Why the Right Wing Is Petrified of Letting Voters, Instead of the Electoral College, Pick Presidents

[marmar]

AlterNet / By Steven Rosenfeld

Why the Right Wing Is Petrified of Letting Voters, Instead of the Electoral College, Pick Presidents
A movement to reform the Electoral College and elect the president based on the national popular vote has half the states it needs.

February 7, 2012 |


Republican Senator Mitch McConnell calls it “absurd and dangerous.” The Wall Street Journal says it deserves to “die.” The Heritage Foundation calls it “unconstitutional.” The Washington Post calls it “flawed.” A Republican National Committee resolution says it is a radical, un-American, “questionable legal maneuver.”

It is awarding the presidency to the candidate who wins the most votes.

“The United States is not a democracy and shouldn’t be,” said Michael Munger, Duke University’s Political Science Department chairman and a 2008 Libertarian gubernatorial candidate attacking it at a League of Women Voters forum. “There is NO moral force in the majority. It is just what most people happen to think.”

These right-wingers are truly worried that a plan reforming the way the president-electing Electoral College works is gaining legal ground and could bring the biggest change in the political landscape in decades. The National Popular Vote plan would replace the current system, in which states award Electoral College delegates to whomever wins the presidential vote in that state, with a new interstate agreement where a participating state’s delegates would be bound to the national popular vote winner. .............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.alternet.org/election2012/154027/why_the_right_wing_is_petrified_of_letting_voters%2C_instead_of_the_electoral_college%2C_pick_presidents/

[jel]

1. Why?

Because our country is a republic, not a democracy - and it's in the constitution.

[muriel_volestrangler]

6. Did you read the article?

Your comments seem to say you didn't. I recommend it to you.

[LonePirate]

2. Dems run up ever increasing margins in big states like CA and NY while R margins in TX keep falling

The swing states will be close for a few more cycles and Rs have fewer large second tier states than Dems. They simply have a much tougher chance to win under a national vote.

Doesn't this movement also contain an amendment process for the Constitution?

[MrTriumph]

5. Like Texas? Ask the Democratic State Reps & Senators that lost in 2010

However, VP Biden came to Fort Worth, Texas last week to raise money that will NOT be spent in Texas.

[Sgent]

8. Constitutional amendment

is not required and probably would never happen.

The way around it is for states to select electors based on the national vote, rather than the vote in the state (state's are free to select electors according to any criteria they want).

If states with more than 270 electoral votes sign on, its done.

[baldguy]

3. Because if we did they'd never win the Presidency ever again.

[tanyev]

4. But they lurrrve the idea of making blue states proportional and red states winner take all.

[Lil Missy]

7. Because they'd lose!