CDZ Hey left, how do you feel about limiting presidential power?

[sakinago]

Why would we have to eliminate the electoral college for that?? Makes no sense. If you want to vote for a different party, then vote a different party, you don't have to vote R or D. I also don't believe in majority rules, it's totalitarianism in a different form. Electoral college was set up so population centers are not lording over the entire region, and vice versa.

A majority vote for a candidate is not majority rules. It certainly does not seem to apply when we do majority votes for senators or representatives.

He is right about third parties as well. Simply look all over this board to see what the general feelings are on third parties - a vote for the libertarian is a vote for the democrat or those that did not vote for Hillary and instead voted for a third party voted for Trump.

That is the general problem. Lets suppose a fictional race between 3 people with an Up Party, Down Party and a third party: one is a staunch person of the Up Party, the other a hard liner third party that stands on the same principals as the Down Party just does not think they go far enough and the third a moderate Down Party candidate. If 60% of the voters are clear Down party constituents but 30% vote for the third party because that candidate more closely fits their issues, the MINORITY Up Party wins. 60% LOSE to 40% because there were 2 good choices for those that stand on Down Party principals but only one for the other party.

That is asinine and is a structure to keep the two parties in absolute control - no matter what garbage they trow at the people they swallow it out of fear of the other party winning. With runoff voting, those same voters could vote their conscience and the best candidate would win because the vote that was split on one side would be consolidated after the one with the fewest votes was identified. You will not see runoff voting for one sole reason and one reason only - it diminished the 2 party power in making third parties irrelevant.

But again this has nothing to do with the electoral college.

I never said that it had anything to do with the EC though there is some connection. Splitting the race into 50 separate races causes something very similar to the FPTP. I did said that eliminating the EC does not change the state of the nations government into a mob rules situation. That is a false narrative and pointless to the argument for/against the EC.

I understand and acknoledge the real argument for the EC is that smaller states and the residents within lose a lot of influence to those states with larger populations. I disagree with it though based on the current battleground state of our elections. It shows that the same problem that we are worried about without the EC exists with it as well but, IMHO, at an even grater extent.

The only fact we make two party's relevant is because we keep voting them in.

As pointed out, the system we follow encourages that reality and I have shown why. This has even happened in the past where a third party will cause a majority of the nation to outright lose the election.

There have been multiple parties in the American system that have died off. Let them die off naturally. If your trying to kill them off through a populist position, than I believe that that is not only short sighted, but principled wrong to do.

Never said anything about killing them off with a populist position. I did say that I want to put the power back into the voters hands and allow them to actually vote for who they want to win rather than voting because they are afraid of the other candidate.

I would counter that protecting the party system with laws and systems that corral voters based on fear is the wrong principaled thing to do.

There is no other reason that third parties aren't as popular as they should be other than people choose not to vote that way, wether it's in an electoral college sense or populist sense. The votes just aren't there, as much as I hate that. But I really do not want populism to take control either, that is a fate 10 fold worse than trump.

Again, I just showed why that statement is false.

I understand what they're saying, it still does not stop the fact that if the American republic wanted third party, they would have voted higher than a 5% for a third party. They did not. It upsets me, but I still believe in the voting power of a CONSTITUTIONAL REPUBLIC, not the voting power of a democracy.

I believe in the voting power of a constitutional republic as well. That is why I have stated nowhere whatsoever that I wish the constitutional republic nature of our government be changed.

2 points here:
The thrust of my post was around the instant runoff voting system and not the EC. You seem to be conflating the two issues. Moving to an instant runoff voting system can be done with the EC in place though I think it would be less effective.

As far as the EC goes, it is not what makes us a republic. The fact that we vote for representatives to make law rather than on law directly does. The EC has literally nothing to do with that. The EC is simply a system for tallying the votes for the representatives. It simply balances the influence from heavily populated regions more evenly with those that do not have as much population.

