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Pensacola Discussion Forum » Politics » Petition: National Popular Vote

Petition: National Popular Vote

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Joanimaroni
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gatorfan
boards of FL
Floridatexan
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Joanimaroni

Joanimaroni

boards of FL wrote:
Joanimaroni wrote:
boards of FL wrote:
Joanimaroni wrote:If Hillary won the electoral vote and lost the popular vote would we be having this discussion?


Yes.  I also had this very conversation several times over the years in the absence of a general election result.  I've even posted statistical analysis comparing each state's population with its number of electoral votes in order to determine how much a vote in each state counts several times going back as far as to the PNJ forum.

And I'm bringing it up again now because it is relevant to current events.



Trump won well over the needed electoral votes.


Yes.  But the question at hand is why shouldn't the person who earns the most actual votes win the election?  Do you have any rational argument for that?


I don't. It is a complicated process based on population of counties and each party has electors in each state....when added up Trump had the most electors vote for him.

Joanimaroni

Joanimaroni

boards of FL wrote:
Joanimaroni wrote:
boards of FL wrote:
Joanimaroni wrote:If Hillary won the electoral vote and lost the popular vote would we be having this discussion?


Yes.  I also had this very conversation several times over the years in the absence of a general election result.  I've even posted statistical analysis comparing each state's population with its number of electoral votes in order to determine how much a vote in each state counts several times going back as far as to the PNJ forum.

And I'm bringing it up again now because it is relevant to current events.



Trump won well over the needed electoral votes.


Yes.  But the question at hand is why shouldn't the person who earns the most actual votes win the election?  Do you have any rational argument for that?


I don't. It is a complicated process based on population of counties and each party has electors in each state....when added up Trump had the most electors vote for him.

Markle

Markle

boards of FL wrote:So that's it?  Not one republican is able to make any arguments in support of the electoral college?

Add another one to the pile.

Petition: National Popular Vote - Page 2 Duct%20Tape_zpsb3cli3ah

2seaoat



The electoral college is not the problem. The problem is that folks in Milwaukee and Detroit failed to turn out and the electoral college was lost by less than 100k votes, not by hateful dixiecrats.......that is a given, but by blue collar reagan democrats who did not trust the trade policies to be in their best interest, and black, Hispanic, and young people not voting, or voting for third party protest candidates. The reality is that those who most have risk with a Trump Presidency failed to give a chit. So we are going to over turn the apple cart because of voter complacency when this system has served us well for hundreds of years........a million votes more for Hillary or a million less does not change the reality. Donald Trump won because those most impacted by the policies to come did not give a chit. Blaming Trump for lazy citizens who chose not to get involved, or blaming the electoral college is simply short sighted. I might add that Hillary Clinton did not make one campaign stop in Wisconsin. The Madison area overwhelmingly voted for President Obama, but did nothing for Hillary who could not spare one stop to the state. It appears that SOS Powell speaking of Hillary's Hubris was just being honest. Yea, it sucks to allow ignorance and hate to take the lead in this country, but apathy and the failure to vote is responsible for this loss, not the electoral college.

Guest


Guest

Turnout? Where have I heard that before?

Joanimaroni

Joanimaroni

2seaoat wrote:The electoral college is not the problem.  The problem is that folks in Milwaukee and Detroit failed to turn out and the electoral college was lost by less than 100k votes, not by hateful dixiecrats.......that is a given, but by blue collar reagan democrats who did not trust the trade policies to be in their best interest, and black, Hispanic, and young people not voting, or voting for third party protest candidates.  The reality is that those who most have risk with a Trump Presidency failed to give a chit.  So we are going to over turn the apple cart because of voter complacency when this system has served us well for hundreds of years........a million votes more for Hillary or a million less does not change the reality.   Donald Trump won because those most impacted by the policies to come did not give a chit.  Blaming Trump for lazy citizens who chose not to get involved, or blaming the electoral college is simply short sighted.  I might add that Hillary Clinton did not make one campaign stop in Wisconsin.  The Madison area overwhelmingly voted for President Obama, but did nothing for Hillary who could not spare one stop to the state.  It appears that SOS Powell speaking of Hillary's Hubris was just being honest.  Yea, it sucks to allow ignorance and hate to take the lead in this country, but apathy and the failure to vote is responsible for this loss, not the electoral college.


