6 ms·

It may actually happen in our lifetime. The small states would never allow such a change to the constitution. (A presidential voter in Wyoming has almost 4 ti

It may actually happen in our lifetime. The small states would never allow such a change to the constitution. (A presidential voter in Wyoming has almost 4 times the vote of a Californian.) But the big states may have found a work around: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstat... In short, the states that agree to the compact agree to proportion all of their electoral votes to the winner of the popular vote. (For example, if Romney wins the national popular vote, CA would give Romney all of CA's electoral votes.) The compact will only kick in once the states that have ratified it have 270 electoral votes (enough to win). It's already about halfway there at 132. How crazy would it be to see campaigning in California and New York?

waterlesscloud 14y ago
So instead of your vote being lost in the mass of California or New York votes, it would just be lost in the much larger mass of national votes. You'd still be in a winner-take-all situation with your vote, but on a national level rather than a state level. I don't think this change would have the effect people imagine. At all.
- calinet6 14y ago
  It would not appear to, but in effect, it would make the entire election simply based on popular vote. Therefore your vote is not lost, it simply becomes equal. This is far better than your vote actually being lost in the mass of California votes, since you, living in California, would still have some impact on the national outcome. And candidates, looking for popular votes instead of electoral votes, would have much higher incentive to campaign to all people, not just those in states where votes carry "more weight." In all ways, this is more equal and more fair. Every election is a winner-take-all situation—it might as well be a winner-take-all situation where your vote actually has an impact independent of your state.
  - waterlesscloud 14y ago
    What specific concrete difference do you see happening in that case? What does it mean to "campaign to all people"?
    - comex 14y ago
      Candidates currently essentially have no reason to pay any attention whatsoever to non-competitive states, but if the election were a popular vote, going from, say, 20% to 40% in a state would be a significant advantage.
    - afterburner 14y ago
      If you can move one percent of the population everywhere with some nation-wide issues, that's huge. Currently, that strategy is less useful, being costly and with less payoff.
    - yummyfajitas 14y ago
      One effect - economic conservatism may make a comeback. NY, CA and several other liberal states tend to have people who call themselves "conservatives" (folks like me). We tend to be libertarian leaning economic conservatives who don't identify with religious culture war stuff (war on christmas, the gays are gonna get you). We get ignored since our vote doesn't matter. This leads to national candidates who are basically Democrats with a little bit of Jesus thrown in (e.g. Bush, Romney), albeit answering to different special interest groups.
      - backprojection 14y ago
        Isn't what you're describing more an effect of a two-party system? Unrelated policies tend to get pushed together just because they fit best under one party vs. the other one.
      - jbooth 14y ago
        That'd be nice, but for the record, spending a lot of money on the military and cutting taxes (Bush, Romney) is not 'basically democrats with a little bit of jesus thrown in'. I think your beef is more with the national security conservatives than the religious ones, religion is orthogonal to economic conservatism and often employed in its favor (megachurches hating on 'socialism', etc)
wisty 14y ago
I'm surprised that most of the states supporting this are democrat or swing states. I guess more red states will get behind this if Obama wins the election, but loses the popular vote.

waterlesscloud 14y ago

So instead of your vote being lost in the mass of California or New York votes, it would just be lost in the much larger mass of national votes. You'd still be in a winner-take-all situation with your vote, but on a national level rather than a state level. I don't think this change would have the effect people imagine. At all.

calinet6 14y ago
It would not appear to, but in effect, it would make the entire election simply based on popular vote. Therefore your vote is not lost, it simply becomes equal. This is far better than your vote actually being lost in the mass of California votes, since you, living in California, would still have some impact on the national outcome. And candidates, looking for popular votes instead of electoral votes, would have much higher incentive to campaign to all people, not just those in states where votes carry "more weight." In all ways, this is more equal and more fair. Every election is a winner-take-all situation—it might as well be a winner-take-all situation where your vote actually has an impact independent of your state.
- waterlesscloud 14y ago
  What specific concrete difference do you see happening in that case? What does it mean to "campaign to all people"?
  - comex 14y ago
    Candidates currently essentially have no reason to pay any attention whatsoever to non-competitive states, but if the election were a popular vote, going from, say, 20% to 40% in a state would be a significant advantage.
  - afterburner 14y ago
    If you can move one percent of the population everywhere with some nation-wide issues, that's huge. Currently, that strategy is less useful, being costly and with less payoff.
  - yummyfajitas 14y ago
    One effect - economic conservatism may make a comeback. NY, CA and several other liberal states tend to have people who call themselves "conservatives" (folks like me). We tend to be libertarian leaning economic conservatives who don't identify with religious culture war stuff (war on christmas, the gays are gonna get you). We get ignored since our vote doesn't matter. This leads to national candidates who are basically Democrats with a little bit of Jesus thrown in (e.g. Bush, Romney), albeit answering to different special interest groups.
    - backprojection 14y ago
      Isn't what you're describing more an effect of a two-party system? Unrelated policies tend to get pushed together just because they fit best under one party vs. the other one.
    - jbooth 14y ago
      That'd be nice, but for the record, spending a lot of money on the military and cutting taxes (Bush, Romney) is not 'basically democrats with a little bit of jesus thrown in'. I think your beef is more with the national security conservatives than the religious ones, religion is orthogonal to economic conservatism and often employed in its favor (megachurches hating on 'socialism', etc)

wisty 14y ago

I'm surprised that most of the states supporting this are democrat or swing states. I guess more red states will get behind this if Obama wins the election, but loses the popular vote.