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The Electoral College will remain.

The EC will vote according to their state laws governing EC voting.

Trump will become president in January.

Hillary will wrap up her pending cases, receive a slap on the wrist, and retire into obscurity.

 Asherian Command wrote:
I haven't, I think the electoral college is a problem that will only worsen with time. I tossed my vote, but I voted liberal and conservative. (Well I didn't vote for president mostly because I live in Kent County in Michigan which went all red no matter what I did).

What? Dude, it doesn't matter which way your county went, your vote for president is part of the total state vote count, and this year Michigan was very competitive.

 sebster wrote:

 CptJake wrote:
I don't remember Obama ever losing the popular vote, so I don't see the correlation here. I.e. in Obama's case, the electoral college results were not in conflict with the popular vote, as is the casewi th Trump and was the case when GW Bush first got elected IIRC.

The correlation is a gak ton of folks were upset he won. Except they didn't riot and start harassment campaigns against the electors. Clinton lost the popular vote in enough states that she took the biggest Electoral College loss the Dems have had in ages. She lost over 200 counties Obama won twice, and more he won once. She saw states flip that had been reliably D.

She took a major fething beating.

Yes, Clinton lost the election by the rules of the system. Calling it a major beating, though, that requires a level of imagination that really should be getting put to use on something that isn't crazy. Clinton lost Florida by 1.25 points, and Pennsylvania by 1.08%. Clinton improves her numbers in those states by a tick over 1% and you have a different result.

Calling that a major fething beating is a denial of reality. Trying to define the win based on who won what county is even sillier, I mean the popular vote might not determine an election but at least people understand how it might decide an election, whereas tallying up a bunch of counties with wildly differing populations is just the weirdest bit of nonsense.

I agree with that. I think her being 'crushed' wasn't really true it was extremely close, not a 'crushing' victory for trump it was 50 - 50 in most states.

But I think people just forget that this also had the largest voter turn out in a while.

What? Dude, it doesn't matter which way your county went, your vote for president is part of the total state vote count, and this year Michigan was very competitive.

While true, it has been the only time I tossed my vote. But It probably won't ever happen again!

 LordofHats wrote:
Lets be fair to Whembly. The one time he actually agreed in full with all of us not on the right we turned out to be wildly incorrect XD

Uh, I was saying in the last few weeks that Trump was close enough, because it is normal for polls to miss by up to 3 points, and to miss in the same direction across most states. And given there was no firewall (as Clinton's best 270 votes were less that 3 points), then if Trump beat his polls by about 2 to 3 points, then he'd have 270 votes worth of states to claim a win. Trump would still have to sneak over the line in each of those swing states, which was always goign to be tough but certainly possible, and as it turned out that's exactly what happened.

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 Asherian Command wrote:
I agree with that. I think her being 'crushed' wasn't really true it was extremely close, not a 'crushing' victory for trump it was 50 - 50 in most states.

Yeah, I think its tempting for people to confuse the stakes with the scale of the win. When the winner gets the presidency, and the loser gets to write a memoir that no-one will read, it's natural for people to assume the result was emphatic. This leads to people doing silly things but looking at a map of who won each county, as if that meant a damn thing, while ignoring the closeness of the results in the swing states.

But I think people just forget that this also had the largest voter turn out in a while.

Well, it was smaller than 2008 and 2012, but outside of those elections you have to go a long way back to get a better turnout figure.

While true, it has been the only time I tossed my vote. But It probably won't ever happen again!

And to be fair, no-one saw the Michigan result coming, and it wouldn't have flipped the election anyway. But still, you're now in a state that's very competitive. Be happy because you have now joined the small population of people who's vote actually means a damn thing.

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/305932-glenn-beck-bannon-has-clear-tie-to-white-nationalism

I remember when Glenn Beck was the craziest right-wing media guy...