Hillary seemed to disappear for a week or more frequently . ...I still believe there is a medical problem.

32Petition: National Popular Vote - Page 2 Empty Turnout 11/17/2016, 1:55 pm

ottootto



With National Popular Vote, presidential campaigns would poll, organize, visit, and appeal to more than 7 states. One would reasonably expect that voter turnout would rise in 80%+ of the country that is currently conceded months in advance by the minority parties in the states, taken for granted by the dominant party in the states, and ignored by all parties in presidential campaigns.

A national popular vote could increase down-ballot turnout voters during presidential election years.

Under National Popular Vote, every voter, everywhere, would be politically relevant and equal in every presidential election. Every vote would matter in the state counts and national count.

National Popular Vote would give a voice to the minority party voters in presidential elections in each state. Now they don't matter to their candidate.

In 2012, 56,256,178 (44%) of the 128,954,498 voters had their vote diverted by the winner-take-all rule to a candidate they opposed (namely, their state’s first-place candidate).

And now votes, beyond the one needed to get the most votes in the state, for winning in a state, are wasted and don't matter to candidates.
Oklahoma (7 electoral votes) alone generated a margin of 455,000 "wasted" votes for Bush in 2004 -- larger than the margin generated by the 9th and 10th largest states, namely New Jersey and North Carolina (each with 15 electoral votes).
Utah (5 electoral votes) alone generated a margin of 385,000 "wasted" votes for Bush in 2004.
8 small western states, with less than a third of California’s population, provided Bush with a bigger margin (1,283,076) than California provided Kerry (1,235,659).

In 2008, voter turnout in the then 15 battleground states averaged seven points higher than in the 35 non-battleground states.

In 2012, voter turnout was 11% higher in the then 9 battleground states than in the remainder of the country.

In the 2012 presidential election, 1.3 million votes decided the winner in the ten states with the closest margins of victory. But nearly 20 million eligible citizens in those states—Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Wisconsin—are missing from the voter rolls.

Overall, these “missing voters” amount to half, and in some cases more than half, of the total votes cast for president in these states.

ottootto



In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state's electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but later enacted by 48 states) (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided).

Support for a national popular vote is strong among Republicans, Democrats, and Independent voters, as well as every demographic group in every state surveyed recently. In the 41 red, blue, and purple states surveyed, overall support has been in the 67-81% range - in rural states, in small states, in Southern and border states, in big states, and in other states polled.

Most Americans don't ultimately care whether their presidential candidate wins or loses in their state or district . . . they care whether he/she wins the White House. Voters want to know, that no matter where they live, even if they were on the losing side, their vote actually was equally counted and mattered to their candidate. Most Americans think it is wrong that the candidate with the most popular votes can lose. We don't allow this in any other election in our representative republic.

The National Popular Vote bill was approved this year by a unanimous bipartisan House committee vote in both Georgia (16 electoral votes) and Missouri (10).
Since 2006, the bill has passed 34 state legislative chambers in 23 rural, small, medium, large, Democratic, Republican and purple states with 261 electoral votes, including one house in Arizona (11), Arkansas (6), Maine (4), Michigan (16), Nevada (6), New Mexico (5), North Carolina (15), and Oklahoma (7), and both houses in Colorado (9).
The bill has been enacted by 11 small, medium, and large jurisdictions with 165 electoral votes – 61% of the way to guaranteeing the presidency to the candidate with the most national popular votes and majority of Electoral College votes.

NationalPopularVote

ottootto



The National Popular Vote bill is 61% of the way to guaranteeing the majority of Electoral College votes and the presidency in 2020 to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in the country, by changing state winner-take-all laws (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but later enacted by 48 states), without changing anything in the Constitution, using the built-in method that the Constitution provides for states to make changes.

All voters would be valued equally in presidential elections, no matter where they live.

Every vote, everywhere, for every candidate, would be politically relevant and equal in every presidential election.
No more distorting and divisive red and blue state maps of predictable outcomes.