You're ignoring the fact that many different regions have many different needs and beliefs. Especially in America, we are the most diverse nation in the world. To diminish a states power, and in turn increase another states power, is to place priority of one region over another. Again we are not a democracy, we are a constitutional republic.

That is actually what we do now, diminish the power of one state over another.

Changing the way that we vote for president does not really change that either - the balance of power is rooted in congress where regional powers mean more than popularity of a particular region.

AGAIN, the EC does not make us a republic. You keep demanding that my position does not recognize we are a republic. It does.

Our constitutional republic was set up to firstly, greatly diminish the power of governance of any entity over individuals (BOR is a list of NEGATIVE rights forced upon government). Secondly to limit the central governments power over the states, see 9th and 10th amendment. This is an area we have gone away from, and was put in place to make sure a state with a higher population say New York, is not out there telling folks up in a lesser population state like Maine to live. Giving power to more condensed populations destroys that balance that is to be maintained in a republic. To counter act lesser populated regions ruling over more condensed ones, is the HOR. To in turn counter the population based HOR, is the state based senate. The senate for a long time was supposed to be elected by state representatives, taking power away from population centers of states and giving more power to local governments. But we have done away with this, and now Senates are more subject to majority rules.

I agree.

None of that has anything to do with my position here.

As you can see above, our republic was set up to keep in check the power of majority rules, which our founders greatly warned against for good reason. Our constitution was very clearly set up to be a bottom up system, where FarmVille USA lives the way they want to, and big city USA lives the way they want to, East coast lives the way they want to, west coast lives the way they want to...as long as each government entity operates within the guidelines of the BOR/constitution. We obviously have gotten away from that, which is why I posted this thread

Again, I agree. I do not know why you are responding to me with this though.

Your position gives more power to population centers than anything else, in the election for the entire executive branch of government, which also holds a great deal of power over the other 2. That's why I laid out the entire set up for you, you obviously missed the point, where election power was pretty evenly distributed between population centers and rural regions alike. You do away with the EC, then the population centers are the only thing that matters in presidential elections.

 

[FA_Q2]

A majority vote for a candidate is not majority rules. It certainly does not seem to apply when we do majority votes for senators or representatives.

He is right about third parties as well. Simply look all over this board to see what the general feelings are on third parties - a vote for the libertarian is a vote for the democrat or those that did not vote for Hillary and instead voted for a third party voted for Trump.

That is the general problem. Lets suppose a fictional race between 3 people with an Up Party, Down Party and a third party: one is a staunch person of the Up Party, the other a hard liner third party that stands on the same principals as the Down Party just does not think they go far enough and the third a moderate Down Party candidate. If 60% of the voters are clear Down party constituents but 30% vote for the third party because that candidate more closely fits their issues, the MINORITY Up Party wins. 60% LOSE to 40% because there were 2 good choices for those that stand on Down Party principals but only one for the other party.

That is asinine and is a structure to keep the two parties in absolute control - no matter what garbage they trow at the people they swallow it out of fear of the other party winning. With runoff voting, those same voters could vote their conscience and the best candidate would win because the vote that was split on one side would be consolidated after the one with the fewest votes was identified. You will not see runoff voting for one sole reason and one reason only - it diminished the 2 party power in making third parties irrelevant.

But again this has nothing to do with the electoral college.

I never said that it had anything to do with the EC though there is some connection. Splitting the race into 50 separate races causes something very similar to the FPTP. I did said that eliminating the EC does not change the state of the nations government into a mob rules situation. That is a false narrative and pointless to the argument for/against the EC.

I understand and acknoledge the real argument for the EC is that smaller states and the residents within lose a lot of influence to those states with larger populations. I disagree with it though based on the current battleground state of our elections. It shows that the same problem that we are worried about without the EC exists with it as well but, IMHO, at an even grater extent.

The only fact we make two party's relevant is because we keep voting them in.

As pointed out, the system we follow encourages that reality and I have shown why. This has even happened in the past where a third party will cause a majority of the nation to outright lose the election.

