Victor Koman Says: Excellent article with historical examples regarding the dangers of abandoning our republic’s well-thought-out Electoral College for the reckless, unconstitutional National Popular Vote:
Once upon a time, the Electoral College was not controversial. During the debates over ratifying the Constitution, Anti-Federalist opponents of ratification barely mentioned it. But by the mid-twentieth century, opponents of the Electoral College nearly convinced Congress to propose an amendment to scrap it. And today, more than a dozen states have joined in an attempt to hijack the Electoral College as a way to force a national popular vote for president.
What changed along the way? And does it matter? After all, the critics of the Electoral College simply want to elect the president the way we elect most other officials. Every state governor is chosen by a statewide popular vote. Why not a national popular vote for president?
Denise Fuller-Hilton - Excellent read.
LeRoy Lauer - Frightening! We must fight to save minority rural rule!
Gregory Laan - The Electoral College was Intentionally Designed to keep the Masses from Selecting the President... The Founding Fathers wanted to Keep Power in their Own Hands... No Votes for Blacks or Women... only rich white men vote...
Victor Koman - Wrong. It works just as well now with nearly universal suffrage. Remember: we are a Republic, not a democracy. Democracies fall very quickly when a majority decides to oppress a minority or loot a treasury. Republics are founded on principles that the mob cannot override by sheer force of numbers.
The problems we are having now are the result of a century of Progressive efforts to subvert our republican form of government ineluctably toward a democracy. The result, if not resisted, will be chaos followed by tyranny.
Gregory Laan - The Founding Fathers were afraid that The Uneducated Masses in New York would be Convinced by some Rabble Rousing Orator to Select a Bad President... At Least That's What my Brother Martin Says...
Victor Koman - And yet these rich white men put nothing in the Constitution saying “this applies only to rich white men.”
Weird, huh? Because the Constitution was what the Abolitionists relied on to end slavery, what the suffragettes pointed to in demanding the vote, and Martin Luther King appealed to in fighting (the Democrats’) segregation and (the Democrats’) Jim Crow laws. So weird that the Constitution failed to protect the privilege of rich white guys, yet remains in force as the guiding republican ideal for the most diverse nation ever witnessed by history.
Gregory Laan - Victor Koman Interesting insight! Remember Democrat Lyndon Johnson's Civil Rights Act. That was a Good thing but Johnson was only remembered for Vietnam... https://www.history.com/.../johnson-signs-civil-rights-act
Gregory Laan - Victor Koman - Only White Property Owners were allowed to vote. You do not have to write something down for it to be true... "Even a Blind Man Knows When The Sun is Shining."
Gregory Laan - PAPER BALLOTS - PURPLE THUMBS. Election Security is Very Simple. After voting every person dips their thumb in purple dye preventing them from voting twice. No one needs to register to vote. Everyone has a right to vote.
Paper Ballots allow recounting if there is a question about cheating... SO VERY SIMPLE... No Microsoft/DARPA Machines needed... Just Count the votes with a pencil and paper... a HUMAN reads the ballot and makes a mark to tally the votes.
Robert Noel - The electoral college made sense back in the 1800s
Victor Koman - As it does now. Because Math!
Robert Noel - Victor Koman - that isn't what you call coherent. Math?
Victor Koman - Robert — Check out prior comments about #AlanNatapoff’s mathematical proof that the EC maximizes every individual’s voting power.
Robert Noel - Victor Koman - I don't see that article? My thought is that a person in Wyoming has far more power than one in larger states based on the population and electoral votes. I'll read the hillsdale one when I have time but after skimming through it, I can find flaws.
Victor Koman - "Anyone who supports — or opposes — the Electoral College for partisan reasons is bound to be disappointed. Consider how often the Electoral College “advantage” has flipped over the years."
https://twitter.com/TaraRoss/status/1143554173868359680
Gregory Laan - Of Course, the Real Trouble with the Electoral College is The Other Team Won... If it Helped Democrats win they would be all for it... Everyone is a Hypno-Cat...