The bill would take effect when enacted by states with a majority of the electoral votes—270 of 538.
All of the presidential electors from the enacting states will be supporters of the presidential candidate receiving the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC)—thereby guaranteeing that candidate with an Electoral College majority.

NationalPopularVote.com

2seaoat



The electoral college has worked well throughout history. The idea that votes are wasted within the structure of a state is what in part gives that state a level of sovereignty to counter balance the sway of the popular vote where a state may stand in opposition to a candidate.

In regard to focusing on only six or seven states, I would argue that did not work in this election cycle. The assumptions that a state is blue or red are not set in stone. In Illinois we have a Republican governor, and had one Republican senator, yet from the get go it was considered a sure thing for Hillary. This same assumption was in effect in Michigan and Wisconsin. Well the assumptions were wrong. If folks want to change the system, move to rural states, or move to urban area states, but do not take more vestiges of our founding fathers emphasis on the role of the states in our constitutional system.

If electing the MVP was simply who scored the most points, then other criteria which over time has been deemed important could simply be ignored and the highest point scorer would automatically be the MVP. Our system has worked reasonably well for two hundred years. Political change in response to disappointing election results is not a foundation I want built upon......we have a great foundation and we should play the game by the rules.

Markle

Markle

boards of FL wrote:
Joanimaroni wrote:If Hillary won the electoral vote and lost the popular vote would we be having this discussion?


Yes.  I also had this very conversation several times over the years in the absence of a general election result.  I've even posted statistical analysis comparing each state's population with its number of electoral votes in order to determine how much a vote in each state counts several times going back as far as to the PNJ forum.

And I'm bringing it up again now because it is relevant to current events.

NOT relevant to current events.

A constitutional amendment would be needed. That means two-thirds of the house and senate must approve of the amendment.

Do you really believe that two-thirds of the house and senate would vote to eliminate their state from, in effect, voting for the president? No, I didn't think so.

THEN it must go to the states where THREE-QUARTERS of the state legislators must approve. Do you really believe that three-quarters of the states would approve of eliminating themselves from having any power in choosing our president? No, I didn't think so.

It was put into the Constitution for a very good reason and should remain.

If ANYTHING should be changed in our voting process is the Repeal of the 17th Amendment. The one that establishes the direct election of United States Senators by popular vote.

ottootto



Unable to agree on any particular method for selecting presidential electors, the Founding Fathers left the choice of method exclusively to the states in Article II, Section 1
“Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors….”
The U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly characterized the authority of the state legislatures over the manner of awarding their electoral votes as "plenary" and "exclusive."

Neither of the two most important features of the current system of electing the President (namely, universal suffrage, and the 48 state-by-state winner-take-all method) are in the U.S. Constitution. Neither was the choice of the Founders when they went back to their states to organize the nation's first presidential election.

In 1789, in the nation's first election, a majority of the states appointed their presidential electors by appointment by the legislature or by the governor and his cabinet, the people had no vote for President in most states, and in states where there was a popular vote, only men who owned a substantial amount of property could vote, and only three states used the state-by-state winner-take-all method to award electoral votes.

The current winner-take-all method of awarding electoral votes is not in the U.S. Constitution. It was not debated at the Constitutional Convention. It is not mentioned in the Federalist Papers. It was not the Founders’ choice. It was used by only three states in 1789, and all three of them repealed it by 1800. It is not entitled to any special deference based on history or the historical meaning of the words in the U.S. Constitution. The actions taken by the Founding Fathers make it clear that they never gave their imprimatur to the winner-take-all method. The winner-take-all method of awarding electoral votes became dominant only in the 1830s, when most of the Founders had been dead for decades, after the states adopted it, one-by-one, in order to maximize the power of the party in power in each state.

The constitutional wording does not encourage, discourage, require, or prohibit the use of any particular method for awarding a state's electoral votes.

States have the responsibility and constitutional power to make all of their voters relevant in every presidential election and beyond.

The National Popular Vote bill is 61% of the way to guaranteeing the majority of Electoral College votes and the presidency in 2020 to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in the country, by changing state winner-take-all laws (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but later enacted by 48 states), without changing anything in the Constitution, using the built-in method that the Constitution provides for states to make changes.