There have been multiple parties in the American system that have died off. Let them die off naturally. If your trying to kill them off through a populist position, than I believe that that is not only short sighted, but principled wrong to do.

Never said anything about killing them off with a populist position. I did say that I want to put the power back into the voters hands and allow them to actually vote for who they want to win rather than voting because they are afraid of the other candidate.

I would counter that protecting the party system with laws and systems that corral voters based on fear is the wrong principaled thing to do.

There is no other reason that third parties aren't as popular as they should be other than people choose not to vote that way, wether it's in an electoral college sense or populist sense. The votes just aren't there, as much as I hate that. But I really do not want populism to take control either, that is a fate 10 fold worse than trump.

Again, I just showed why that statement is false.

I understand what they're saying, it still does not stop the fact that if the American republic wanted third party, they would have voted higher than a 5% for a third party. They did not. It upsets me, but I still believe in the voting power of a CONSTITUTIONAL REPUBLIC, not the voting power of a democracy.

I believe in the voting power of a constitutional republic as well. That is why I have stated nowhere whatsoever that I wish the constitutional republic nature of our government be changed.

2 points here:
The thrust of my post was around the instant runoff voting system and not the EC. You seem to be conflating the two issues. Moving to an instant runoff voting system can be done with the EC in place though I think it would be less effective.

As far as the EC goes, it is not what makes us a republic. The fact that we vote for representatives to make law rather than on law directly does. The EC has literally nothing to do with that. The EC is simply a system for tallying the votes for the representatives. It simply balances the influence from heavily populated regions more evenly with those that do not have as much population.

You're ignoring the fact that many different regions have many different needs and beliefs. Especially in America, we are the most diverse nation in the world. To diminish a states power, and in turn increase another states power, is to place priority of one region over another. Again we are not a democracy, we are a constitutional republic.

That is actually what we do now, diminish the power of one state over another.

Changing the way that we vote for president does not really change that either - the balance of power is rooted in congress where regional powers mean more than popularity of a particular region.

AGAIN, the EC does not make us a republic. You keep demanding that my position does not recognize we are a republic. It does.

Our constitutional republic was set up to firstly, greatly diminish the power of governance of any entity over individuals (BOR is a list of NEGATIVE rights forced upon government). Secondly to limit the central governments power over the states, see 9th and 10th amendment. This is an area we have gone away from, and was put in place to make sure a state with a higher population say New York, is not out there telling folks up in a lesser population state like Maine to live. Giving power to more condensed populations destroys that balance that is to be maintained in a republic. To counter act lesser populated regions ruling over more condensed ones, is the HOR. To in turn counter the population based HOR, is the state based senate. The senate for a long time was supposed to be elected by state representatives, taking power away from population centers of states and giving more power to local governments. But we have done away with this, and now Senates are more subject to majority rules.

I agree.

None of that has anything to do with my position here.

As you can see above, our republic was set up to keep in check the power of majority rules, which our founders greatly warned against for good reason. Our constitution was very clearly set up to be a bottom up system, where FarmVille USA lives the way they want to, and big city USA lives the way they want to, East coast lives the way they want to, west coast lives the way they want to...as long as each government entity operates within the guidelines of the BOR/constitution. We obviously have gotten away from that, which is why I posted this thread

Again, I agree. I do not know why you are responding to me with this though.

Your position gives more power to population centers than anything else, in the election for the entire executive branch of government, which also holds a great deal of power over the other 2. That's why I laid out the entire set up for you, you obviously missed the point, where election power was pretty evenly distributed between population centers and rural regions alike. You do away with the EC, then the population centers are the only thing that matters in presidential elections.

You keep it and population centers as well as rural centers are rendered moot in presidential elections. That is the rub - you can claim that it is to even the power out between the two but in practice it has shifted all of the power to a select few states that determine the presidency with the vast majority of the nation being utterly meaningless in the race.