Robert Noel - Gregory Laan - that's the best reason for getting rid of it.
Gregory Laan - We the People have shown wisdom in our selection of Presidents. George Bush the son Was the Worst President in my Lifetime. Al Gore got more votes... Trump Is Number Two in the Race for Worst President... Hillary got more Votes... We the people Chose the Better Candidate Both Times.
Stephan Kinsella - Victor, I thought you were a fellow anarchist libertarian. Didn't realize you were a fan of the American central state and our "republic" and "our" "well-thought-out" "Electoral college." WTF. What is universalizable or libertarian about this US-founder-worship stuff?
Victor Koman - Stephan — It beats Socialism and it pisses off liberals. What could be more fun?
Stephan Kinsella - Victor Koman - Fair point. I would answer: Trump.
Gregory Laan - The Author: Trent England works for the Heritage Foundation. An organization that is known for Writing "Learned" Articles Supporting WHATEVER THEY ARE PAID TO SAY. Obvious Think Tank Whores.
Simon Hawke - Sorry to disagree with you, Vic, but I'm in favor of getting rid of it. What we have now is precisely a case of the majority being oppressed by the minority. In this case, powerful corporations controlling politicians at the expense of the working class. If the popular vote means nothing, why bother having elections? Twice in recent memory, we've had politicians winning the popular vote, only to lose the election. It should be one person, one vote. Otherwise, it's meaningless.
Victor Koman - Simon — “History shows that the Electoral College is neither pro-Democrat nor pro-Republican. Instead, it rewards the candidate who appears to be listening to the greatest cross-section of people at any given time. It encourages coalition-building across states and regions, which is healthy in a large and diverse nation.” From https://thehill.com/.../450069-the-electoral-college-isnt...
Gregory Laan - Victor Koman - FALSE - It Helped G W Bush and Trump... Both were Republicrimes...
Victor Koman - And, ultimately, the NPV crowd will have to amend the Constitution, and their attempt to subvert the EC with their compact has to be affirmed by Congress.
Simon Hawke - I don't have any problems with the idea of Constitutional amendments. It makes sense to amend a document that's over 200 years old and was written at a time when we still had slavery and women didn't have the right to vote. Bottom line: this is OUR country, meaning the people, and we should be able to run it any way we want. (Which is not what's happening now.)
Stephan Kinsella - Simon Hawke - Everyone has this benign view of what they call "a document" and then they think of the "document" as a "great attempt" to "protect human freedom" or some such bullshit. The "Constitution" was simply a document STARTING a new central state--it "constituted" it--it made it exist. IT granted it powers. It has literally nothing to do wtih human liberty or freedom. Why libertarians worsip the founding constitutional document of a STATE is beyond me. Idiots.
Kathryn Dawkins - Victor, posting this article is a politically motivated act on your part. Why are you pretending otherwise?
Tom Brosz - In 2004, the Democrats fought like hell for around 100,000 votes in Ohio to try to switch that state's electoral votes from Bush to Kerry. Had they succeeded, Kerry would have won the Electoral College and become president.
This, while Bush had around three million more popular votes than Kerry. Three million.
Anybody think that if Kerry had somehow managed to land Ohio, any Democrats would have been calling Kerry an "illegitimate" president because he was three million popular votes behind Bush? Or that any Democrats would be wailing about how awful the Electoral College is? Me either.
The noise the Democrats are making about the Electoral College is the same as the noise you hear about filibusters. If it gains the Democrats political power, it's one of the main foundations of our democracy. If it loses the Democrats power, it's an archaic remnant that needs to be ditched as soon as possible. Flip back and forth as necessary.
Just for the record, If California’s votes had been left out of the 2016 election, both Trump’s and Hillary’s, Trump would have been 1.4 million popular votes ahead.
