Why Right Wing Is Petrified of Letting Voters, Not Electoral College, Pick Presidents

[Lakhota]

By Steven Rosenfeld

A movement to reform the Electoral College and elect the president based on the national popular vote has half the states it needs.

Republican Senator Mitch McConnell calls it “absurd and dangerous.” The Wall Street Journal says it deserves to “die.” The Heritage Foundation calls it “unconstitutional.” The Washington Post calls it “flawed.” A Republican National Committee resolution says it is a radical, un-American, “questionable legal maneuver.”

It is awarding the presidency to the candidate who wins the most votes.

“The United States is not a democracy and shouldn’t be,” said Michael Munger, Duke University’s Political Science Department chairman and a 2008 Libertarian gubernatorial candidate attacking it at a League of Women Voters forum. “There is NO moral force in the majority. It is just what most people happen to think.”

These right-wingers are truly worried that a plan reforming the way the president-electing Electoral College works is gaining legal ground and could bring the biggest change in the political landscape in decades. The National Popular Vote plan would replace the current system, in which states award Electoral College delegates to whomever wins the presidential vote in that state, with a new interstate agreement where a participating state’s delegates would be bound to the national popular vote winner.

In other words, as soon as states with a total of 270 Electoral College delegates sign on—and they are halfway there—presidential elections where one state swayed the outcome, such as Ohio in 2004 and Florida in 2000, would be no more.

“It is born from a frustration of a system that is inherently broken, a system that allots two-thirds to three-fourths of resources in a presidential campaign in the last six or seven weeks to six states. That isn’t democracy,” said Pam Wilmot, Common Cause’s National Popular Vote coordinator. “We cannot and should not have a small number of states deciding the outcome of presidential elections for the rest of us.”

The idea that voters across the country—not just in politically split battleground states—would elect the president scares the Republican Party and arch conservatives on so many levels. It would upend the way candidates and political parties and consultants now work to retain their power and influence. It would force presidential nominees and parties to campaign in more racially diverse states, more cities and suburbs, addressing those communities and their concerns.

“We need to kill it in the cradle before it grows up,” McConnell told a Heritage Foundation audience last December.

Right-wingers say these changes are terrible, and not just because they might empower Democrats and relegate the GOP as it now exists to history’s dustbin. But even worse, they say this is a constitutional coup because the founders’ great insight was that some branches of the government—such as the presidency and Senate—had to be set apart from the passions of majority opinion and the tyranny of mob rule.

Much More: Why the Right Wing Is Petrified of Letting Voters, Instead of the Electoral College, Pick Presidents | Election 2012 | AlterNet

 

[Lakhota]

Letting voters pick presidents makes sense to me.

 

[Oddball]

Communism makes sense to you.

 

[Lakhota]

The national popular vote has half the states it needs.

So, we're halfway there.

 

[BluePhantom]

Letting voters pick presidents makes sense to me.

Do some research on why we have a bicameral Legislative Branch of government Lakhota. I don't think Rhode Island, Wyoming, Alaska, New Hampshire, Connecticut, etc really feel like being bullied to death by what is in New York and California's best interests.

 

[kyzr]

Never gonna happen, so why waste our time debating this non-event. <poof>

 

[WillowTree]

Lakota whines a lot. really..

 

[Lakhota]

After reading the "entire" article, it makes good sense to me.

 

[bripat9643]

The national popular vote has half the states it needs.

So, we're halfway there.

What does "it has half the states it needs" mean? They are willing to approve a Constitutional Amendment? What?

 

[whitehall]

No surprises here. When a liberal administration is in trouble the radical left claims it wants to overhaul the whole electoral system. Nobody but nut cases and the OWS takes the issue seriously.

 

[occupied]

It would be the best incremental step in breaking the stranglehold the two party system has on our democracy. What if all presidents ran as independents? That suggestion alone is enough to make partisans piss their pants. It's more democracy, more power to an individual vote, I am 100% for it.

 

[Stephanie]

No surprises here. When a liberal administration is in trouble the radical left claims it wants to overhaul the whole electoral system. Nobody but nut cases and the OWS takes the issue seriously.

you got that right..

 

[occupied]

The national popular vote has half the states it needs.

So, we're halfway there.

What does "it has half the states it needs" mean? They are willing to approve a Constitutional Amendment? What?

The way I understand it, individual states would vote to change their election laws to award their electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote. Legal as can be and does not touch The Constitution.

 

[WillowTree]

It would be the best incremental step in breaking the stranglehold the two party system has on our democracy. What if all presidents ran as independents? That suggestion alone is enough to make partisans piss their pants. It's more democracy, more power to an individual vote, I am 100% for it.

well when you can guarantee us an ironclad national ID that cannot be duplicated, sold or tampered with and zero voter fraud you might then state your case til then. eat some cow poop.

 

[Avatar4321]

You want to do away with the EC? You have any idea what the results would be?

Just think Florida 2000 on a national scale. Every precinct in every state counting and recounting votes. Votes being manufactured all over the place. Fraud. Corruption. Complete manipulation of the elections. Total Chaos.