The EC is not achieving what you are saying it is supposed to.

 

[usmbguest5318]

Our constitutional republic was set up to firstly, greatly diminish the power of governance of any entity over individuals (BOR is a list of NEGATIVE rights forced upon government).

That's the romanticized view of it.. Pragmatically, the Founders sought mostly to establish a form of governance that enabled and intervened little in one's "pursuit of happiness" in two key dimensions:

• Right of religious self expression -- There were two distinct categories of colonial settlers who came to England's colonies: those who wanted to break with the Church of England and those who wanted to establish a "purified" implementation of the Church of England
• Economic riches -- The whole point for colonists to immigrate to the Southern colonies was for economic gain. The land grants given to enterprising colonists along with the temperate weather and fertile soil pretty much guaranteed their prosperity to extents that were impossible for non-peers to achieve in England.

By the late 18th century, the issue the colonists had with the Crown wasn't that individuals were unfairly burdened in any way other than by having to pay Parliament's taxes and receiving no representation in Parliament. Quite simply, had King George simply given the colonies some seats in the houses of Lords and Commons, the British colonies would have remained part of the England. The social and political rights in the BOR aren't terribly different from those enjoyed by the British nobility; however, the Founders designed their government so that there'd be just enough confusion and discord so that amidst it all entrepreneurs could just "keep on keepin' on" with their profit making, arguing all the while. As for the religious thing, the colonists, though they had their individual views on it, they weren't about to let notions of a god and the hereafter interfere with profit making and economic trade in the here and now.

Our constitution was very clearly set up to be a bottom up system, where FarmVille USA lives the way they want to, and big city USA lives the way they want to

Bottom up. Top down. Which it is is irrelevant. What matters is that the U.S. was designed as a place where the little guy could become a titan of commerce and where existing titans of commerce were predominantly ensured of facing little that put the primacy at risk. The intent was to facilitate parity between the mechanized enterprise and agrarian ones. The thriving shipmaker or fishery should not be given political superiority over the plantation holder.

This is all utter here-say. Using some historical tid bits of info to support an alternative history of the founders intentions, in one huge non-sequitur revisionist history statement. The intentions of the founders were very clear. Not only in the BOR, DOI, and constitution, which you made almost no mention of in your alternate universe. But also in the founders writings, letters, and historical accounts of their actions, of which you have to completely ignore to support your theory passed down to you by some college professor. How can you claim different intentions attributed to the founders, when they clearly wrote out what their actual intentions were over and over?? In debate after debate, letter after letter, book after book. We can very easily see what their intentions were, even outside of the BOR, DOI, and constitution, which clearly lays it out for us.

If I were in the mood to be didactic toward this topic, I'd answer your questions. But I'm really tired of being that. I've had it with people on this forum simply not knowing the topic they choose to discuss well enough that they can make remarks that have more gravitas than what a basic exposition of high school history, science, economics, etc. is all it takes to refute them. I see what you wrote, but I also can see from what you wrote in response to my comments that you don't actually know what you're talking about, but to folks who share your stance and don't know any more than you do, you sound good...I'll give you that much.

 

[sakinago]

But again this has nothing to do with the electoral college.

I never said that it had anything to do with the EC though there is some connection. Splitting the race into 50 separate races causes something very similar to the FPTP. I did said that eliminating the EC does not change the state of the nations government into a mob rules situation. That is a false narrative and pointless to the argument for/against the EC.

I understand and acknoledge the real argument for the EC is that smaller states and the residents within lose a lot of influence to those states with larger populations. I disagree with it though based on the current battleground state of our elections. It shows that the same problem that we are worried about without the EC exists with it as well but, IMHO, at an even grater extent.

The only fact we make two party's relevant is because we keep voting them in.

As pointed out, the system we follow encourages that reality and I have shown why. This has even happened in the past where a third party will cause a majority of the nation to outright lose the election.