Back a bit to the must EC's follow the voting or not. If they are supposed to just vote for the winner of state(fair enough) then why there even needs to BE EC's?

As it is if they never are supposed to vote according to their own discretion aren't they just basically rubber stamps? So at the moment Trump isn't legally yet the coming president(for that the EC's have to do their voting) but it's just foregone conclusion with 0 votes being against votes...

...Which begs the question why bother with EC's then? You can have the same calculation system that allows two dozens or so votes to trump 200 million votes without EC's. Just have the results be official the moment remaining votes have been calculated.

So rather than:

Elections
EC's cast their vote
Inaugural

You would have:

Elections
Inaugural

Same result but USA would save up bit of cash from not having to bother rubber stamp EC's do the vote.

In some states the electors can vote against the popular vote of the state...

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

During the 1836 election, Virginia's entire 23-man electoral delegation faithlessly abstained[1] from voting for victorious Democratic Party Vice Presidential Candidate Richard Mentor Johnson[2] due to Johnson's openly admitted, publicized, long-term interracial relationship with his slave, Julia Chinn. The loss of Virginia's support caused Johnson to fall one electoral vote short of a majority, causing the Vice Presidential election to be thrown into the U.S. Senate for the only time in American history. However, Virginia's electors voted for Martin Van Buren as pledged, meaning the presidential election itself was not in dispute. The U.S. Senate ultimately elected Johnson anyway after a party-line vote. Despite 157 instances of faithlessness as of 2015, faithless electors have not yet affected the results or ultimate outcome of any other presidential election.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
In some states the electors can vote against the popular vote of the state...

YEah but doesn't seem to be all that common and there seems to be huge backlash here against the mere IDEA that they would vote against what election result.

Looks to be nothing more than rubber stamps which makes it just wasted money.

tneva82 wrote:
Back a bit to the must EC's follow the voting or not. If they are supposed to just vote for the winner of state(fair enough) then why there even needs to BE EC's?

As it is if they never are supposed to vote according to their own discretion aren't they just basically rubber stamps? So at the moment Trump isn't legally yet the coming president(for that the EC's have to do their voting) but it's just foregone conclusion with 0 votes being against votes...

...Which begs the question why bother with EC's then? You can have the same calculation system that allows two dozens or so votes to trump 200 million votes without EC's. Just have the results be official the moment remaining votes have been calculated.

So rather than:

Elections
EC's cast their vote
Inaugural

You would have:

Elections
Inaugural

Same result but USA would save up bit of cash from not having to bother rubber stamp EC's do the vote.

Because it is up to the States to decide how to choose their electors. The process we have right now is basically just a rubber stamp and a redundancy of the actual selection, and yes it would be cheaper to just give "points" to each state rather than to go through the motion of the actual electors. But the states have the options of changing the system at any point. The Constitution itself says that the members of the Electoral College are the only people who have any actual say in who becomes president, and there would be nothing unconstitutional about getting rid of the election process altogether and just letting the Governors ask his wife to pick random names out of a hat to pick the people who will vote for President.

Truthfully, this whole "petition the Electors to change their mind" is probably the closest we have actually come to following the original purpose of the Electoral College. When the constitution was written, the founders had a distain for political parties for the same reason that they had a distrust of the "tyranny of the majority". They didn't envision for the Electoral College to be filled with people handpicked to fulfill the wishes of their party. They created the Electoral College so that the electors could meet, deliberate, and then decide as an individual body who would make the best president. They didn't create the Electoral College as a way to give individual voters in smaller state a bigger voice than individual voters in bigger state when it comes to directly electing the president. They created the Electoral College to give smaller states a slightly bigger voice in the whole process, but the process was for states to pick people who had the time and resources to learn enough about the issues and candidates to make a wise decision about who they think should be president.

"Vote for Elector X so that they can vote for Candidate Y" is so far removed from the original concept of the EC that we might as well get rid of it IMO, especially once we add the restrictions that states imposed to prevent electors from actually deliberating and making up their own minds once they meet.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
In some states the electors can vote against the popular vote of the state...

