Republicans: When you can't win, change the game

[Ugg]

Originally Posted by jnpy!$4g3cwk

I understand the sentiment, but, proportional representation has huge issues also. Bunches of small parties typically mean changing coalitions every few months. If a guy is elected to a small party-- who does he represent? At least with district representation, he represents the people inside the boundaries of that district.

Obviously, though, it hasn't worked well to let the politicians themselves draw up boundaries.

California recently changed it by referendum so that in independent board draws the boundaries. November was the first election that was used and it seemed to have worked ok.

[zioxide]

Originally Posted by jnpy!$4g3cwk

I understand the sentiment, but, proportional representation has huge issues also. Bunches of small parties typically mean changing coalitions every few months. If a guy is elected to a small party-- who does he represent? At least with district representation, he represents the people inside the boundaries of that district.

Obviously, though, it hasn't worked well to let the politicians themselves draw up boundaries.

It just seems like it would make more sense, especially for smaller states like mine, to have the Reps cover the whole state like the Senators do.

Maybe split a bigger state like California in to two or three districts, but do we really need 435 separate congressional districts? There's no real benefit and it just opens the door to all of these gerrymandering problems we have seen recently.

If the Senate has a majority of democrats and the majority of the people elected a democratic president, it doesn't seem like the House of Representatives is very representative of the population if it's majority republican.

[Bug-Creator]

Originally Posted by jnpy!$4g3cwk

I understand the sentiment, but, proportional representation has huge issues also.

Here in Germany we have a mixed system were 50% of the seats are taken by people voted in for a specific district while the overall number of seats for a party is determinated by proportional representation.

Problem is that these are counted state-by-state 1st which leads to parties having more direct candidates than seats to fill at which point the Bundestag has to be resized.

The way it's currently done has some errors that could lead to a majority coalition that did not get a majority of the actual votes and was therefor dismissed by our supreme court some years ago.
Offcourse the politicans have been unable to come up with new (legal) voting law, which might end in quite a mess since it's only 8 months till the next election....


Or in short:
Not only the US is run by bunch of selfserving dimwits

[MacNut]

Originally Posted by yg17

So you're saying that Cameron County, PA, with a population of 5,000 people, should count the same as Philadelphia County, with a population of 1.5 million people?



It's not a R-based idea. It's an asinine idea that I would hope anybody on either side of the aisle would find ridiculous.

It should not go by county or state, just base every vote separate. In Connecticut we don't recognize the county system as every town is individual. In fact I would blow apart the party system and just vote the person you want.

[SwiftLives]

Originally Posted by Ugg

That's exactly what they want, to turn this into a rural vs urban contest. The problem of course is that we are an increasingly urban country and while the repubs may gain a few votes now, they're going to lose in the long run. This is one of those moves that will come back to bite them for sure.

Ironically, the electoral college was created to provide balance between rural and urban areas.

I keep going back and forth on the electoral college issue. If we were to abolish it and move to a straight popular vote, would any candidate bother to campaign or even listen to areas of low population? Would rural interests ever be acknowledged?

On the other hand, the EC is just such a stupid system. Any system that can allow a candidate who receives fewer votes then his opponent to win an election is fundamentally flawed. And rigging the EC to allow this scenario to become more common is even more ludicrous.

[rdowns]

Originally Posted by SwiftLives

Ironically, the electoral college was created to provide balance between rural and urban areas.

I keep going back and forth on the electoral college issue. If we were to abolish it and move to a straight popular vote, would any candidate bother to campaign or even listen to areas of low population? Would rural interests ever be acknowledged?

On the other hand, the EC is just such a stupid system. Any system that can allow a candidate who receives fewer votes then his opponent to win an election is fundamentally flawed. And rigging the EC to allow this scenario to become more common is even more ludicrous.

Would the EC system be as broken if we didn't allow this ridiculous gerrymandering?

As for rural interests, they have been over represented in this country for decades. Urban tax money paid for rural development- interstates, roads, telephone lines, cable TV, cell service etc. Most red states (most are rural) receive a lot more in federal dollars than they pay in. Oddly, it is these rural folks who scream the loudest about government spending. Maybe we ought to give them their wish.

[spork183]

And out in California, the candidates come here for money, but no real campaigning. If the EC got tossed, it might make some sense to actually see candidates come here for more than a pocketbook refill.