There have been multiple parties in the American system that have died off. Let them die off naturally. If your trying to kill them off through a populist position, than I believe that that is not only short sighted, but principled wrong to do.

Never said anything about killing them off with a populist position. I did say that I want to put the power back into the voters hands and allow them to actually vote for who they want to win rather than voting because they are afraid of the other candidate.

I would counter that protecting the party system with laws and systems that corral voters based on fear is the wrong principaled thing to do.

There is no other reason that third parties aren't as popular as they should be other than people choose not to vote that way, wether it's in an electoral college sense or populist sense. The votes just aren't there, as much as I hate that. But I really do not want populism to take control either, that is a fate 10 fold worse than trump.

Again, I just showed why that statement is false.

I understand what they're saying, it still does not stop the fact that if the American republic wanted third party, they would have voted higher than a 5% for a third party. They did not. It upsets me, but I still believe in the voting power of a CONSTITUTIONAL REPUBLIC, not the voting power of a democracy.

I believe in the voting power of a constitutional republic as well. That is why I have stated nowhere whatsoever that I wish the constitutional republic nature of our government be changed.

2 points here:
The thrust of my post was around the instant runoff voting system and not the EC. You seem to be conflating the two issues. Moving to an instant runoff voting system can be done with the EC in place though I think it would be less effective.

As far as the EC goes, it is not what makes us a republic. The fact that we vote for representatives to make law rather than on law directly does. The EC has literally nothing to do with that. The EC is simply a system for tallying the votes for the representatives. It simply balances the influence from heavily populated regions more evenly with those that do not have as much population.

You're ignoring the fact that many different regions have many different needs and beliefs. Especially in America, we are the most diverse nation in the world. To diminish a states power, and in turn increase another states power, is to place priority of one region over another. Again we are not a democracy, we are a constitutional republic.

That is actually what we do now, diminish the power of one state over another.

Changing the way that we vote for president does not really change that either - the balance of power is rooted in congress where regional powers mean more than popularity of a particular region.

AGAIN, the EC does not make us a republic. You keep demanding that my position does not recognize we are a republic. It does.

Our constitutional republic was set up to firstly, greatly diminish the power of governance of any entity over individuals (BOR is a list of NEGATIVE rights forced upon government). Secondly to limit the central governments power over the states, see 9th and 10th amendment. This is an area we have gone away from, and was put in place to make sure a state with a higher population say New York, is not out there telling folks up in a lesser population state like Maine to live. Giving power to more condensed populations destroys that balance that is to be maintained in a republic. To counter act lesser populated regions ruling over more condensed ones, is the HOR. To in turn counter the population based HOR, is the state based senate. The senate for a long time was supposed to be elected by state representatives, taking power away from population centers of states and giving more power to local governments. But we have done away with this, and now Senates are more subject to majority rules.

I agree.

None of that has anything to do with my position here.

As you can see above, our republic was set up to keep in check the power of majority rules, which our founders greatly warned against for good reason. Our constitution was very clearly set up to be a bottom up system, where FarmVille USA lives the way they want to, and big city USA lives the way they want to, East coast lives the way they want to, west coast lives the way they want to...as long as each government entity operates within the guidelines of the BOR/constitution. We obviously have gotten away from that, which is why I posted this thread

Again, I agree. I do not know why you are responding to me with this though.

Your position gives more power to population centers than anything else, in the election for the entire executive branch of government, which also holds a great deal of power over the other 2. That's why I laid out the entire set up for you, you obviously missed the point, where election power was pretty evenly distributed between population centers and rural regions alike. You do away with the EC, then the population centers are the only thing that matters in presidential elections.

You keep it and population centers as well as rural centers are rendered moot in presidential elections. That is the rub - you can claim that it is to even the power out between the two but in practice it has shifted all of the power to a select few states that determine the presidency with the vast majority of the nation being utterly meaningless in the race.

The EC is not achieving what you are saying it is supposed to.