Sure, but ultimately it's a bit like super-delegates, the only time it ever might happen it would be a goddamn disaster and therefore very, very unlikely to happen.

I mean, I get tneva82's point that this makes it redundant, but ultimately there's redundant, purely ceremonial positions throughout all governments. It isn't like we're paying people a full time wage to rock up once every four years or anything like that.

Anyhow, I'm surprised this hasn't come up yet, the campaign to get states to bind their vote to the national popular vote rather than their own state's result. It's a fairly clever bill that avoids the issue of state's giving up their own power, by having it apply only when there is more than 270 states worth of EV signed up to do the same.
http://www.nationalpopularvote.com/

It's gotten bills proposed in most states.

The other interesting thing on that site is the stat that a full 2/3 of all campaign activity was focused on just 11 states. That really makes a joke of the argument that the EV is about making sure all states are considered.

 sebster wrote:
I mean, I get tneva82's point that this makes it redundant, but ultimately there's redundant, purely ceremonial positions throughout all governments. It isn't like we're paying people a full time wage to rock up once every four years or anything like that.

Expenses isn't just the wage though.

And just because there's redundancy elsewhere doesn't mean it shouldn't be removed where possible when it serves no function.

Well not big deal but wasted money. When poor folks are expected to eat cuts why not cut first on totally useless expenses first?

 sebster wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
In some states the electors can vote against the popular vote of the state...

Sure, but ultimately it's a bit like super-delegates, the only time it ever might happen it would be a goddamn disaster and therefore very, very unlikely to happen.

I mean, I get tneva82's point that this makes it redundant, but ultimately there's redundant, purely ceremonial positions throughout all governments. It isn't like we're paying people a full time wage to rock up once every four years or anything like that.

Anyhow, I'm surprised this hasn't come up yet, the campaign to get states to bind their vote to the national popular vote rather than their own state's result. It's a fairly clever bill that avoids the issue of state's giving up their own power, by having it apply only when there is more than 270 states worth of EV signed up to do the same.
http://www.nationalpopularvote.com/

It's gotten bills proposed in most states.

The other interesting thing on that site is the stat that a full 2/3 of all campaign activity was focused on just 11 states. That really makes a joke of the argument that the EV is about making sure all states are considered.

The problem facing the Compact is that it is that it exists in a Constitutional Black Hole. The Supreme Court (in the few times it has come up) has carefully avoided actually issuing rulings about the current way electors vote in the EC, literally dancing around the issue of Clause III of Section II, of which the way we do EC elections could arguably be in violation of. The Compact would almost certainly be challenged in the courts, and then you end up with the Court having to decide both its legality and the legality of the current College process. Given that this would only happen following a Presidential election you wind up with a legitimacy crisis at the exact moment you really don't need it.

And that's just assuming it goes into effect. Section X of Article I confirms that the states cannot legally enter into compacts with one another (though they have historically) without the approval of Congress, if they effect the federal government. There'd be another SCOTUS case right there because how can the election process of the Presidency not effect the Federal government? It's hard to fathom the Republicans tolerating such a proposal given that it really favors the Democrats (and is mostly adopted and pushed in Blue states). They could easily block the compact from going into effect.

Not to mention that the whole idea is just kind of dirty in spirit. It tries to pull an end run around the election process.

tneva82 wrote:
When poor folks are expected to eat cuts why not cut first on totally useless expenses first?

Because changing it would require a constitutional amendment, which is a really big obstacle.

tneva82 wrote:
Expenses isn't just the wage though.

And just because there's redundancy elsewhere doesn't mean it shouldn't be removed where possible when it serves no function.

Well not big deal but wasted money. When poor folks are expected to eat cuts why not cut first on totally useless expenses first?