All voters would be valued equally in presidential elections, no matter where they live.

ottootto



2seaoat wrote:The electoral college has worked well throughout history. .

Trump, November 13, 2016, 60 Minutes
“ I would rather see it, where you went with simple votes. You know, you get 100 million votes, and somebody else gets 90 million votes, and you win. There’s a reason for doing this. Because it brings all the states into play.”

In 2012, the night Mitt Romney lost, Donald Trump tweeted.
"The phoney electoral college made a laughing stock out of our nation. . . . The electoral college is a disaster for a democracy."

In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state's electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but later enacted by 48 states) (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided).

Support for a national popular vote is strong among Republicans, Democrats, and Independent voters, as well as every demographic group in every state surveyed recently. In the 41 red, blue, and purple states surveyed, overall support has been in the 67-81% range - in rural states, in small states, in Southern and border states, in big states, and in other states polled.

Most Americans don't ultimately care whether their presidential candidate wins or loses in their state or district . . . they care whether he/she wins the White House. Voters want to know, that no matter where they live, even if they were on the losing side, their vote actually was equally counted and mattered to their candidate. Most Americans think it is wrong that the candidate with the most popular votes can lose. We don't allow this in any other election in our representative republic.

ottootto



Wasting the votes of citizens of a state is Not what in part gives that state a level of sovereignty.

The National Popular Vote bill would give a voice to the minority party voters for president in each state. Now their votes are counted only for the presidential candidate they did not vote for. Now they don't matter to their candidate.

In 2012, 56,256,178 (44%) of the 128,954,498 voters had their vote diverted by the winner-take-all rule to a candidate they opposed (namely, their state’s first-place candidate).

And now votes, beyond the one needed to get the most votes in the state, for winning in a state, are wasted and don't matter to presidential candidates.
Utah (5 electoral votes) alone generated a margin of 385,000 "wasted" votes for Bush in 2004.
Oklahoma (7 electoral votes) alone generated a margin of 455,000 "wasted" votes for Bush in 2004 -- larger than the margin generated by the 9th and 10th largest states, namely New Jersey and North Carolina (each with 15 electoral votes).
8 small western states, with less than a third of California’s population, provided Bush with a bigger margin (1,283,076) than California provided Kerry (1,235,659).

ottootto



Because of state-by-state winner-take-all laws, not mentioned, much less endorsed, in the Constitution. . .

In the 2012 presidential election, 1.3 million votes decided the winner in the ten states with the closest margins of victory.

Candidates had no reason to poll, visit, advertise, organize, campaign, or care about the voter concerns in the dozens of states where they were safely ahead or hopelessly behind.

With the end of the primaries, without the National Popular Vote bill in effect, the political relevance of 70% of all Americans was finished for the presidential election.

In the 2016 general election campaign

Over half (57%) of the campaign events were held in just 4 states (Florida, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Ohio).

Virtually all (94%) of the campaign events were in just 12 states (containing only 30% of the country's population).

In the 2012 general election campaign

38 states (including 24 of the 27 smallest states) had no campaign events, and minuscule or no spending for TV ads.

More than 99% of presidential campaign attention (ad spending and visits) was invested on voters in just the only ten competitive states..

Two-thirds (176 of 253) of the general-election campaign events, and a similar fraction of campaign expenditures, were in just four states (Ohio, Florida, Virginia, and Iowa).

ottootto



The system is the mother of all gerrymanders.

No American should have to move anywhere to be politically relevant in presidential elections.

Markle

Markle

Here are the counties where Hillary won the popular vote.

Anyone who believes we should have our Presidential Election based on the popular vote is more than a few fries short of a Happy Meal.

More than forty states simply would not participate.  Why would they?  They have no vote.

Grow up, we have the Electoral College for a great reason and it is just as valuable today as it was from day one.  It is NOT going away...ever, so just accept the FACT.

Nuff said.

ottootto



Trump, November 13, 2016, 60 Minutes
“ I would rather see it, where you went with simple votes. You know, you get 100 million votes, and somebody else gets 90 million votes, and you win. There’s a reason for doing this. Because it brings all the states into play.”