Those states just happen to dictate elections of recent just because of what the demographics are in the entire United States. In other words, that's just how the cookie has been crumbling. That's not the fault of the EC. You can't control what type of voters make up what type of region. And it would still gives much more power to population centers if we got rid of the EC. It would render the entire middle of the country useless. How would getting rid of EC not give population centers the greatest advantage and final say??? Instead of 5-6 entire states determining an election, it becomes the mood of the cities.

 

[sakinago]

Our constitutional republic was set up to firstly, greatly diminish the power of governance of any entity over individuals (BOR is a list of NEGATIVE rights forced upon government).

That's the romanticized view of it.. Pragmatically, the Founders sought mostly to establish a form of governance that enabled and intervened little in one's "pursuit of happiness" in two key dimensions:

• Right of religious self expression -- There were two distinct categories of colonial settlers who came to England's colonies: those who wanted to break with the Church of England and those who wanted to establish a "purified" implementation of the Church of England
• Economic riches -- The whole point for colonists to immigrate to the Southern colonies was for economic gain. The land grants given to enterprising colonists along with the temperate weather and fertile soil pretty much guaranteed their prosperity to extents that were impossible for non-peers to achieve in England.

By the late 18th century, the issue the colonists had with the Crown wasn't that individuals were unfairly burdened in any way other than by having to pay Parliament's taxes and receiving no representation in Parliament. Quite simply, had King George simply given the colonies some seats in the houses of Lords and Commons, the British colonies would have remained part of the England. The social and political rights in the BOR aren't terribly different from those enjoyed by the British nobility; however, the Founders designed their government so that there'd be just enough confusion and discord so that amidst it all entrepreneurs could just "keep on keepin' on" with their profit making, arguing all the while. As for the religious thing, the colonists, though they had their individual views on it, they weren't about to let notions of a god and the hereafter interfere with profit making and economic trade in the here and now.

Our constitution was very clearly set up to be a bottom up system, where FarmVille USA lives the way they want to, and big city USA lives the way they want to

Bottom up. Top down. Which it is is irrelevant. What matters is that the U.S. was designed as a place where the little guy could become a titan of commerce and where existing titans of commerce were predominantly ensured of facing little that put the primacy at risk. The intent was to facilitate parity between the mechanized enterprise and agrarian ones. The thriving shipmaker or fishery should not be given political superiority over the plantation holder.

This is all utter here-say. Using some historical tid bits of info to support an alternative history of the founders intentions, in one huge non-sequitur revisionist history statement. The intentions of the founders were very clear. Not only in the BOR, DOI, and constitution, which you made almost no mention of in your alternate universe. But also in the founders writings, letters, and historical accounts of their actions, of which you have to completely ignore to support your theory passed down to you by some college professor. How can you claim different intentions attributed to the founders, when they clearly wrote out what their actual intentions were over and over?? In debate after debate, letter after letter, book after book. We can very easily see what their intentions were, even outside of the BOR, DOI, and constitution, which clearly lays it out for us.

If I were in the mood to be didactic toward this topic, I'd answer your questions. But I'm really tired of being that. I've had it with people on this forum simply not knowing the topic they choose to discuss well enough that they can make remarks that have more gravitas than what a basic exposition of high school history, science, economics, etc. is all it takes to refute them. I see what you wrote, but I also can see from what you wrote in response to my comments that you don't actually know what you're talking about, but to folks who share your stance and don't know any more than you do, you sound good...I'll give you that much.

The big problem with big words (hint: they make you look stupid)

Post your retort, or don't bother with this thread. No ones forcing you to reply, and there's zero reason to post one, if you believe what you said above. That's probably not the case, since you did in fact post it.

 

[longknife]

There was a concept being thrown around during Obamas term, mostly on the right, and it was the idea of a state constitutional convention. Which was designed to reign in the power of anything federal (say the executive branch, and a party controlled legislative branch).

Do you really want trump and a republican congress to have as much power as they do now over your life?