This would require a constitutional amendment, which is going to be pricier than the cost of the electors and their pointless formality for the next 100 elections.

That's why these formalities are generally left in place. Because for some very good reasons governments make it hard to change their key processes. While that means core parts of government, like elections and free speech are hard to cut away, it also means that silly bits of nonsense like electors and voting on a Tuesday are just as hard to change.


The call to helping the poor is a bit misplaced. You won't materially improve the poor by cutting trivial bits of nonsense like this. And if there was genuine interest in helping the poor, the money is there, in large programs. We just choose not to spend it on the way you'd like (and I'd like for that matter), for lots of reasons.


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 LordofHats wrote:
The problem facing the Compact is that it is that it exists in a Constitutional Black Hole. The Supreme Court (in the few times it has come up) has carefully avoided actually issuing rulings about the current way electors vote in the EC, literally dancing around the issue of Clause III of Section II, of which the way we do EC elections could arguably be in violation of. The Compact would almost certainly be challenged in the courts, and then you end up with the Court having to decide both its legality and the legality of the current College process. Given that this would only happen following a Presidential election you wind up with a legitimacy crisis at the exact moment you really don't need it.

And that's just assuming it goes into effect. Section X of Article I confirms that the states cannot legally enter into compacts with one another (though they have historically) without the approval of Congress, if they effect the federal government. There'd be another SCOTUS case right there because how can the election process of the Presidency not effect the Federal government? It's hard to fathom the Republicans tolerating such a proposal given that it really favors the Democrats (and is mostly adopted and pushed in Blue states). They could easily block the compact from going into effect.

Those are some really good points. I thought the compact was very unlikely, and now I can see how it is extremely unlikely, and also a very bad idea because of the constitutional uncertainty. Would it be possible to have it tested by the SC before an election, such as an elector taking it to court, so the legality of it was decided before the election?

Not to mention that the whole idea is just kind of dirty in spirit. It tries to pull an end run around the election process.

That's what I love about it. Something about running a clever plan to get around an obnoxious bit of law that just sings to me.

 sebster wrote:
Would it be possible to have it tested by the SC before an election, such as an elector taking it to court, so the legality of it was decided before the election?

SCOTUS isn't allowed to rule on things without jurisdiction, and their jurisdiction understandably does not extend to include "things we'd like to rule on but no one has brought the case before us."

It is not Constitutional for SCOTUS to issue a ruling until some can bring a case before them, and there's no way to do that if the Compact never tries to be put into effect. if it every reaches the margin necessary to go into effect, we'll find out because that's when stuff will happen and the case will be brought.

 d-usa wrote:
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/305932-glenn-beck-bannon-has-clear-tie-to-white-nationalism

I remember when Glenn Beck was the craziest right-wing media guy...

I heard a very interesting interview with him on NPR last week. He's still Glenn Beck, I do think he has sort of realized what he has contributed too. I actually got a bit of respect for the guy, just hearing his reactions to the Trumpsters.

I don't think we've heard the last of Hilary Clinton, in the political arena at least.

Whenever the GOP is in trouble or looking to bash the Democrats, expect to see subpoenas against Clinton as part of this strategy.

The EC was always intended to have the capacity to do an end run around the elections. That is why the electors votes were not tied to the popular vote. That some (not all) now are is an issue that hasn't been litigated at any level.

ender502

 sebster wrote:

 CptJake wrote:
The correlation is a gak ton of folks were upset he won. Except they didn't riot and start harassment campaigns against the electors. Clinton lost the popular vote in enough states that she took the biggest Electoral College loss the Dems have had in ages. She lost over 200 counties Obama won twice, and more he won once. She saw states flip that had been reliably D.

She took a major fething beating.

Yes, Clinton lost the election by the rules of the system. Calling it a major beating, though, that requires a level of imagination that really should be getting put to use on something that isn't crazy. Clinton lost Florida by 1.25 points, and Pennsylvania by 1.08%. Clinton improves her numbers in those states by a tick over 1% and you have a different result.

