House proposes an Amendment to the Constitution to eliminate the Electoral College

tippy2k2

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I doubt it will succeed.
Almost certainly. You need 75% of the states to be on board a constitutional change (which this would be) and Republicans know that if it were purely popular vote, their chances of winning a national election plummets badly (it's probably not a zero percent change they could win Presidency again but it would be damn close to it). There's no chance that they're going to convince any Republican or Republican Run State to basically volunteer their power away.
 

Agema

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Almost certainly. You need 75% of the states to be on board a constitutional change (which this would be) and Republicans know that if it were purely popular vote, their chances of winning a national election plummets badly (it's probably not a zero percent change they could win Presidency again but it would be damn close to it). There's no chance that they're going to convince any Republican or Republican Run State to basically volunteer their power away.
One thing you can absolutely guarantee is that in the long term, things never work out quite like you thought they would.

Let's say this passes, and the Republicans know they're down on national percentages. They will simply reconfigure. The thing is, the Republicans need to keep on message for certain states to get over the finish line. What if they don't need to any more? Screw Kansas and Alabama, look at all the votes that could be available in California and New York! No more fretting over what Florida retirees and rural Georgia thinks, because there are three times as many urban professionals in LA, Chicago, NY, etc. whose votes now count to their total even if they don't carry the state.

It could actually, at a stroke, completely revitalise the Republican Party by forcing them to change. They could go from a decaying party of bitter, old white men to a vibrant, younger, socially liberal(-ish) economically right wing. It only needs a few years to do that. What are all those fervent conservatives going to do? Vote Democrat? I don't think so. Sure, some of them will turn off in despair or switch in anger, but most of them will take a look and stick with their lesser evil.

So, you know, be careful what you wish for.

* * *

I also just want to point out Kyle Becker in that tweet essentially admitting the Republicans are a dead-end party that lacks the democratic support to win a popular majority.

He should really be reflecting on that fact, and thinking about just what it is that the Republicans are doing wrong.
 

Trunkage

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The thing I find most abhorrent in the US election system is the winner takes all aspect. For example, there are a lot of Republicans in California that will never be represented. They should be and letting a whole state go one political party or the other is not helping with the division thing
 

Trunkage

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One thing you can absolutely guarantee is that in the long term, things never work out quite like you thought they would.

Let's say this passes, and the Republicans know they're down on national percentages. They will simply reconfigure. The thing is, the Republicans need to keep on message for certain states to get over the finish line. What if they don't need to any more? Screw Kansas and Alabama, look at all the votes that could be available in California and New York! No more fretting over what Florida retirees and rural Georgia thinks, because there are three times as many urban professionals in LA, Chicago, NY, etc. whose votes now count to their total even if they don't carry the state.

It could actually, at a stroke, completely revitalise the Republican Party by forcing them to change. They could go from a decaying party of bitter, old white men to a vibrant, younger, socially liberal(-ish) economically right wing. It only needs a few years to do that. What are all those fervent conservatives going to do? Vote Democrat? I don't think so. Sure, some of them will turn off in despair or switch in anger, but most of them will take a look and stick with their lesser evil.

So, you know, be careful what you wish for.

* * *

I also just want to point out Kyle Becker in that tweet essentially admitting the Republicans are a dead-end party that lacks the democratic support to win a popular majority.

He should really be reflecting on that fact, and thinking about just what it is that the Republicans are doing wrong.
Well, I was going to write 'Republicans are worried they'd actually have to listen to the populace and provide policies that help them' but you did it for me
 

tippy2k2

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One thing you can absolutely guarantee is that in the long term, things never work out quite like you thought they would.

Let's say this passes, and the Republicans know they're down on national percentages. They will simply reconfigure. The thing is, the Republicans need to keep on message for certain states to get over the finish line. What if they don't need to any more? Screw Kansas and Alabama, look at all the votes that could be available in California and New York! No more fretting over what Florida retirees and rural Georgia thinks, because there are three times as many urban professionals in LA, Chicago, NY, etc. whose votes now count to their total even if they don't carry the state.

It could actually, at a stroke, completely revitalise the Republican Party by forcing them to change. They could go from a decaying party of bitter, old white men to a vibrant, younger, socially liberal(-ish) economically right wing. It only needs a few years to do that. What are all those fervent conservatives going to do? Vote Democrat? I don't think so. Sure, some of them will turn off in despair or switch in anger, but most of them will take a look and stick with their lesser evil.

So, you know, be careful what you wish for.

* * *

I also just want to point out Kyle Becker in that tweet essentially admitting the Republicans are a dead-end party that lacks the democratic support to win a popular majority.

He should really be reflecting on that fact, and thinking about just what it is that the Republicans are doing wrong.
They could do that...

Or they could just block this and keep on keepin on. There's literally zero reason for them to let this go through as it will force them to either completely lose power or force them to basically change their entire party. There's no real upside for Republicans to let this happen and a LOT of downsides for them.
 