In 2012, the night Mitt Romney lost, Donald Trump tweeted.
"The phoney electoral college made a laughing stock out of our nation. . . . The electoral college is a disaster for a democracy."

Recent and past presidential candidates who supported direct election of the President in the form of a constitutional amendment, before the National Popular Vote bill was introduced: George H.W. Bush (R-TX-1969), Jimmy Carter (D-GA-1977), Hillary Clinton (D-NY-2001), Bob Dole (R-KS-1969),Michael Dukakis (D-MA), Gerald Ford (R-MI-1969), and Richard Nixon (R-CA-1969).

Recent and past presidential candidates with a public record of support for the National Popular Vote bill that would guarantee the majority of Electoral College votes and the presidency to the candidate with the most national popular votes: Congressmen John Anderson (R, I –ILL), and Bob Barr (Libertarian- GA), Senator Birch Bayh (D-IN), Senator and Governor Lincoln Chafee (R-I-D, -RI), Governor and former Democratic National Committee Chair Howard Dean (D–VT), U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R–GA), Senator and Vice President Al Gore (D-TN), Ralph Nader, Governor Martin O’Malley (D-MD), Jill Stein (Green), Congressman Tom Tancredo (R-CO), and Senator Fred Thompson (R–TN).

ottootto



Now, a presidential candidate could lose while winning 78%+ of the popular vote and 39 states.

With the current state-by-state winner-take-all system of awarding electoral votes (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but later enacted by 48 states), it could only take winning a bare plurality of popular votes in only the 11 most populous states, containing 56% of the population of the United States, for a candidate to win the Presidency with less than 22% of the nation's votes!

ottootto



A difference of a few thousand voters in one, two, or three states would have elected the second-place candidate in 5 of the 16 presidential elections since World War II. Near misses are now frequently common. There have been 8 consecutive non-landslide presidential elections since 1988.
537 popular votes won Florida and the White House for Bush in 2000 despite Gore's lead of 537,179 (1,000 times more) popular votes nationwide.
A difference of 60,000 voters in Ohio in 2004 would have defeated President Bush despite his nationwide lead of over 3 million votes.
In 2012, a shift of 214,733 popular votes in four states would have elected Mitt Romney, despite President Obama’s nationwide lead of 4,966,945 votes.

ottootto



In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state's electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but later enacted by 48 states) (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided).

Support for a national popular vote for President is strong among Republicans, Democrats, and Independent voters, as well as every demographic group in every state surveyed recently. In the 41 red, blue, and purple states surveyed, overall support has been in the 67-81% range - in rural states, in small states, in Southern and border states, in big states, and in other states polled.

Most Americans don't ultimately care whether their presidential candidate wins or loses in their state or district . . . they care whether he/she wins the White House. Voters want to know, that no matter where they live, even if they were on the losing side, their vote actually was equally counted and mattered to their candidate. Most Americans think it is wrong that the candidate with the most popular votes can lose. We don't allow this in any other election in our representative republic.

The National Popular Vote bill was approved this year by a unanimous bipartisan House committee vote in both Georgia (16 electoral votes) and Missouri (10).
Since 2006, the bill has passed 34 state legislative chambers in 23 rural, small, medium, large, Democratic, Republican and purple states with 261 electoral votes, including one house in Arizona (11), Arkansas (6), Maine (4), Michigan (16), Nevada (6), New Mexico (5), North Carolina (15), and Oklahoma (7), and both houses in Colorado (9).
The bill has been enacted by 11 small, medium, and large jurisdictions with 165 electoral votes – 61% of the way to guaranteeing the presidency to the candidate with the most national popular votes and majority of Electoral College votes.

ottootto



A survey of Florida voters showed 78% overall support for a national popular vote for President.

NationalPopularVote.com

Guest


Guest

boards of FL wrote:
PkrBum wrote:Lol... why bother having elections. Eh comrade?


I'm interested in hearing your rationale for why the person who earns the most votes should not win the election.

Watch, everyone. He's going to be at a loss for words.

urban centers (about 20% of nation) would be dominate 80% of the nation without the electoral college.....that is mob rule

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