I'll leave it at that for now

You Libturds didn't give a damn when Obozo was in office. Why now?

 

[FA_Q2]

I never said that it had anything to do with the EC though there is some connection. Splitting the race into 50 separate races causes something very similar to the FPTP. I did said that eliminating the EC does not change the state of the nations government into a mob rules situation. That is a false narrative and pointless to the argument for/against the EC.

I understand and acknoledge the real argument for the EC is that smaller states and the residents within lose a lot of influence to those states with larger populations. I disagree with it though based on the current battleground state of our elections. It shows that the same problem that we are worried about without the EC exists with it as well but, IMHO, at an even grater extent.
As pointed out, the system we follow encourages that reality and I have shown why. This has even happened in the past where a third party will cause a majority of the nation to outright lose the election.
Never said anything about killing them off with a populist position. I did say that I want to put the power back into the voters hands and allow them to actually vote for who they want to win rather than voting because they are afraid of the other candidate.

I would counter that protecting the party system with laws and systems that corral voters based on fear is the wrong principaled thing to do.
Again, I just showed why that statement is false.
I believe in the voting power of a constitutional republic as well. That is why I have stated nowhere whatsoever that I wish the constitutional republic nature of our government be changed.

2 points here:
The thrust of my post was around the instant runoff voting system and not the EC. You seem to be conflating the two issues. Moving to an instant runoff voting system can be done with the EC in place though I think it would be less effective.

As far as the EC goes, it is not what makes us a republic. The fact that we vote for representatives to make law rather than on law directly does. The EC has literally nothing to do with that. The EC is simply a system for tallying the votes for the representatives. It simply balances the influence from heavily populated regions more evenly with those that do not have as much population.

You're ignoring the fact that many different regions have many different needs and beliefs. Especially in America, we are the most diverse nation in the world. To diminish a states power, and in turn increase another states power, is to place priority of one region over another. Again we are not a democracy, we are a constitutional republic.

That is actually what we do now, diminish the power of one state over another.

Changing the way that we vote for president does not really change that either - the balance of power is rooted in congress where regional powers mean more than popularity of a particular region.

AGAIN, the EC does not make us a republic. You keep demanding that my position does not recognize we are a republic. It does.

Our constitutional republic was set up to firstly, greatly diminish the power of governance of any entity over individuals (BOR is a list of NEGATIVE rights forced upon government). Secondly to limit the central governments power over the states, see 9th and 10th amendment. This is an area we have gone away from, and was put in place to make sure a state with a higher population say New York, is not out there telling folks up in a lesser population state like Maine to live. Giving power to more condensed populations destroys that balance that is to be maintained in a republic. To counter act lesser populated regions ruling over more condensed ones, is the HOR. To in turn counter the population based HOR, is the state based senate. The senate for a long time was supposed to be elected by state representatives, taking power away from population centers of states and giving more power to local governments. But we have done away with this, and now Senates are more subject to majority rules.

I agree.

None of that has anything to do with my position here.

As you can see above, our republic was set up to keep in check the power of majority rules, which our founders greatly warned against for good reason. Our constitution was very clearly set up to be a bottom up system, where FarmVille USA lives the way they want to, and big city USA lives the way they want to, East coast lives the way they want to, west coast lives the way they want to...as long as each government entity operates within the guidelines of the BOR/constitution. We obviously have gotten away from that, which is why I posted this thread

Again, I agree. I do not know why you are responding to me with this though.

Your position gives more power to population centers than anything else, in the election for the entire executive branch of government, which also holds a great deal of power over the other 2. That's why I laid out the entire set up for you, you obviously missed the point, where election power was pretty evenly distributed between population centers and rural regions alike. You do away with the EC, then the population centers are the only thing that matters in presidential elections.

You keep it and population centers as well as rural centers are rendered moot in presidential elections. That is the rub - you can claim that it is to even the power out between the two but in practice it has shifted all of the power to a select few states that determine the presidency with the vast majority of the nation being utterly meaningless in the race.