Gregory Laan - We have elected some astonishingly evil Presidents. Nixon ran the Vietnam war an extra four years, maybe 15,000 extra dead Americans... Reagan Imported TONS of Cocaine to fund the Contras in Nicaragua... and He sold Anthrax to Saddam Hussein... REALLY! Donald Rumsfeld made the sale! https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/
Gregory Laan - Debating the Merits of the Electoral College is Fun but... I don't think we are going to HAVE an Election in 2020. If Trump Loses, He will declare the Election FAKE and remain in the White House as CZAR. Defended by GUN NUTS just like they did in Oregon This week... They keep on Talking about the coming Civil War and... IT'S ENTIRELY POSSIBLE.
Tom Brosz - Yeah, we wouldn't want to see what happens when one political side simply refuses to accept the results of an election.
What do you think this entire "Kill the Electoral College" thing is about in the first place?
Gregory Laan - A Morality Free Life. To Republicans, concepts Like Right and Wrong JUST DON'T MATTER. I was raised in a World where there is Good and Evil. Mom taught me to Do Good and Avoid Evil.
Well, Republicans don't do that. They just ask Do We Win? Will it work? Will it give US an advantage? Total disregard for the Ten Commandments... Some Philosophers [Nietzsche?] have said that it is impossible to do things that are wrong. If any action was actually wrong, it would be impossible to do it. I have heard that Jimmy Page of the Rock Band Led Zeppelin embraced this philosophy...
That's the Reason SO MANY REPUBLICANS END UP IN PRISON...
https://gvan42.blogspot.com/.../a-morality-free-life-to...
On the other hand... I saw Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor doing a Book Signing and she walked around in the audience to answer reader's questions... She is such an Enlightened Being that she Floated among the people LIKE THE DALAI LAMA... She writes children's Books to inspire young people to do wonderful things...
Victor Koman - Strange... I remember when it was the Left that accused the Right of being moralistic and uptight for not merely believing in right and wrong, but believing in reflecting morality in law and culture. The intellectual/artistic Left reacted by promoting the cult of moral grayness, creating TV and movies and novels with "anti-heroes", making villains from literature and history into "misunderstood" victims or even heroes in their own way. Pornography was defended and celebrated and immorality was embraced.
Now, it seems, the tables have turned. Over the past few years, we've seen feminists denounce porn and equate consensual heterosexual sex with rape. We've seen secular humanists embrace pseudo-theistic quasi-religions such as Gaea worship and Voluntary Human Extinction, and leftists of all types wrap themselves in a moralistic, accusatory toga of outrage that would make a 1970s televangelist ask "Why so judgie?"
The truth is, the left still pursues its mysosophy of moral decay as a means to soften up a culture, collapse it, then impose their usual socialist tyranny. But now, they are — more than ever — loudly employing Saul Alinsky's tactic of accusing their adversaries of the very acts they themselves employ. This is how the DNC and the Clinton campaign can collude by proxy with Russia to generate a fake dossier on Trump, then use it to accuse Trump of colluding with Russia. Or why AntiFa can use fascistic mob brutality to assault and silence conservative speakers (Their Speech is Violence! Our Violence is Speech!). Or why members of the Democrat party — which started a civil war to preserve slavery, imposed the Black Codes, segregation, and Jim Crow, and filibustered the Civil Rights Act — can straight-faced accuse the other party of "wanting to put y'all back in chains."
Did half the people who were outraged that Biden would speak of working with segregationist senators James Eastland of Mississippi and Herman Talmadge of Georgia even know they were both Democrats?
It's all psychological confession. Leftists either consciously lie about their enemies as misdirection, or they project their own flaws and history on others because they can't acknowledge the enormity of their own guilt.
It's really jaw-droppingly hilarious to watch the party with the worst, centuries-long record on race calling anyone else racist. If slavery reparations were really intended to pursue justice, only Democrats should have to pony up.
Stephan Kinsella - Democrats and leftists have always been worse, IMO. They are not even real secularists--they worship the state and democracy as their gods.
