Electoral College chooses the President

Discussion in 'Political Opinions & Beliefs' started by Ronstar, Nov 10, 2016.

  1. Ronstar

    Ronstar Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Understand this, as plainly as you can.

    The People do not elect the President.

    The Electoral College does.

    The Electors, are allowed to vote for whomever they like.

    They can follow the Popular vote, they can choose not to.

    They can decide that Trump is simply not stable or qualified enough to be President.

    And if they make such a choice, we MUST accept that choice.
     
  2. Bluesguy

    Bluesguy Well-Known Member Donor

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    I learned all that in school civics classes don't they teach civics anymore. All this talk about a non-existant popular vote for the President and VP. This idea that we just had a national election when there are NO national elections in this country. The Constitution specifically does not even mandate that the People shall have a say in the selection of the President and VP. It's all up to their State government how they will be selected. And trying to use that as an excuse by tallying up all the state results and proclaiming that is what the tally would be had there just been one big nationwide all inclusive vote is utter folly, you can't make that extrapolation.

    There is only ONE way to win the Presidency, Hillary failed to do so.
     
  3. Penrod

    Penrod Well-Known Member

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    Just as the founders intended

    - - - Updated - - -


    Same here. Looks like Ronstar never heard of it or that there is no right to vote in the constitution for the people
     
  4. Ronstar

    Ronstar Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    You understand the Constitution says nothing about a vote by the People to select Electors, right?

    You do understand that the Electoral College CAN choose a different President, if the they feel the so-called winner is not qualified, or has committed a terrible crime, right?
     
  5. kgeiger002

    kgeiger002 Active Member Past Donor

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    That is insanity talk. Wow! Trump was elected by the people of the US! How is that not cut & dry? Please don't make that joke ("Liberalism is a mental disorder") turn into an obvious truth!
     
  6. DDave

    DDave Well-Known Member

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    The level of disrespect and hysteria displayed by liberals following almost any election they lose is just astounding.

    And California wants to secede? Good riddance. I live in far northern California and there has been a movement for years to split the state. I say split it. I'll stay in northern California and Southern California can secede or fall into the ocean for all I care.
     
  7. Texas Republican

    Texas Republican Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Time to buy that ocean front property in Arizona.
     
  8. tkolter

    tkolter Well-Known Member

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    The down side the voters of the side that won will then riot and unleash hell and a good number of them are happy to use guns and other violence so I suggest then they vote as the vote fell, and voters in the next collection can do better and pick someone else.
     
  9. PARTIZAN1

    PARTIZAN1 Well-Known Member

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    There were a group of idiotic anus heads in Texas who wanted to secede and people on this forum who purported to be Patriots and conservatives supported the wannabe secessionists. As far as I am concerned the secessionists is Texas are no better than the idiots in California.
     
  10. TedintheShed

    TedintheShed Banned

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    "Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector."

    [​IMG]
     
  11. perotista

    perotista Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    The people of each state elected or choose the electors of that state. The candidates submit their list of electors to the Secretary of State, at least here in Georgia. Each candidate has a separate list. When one votes for Trump, Clinton or Johnson, they are voting for their slate of electors. Trump won Georgia and it will be his slate of electors who vote in the electoral college come 19 December. The people of Georgia decided, voted for that slate of electors.

    The electoral college provides or is 50 separate elections for president. Not one national event. Each state votes for their own electors. Now Georgia doesn't have a law that binds any slate of electors to how they will cast their electoral vote. Some states do however. So all are not free agents so to speak. They must follow state law.

    The constitution lets each state decide how their electors are chosen and whether they are bound to a certain candidate or not. The people decided whom their electors would vote for on Tuesday. Since each candidate submits their own list of electors, at least that is how it is here in Georgia, you can be sure each candidate only submitted the most trustworthy for them on that list. The odds of even one elector bucking how his state voted is very high since that elector was chosen by the winning candidate or his team.

    I had the privilege of serving as an elector for Ross Perot here in Georgia back in 1996. You can be sure if Ross thought I wasn't trusted enough to vote for him if he had won Georgia on 19 Dec, he wouldn't have put me on his list of electors. As it was in 96, Dole won Georgia and it was Dole's slate of electors who voted in 1996.
     
