Over at the conservative National Review, Reihan Salam suggests Republicans give up this idea of changing the way select states apportion their Electoral College votes. Salam notes that the more liberal alternative to the current system, the winner-take-all National Popular Vote, has already passed in nine states. And it's literally popular. Salam writes:
Rather than work to upend the way the Electoral College has worked in the vast majority of states for most of modern American history, we might want to recognize the virtues of our current arrangement as they compare to the National Popular Vote bill, which would obviate [Virginia's] Carrico bill quite neatly.
This Carrico bill is a little like mischievously toilet-papering your neighbor’s house while she stacks dynamite around yours on a hot and dry day.
Shorter Salam: Republicans are accidentally giving a push to the idea of a national popular vote, and under that system, Republicans lose. Oops.
Republicans have lost the popular vote in three of the last four elections, including George W. Bush's victory in 2000. If not for the Electoral College, Republicans might not have propped boots on the Oval Office desk for well more than a decade. No wonder Salam is urging the party to "recognize the virtues of our current arrangement." (Thanks, @pdxuser, for the link.)
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yes, they are helping the winner take all idea, along with the top two gets on the ballot.
they are also begging for a single payer as well.
There's already a plan to get more states on board with the national popular vote: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/01/24/1181394/-Republicans-WILL-take-the-White-House-in-2016
Great link. Thank you.
yes thanks, being in Oregon this is good info.
Hahahahahahahahahaha. So shortsighted. So deserving.
The irony of the Virginia GOP plan has just been revealed in a great post by Goblinbooks. It's all about the number, a special number. Go see:
http://paulbibeau.blogspot.ca/2013/01/a-message-to-virginia-gop-from.html
Thanks for the link, ColdInCanada. It's kind of my dream to get a piece mentioned on this blog, and I am 4 comments away. I am in Kevin Bacon territory.
It can be fixed with regards to the electoral college- like Maine and Nebraska do it. Just use the congressional districts- winner in that district gets that vote. Illinois might have 4 votes GOP and 13 Dem, etc.
That's exactly what VA GOP is proposing -- winner of the district gets the electoral vote. They're proposing it, after having gerrymandered the districts, so that even if a Dem wins the popular vote across the state, he still loses (there are more -- but sparsely populated -- Repub districts than Dem ones).
Rusty, the difference is that Maine and Nebraska started doing this in an attempt to make the ultimate outcome better reflect the popular vote. It wasn't done with any thought to steal elections by rigging the game in favor of one party by largely ignoring the state's total popular vote. I described the situations that led to these allocations in a post yesterday at:
http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2013/01/24/16677359-if-you-cant-win-elections-rig-them
"Collegium Electorum delenda est."
#7,
And they call it a dead language!
Discussion of Electoral/Popular usually peaks every four years then withers on the vine. Now, on the cycle decline, the repubs have fetched new life into the debate while twirling their villainous moustaches. My skepticism though, is tweaked mightily when I see Frankensteinian handling of lesser government process pustules like fillibuster reform. (Must fix now!)
The canard for keeping daylight savings was the vast amount of energy being saved. Sen. Markey (D) then simply intoned, "People seem to like it." Status quo embraced and reinforced.
Once again the Republicans are spitting in our faces. We need to amend Article II of the Constitution and shut them down once and for all. I'm asking everybody to get involved and sign the petition at whitehouse.gov calling for legislation that will stop Republicans from gerrymandering their way into the White House while preserving the integrity of the popular vote.
We cannot allow our franchise to be marginalized by politics; we must not stand idle while legislative maneuvers threaten the very stability of our democratic way of life. We must unite, with one voice, and demand that immediate steps be taken. Every citizen, whether Democrat or Republican, has a responsibility to defend their franchise. This is not a partisan issue, it is an American issue.
We don't have to stand for this anymore. Please do everything you can to spread the word. Let's see if we can take it viral and get 1,000,000 plus votes to really drive the point home that every single voice has a right to be heard.
petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/publically-support-constitutional-amendment-preserving-integrity-popular-vote/sW8jlWCp
To abolish the Electoral College would need a constitutional amendment, and could be stopped by states with as little as 3% of the U.S. population.
The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC).
Every vote, everywhere, would be politically relevant and equal in presidential elections. No more distorting and divisive red and blue state maps. There would no longer be a handful of 'battleground' states where voters and policies are more important than those of the voters in 80% of the states that now are just 'spectators' and ignored after the conventions.
When the bill is enacted by states with a majority of the electoral votes– enough electoral votes to elect a President (270 of 538), all the electoral votes from the enacting states would be awarded to the presidential candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states and DC.
The presidential election system that we have today was not designed, anticipated, or favored by the Founding Fathers but, instead, is the product of decades of evolutionary change precipitated by the emergence of political parties and enactment by 48 states of winner-take-all laws, not mentioned, much less endorsed, in the Constitution.
The bill uses the power given to each state by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution to change how they award their electoral votes for President. Historically, virtually all of the major changes in the method of electing the President, including ending the requirement that only men who owned substantial property could vote and 48 current state-by-state winner-take-all laws, have come about by state legislative action.
