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 Frazzled wrote:

That doesn't even make sense considering that I'm suggesting basing the outcome of your Presidential election, i.e. the guy who is the Head of State for your entire country, directly on the popular vote.

So if California seceded to Canada, how would that impact your vote? Would you reckon the Quebecois would feel better or want to leave ven more?
And why does Quebec want to leave...oh yea that minority French thing in an English country.

Acquire Canada then it will be majority Spanish. Poutain and queso baby!

Only if they leave the queso behind... like Canada's Maple Syrup, queso is Texa's national resource.

Queso was a thing before California was even a territory baby.

The Quebecois actually did have some valid concerns that made it appealing to be their own country that one time they had a vote on it over 25 years ago and haven't had it be a huge issue ever since.

Also, given how politics work in Canada, probably not much since our Prime Minister isn't someone the entire country votes for as a whole. California would have its own ridings to elect their own MPs to the House of Commons who would then be given the same say in Canadian Federal Politics as the MPs of every current Province and Territory.

Also, our two official languages as a country are English and French. And all that means is that all business done by the government is done in those two languages. Canadian MPs are basically required to have a significant amount of fluency in both official languages as a job requirement. If we want to be a trilingual country because the number of Spanish-speaking people in our country due to the inclusion of California is high enough it would be a good idea for our government to conduct business in Spanish as well, it'd probably happen, and then Canadian MPs would have to know three languages instead of two and there would be government training courses to help them learn that language while still holding their current jobs. Californian Spanish-speaking people would be hired by the government to teach our politicians those courses.

 whembly wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 whembly wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

I'm curious on your reasoning behind that. Becauae I'd say in a straight popular vote, no winning states or anything, most people's votes wpuld matter more. Currently every Republican living in NY or CA might as well not vote, same for TX Ds.

Are state governments are independent sovereigns?

Or are they provincial subdivisions of the federal government?

There's your answer.

No it isn't.

Sure it is, that's the justification of using the electoral college now and present.

I was asking him about the 98% thing. I'm not sure what you are talking about.

That's just the old man being hyperbolic there I'm sure....

It's not the answer to the question I asked. Nor is it just him being hyperbolic, it makes absolutely no sense. How on earth does it make people's votes worth less?

Nah, long term the Republican party is done. I'll spend the next 4 years laughing as trump backtracks on his promises and betrays the people that voted for him. He's already started... Repeal and replace? Nah. Keep and modify. Build a wall? Well, part of that will be a fence. Deport the 11 million undocumented? Well, maybe just 3 million.

Unless of course the Republican Party transforms into the Worker's Party.

The Republicans had a chance to expand their party. They doubled down on whipping up the base and with the dems losing their economic message they managed to squeak by through the electoral college. It wont happen again. And all those union workers that flipped for trump? Do you think they will stay red when he does come through with the promised hubs? Nah bro. Nah.

Ender502

They won't vote Democrat. Democrats hate them now, and despise them as flyover Deplorables, unfit, unclean. Sounds like the old White Man's Burden argument.
Speaking of, your argument sounds a bit like A Modest Proposal.

 whembly wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

I'm curious on your reasoning behind that. Becauae I'd say in a straight popular vote, no winning states or anything, most people's votes wpuld matter more. Currently every Republican living in NY or CA might as well not vote, same for TX Ds.

Are state governments are independent sovereigns?

Or are they provincial subdivisions of the federal government?

There's your answer.

Does it matter when you're convincing your people that the vote they're casting is for a particular Presidential candidate, then when most of them vote for the candidate who didn't win you basically tell them, "The votes of less than 500 individuals who are legally allowed to vote for whoever they see fit matter more than all of yours combined"?

Most didn't vote for HRC. No candidate won a majority of the vote.

Somehow I dpubt the party that despises unions and is still throwing tax cuts at the wealthy for no reason whatsover is going to become a workers party.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

It's not the answer to the question I asked. Nor is it just him being hyperbolic, it makes absolutely no sense.

 Frazzled wrote:
Most didn't vote for HRC. No candidate won a majority of the vote.

Unless I am very much mistaken, HRC did get a plurality, which is as good as a majority in a FPTP system. Now if I was able to get rid of the the EC (which I've benn banging on for years now) ,I'd also get an IRV system in place to allow viable third parties.

 Frazzled wrote:
Most didn't vote for HRC. No candidate won a majority of the vote.

Replace most with "more than any other candidate". Meaning is kept the same.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Most didn't vote for HRC. No candidate won a majority of the vote.

Unless I am very much mistaken, HRC did get a plurality, which is as good as a majority in a FPTP system.

.

It is however a false statement. She won a plurality of votes, because of California. The majority of right thinking citizens voting against both her and Trump.