  12. Deckel

    Deckel Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    You have been wrong about absolutely everything else regarding this election, you might as well empty the lint from your pockets on the super trifecta. (and close to 60% of the state legally bind their electors so the vote would look pretty much the same as it is now).
     
  13. Steady Pie

    Steady Pie Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Aaaannndd there we go!

    I agree. But:

    1. Good luck switching 36 electors without any on the other side doing the same. Maybe if he had 276EV.

    2. If you want to see how deep the rabbit hole goes, try this sort of (*)(*)(*)(*).

    3. Trump seems to be pretty keen to bring people together. The Republicans are politicians, they just want their power. Trump has given this to them, go and read The Prince. It's unlikely that this same frothing at the mouth will be going on by Dec 20.
     
  14. Bluesguy

    Bluesguy Well-Known Member Donor

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    Yes what is your point? Your state legislature could vote to not have an election for the electors and choose them themselves if they wanted to.

    I understand that states can bind their electors and if an elector does not vote the will of the people in that state can void their vote and submit one for the winner of that state. Many do just that.

    Again, there is only one way to win the Presidency and Clinton lost and Trump won.

    Why would you want to void the will of the people in their respective states?
     
  15. jrr777

    jrr777 Well-Known Member

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    And the choice they made was Trump!
     
  16. Space_Time

    Space_Time Well-Known Member

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    Here's more:

    http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a50642/electoral-college-vote-for-clinton/
    What If the Electoral College Really Did Elect Hillary Clinton?
    And, just for the hell of it, VP Mike Pence.

    MOST POPULAR

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    WHY HIRING STEVE BANNON IS THE SAME AS HIRING DAVID DUKE

    Getty The Washington Post
    BY CHARLES P. PIERCE
    NOV 14, 2016
    1.7k
    My eldest is one of those people with a gift for problem-solving. (Which, god knows, he gets from his mother.) This is not merely in the McGyver sense of getting things done, either, although he's good at that, too. He's the kind of person who can walk into a room, get an immediate sense of the actors and forces involved in a problem, and put together a solution that manages to keep all parties at least content that they made the best deal possible under the circumstances. So, when he proposed a plan to pry the Republic out of the mess into which it wandered a week ago Tuesday, I felt compelled to pass it along.

    There is a lot of wishful thinking and candle-lighting being done in prayerful hope that the Electoral College will avert the pending catastrophe. So, what the hell. It's our turn now. Let us put all purely political considerations aside for the moment, although I admit they're considerable, and just propose that, in its deliberations, the EC vote to award the presidency to Hillary Rodham Clinton and the vice-presidency to Mike Pence.

    RELATED STORY

    This Petition Would Justify All Trump's Rigged Election Talk
    I am assured by lawyers that I trust that there is no constitutional bar to this solution. Indeed, as one prominent constitutional lawyer pointed out, it's closer to what Alexander Hamilton had in mind when he argued for the EC in Federalist 68 as a roadblock to prevent the presidency from falling into the hands of the unqualified, the crooked, or the vulgar talking yams.

    "Talents for low intrigue, and the little arts of popularity, may alone suffice to elevate a man to the first honors in a single State; but it will require other talents, and a different kind of merit, to establish him in the esteem and confidence of the whole Union, or of so considerable a portion of it as would be necessary to make him a successful candidate for the distinguished office of President of the United States"
    The balance of power in Washington would change very little. The congressional majorities would remain the same. A Democratic president would have the veto, but a Republican vice-president would have the tie-breaking vote in the Senate. (I suspect Pence would have a more active role in that body than most Veeps would but, hey, at least it would distract him from thinking about what people might be doing with their naughty bits.) And, for those of you who care about such things, it would force the parties to govern together or perish. If Pence doesn't like the policies of the administration, he can leave in 2018 and run against the president in the 2020 election when, with any luck at all, the madness that produced our current situation will have passed and we can have normal politics again.

    Now, as for those political considerations that we put aside for the moment, they would be explosive. The Trump loyalists would go absolutely out of their minds. The arrangement would depend vitally on some substantial political courage, particularly on the part of the Republicans, but you can't tell me that, secretly, in their heart of hearts, there aren't some who would celebrate any chance to let this cup pass from them. Out in the country, I hope, there would be some comfort in the fact that the presidency would pass to the person who got the most votes.

    (Added bonus: the backlash might be so ferocious as to force an end to the Electoral College once and for all.)

