Should we reform the Electoral College?

[Mister Mets]

I'm in full support of the Popular Vote Compact. It's the easiest way to have the equivalent of a national popular vote.

I don't think a vote by congressional district works, as that encourages even more gerrymandering and naturally benefits one party (in this case it's the Republicans, as Democrats are more likely to live in areas where they're overrepresented, or in small liberal enclaves within conservative zones.)

[Mister Mets]

I'm in full support of the Popular Vote Compact. It's the easiest way to have the equivalent of a national popular vote.

I don't think a vote by congressional district works, as that encourages even more gerrymandering and naturally benefits one party (in this case it's the Republicans, as Democrats are more likely to live in areas where they're overrepresented, or in small liberal enclaves within conservative zones.)

I think that's the biggest issue. Over representation. Democrats in cities have far too much power in major states just by living in tiny zones.

They'd have the same amount of votes no matter where they lived in the state.

The problem Democrats face with congressional representation is that urban areas are more liberal than rural and suburban areas are more conservative. It doesn't seem fair to repeat that imbalance with the presidential vote.

I like the idea of a popular electoral vote, so that the votes of people who don't live in a handful of purple states can matter, even though whoever wins the popular vote usually gets the electoral vote as well (And I'm not going to cry if someone loses the popular vote by a slim margin, but wins the electoral vote.)

[Mister Mets]

For the ones who want to abolish the Electoral College, what do you prefer:
Popular vote in one round? Or two rounds?

Would you like the possibility of voting for Ralph Nader in the first round and for the Democrat in the second round?

One round. Election day is complicated enough without sometimes making it happen twice in a short period of time.

I don't know if Instant Runoff Voting works. First it's tough to get parties to agree to anything that makes Independents stronger. And the electorate is unlikely to be sufficiently informed to be expected to rank numerous candidates.

[Mister Mets]

Hilarious how the GOP now wants to reform the electoral college.  Last time I checked Gore won the popular vote

Last I checked it's 2014, not 2000, and the Democrats have a huge advantage with the current EC map

The regions that have agreed to the National Popular Vote Compact tend to be liberal. It passed in DC and nine Safe-D states. It's also waiting for executive approval in New York.

Its best showing in any conservative state is Oklahoma, where it passed the upper house.

[Mister Mets]

Getting rid of the EC would be unfair to states like Wyoming & Vermont.

Not really.

There is the argument that citizens in the small states have an unfair advantage at the moment, since they'll have a bigger effect on the electoral outcome than the typical voter.

Although I'd counter that with the current system deprives them of a meaningful effect on the outcome.

There are 12 states with 3-4 electoral votes, in addition to DC. Only one, New Hampshire, has a shot at making a difference in the current political environment.

In the rest, an individual vote doesn't matter because it's a safe bet one party will win in a landslide. The Democrats will win the electoral votes of Hawaii, Vermont, Delaware, Rhode Island, Maine and Washington DC. Republicans will win the electoral vote totals of Idaho, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Alaska and Wyoming.

Repealing the electoral college allows the citizens to be part of a process where the outcome isn't known.

[Mister Mets]

Hilarious how the GOP now wants to reform the electoral college.  Last time I checked Gore won the popular vote

Last I checked it's 2014, not 2000, and the Democrats have a huge advantage with the current EC map

The regions that have agreed to the National Popular Vote Compact tend to be liberal. It passed in DC and nine Safe-D states. It's also waiting for executive approval in New York.

Its best showing in any conservative state is Oklahoma, where it passed the upper house.

It is kind of ironic that the compact is doing best in liberal state, seeing as how Democrats, at least right now, benefit much more from keeping the EC

Republicans are more likely to support the federalist arguments for preserving the electoral college, so that could encourage them to go against their interests. A national vote may also require uniform voting standards, which they might not be comfortable with.

Although there's also the presumption that the outcome won't be different with or without the electoral college (which is usually true.)

There may also be a greater comfort in a familiar strategy over a suddenly nationalized campaign.

[Mister Mets]

Big cities should be treated as "city-states" during presidential elections. This would make things fair for non-city folk in states like California and Pennsylvania, where rural people have no say.

There's an argument for giving cities with a big enough population (let's say one in excess of the least populated state) more representation, including Senators. That would also include some electoral college benefits.

Though it would probably end up favoring Democrats.

Why not keep the EC, but allocating the votes with the popular vote in the states?

Examples: Wyoming  GOP 64%; DEM 32% --> GOP 2 EV; DEM 1 EV

Might even make third party votes more interresting.

That could make it tougher to find out who won the presidential election, and by how much.

Right now, it's enough to know that a state was won. But now we'd have to wait for the full results to determine how many EVs a candidate won.

[Mister Mets]

Big cities should be treated as "city-states" during presidential elections. This would make things fair for non-city folk in states like California and Pennsylvania, where rural people have no say.

There's an argument for giving cities with a big enough population (let's say one in excess of the least populated state) more representation, including Senators. That would also include some electoral college benefits.

Though it would probably end up favoring Democrats.

This is actually one of the most reasonable reforms to 1. protect rural interests in presidential elections and 2. protect urban interests in the senate.  It would actually hurt Democrats in the electoral college most likely, but it might make the senate of all things very hard for R's to win.  There are currently 30 cities (excluding DC) with a larger population than Wyoming, the smallest of which being Las Vegas.  If we made each of them new states, 26 of them would reflexively vote Democratic for everything, the only exceptions being Oklahoma City, Jacksonville, and possibly Fort Worth and Houston.

In the electoral college, this probably helps Republicans.  For example, after removing LA, San Diego, San Francisco and San Jose, the remainder of CA would still contain about 30 million people and most of the EVs.  It might be a swing state.  The remainder of IL, PA, WA, OR, MI and OH would clearly flip to R's.  However, the cities now having senator EVs of their own would offset this somewhat.

If we added these 30 new states, that would give 52 new Democratic senators, 4 new Republican senators (OKC and Jacksonville) and let's say a 1-1 split in Ft. Worth and Houston which might be generous to R's.  Now, Republicans would pick up about 15 new senate seats in existing states once the cities were removed, but that would still be a Senate in the neighborhood of a 95D/65R...

I'm kinda proud of the idea even if it's not going to happen. The current Senate system screws over urban populations, as well as groups that disproportionately live in Urban areas.

But you noted the obvious harm to Republicans. There are also would be a point where the Senate gets too big. And cities would have massive incentives to grow populations , at least pn paper, enough to qualify for representation (although there is a fairly major cutoff from Vegas to Albuquerque.) Minneapolis and St Paul would have an argument for a representative for the Twin Cities.

There are ways to avoid some of the problems, including limiting Senate representation to the an arbitrary number of popular cities (IE- ten most populous cities, or nine most populous cities plus DC.)

There might be a few more new swing states than you suggest. Indianapolis and San Diego have Republican mayors, although that's pretty much it. Though Arizona without Phoenix, and Pennsylvania without Philadelphia would be different electorates.