Originally Posted by rdowns

As for rural interests, they have been over represented in this country for decades. Urban tax money paid for rural development- interstates, roads, telephone lines, cable TV, cell service etc. Most red states (most are rural) receive a lot more in federal dollars than they pay in. Oddly, it is these rural folks who scream the loudest about government spending. Maybe we ought to give them their wish.

I live in a semi-rural area. We have a volunteer fire department, no city government, policing done by the county sheriff. Yet I know the local industry contributes significantly to the county and state coffers. To keep "our money" at home would create a different imbalance. From looking at a lot of tea party signs (and listening to some really interesting tea party arguments...), I wonder if part of the allure for that ideology is a lack of understanding about what our taxes and spending really fund.

[rdowns]

Originally Posted by spork183

And out in California, the candidates come here for money, but no real campaigning. If the EC got tossed, it might make some sense to actually see candidates come here for more than a pocketbook refill.

Same here in NY. Actually, same in all solid red or blue states. Our current presidential elections involve only 10 states but in reality, they are only focused on 68 counties. That's how divided this country is.

I live in a semi-rural area. We have a volunteer fire department, no city government, policing done by the county sheriff. Yet I know the local industry contributes significantly to the county and state coffers. To keep "our money" at home would create a different imbalance. From looking at a lot of tea party signs (and listening to some really interesting tea party arguments...), I wonder if part of the allure for that ideology is a lack of understanding about what our taxes and spending really fund.

I think that's a fair statement. Surely the "keep the government out of my Medicare" signs support that. The recent vote for Sandy aid confirms that as well. All the votes against it were Republicans from red states who happen to all have received federal disaster aid recently.

[spork183]

Originally Posted by rdowns

Same here in NY. Actually, same in all solid red or blue states.

Hey, is your avatar a picture of Rex Ryan's tattoo? Isn't there a Republican bill going through the government over there limiting the voting rights of Jets Fans?

[rdowns]

Originally Posted by spork183

Hey, is your avatar a picture of Rex Ryan's tattoo? Isn't there a Republican bill going through the government over there limiting the voting rights of Jets Fans?

It's the sports page the day after the Sanchez butt fumble. Woody Johnson, the Jets owner, was one of Romney's biggest financial supporters.

[spork183]

Originally Posted by rdowns

It's the sports page the day after the Sanchez butt fumble. Woody Johnson, the Jets owner, was one of Romney's biggest financial supporters.

It's all good. They just revoked voting rights for Raider Fans. Took us 3 days to figure out what that meant...

[Don't panic]

Originally Posted by glocke12

Im saying the system is pretty ****ed....90% of PA votes red, yet has gone blue for at least the past 3-4 elections because of philly and pitt.

If the situation was reversed, I wonder what the left would be saying...

I am not sure if you are joking or what.

52% of PA voted for Obama, 46% for Romney

everything else is disingenious bull


anyway, back to the subject of the thread, i would be totally in favor of eliminating the 'winner take all' system and move to a proportional distribution of the electoral votes, with the two extra ones given to the winner of the state.
but it would have to be implemented simultaneously everywhere.


and the gerrymandering is just pathetically shameful. have a third party agency redesign all of them based on logic and reason, with some 'geometry' rules to make it impossible to have the ridiculous pattern shown above

[MadeTheSwitch]

Originally Posted by glocke12

Is the current system fair as it stands now?

Yes. the majority of people in your state voted for Obama, and Obama won the state. Just as he should have.

Originally Posted by glocke12

No....

I just think that its screwy that a state like PA which is largely rural, has its fate decided by a single population center that does not understand or is even really able to relate to the people in the other areas of the state.

Why are you so focused on LAND area? It's POPULATION that matters. It's curious that you think it is somehow unfair to have a majority of people get the majority of votes. Why shouldn't they? Why would a smaller population of people in the rural areas, outweigh the majority of people? You want a minority of people to always have the say? Yeah...that's a recipe for diaster. And like others said, it doesn't matter if the population is concentrated into cities, if you were to spread them out, the total voting for Obama would STILL be the same state-wide.

[AhmedFaisal]

Originally Posted by jnpy!$4g3cwk

I understand the sentiment, but, proportional representation has huge issues also. Bunches of small parties typically mean changing coalitions every few months. If a guy is elected to a small party-- who does he represent? At least with district representation, he represents the people inside the boundaries of that district.

Obviously, though, it hasn't worked well to let the politicians themselves draw up boundaries.