 Pouncey wrote:

 whembly wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

I'm curious on your reasoning behind that. Becauae I'd say in a straight popular vote, no winning states or anything, most people's votes wpuld matter more. Currently every Republican living in NY or CA might as well not vote, same for TX Ds.

Are state governments are independent sovereigns?

Or are they provincial subdivisions of the federal government?

There's your answer.

Does it matter when you're convincing your people that the vote they're casting is for a particular Presidential candidate, then when most of them vote for the candidate who didn't win you basically tell them, "The votes of less than 500 individuals who are legally allowed to vote for whoever they see fit matter more than all of yours combined"?

It does not matter because that's not how the system works.

 Frazzled wrote:

Nah, long term the Republican party is done. I'll spend the next 4 years laughing as trump backtracks on his promises and betrays the people that voted for him. He's already started... Repeal and replace? Nah. Keep and modify. Build a wall? Well, part of that will be a fence. Deport the 11 million undocumented? Well, maybe just 3 million.

Unless of course the Republican Party transforms into the Worker's Party.

The Republicans had a chance to expand their party. They doubled down on whipping up the base and with the dems losing their economic message they managed to squeak by through the electoral college. It wont happen again. And all those union workers that flipped for trump? Do you think they will stay red when he does come through with the promised hubs? Nah bro. Nah.

Ender502

They won't vote Democrat. Democrats hate them now, and despise them as flyover Deplorables, unfit, unclean. Sounds like the old White Man's Burden argument.
Speaking of, your argument sounds a bit like A Modest Proposal.

The deplorables is directly attributable to the flaws of the candidate. Though I do think she would have made a perfectly adequate president, she was a terrible candidate. Her own arrogance was reflected in her campaign and lead to some mind blowingly bad mistakes. Heck, even her own husband said "its about the economy" and she forgot that or forgot to make it seemed like she cared.

I would hope the Dems would not make the same mistake a second time... But then again try nominated John Kerry. So, you never know how dumb they can be.

No, the votes will flip back.pa and mi will vote Dem in the next election. Fewer of the flipped votes will be living and the rest will stay home or vote Dem because of trumps broken promises.

Modest proposal? Not sure what you're referencing.

Ender502

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Modest_Proposal

 Frazzled wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Most didn't vote for HRC. No candidate won a majority of the vote.

Unless I am very much mistaken, HRC did get a plurality, which is as good as a majority in a FPTP system.

.

It is however a false statement. She won a plurality of votes, because of California. The majority of right thinking citizens voting against both her and Trump.

Look, I'm in Canada. We have three major contending parties for the ruling government plus a fourth who used to get a ton of seats but could never win because they never ran in ridings outside Quebec because the purpose of the party was to represent Quebec and only Quebec in the Federal government.

The difference between "most" and "more than anyone else" is an irrelevant concept to me when it comes to the question of "Which party/candidate won the election?" since a lot of the time, our ruling party in the Federal government commands a total of less than half of the total number of votes on any issue and most of our MPs got less than half of their riding's votes but still got more than any other.

The only reason I said most at all is because I know you guys are a two-party system and this is about American politics, so I just assumed. Incorrect assumption, but totally irrelevant.

 Frazzled wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Most didn't vote for HRC. No candidate won a majority of the vote.

Unless I am very much mistaken, HRC did get a plurality, which is as good as a majority in a FPTP system.

.

It is however a false statement. She won a plurality of votes, because of California. The majority of right thinking citizens voting against both her and Trump.

The majority voted for either trump or clinton. It was a 60% turnout.

 whembly wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

It's not the answer to the question I asked. Nor is it just him being hyperbolic, it makes absolutely no sense.

...well I'll let him answer that.

How on earth does it make people's votes worth less?

Because we are 50 states in a union... not one homogeneous state.

Federalism is a thing ya know?

So... if the election truly went to popular vote, why should these politicians focus on any of the non-blue areas?

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Most didn't vote for HRC. No candidate won a majority of the vote.

Unless I am very much mistaken, HRC did get a plurality, which is as good as a majority in a FPTP system. Now if I was able to get rid of the the EC (which I've benn banging on for years now) ,I'd also get an IRV system in place to allow viable third parties.

Because the most populous cities were in her favor.
Most of the states were against her. How is it fair when all what a candidate has to do is ingratiate themselves with only certain areas of the country, which tend to lean towards that candidate's party anyway?

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Most didn't vote for HRC. No candidate won a majority of the vote.

Unless I am very much mistaken, HRC did get a plurality, which is as good as a majority in a FPTP system. Now if I was able to get rid of the the EC (which I've benn banging on for years now) ,I'd also get an IRV system in place to allow viable third parties.

Because the most populous cities were in her favor.
Most of the states were against her. How is it fair when all what a candidate has to do is ingratiate themselves with only certain areas of the country, which tend to lean towards that candidate's party anyway?