    This will not happen, of course. That much political courage doesn't exist anywhere in the system these days. The kick-em-in-the-nuts-and-run crowd is driving the train. Governing is hard. Governing when you have contempt for the process itself is a self-evident disaster.

    Click here to respond to this post on the official Esquire Politics Facebook page.
     
  17. Space_Time

    Space_Time Well-Known Member

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    Here's more:

    http://thefederalist.com/2016/11/14...emocracy-mongers-long-live-electoral-college/

    Don’t Listen To The Mob. Long Live The Electoral College!
    Diffused democracy weakens centralized power. This is why Democrats hate it.
    David Harsanyi By David Harsanyi
    NOVEMBER 14, 2016
    This week, anti-Trump protesters hit the streets in big cities around the country, chanting “This is what democracy looks like!” Yes. That’s the problem.

    For many Democrats, the greatest political system is the one that instills their party with the most power. Now that it looks like Hillary Clinton will “win” the fictional popular vote over Donald Trump, people — not just young people who’ve spent their entire lives being told America is a democracy, but people who know better — are getting hysterical about the Electoral College. Not only is it “unfair” and “undemocratic,” but like anything else progressives dislike these days, it’s a tool of “White Supremacy—and Sexism.”


    If liberals truly believe majoritarianism is the fairest way to run a government, then why shouldn’t 50 percent of states be able to repeal constitutional amendments? (Democrats only run only 13 state legislatures. But, you know, when it’s convenient.) Why should a bunch of white men from the late eighteenth century have any say in how contemporary Americans live? If proportional government is unfair, why do we even have two senators from each state? Why not 20 from California and one from Wyoming? Why have states at all? Maybe we should have a series of referendums instead of relying on Congress.

    Maybe we should let protesters overturn elections?

    Follow
    Joss Whedon ✔ @joss
    This is simple: Trump cannot CANNOT be allowed a term in office. It's not about 2018. It's about RIGHT NOW
    2:11 AM - 14 Nov 2016
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    Granted, because of our childish propensity to use the word “fair,” I understand that the Electoral College must seem like a relic that undercuts the sacramental notion of “one man, one vote.” As if a losing vote ever counts anyway. But if you still generally believe the Founders did a decent job setting up the conditions for material prosperity and individual freedom to guarantee a stable government and dispersed political power, you should be a big fan of the Electoral College.

    If it needs repeating, in the United STATES of America, we have an Electoral College, wherein the president and vice president aren’t elected directly by the voters, but rather by electors who are chosen through the popular votes from each state. Your state’s portion of electors equals the number of members in its congressional delegation: one for each member in the House of Representatives plus two for your senators. We have 51 separate elections. This is done so that every part of the nation has some kind of say over the next executive. The president, after all, is not a monarch. He does not make laws. Not even Barack Obama was supposed to do that. Voters need to view the system as a whole to understand why this is “fair.”


    Diffused democracy weakens the ability of politicians to scaremonger and use emotional appeals to take power. It blunts the vagaries of the electorate. So, naturally, the Left has been attacking the Electoral College for years — including talk of a national “compact” to circumvent smaller states. A few years ago, Alexander Keyssar, a professor of history and social policy at Harvard’s Kennedy School, penned an article in The New York Times about revising the Constitution:

    If we were writing or revising the constitution now, we would almost certainly adopt a rather simple method of choosing our presidents: a national popular vote, followed by a run-off if no candidate wins a majority. We applaud when we witness such systems operating elsewhere in the world.
    Perhaps we should try one here.
    We do? We should? Why on earth would we do that? Which parliamentary setup is more stable than our form of governance? What free nation in the world has as consistently and peacefully been able to turn power from one political party to the next the way we have in the past 100 years?

    That, of course, is the point. Need it be repeated, the Electoral College, and other mechanisms that balance democracy, create moderation and compromise—or, stop one party from accumulating too much power. It is certainly possible that Obama’s unilateral governance over the past eight years had a lot to do with the pushback of three consecutive losses in the Senate and Congress and the election of Donald Trump.

    To some extent, the Electoral College impels presidents and their political parties to consider all Americans in rhetoric and action. By allowing Wyoming, with a population of less than 600,000, and California, with a population of more than 38 million people, both have two senators, we create more national cohesion. We protect large swaths of the nation from being bullied. We incentivize Washington—both the president and the Senate—to craft policy that meets the needs of Colorado as well as New York.


