a generic Apple engineer to make a point about real hard work in comparison to your coal miner and roughneck who can die just punching his card. Sorry if that hurt your feelings.

No worries Husker. Electoral College is here to stay.

Wait...family of engineers. You've never been a rancher? But you're willing to speak like you have, right? I'm telling you I was a farmer and an engineer which appears to be more experience than you. Keep up the condescension internet tough guy...it's a good look for you.

 

[NJlonghorn]

Not only did Hillary come out of this with egg on her face, but the entire media complex now looks pretty silly (or corrupt if you prefer). This was a massive media campaign across all fronts. And they failed. Miserably.

I 100% agree that the media gave the "flipped elector" story more attention that it deserved. But I never heard any mainstream media report playing it up as likely to succeed. Every media report I saw called it a last-gasp effort, a long shot, a Hail Mary, etc. I never saw anyone in the MSM predict that it would succeed. Thus, I'm not sure why you say they have egg on their face. I just think they wasted everyone's time and attention.

Of course, they do have egg on their face from the election itself and their predictions for how that would go. They were off by "only" about 3%, but being 97% right is not good in this context.

 

[ShAArk92]

Dana McClendon (Hot/Crazy Matrix) posted the other day something to the effect:

If you support abolishing the ECC because it doesn't allow for "one man/one vote" and if you are not also calling for the abolition of the US Senate, then you are simply repeating what you've been told and have not, yourself, done any serious/critical thinking on this issue.

Wail On



unicorn hunter ...

 

[ShAArk92]

... and nobody works harder than farmers and ranchers ... not even roughnecks. That's not simply anthem lyric for the working man ...

farmers and ranchers embody the small business aspect of responsibility and risk ... but the risk is not only to financial loss, but physical injury/death. They do it because they love it.

Someone made a remark I hope I misunderstood, but "google engineers have marketable skills ... (and therefore farmers/ranchers do not)"

Height of idiocy .... and that's saying something (not very edifying)

Like I say, I hope I misinterpreted that ... multiple times. If not, you (and you know who you are) ... need to get a clue.

 

[NJlonghorn]

Someone made a remark I hope I misunderstood, but "google engineers have marketable skills ... (and therefore farmers/ranchers do not)"

I said the first half of this. I didn't say the second part, and certainly don't agree with it.

Some people want to do physically demanding jobs and/or dangerous jobs, such as ranching or mining, for personal reasons. Others are forced to do those jobs because they have no marketable skills to do anything else. Still others do the jobs because they have never been exposed to any other options.

I can only speak for myself, but the main reason I got two college degrees and developed marketable skills was so that I wouldn't have to do jobs like that. I work hard (sometimes ), but I don't want to have to work that hard, or at least hard in that way. Thankfully, I live in a mostly-capitalistic country that allows me to pursue this path.

 

[texas_ex2000]

Wait...family of engineers. You've never been a rancher? But you're willing to speak like you have, right? I'm telling you I was a farmer and an engineer which appears to be more experience than you. Keep up the condescension internet tough guy...it's a good look for you.

Yes, my father was a software engineer. And believe it or not, my mom came from a family of banana farmers. My family still has that farm.

And yes, while I have worked the odd summer job as a hand on my Marine friend's family cow calf ranch in Montana after the Navy before business school, I am not a rancher. I put up fencing. I castrated calves. I've drove, sorted, penned, branded, inoculated, and a few times had to euthanize steers and a cow. I almost got gored by the bull, because I was f'in too stupid thinking I was Jasper from watching Lonesome Dove too many times. I still remember very clearly, the bull turning towards me head down and pawing the ground and then charged. For two seconds I saw my life flash before my eyes thinking, oh $h!t. Thank God my horse had more sense than I did and got me the hell out of there. I can't imagine doing any of this in the middle of winter.

It was an amazing experience and I loved every minute of it, but I didn't have the intestinal fortitude for that hard a lifestyle. I have tremendous respect and admiration what those men and women do. Maybe one day I can have my own little ranch to raise steers as a hobby haha.

Unless you were ever a 1st year associate at a Wall Street law firm (you weren't), I've done longer hours grinding away as an investment banker then you ever did as an engineer. But no matter what our backgrounds are, your statement "Apple and Google engineers work just as hard as farmers/coal miners/roughnecks" is a stupid comment if you were Steve Jobs or the husband from Wood's American Gothic.

It's a stupid point, especially if you're comparing engineers to coal miners, and everyone here knows it. Keep doubling down on that though. That's the wrecking ball for the blue "firewall."

... and nobody works harder than farmers and ranchers ... not even roughnecks. That's not simply anthem lyric for the working man ...

farmers and ranchers embody the small business aspect of responsibility and risk ... but the risk is not only to financial loss, but physical injury/death. They do it because they love it.

+1

I'll add only their dogs surpass ranchers in this regard...ha.

 

[Mr. Deez]

Just out of curiosity, is this war over whether engineers or farmers work harder going to work its way back to the electoral college?

 

[mchammer]

Just out of curiosity, is this war over whether engineers or farmers work harder going to work its way back to the electoral college?

Well, the original point that I made which was somewhat related to the EC is that farmers and the like in middle America are now the new minority that needs protection that the EC affords. Somehow it soon went off the rails.

 

[ShAArk92]

Just out of curiosity, is this war over whether engineers or farmers work harder going to work its way back to the electoral college?

LOL ... IDK ... but I found it incredibly arrogant to suggest folks in that line of work were lower class because they "don't have marketable skills"

SMH ... getting untold bushels of grain to market ... no marketable skill involved there.

getting untold thousands of pounds of GOOD beef to market ... no marketable skill there either.

only those who don't get their hands dirty have skills. Poster boy for the MikeRoweWorks outfit.

I got two college degrees and developed marketable skills was so that I wouldn't have to do jobs like that.

you don't agree with it, but you said it again. So ... I'm not sure what to think NJ ... except you think like a Joisey boy.

To oblige Deez ... ECC was right for the founding. And it still is ... right. Voter ID, now ... THAT is necessary now when it probably wasn't so much then.

 

[Statalyzer]

I understand the point, but I disagree because that would give small states very little influence over national politics. The current allotment is a brilliant and workable compromise between "one person, one vote" as you are advocating for and the equally viable "one state, one vote".

I'm actually not advocating for one person / one vote there.

Someone with more pure vote count could still lose due to overly-narrow clustering of support, but someone could no longer lose just because of more "bonus electors" from a higher aggregate state count, especially when making electors equal to House reps already gives smaller states much more power than their population says they should have because reps have to be in whole number increments and cannot fall below 1.

 

[UTChE96]

Im going on record that farmers work harder then engineers.

 

[texas_ex2000]

Well, the original point that I made which was somewhat related to the EC is that farmers and the like in middle America are now the new minority that needs protection that the EC affords. Somehow it soon went off the rails.

I didn't want to get into it, but like our Warthog flyboy, I didn't want something like that to go by and slowly let that new way of incorrect thinking become the orthodoxy.

My view on hammer's very good point is that states matter. Some states are more agrarian and industrial than others. That shouldn't mean those states' voice should matter less than media, financial, and tech centers. And that is what would happen with a direct popular vote. Even as it is right now, California already has 5.5x the electoral power than the state of Wisconsin and 18.3x the power of Montana. How really "United" can States be in America if power is further concentrated?