Follow that with fighting in the streets and civil war.

 

[Greenbeard]

Letting voters pick presidents makes sense to me.

Do some research on why we have a bicameral Legislative Branch of government Lakhota. I don't think Rhode Island, Wyoming, Alaska, New Hampshire, Connecticut, etc really feel like being bullied to death by what is in New York and California's best interests.

Contrary to popular belief, the reasons we have a bicameral legislature are not the reasons we have an Electoral College.

 

[bripat9643]

So, we're halfway there.

What does "it has half the states it needs" mean? They are willing to approve a Constitutional Amendment? What?

The way I understand it, individual states would vote to change their election laws to award their electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote. Legal as can be and does not touch The Constitution.

Unless they have actually done that, the claim is bullshit. Any state that does do it is just diluting its influence on the national election. It's not in the best interests of any state to do it. Therefore, it will never happen.

 

[Two Thumbs]

This is the issue in states with large cities.

the city dictates everything and the country side gets fucked.

so what we end up with is people voting only for the person that puts free money in their pocket and not the person that's best for the country.


while I am not against one man - one vote, I know it's a bad idea as candidates won't have to win states, but just the cities.

 

[Greenbeard]

Unless they have actually done that, the claim is bullshit. Any state that does do it is just diluting its influence on the national election. It's not in the best interests of any state to do it. Therefore, it will never happen.

The movement for a national popular vote is based on states agreeing to allocate their electoral votes to the national popular vote winner once a majority (in the Electoral College) of states have agreed to do the same. That is, their laws don't take effect until enough other states have passed similar laws. At which point the national popular vote winner is guaranteed to receive 270 electoral votes and assume the presidency.

They're up to 132 electoral votes cumulative at present.

 

[edthecynic]

By Steven Rosenfeld

A movement to reform the Electoral College and elect the president based on the national popular vote has half the states it needs.

Republican Senator Mitch McConnell calls it “absurd and dangerous.” The Wall Street Journal says it deserves to “die.” The Heritage Foundation calls it “unconstitutional.” The Washington Post calls it “flawed.” A Republican National Committee resolution says it is a radical, un-American, “questionable legal maneuver.”

It is awarding the presidency to the candidate who wins the most votes.

“The United States is not a democracy and shouldn’t be,” said Michael Munger, Duke University’s Political Science Department chairman and a 2008 Libertarian gubernatorial candidate attacking it at a League of Women Voters forum. “There is NO moral force in the majority. It is just what most people happen to think.”

These right-wingers are truly worried that a plan reforming the way the president-electing Electoral College works is gaining legal ground and could bring the biggest change in the political landscape in decades. The National Popular Vote plan would replace the current system, in which states award Electoral College delegates to whomever wins the presidential vote in that state, with a new interstate agreement where a participating state’s delegates would be bound to the national popular vote winner.

In other words, as soon as states with a total of 270 Electoral College delegates sign on—and they are halfway there—presidential elections where one state swayed the outcome, such as Ohio in 2004 and Florida in 2000, would be no more.

“It is born from a frustration of a system that is inherently broken, a system that allots two-thirds to three-fourths of resources in a presidential campaign in the last six or seven weeks to six states. That isn’t democracy,” said Pam Wilmot, Common Cause’s National Popular Vote coordinator. “We cannot and should not have a small number of states deciding the outcome of presidential elections for the rest of us.”

The idea that voters across the country—not just in politically split battleground states—would elect the president scares the Republican Party and arch conservatives on so many levels. It would upend the way candidates and political parties and consultants now work to retain their power and influence. It would force presidential nominees and parties to campaign in more racially diverse states, more cities and suburbs, addressing those communities and their concerns.

“We need to kill it in the cradle before it grows up,” McConnell told a Heritage Foundation audience last December.

Right-wingers say these changes are terrible, and not just because they might empower Democrats and relegate the GOP as it now exists to history’s dustbin. But even worse, they say this is a constitutional coup because the founders’ great insight was that some branches of the government—such as the presidency and Senate—had to be set apart from the passions of majority opinion and the tyranny of mob rule.

Much More: Why the Right Wing Is Petrified of Letting Voters, Instead of the Electoral College, Pick Presidents | Election 2012 | AlterNet

Depending on the day of the week, of course!

February 7, 2012
Rush: That's what we're after, a political victory that represents proportionately the population of the country, the thinking of the country.

May 4, 2009
RUSH: I maintain when a politician says, "We have to listen to the American people and learn," we are pandering. We're not leading.

You simply listen to what people say they want and then come up with a series of policies that give them what they want. What if what they want is destructive to the country? What if what the people want is destructive to your own party? What if what the people want is something they don't even really understand? Where is leadership in this equation? Listen, learn, lead.

February 7, 2012
RUSH: Govern against the will of the people. Now, I don't have anything in common with those people. I don't know where I'm supposed to give up what I believe in and agree with them about, when they must govern against the will of the people. Where do you agree with that?