An electoral tie & the EC

LexiLupin

A sort of fun article on Yahoo breaks down the ways in which Romney and Obama could wind up at 269-269.

http://news.yahoo.com/electoral-college-tie-becomes-growing-possibility-103405840.html

 

But let's talk about the Electoral College. My husband and I were talking about something vaguely political this weekend which got me thinking about electoral math, and this led to the question of "Why the he!l do we still do it this way?" 

Do which MH responded with some historical reasoning that made no modern sense to me... so then he started googling it, and five minutes later returned with "Why DO we still use the EC?!" 

So- discuss. Is it important that Wyoming continue to hold power over 3/538th (.55%)  of the decision over who is president, even though Wyoming will NEVER hold 3/538th of the population (.18%)? Or should proportioned representation be restricted to number of House seats, leaving presidential elections up to a national popular vote?

Should we keep the EC but allot electoral votes by individual (congressional) district results? At the moment, Nebraska and... eh... Maine?... do this, Obama got 1 of NE's votes in '08. Would this be the downfall of democrats in states like New York, where they heavily rely on getting the whole package deal based essentially on NYC?

 Ah, to live in a 'democracy'/republic/thing.

 

Edit: clarification

Kitiara5512

I dont get the EC either. I think with the technological progress that has been made, since they tally up votes to figure out electoral votes anyway, they should just do it based on the popular vote. Of course, that means Bush would have lost to Kerry (?) in 2000. People might be more likely to vote too, since they would feel more like their vote counts, especially if they are voting in the minority for their state like I am in Texas.

ohioloveyou

I used this in my senior government class to teach about the electoral college and then we had a class discussion about pros and cons. It's a pretty good little article, IMO. Goes through the history, founders' reasons for it, and pros and cons toward the end.

http://articles.cnn.com/2004-11-01/politics/eletoral.college.tm_1_respective-state-capitals-electoral-college-electoral-votes?_s=PM:ALLPOLITICS

I understand the rationale behind it, but really can't completely make up my mind if I like it or not because I'm forever hearing great arguments from both sides from my students!

MrsGoodkat

Kitiara5512:

I dont get the EC either. I think with the technological progress that has been made, since they tally up votes to figure out electoral votes anyway, they should just do it based on the popular vote. Of course, that means Bush would have lost to Kerry (?) in 2000. People might be more likely to vote too, since they would feel more like their vote counts, especially if they are voting in the minority for their state like I am in Texas.

Gore. 

Without Gore inventing the Internet, we wouldn't be here together today. *tear*  

LuckyDad

The two major parties like the EC because it means they only have to actively campaign in ~10 states rather than 50. It makes running a national campaign much cheaper. It's in the constitution, and changing the constitution is a LOT of work. I don't think it's an issue people care enough about to change.