Calling that a major fething beating is a denial of reality. Trying to define the win based on who won what county is even sillier, I mean the popular vote might not determine an election but at least people understand how it might decide an election, whereas tallying up a bunch of counties with wildly differing populations is just the weirdest bit of nonsense.

Trump got over 300 electoral college votes. That is the biggest beating a D has taken in a while (since 1988), and since getting those EC votes was the game being played, judging the contest by the results is fair. The loss of what had been considered 'safe' counties for the Ds, in the quantities she lost them is indicative of the whooping she took and directly led to her seeing D states flip to R states for this election. Had those counties not flipped in the quantities they did, the states would not have flipped.

And Michigan still hasn't been called. A difference of 11,000 votes.

I agree with what's being said. Trump won fair and square by the rules that he and Clinton signed up to.

All this horsegak about popular vote beating EC is just that: horsegak.

If the situation had been reversed, I doubt we'd hear anything about popular vote.

I you don't like the rules, don't play the game, as the old saying goes.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
I agree with what's being said. Trump won fair and square by the rules that he and Clinton signed up to.

All this horsegak about popular vote beating EC is just that: horsegak.

If the situation had been reversed, I doubt we'd hear anything about popular vote.

I you don't like the rules, don't play the game, as the old saying goes.

We heard the exact same thing from Trump in 2012 when he thought that Romney had won the popular vote despite Obama winning the Electoral College.

And Trump has been consistent after this election, for once actually, and said that he still thinks that the popular vote should win over the electoral college even though it benefited him this time around.

.. so what's going on with regards to the donations from places like Iran, Venezuela & Qatar that Giuliani took ?

If money donated to the Clinton Foundation made her judgement in some areas suspect, is this not the same case here ?

Ask and ye shall receive:


Pence supposedly removing lobbyists from transition team, and looking harder at Giuliani's consulting work for foreign countries.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/11/16/pence-removing-lobbyists-from-trump-transition-team.html

The Wall Street Journal reported that Frank Gaffney, a former defense official in the Reagan administration, had been brought in to assist on national security issues, along with Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., and former Rep. Pete Hoekstra.

Gaffney is in ? !


... When do the purges start ?

The Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC) were secretly aiding the Muslim Brotherhood according to him.

"During an appearance on MSNBC’s “Hardball with Chris Matthews” in 2009, Gaffney made a statement that boggled even veteran Gaffney-watchers: “There is also circumstantial evidence, not proven by any means, but nonetheless some pretty compelling circumstantial evidence, of Saddam Hussein's Iraq being involved with the people who perpetrated both the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center and even the Oklahoma City bombing.""


be prepared for televised pork eating to prove that you are not now nor were you ever a muslim.

 ender502 wrote:
And Michigan still hasn't been called. A difference of 11,000 votes.

And? You're gonna have to take PA, and some other state away from him to make that matter.

Give it up dude. One man is not worth tearing the fabric of our government asunder.

 reds8n wrote:

The Wall Street Journal reported that Frank Gaffney, a former defense official in the Reagan administration, had been brought in to assist on national security issues, along with Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., and former Rep. Pete Hoekstra.

Gaffney is in ? !


... When do the purges start ?

The Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC) were secretly aiding the Muslim Brotherhood according to him.

"During an appearance on MSNBC’s “Hardball with Chris Matthews” in 2009, Gaffney made a statement that boggled even veteran Gaffney-watchers: “There is also circumstantial evidence, not proven by any means, but nonetheless some pretty compelling circumstantial evidence, of Saddam Hussein's Iraq being involved with the people who perpetrated both the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center and even the Oklahoma City bombing.""


be prepared for televised pork eating to prove that you are not now nor were you ever a muslim.