"How is it fair that someone who gets tye most votes in a democracy wins!"

 Pouncey wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Most didn't vote for HRC. No candidate won a majority of the vote.

Unless I am very much mistaken, HRC did get a plurality, which is as good as a majority in a FPTP system.

.

It is however a false statement. She won a plurality of votes, because of California. The majority of right thinking citizens voting against both her and Trump.

Look, I'm in Canada. We have three major contending parties for the ruling government plus a fourth who used to get a ton of seats but could never win because they never ran in ridings outside Quebec because the purpose of the party was to represent Quebec and only Quebec in the Federal government.

The difference between "most" and "more than anyone else" is an irrelevant concept to me when it comes to the question of "Which party/candidate won the election?" since a lot of the time, our ruling party in the Federal government commands a total of less than half of the total number of votes on any issue and most of our MPs got less than half of their riding's votes but still got more than any other.

The only reason I said most at all is because I know you guys are a two-party system and this is about American politics, so I just assumed. Incorrect assumption, but totally irrelevant.

My boy is a published math major that thinks calculus is for chumps. Guess where I stand on accuracy concerning math terms.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

sirlynchmob wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Most didn't vote for HRC. No candidate won a majority of the vote.

Unless I am very much mistaken, HRC did get a plurality, which is as good as a majority in a FPTP system.

.

It is however a false statement. She won a plurality of votes, because of California. The majority of right thinking citizens voting against both her and Trump.

The majority voted for either trump or clinton. It was a 60% turnout.

But neither achieved the majority vote.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

That still isn't the question. It's why do people's votes matter less. Nothing about state representation was mentioned. You need to wtop thinking in terms of states. a federal, non representative office should represnt the people, not the states. The states have representation via the senate and house (although the house also does local issues).

I disagree...we MUST continue to think in terms of the states. A federal, non representative office (the Prez) MUST represent the collective states... not just a simple majority of the popular vote.

.Also, some refrance for those areas? A map with no context is not a good system.

Oops... sorry. The blue areas are the densely populated areas and it's the blue area vs. grey area are 50% of the population.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Most didn't vote for HRC. No candidate won a majority of the vote.

Unless I am very much mistaken, HRC did get a plurality, which is as good as a majority in a FPTP system. Now if I was able to get rid of the the EC (which I've benn banging on for years now) ,I'd also get an IRV system in place to allow viable third parties.

Because the most populous cities were in her favor.
Most of the states were against her. How is it fair when all what a candidate has to do is ingratiate themselves with only certain areas of the country, which tend to lean towards that candidate's party anyway?

"How is it fair that someone who gets tye most votes in a democracy wins!"

We are a republic. We are not a democracy. Democracy doesn't exist.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Most didn't vote for HRC. No candidate won a majority of the vote.

Unless I am very much mistaken, HRC did get a plurality, which is as good as a majority in a FPTP system. Now if I was able to get rid of the the EC (which I've benn banging on for years now) ,I'd also get an IRV system in place to allow viable third parties.

Because the most populous cities were in her favor.
Most of the states were against her. How is it fair when all what a candidate has to do is ingratiate themselves with only certain areas of the country, which tend to lean towards that candidate's party anyway?

"How is it fair that someone who gets tye most votes in a democracy wins!"

We're a constitutional republic.

 whembly wrote:

 Pouncey wrote:

 whembly wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

I'm curious on your reasoning behind that. Becauae I'd say in a straight popular vote, no winning states or anything, most people's votes wpuld matter more. Currently every Republican living in NY or CA might as well not vote, same for TX Ds.

Are state governments are independent sovereigns?

Or are they provincial subdivisions of the federal government?

There's your answer.

Does it matter when you're convincing your people that the vote they're casting is for a particular Presidential candidate, then when most of them vote for the candidate who didn't win you basically tell them, "The votes of less than 500 individuals who are legally allowed to vote for whoever they see fit matter more than all of yours combined"?

It does not matter because that's not how the system works.

Yeah, it actually is. Your news during elections always comments that the people actually casting votes in your Electoral College are legally allowed to vote for whichever candidate they want, but almost never do, so the election's not actually over yet until those people actually cast their votes. If you want to stop them from doing it, it's as easy as replacing the Electoral College voting with just attributing each state a number of Points equal to the number of Electoral College votes they would have normally, then just tally up the number of Points for each candidate from all the states they won, and whoever gets the most Points wins the election. You wouldn't even be changing the outcome of historical elections in almost all cases if you worked out how that system would've worked if it applied back then.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Most didn't vote for HRC. No candidate won a majority of the vote.

Unless I am very much mistaken, HRC did get a plurality, which is as good as a majority in a FPTP system. Now if I was able to get rid of the the EC (which I've benn banging on for years now) ,I'd also get an IRV system in place to allow viable third parties.