The EC is not achieving what you are saying it is supposed to.

Those states just happen to dictate elections of recent just because of what the demographics are in the entire United States. In other words, that's just how the cookie has been crumbling. That's not the fault of the EC. You can't control what type of voters make up what type of region. And it would still gives much more power to population centers if we got rid of the EC. It would render the entire middle of the country useless. How would getting rid of EC not give population centers the greatest advantage and final say??? Instead of 5-6 entire states determining an election, it becomes the mood of the cities.

I would say that it is the direct result of the EC - or more accurately a direct result of the manner that the EC is implemented. The only reason that the vast majority of Americans do not get any say whatsoever in the presidential election is that states are almost all winner take all states.

I could claim the same thing about popular elections btw - the only reason that urban areas would have more influence is because of demographics. more people have chosen to live in large urban areas. It certainly would move more political power to large urban areas most of which have zero political power (presidentially) right now. I fail to see how being worried about making the middle of the nation obsolete is even remotely consistent when ignoring that the vast majority of the US is already rendered moot in those elections.

The largest difference I see is that candidates would have to piece together voters from all over the nation - in both cites and without. All voters would have access to influence the elections and the presidential candidates could no longer simply ignore 80% of Americans. Going to CA as a Republican would actually be a good idea then - there are more voters to be swayed there.

 

[Toronado3800]

There was a concept being thrown around during Obamas term, mostly on the right, and it was the idea of a state constitutional convention. Which was designed to reign in the power of anything federal (say the executive branch, and a party controlled legislative branch).

Do you really want trump and a republican congress to have as much power as they do now over your life?

I'll leave it at that for now

Good timing. Not sure I fit in as your typical target...

Now is a fair time to reign in the power of Presidents to declare war as it is our quickest path to potential destruction. This has been a long term quest of mine.

Korea, Vietnam, Iraq 1 & 2. All undeclared wars.

What do you think the first step is?

 

[Marion Morrison]

There was a concept being thrown around during Obamas term, mostly on the right, and it was the idea of a state constitutional convention. Which was designed to reign in the power of anything federal (say the executive branch, and a party controlled legislative branch).

Do you really want trump and a republican congress to have as much power as they do now over your life?

I'll leave it at that for now

Now I'm going to make a prediction and it'll blow your mind:


I bet Trump sets out to weaken the power of the office of the president and the bureaus.

 

[FA_Q2]

There was a concept being thrown around during Obamas term, mostly on the right, and it was the idea of a state constitutional convention. Which was designed to reign in the power of anything federal (say the executive branch, and a party controlled legislative branch).

Do you really want trump and a republican congress to have as much power as they do now over your life?

I'll leave it at that for now

Now I'm going to make a prediction and it'll blow your mind:


I bet Trump sets out to weaken the power of the office of the president and the bureaus.

I seriously doubt that will be the case. Not one thing he has said or done as a democrat or republican that I can recall gives weight to this claim.

I would be ecstatic if he did do such a thing. Simply is not going to happen though.

 

[Never3ndr]

There was a concept being thrown around during Obamas term, mostly on the right, and it was the idea of a state constitutional convention. Which was designed to reign in the power of anything federal (say the executive branch, and a party controlled legislative branch).

Do you really want trump and a republican congress to have as much power as they do now over your life?

I'll leave it at that for now

I actually think that, unless Congress is seriously restructured the President will continue to garner power and should continue to garner power.

Congress was originally intended to be the most powerful branch of government...however, in modern times, they may actually be the least powerful. This issue lies in the fact that the partisan bickering has made them a branch of inaction rather than action. Until we fix Congress the only branch of government with power to really act is the Executive branch...and, as I am a fan of a government that does something rather than nothing, it is a necessary evil we have to deal with until Congress either magically starts working or we amend the Constitution to seriously restructure it.