    Moreover, besides protecting the rights of Americans who reside in those states, it should also remind us that smaller states have industries and functions that outweigh a measurement in population alone—the agriculture sector of a state, for instance. In a world with increasing productivity, this matters more than ever. Smaller states are laboratories for ideas, as are big ones. If they become marginalized, then coerced to embrace the policies favored by the people in urban areas, the nation loses valuable resourcefulness, imagination, and brainpower.

    It’s also worth remembering that the dynamics of this election would be completely different if the popular vote actually mattered. The election is geared to winning states, not people. There is no guarantee that Hillary Clinton would have won. There are tons of conservatives in blue states, for instance, who do not vote because they understand that the majority around them have a different political outlook. A direct national election would mean focusing on blue-state Republicans and red-state liberals. I’m not sure that setup works out for Democrats exactly as they imagine.

    It’s true that Americans don’t like the Electoral College. This, considering its purpose, is educationally irrelevant. Gallup has been gauging American sentiments on the Electoral College from different angles over the years. But no matter how pollsters phrase the question, impressive majorities always want to trash this unique buttress against direct democracy — and, since the question was first asked in 1966, it’s become increasingly unpopular.

    My empirical experience tells me that public schools teach kids about American governance in a way that diminishes the importance of diffused democracy. They sure do spend precious little time on civics.


    Now, some of this handwringing is a function of distraught voters trying to figure out ways to delegitimize Trump. Some of it is a function of “democracy” being misunderstood. How about tyranny of the minority, you ask? Good question. Let’s give power back to the states and stop treating the executive branch as if were a law-making branch of government. Washington was never intended to hold this much power over states. And presidents were never meant to be this important.

    David Harsanyi is a Senior Editor at The Federalist. Follow him on Twitter.
     
  18. tharock220

    tharock220 Well-Known Member

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    Hate to break it to you kids, but electors in Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan, Florida, and North Carolina have laws requiring their electors to vote for the candidate they've pledged to vote for. If an elector makes the decision to defect, they'll be removed, replaced, and arrested.

    Trump's president fellas. Learn to love it.
     
  19. Pax Aeon

    Pax Aeon Well-Known Member

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    `
    Good find.
    `
    `

    [​IMG]
     
  20. charleslb

    charleslb New Member

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    Let's hope and pray that the members of the electoral college who've been awarded to Mr. Trump have the moral courage to break from historical precedent and to vote either for Mrs. Clinton or even for a less dangerous and disgusting Republican.
     
  21. Crcata

    Crcata Banned

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    The electoral college is a representation of the people, per state.

    So yes, the people choose. The electoral college gives the people a voice.

    You are objectively wrong and just throwing a hissy fit.

    You really should consider educating yourself on how the system works, and why it works that way before speaking.

    But then again you are simply asking out.

    When they elect Trump, my bet is you refuse to accept that. But yet you are asking us to lolol.
     
  22. charleslb

    charleslb New Member

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    It doesn't matter if most of the votes for Mrs. Clinton were concentrated in certain population centers, she still received the majority of votes, and in an authentic democracy the candidate who wins most of the votes = the victorious candidate. She certainly shouldn't be penalized because the population distribution of the country is such that most of her votes are concentrated in a handful of population centers who don't take up much of the map.
     
  23. Crcata

    Crcata Banned

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    You are only saying that because Hilary lost. The electoral college is vital to giving people a voice.

    You would be saying the complete opposite if crooked hil won the electoral college and lost the popular vote.

    So yes, it absolutely matters where the location of the votes come from.
     
  24. charleslb

    charleslb New Member

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    Isn't it interesting how conservatives and Trump supporters are embracing and rationalizing the Electoral College. One can't help but ask the obvious question, would they be doing so if their candidate had won the popular vote but lost the election? Methinks that in that case they'd be railing against our not exactly genuinely democratic presidential electoral system.
     
  25. Crcata

    Crcata Banned

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    Your hypocrisy is showing.

    And the electoral college is self rationalizing. It inherently makes sense. We just now have to explain it to those who pretend not to understand it.

    Welcome to Trump's newer, stronger, better America. You are welcome here.
     

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