Because the most populous cities were in her favor.
Most of the states were against her. How is it fair when all what a candidate has to do is ingratiate themselves with only certain areas of the country, which tend to lean towards that candidate's party anyway?

"How is it fair that someone who gets tye most votes in a democracy wins!"

Except the US is not a pure democracy. Its a constitutional Democratic Republic. There's a difference.
Also, try using that line of reasoning to everything living in the more sparsely populated parts that the politicians do not ingratiate themselves to.

 whembly wrote:
I disagree...we MUST continue to think in terms of the states. A federal, non representative office (the Prez) MUST represent the collective states... not just a simple majority of the popular vote.

So you're saying your President doesn't represent the people, he represents the States?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

"How is it fair that someone who gets tye most votes in a democracy wins!"

Except the US is not a pure democracy. Its a Democratic Republic.

And the relevant difference to the thing you replied to is...?

 Frazzled wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Most didn't vote for HRC. No candidate won a majority of the vote.

Unless I am very much mistaken, HRC did get a plurality, which is as good as a majority in a FPTP system. Now if I was able to get rid of the the EC (which I've benn banging on for years now) ,I'd also get an IRV system in place to allow viable third parties.

Because the most populous cities were in her favor.
Most of the states were against her. How is it fair when all what a candidate has to do is ingratiate themselves with only certain areas of the country, which tend to lean towards that candidate's party anyway?

"How is it fair that someone who gets tye most votes in a democracy wins!"

We are a republic. We are not a democracy. Democracy doesn't exist.

We are a democratic republic.* We aren't a direct democracy, but still a democracy.



*Or to be really specific, a constitutionally limited representative democratic republic

 Pouncey wrote:

 whembly wrote:

 Pouncey wrote:

 whembly wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

I'm curious on your reasoning behind that. Becauae I'd say in a straight popular vote, no winning states or anything, most people's votes wpuld matter more. Currently every Republican living in NY or CA might as well not vote, same for TX Ds.

Are state governments are independent sovereigns?

Or are they provincial subdivisions of the federal government?

There's your answer.

Does it matter when you're convincing your people that the vote they're casting is for a particular Presidential candidate, then when most of them vote for the candidate who didn't win you basically tell them, "The votes of less than 500 individuals who are legally allowed to vote for whoever they see fit matter more than all of yours combined"?

It does not matter because that's not how the system works.

Yeah, it actually is. Your news during elections always comments that the people actually casting votes in your Electoral College are legally allowed to vote for whichever candidate they want, but almost never do, so the election's not actually over yet until those people actually cast their votes. If you want to stop them from doing it, it's as easy as replacing the Electoral College voting with just attributing each state a number of Points equal to the number of Electoral College votes they would have normally, then just tally up the number of Points for each candidate from all the states they won, and whoever gets the most Points wins the election. You wouldn't even be changing the outcome of historical elections in almost all cases if you worked out how that system would've worked if it applied back then.

I'd be okay with that... but, it's never been a problem... so, "meh".

 whembly wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

That still isn't the question. It's why do people's votes matter less. Nothing about state representation was mentioned. You need to wtop thinking in terms of states. a federal, non representative office should represnt the people, not the states. The states have representation via the senate and house (although the house also does local issues).

I disagree...we MUST continue to think in terms of the states. A federal, non representative office (the Prez) MUST represent the collective states... not just a simple majority of the popular vote.

Why? Why should governments and politicians matter more than the will of the people?

.Also, some refrance for those areas? A map with no context is not a good system.

Oops... sorry. The blue areas are the densely populated areas and it's the blue area vs. grey area are 50% of the population.

So your argument is the representation should be equal to the amount of land you own?

 Pouncey wrote:

 whembly wrote:
I disagree...we MUST continue to think in terms of the states. A federal, non representative office (the Prez) MUST represent the collective states... not just a simple majority of the popular vote.

So you're saying your President doesn't represent the people, he represents the States?

The States *are* the collective people of the U.S.

Or, let me put it to you in this fashion, pick one:
Are state governments are independent sovereigns?

Or are they simply provincial subdivisions of a homogeneous federal government?

 Pouncey wrote:

 whembly wrote:
I disagree...we MUST continue to think in terms of the states. A federal, non representative office (the Prez) MUST represent the collective states... not just a simple majority of the popular vote.

So you're saying your President doesn't represent the people, he represents the States?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

"How is it fair that someone who gets tye most votes in a democracy wins!"

Except the US is not a pure democracy. Its a Democratic Republic.

And the relevant difference to the thing you replied to is...?

You don't elect representatives in a pure democracy.
In a pure democracy, the people directly determine who the president who the president is.
In a Democratic Republic, at least the US brand of it, the people determine democratically who represents their state, who in turn determine who the president is.
The representives are voted by majority rule by the people, and the president is voted by majority rule by the representatives.