Victor Koman - P.S. There are just as many Democrats convicted of crimes as Republicans: https://en.wikipedia.org/.../List_of_American_federal...
Gregory Laan - That's an Interesting List! Mike Flynn is listed as a Democrat! I'm remembering so many names... James Watt, Secretary of Interior... General David "Betray US"... Scooter Libby! Pardoned by Trump for his OUTING of CIA Agent Valerie Plame... I remember that scandal very well... Bush the Son kept on saying he was going to FIND OUT WHO DID IT and kept on pretending that Democrats committed Treason when OOPS, it was his own man who did the dirty deed... and it was all over her husband's exposing Bush the Son's failure to commit forgery effectively in their attempt to "prove" Saddam Hussein bought Yellowcake uranium from Nigeria... Total Loss of Face for Evil Republicans... Thanks! I Like Reading History.
Gregory Laan - The Conclusion of the Mueller Report is: TEN (10) TrumpNiks were arrested and Seven (7) went to prison already. Paul Manafort=Guilty, Mike Flynn=Guilty, Michael Cohen=Guilty, George Papadopoulos=Guilty, Alexander Vanderzwann=Guilty, Maria Butina=Guilty, Rick Gates=Guilty, Rodger Stone=NOT Guilty YET. Steven Calk, the banker who wanted to be Secretary of the Army using fraudulent loans to Paul Manafort as Resume Padding was Indicted on Federal Bribery Charges = Plead not Guilty. Maria Butina's Boyfriend, Paul Erickson Arrested, Plead Not Guilty...
Mueller left Impeachment of Trump up to Congress but provided a roadmap.
Robert Noel - OK, I finally had time to read the Hillsdale article - it's a long one. First, off, George Mason was probably correct that a national popular vote was not practical in the 1770s - or even in the 1920s. But today's technology makes it quite easy for people to vote. With some cyber security in place, we could vote on the internet.
According to the article, Madison was concerned with two things. First, people would tend toward supporting candidates from their own states, giving an advantage to larger states. Second, a few areas with higher concentrations of voters might come to dominate. The first occurs even with the EC system, the second doesn't - but that is a problem because only voters from swing states get to make the decision right now.
The author makes claims about the benefits of the EC. The first is "Under the Electoral College system, presidential elections are decentralized, taking place in the states". This would be true whether you use the EC or not. People would still vote in precincts but one primary difference is that the candidates would be incentivized to visit states where they aren't likely to win but they would perhaps sway the overall vote. The trouble now is that both Dem and GOP candidates generally ignore CA, TX, OK, NY, etc.
Robert Noel - Following up:
The author also makes the claim that the EC allows state boundaries to serve a function analogous to that of watertight compartments on an ocean liner. Disputes over mistakes or fraud are contained within individual states. Illinois can recount its votes, for instance, without triggering a nationwide recount. There is no reason a state or precinct couldn't still count it's votes separately without the EC in place. In fact, if one candidate wins easily overall, many recounts wouldn't need to take place.
Another benefit of the EC according to the author is that it can act to amplify the results of a presidential election. And why is that a benefit? It also leads to wins where the majority didn't agree as in 2016 and other years. These are bad things, not good things.
Robert Noel - The "big" advantage of the EC - according to the author - is the powerful incentive it creates against regionalism. This argument is probably the best but we already have it with the EC anyway. Candidates use this by simply not having to worry about their "region". But potentially arguable.
However, the key thing not mentioned is how little impact people in big states have compared to small states. Even though Wyoming only gets 3 electoral votes, they have much more power than they should given their tiny population. People in Texas or California get much less of a say. Perhaps the silver lining is the lack of campaign signs.
Gregory Laan - and if, For Example, Florida needed a Recount we can always just have the Supreme Court select our President... Like they did with George ( American Idiot) Bush VS Al ( I own a giant eco-disaster House) Gore... What a Bizarro World that was... Republicans Importing Interns to Protest as if they were a Grass Roots Movement of People from Florida!
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