09philj

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The Republican establishment won't risk compromising their gravy train.
 

Eacaraxe

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...No more fretting over what Florida retirees and rural Georgia thinks, because there are three times as many urban professionals in LA, Chicago, NY, etc. whose votes now count to their total even if they don't carry the state...
It would also be carte blanche for the Democratic party to tack even further to the right on economic and foreign policy than they already have in the past decade. The Democratic party is currently further right than the Republican party even under Bush, just wait and see what happens when they find themselves no longer obliged to pay lip service to civil rights and liberties activists, and rust belt voters, and can go full Schumer appealing to people who are fascist in all but identarianism.
 

Worgen

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Whatever, just wash your hands.
It would also be carte blanche for the Democratic party to tack even further to the right on economic and foreign policy than they already have in the past decade. The Democratic party is currently further right than the Republican party even under Bush, just wait and see what happens when they find themselves no longer obliged to pay lip service to civil rights and liberties activists, and rust belt voters, and can go full Schumer appealing to people who are fascist in all but identarianism.
Blargle blargle blargle. The democrats don't want to kill all landlords, they are further right then hitler. Blargle blargle blargle.
 

tippy2k2

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It would also be carte blanche for the Democratic party to tack even further to the right on economic and foreign policy than they already have in the past decade. The Democratic party is currently further right than the Republican party even under Bush, just wait and see what happens when they find themselves no longer obliged to pay lip service to civil rights and liberties activists, and rust belt voters, and can go full Schumer appealing to people who are fascist in all but identarianism.
That too. If The Republican Party didn't exist, The Democrats wouldn't have anyone to blame when "nothing fundamentally changes" again. The Democrats need The Republicans to exist because they need someone to blame every time they try nothing to make changes and have ran out of ideas.

As an aside, it is amazing that The Democrats can keep pumping things out that they know will fail (like for random example, a Constitutional Amendment to ban the Electoral College) but will make The Republicans look bad but as soon as someone says "Hey, maybe we should at least fucking TRY to put something like M4A up to votes just to apply some pressure and see where everyone stands", all of a sudden throwing up measures everyone knows will fail becomes a stupid idea...
 

Eacaraxe

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Blargle blargle blargle. The democrats don't want to kill all landlords, they are further right then hitler. Blargle blargle blargle.
You say as if we're not a month out from Congressional Democrats, in a chamber held by a Democratic majority, getting outflanked from the left on economic relief and military spending by the guy who literally just instigated a right-wing extremist insurrection whilst still in office.

As an aside, it is amazing that The Democrats can keep pumping things out that they know will fail (like for random example, a Constitutional Amendment to ban the Electoral College) but will make The Republicans look bad...
Really, this is the Democratic party in a nutshell, a Tale of Two Feinsteins:


 

Schadrach

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Almost certainly. You need 75% of the states to be on board a constitutional change (which this would be) and Republicans know that if it were purely popular vote, their chances of winning a national election plummets badly (it's probably not a zero percent change they could win Presidency again but it would be damn close to it). There's no chance that they're going to convince any Republican or Republican Run State to basically volunteer their power away.
There's no chance you're going to convince any remotely small state to go along with it. Those broadly trend Republican anyways, but it's less being red and more being small that draws the line. For example, even when we were a predictably blue state, us folks under the motto "Montani Semper Liberi" would be highly unlikely to vote for an amendment whose function is to give individual coastal cities several times more influence over the executive branch than our entire state.

Imagine Wyoming looking at and and going "So the purpose of this is to make New York City (just city limits, not the whole metro area) 16x more valuable in the presidential election than the entire state of Wyoming? Pass." and then realize that to get 3/4 of the states to go along you have to get several states in that sort of position to agree.

The thing I find most abhorrent in the US election system is the winner takes all aspect. For example, there are a lot of Republicans in California that will never be represented. They should be and letting a whole state go one political party or the other is not helping with the division thing
This isn't innate to the electoral college, each state decides how their electors should be assigned. It's just that 48 of them decided on a winner-takes-all approach. The other 2 assign 2 electors based on the result of the overall state vote, and then one each for each congressional district.

That too. If The Republican Party didn't exist, The Democrats wouldn't have anyone to blame when "nothing fundamentally changes" again.
There's nothing stopping them from banning the filibuster (simple majority vote and much more useful than restricting gendered language from the floor of the House which they've actually done) except that then there would be literally nothing between them and passing their entire agenda freely. It's hard to claim the other party is stopping you when you hold the presidency and both houses of congress without the filibuster.
 

Revnak

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It won’t pass but should. It’s embarrassing how undemocratic the US is.
 

Silvanus

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The Electoral College is a grotesque anachronism, totally unfit for purpose. There's no way it should have lasted as long as it has.

That said, I severely doubt this will pass, because both main US parties have benefitted from it.