In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state's electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided). Support for a national popular vote is strong among Republicans, Democrats, and Independent voters, as well as every demographic group in virtually every state surveyed in recent polls in recent closely divided Battleground states: CO – 68%, FL – 78%, IA 75%, MI – 73%, MO – 70%, NH – 69%, NV – 72%, NM– 76%, NC – 74%, OH – 70%, PA – 78%, VA – 74%, and WI – 71%; in Small states (3 to 5 electoral votes): AK – 70%, DC – 76%, DE – 75%, ID – 77%, ME – 77%, MT – 72%, NE 74%, NH – 69%, NV – 72%, NM – 76%, OK – 81%, RI – 74%, SD – 71%, UT – 70%, VT – 75%, WV – 81%, and WY – 69%; in Southern and Border states: AR – 80%, KY- 80%, MS – 77%, MO – 70%, NC – 74%, OK – 81%, SC – 71%, TN – 83%, VA – 74%, and WV – 81%; and in other states polled: AZ – 67%, CA – 70%, CT – 74%, MA – 73%, MN – 75%, NY – 79%, OR – 76%, and WA – 77%. Americans believe that the candidate who receives the most votes should win.
The bill has passed 31 state legislative chambers in 21 states with 243 electoral votes. The bill has been enacted by 9 jurisdictions with 132 electoral votes - 49% of the 270 necessary to go into effect.
NationalPopularVote
Follow National Popular Vote on Facebook via NationalPopularVoteInc
The GOP is cornered and this decision of theirs that it is now ok to fight as dirty as they can get away with is going to seriously backfire. I am relatively certain these underhanded electoral tactics will never withstand a court challenge.
This move challenges the very base fabric of our democracy: the concept of equal representation. One vote is equal to one vote, except now some votes are a little more equal than others. The balance is being skewed to make rural votes count for more than urban votes and this simply won't fly with any court justice that isn't interested in being an embarrassment among his peers.
They only tried it because they thought no one would notice or understand the importance until it was too late to fix it. But this really ought to be a big heads up for everyone. We can be pretty certain this isn't the last dirty, rotten trick they will try to play. They are just getting started.
Just1morevoice, WillKnox, etc.....sounds like both of you would like for there to just be ONE voice in this country. Wow, what a scary thing! No need for a competing party, like the sorry Republicans anymore. One party rules.....YOU!! Yes to the ideas of Communism, Socialism, Marxism!! You guys win! Congratulations. Republican Presidents Lincoln and Reagan would be proud.
Did you even read what I wrote? Why would I write about the importance of giving equal weight to each individual vote if I wanted only a single voice?
Projection is a tactic I see far too often coming from the Republicans lately. You all seem to be very eager to accuse us of the crimes that you yourself are guilty of.
Wow Mike, the Republicans are the party that is trying to take power from the people here by force. You take that as Democrats want one party rule? Projection indeed.
There's a person from VA on another earlier thread here telling us how she learned her Congressman had changed without any voice and she felt cheated:
#18
Indeed, the 2010 election needs to be reversed, by way of voting these jokers OUT.
All this vote riggin, gerrymandering and vote-ology being tossed about is absurd.Especially coming from left rads like yall. Don't you dare lecture us about rigging the vote.Both parties have done it and will attempt it again.The media which is an arm of radical left politics has a great deal of power and influence.The target audience (the folks who fret over who wore what to some self congrats Hollywood gathering) believe just about anything you fly back to the nest with and regurgitate.
Its a Matrix type world we live in today.What people see is not reality in many cases.Staged props and reality shows don't fool me.Neither does polls or (har-dee-har-har !) M-E-D-I-A now that's some knee slapping humor there. The Third column, speaking truth to power, the forth branch check valve, all those bloated lies fostered around the word "Press" or media are a joke.
You wouldn't talk about "centrist" and 'unifier" Obama bringing everyone together with hope, sitting in a pew listening to Rev.Blight damning America and blaming America for all evils.Any such a compassionate and tolerant man would have stormed out of there the first time they heard such rubbish.
So why in the Hades would we ever think your telling the truth about voting fraud or anything else?
You are not comprehending what is clear to most!!!! And that is SAD!!!! If you actually think about what you have just posted......it would not make sense to you unless reality is something that does not exist.
I have not done a detailed count, but the National Popular Vote bill will generally be opposed by the same Republican-controlled legislatures that are now trying the by-district vote trick and these will tend to be the swing states. That is, it may be necessary to recapture the state legislatures in these states either to block by-district or to bring in National Popular Vote.
What amazes me is that those conned on the right obviously think that negativity produces positive results whether by hook or crook......but when these same folk reject science, reality, logic, common sense and historical facts together with getting rid of the education department......their blissfull ignorance, coupled with hatred, bigotry and racism is magnified! Negativity begets more and will never equal a positive!!!!
Heard today on the Reverend Al's show that a marketing firm headed up by former Republican Secretary of State Ken Blackwell of the Diebold voting machine controversy in the 2004 sohbet election came up with the newest GOP electoral college voter suppression idea.