At first I was scared and then you said televised loyalty oaths with bacon and I was happy. Test ME TEST ME!

 reds8n wrote:
.. so what's going on with regards to the donations from places like Iran, Venezuela & Qatar that Giuliani took ?

If money donated to the Clinton Foundation made her judgement in some areas suspect, is this not the same case here ?

You'd think so, but we're about to witness the great american flip flop again.

where pence is trying to keep his offical emails away from the public eye.
where after numerous teachers got fired for being seen in a bikini, Melania Trump is now a great role model.
Executive actions will now be constitutional again and a sign of a leader taking action.
and all those horrible policies that are destroying america will be kept
those flying confederate flags saying "you lost, get over it"

 ender502 wrote:
Cause you might find it interesting. Federalist #68. I've bolded the part about electors but included the entire text.

All these advantages will happily combine in the plan devised by the convention; which is, that the people of each State shall choose a number of persons as electors, equal to the number of senators and representatives of such State in the national government, who shall assemble within the State, and vote for some fit person as President. Their votes, thus given, are to be transmitted to the seat of the national government, and the person who may happen to have a majority of the whole number of votes will be the President. But as a majority of the votes might not always happen to centre in one man, and as it might be unsafe to permit less than a majority to be conclusive, it is provided that, in such a contingency, the House of Representatives shall select out of the candidates who shall have the five highest number of votes, the man who in their opinion may be best qualified for the office.

The process of election affords a moral certainty, that the office of President will never fall to the lot of any man who is not in an eminent degree endowed with the requisite qualifications. 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. It will not be too strong to say, that there will be a constant probability of seeing the station filled by characters pre-eminent for ability and virtue. And this will be thought no inconsiderable recommendation of the Constitution, by those who are able to estimate the share which the executive in every government must necessarily have in its good or ill administration. Though we cannot acquiesce in the political heresy of the poet who says: "For forms of government let fools contest That which is best administered is best,'' yet we may safely pronounce, that the true test of a good government is its aptitude and tendency to produce a good administration.

That may have been the system Hamilton wanted us to use but that is not an accurate description of the EC system as it exists today.

The 2 Parties control the ballot, they control access in regards to who gets on the ballot and they control the appearance of the ballot itself. The ballots given to voters do not provide voters with a list of possible Electors to choose from, the ballots do not provide spaces for voters to write in the names of people who they believe would be good Electors. What is on the ballots are the candidate teams from the 2 Parties running for President/Vice President. The people vote for the Party candidates, then those votes are tabulated, then candidate team that won the majority of the votes in that state is declared the winner. Following that the Party of the winning candidate team selects Electors that will vote in favor of that Party candidate team on Dec 19th.

If we want to have a system wherein we elect independent Electors on Election Day so that those independent Electors can choose to support a presidential candidate on our behalf then we need to rework the process of ballot access and the format of the ballot itself. As it stands no voters in any state actually cast a vote for specific Electors, they only vote for Party candidates and then the winning Party chooses Electors so none of our Electors are being chosen in the manner in which Hamilton wanted them chosen. Of course, Hamilton's ideas on the EC are only in the Federalist papers not the constitution or any other official document that would have any power to compel states to reform the way that Parties now control the election process.

The Con. fed . flag thing did generate a chuckle.

TBF going from the above the donations thing is being considered.

I'd like to laugh and watch as Trump completely disregards those he used to get into power but I don't quite see it.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/donald-trump-administration/2016/11/trump-team-talks-of-setting-up-political-arm-231462

Donald Trump’s top advisers are discussing a plan to launch a new political organization outside the White House and the Republican Party to harness the energy that powered his populist candidacy, according to people familiar with talks.

While the planning for such a group is still in its infancy, the idea is to create a structure akin to what President Barack Obama did after he won in 2008, when members of his campaign team launched Organizing for America.


...........................

The exact form of the entity, whether it would be a super PAC or a nonprofit like OFA was, remains undecided.

would anyone care to place their bets with regards to this ?