That problem can be fixed through 5% cut-offs. That way only significant minorities have representation in the legislative process. The bigger problem is that you lose the direct accountability of the representatives to the people they are supposed to represent.

[Ugg]

Originally Posted by MadeTheSwitch

Yes. the majority of people in your state voted for Obama, and Obama won the state. Just as he should have.



Why are you so focused on LAND area? It's POPULATION that matters. It's curious that you think it is somehow unfair to have a majority of people get the majority of votes. Why shouldn't they? Why would a smaller population of people in the rural areas, outweigh the majority of people? You want a minority of people to always have the say? Yeah...that's a recipe for diaster. And like others said, it doesn't matter if the population is concentrated into cities, if you were to spread them out, the total voting for Obama would STILL be the same state-wide.

It's really amazing how rural America has this sense of entitlement when it comes to voting. Voting is about people, not land, yet here in N California with a huge land mass yet perhaps only 10% of the population and an even smaller GDP, people constantly complain that Sacramento doesn't care about them but when you consider all the subsidies, rural areas benefit far more than urban ones.

Not only that but few of the whiners have anything to do with the rural economy. Most live on ranchettes or arboreal hideaways. They always ignore how expensive it is to provide them with basic services and complain how high their taxes are but refuse to acknowledge that their lifestyle choices are the root of their problems.

[Blue Velvet]

We can correct for this by making use of a cartogram, a map in which the sizes of states are rescaled according to their population. That is, states are drawn with size proportional not to their acreage but to the number of their inhabitants, states with more people appearing larger than states with fewer, regardless of their actual area on the ground. On such a map, for example, the state of Rhode Island, with its 1.1 million inhabitants, would appear about twice the size of Wyoming, which has half a million, even though Wyoming has 60 times the acreage of Rhode Island.

Here are the 2012 presidential election results on a population cartogram of this type:

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2012/

America: predominantly blue. So much for the 'right of center' nation.

It's the Senate that is the truly undemocratic house. Two senators from each state, with no regard to population. Nebraska, Wyoming and North Dakota have as many senators in the Senate as California, Florida and New York.

[hulugu]

Originally Posted by glocke12

No....

I just think that its screwy that a state like PA which is largely rural, has its fate decided by a single population center that does not understand or is even really able to relate to the people in the other areas of the state....

Arizona represents both problems. Arizona appears to be a red state because of the large population center in Maricopa County, the Phoenix Metropolitan area. So, the state has two Republican senators, a Republican governor, and apportioned its electoral college votes to Romney.
And, the state appears to be red because only three counties appear Democratic, Apache, Coconino, and Pima.

In this instance, the Tucson metropolitan area of 990,000 people are overridden by the huge metropolitan complex of 3.2 million. And, the small urban centers of Yuma and Flagstaff are completely meaningless in any election. Changing this to land area would merely extend this problem, since Tucson would still be ignored for the huge counties like Coconino, which is almost entirely national parks, national forest and state parks.

A direct apportionment would at least force politicians to notice the Tucson and Nogales areas and change their policies accordingly.

Originally Posted by zioxide

Congressional districts should be eliminated all together. They are ****ing stupid and serve no purpose other than to rig elections.

Well, they do help choose Congressional representatives.

[APlotdevice]

Originally Posted by Blue Velvet

It's the Senate that is the truly undemocratic house. Two senators from each state, with no regard to population. Nebraska, Wyoming and North Dakota have as many senators in the Senate as California, Florida and New York.

Niether house is particularly democratic thanks to the whole districting BS.

Though here's a crazy thought: have the whole state vote for all of its representatives, though with each individual voter still only voting for one cadidate, and then the top [however many seats that the state has] candidates are elected into office.

[Technarchy]

Keep in mind this is cyclical.

California and New York and many other blue states are bleeding residents who are relocating to red states.

Texas gained four House seats and Florida picked up two, New York and Ohio each lost two seats. Utah, Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, South Carolina and Washington each gained one seat. Losing seats were Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

This will balance out over time.

[Thomas Veil]

Originally Posted by Ugg

California recently changed it by referendum so that in independent board draws the boundaries. November was the first election that was used and it seemed to have worked ok.

My state of Ohio recently had a referendum that would allow a bipartisan board to draw district boundaries. Naturally GOP-leaning PACs took out ads portraying it as a dangerous power grab by unelected officials, and convinced voters to kill it.

I heard recently on Real Time that the US is the only democracy that lets the people in charge -- politicians -- draw up the political boundaries. If that's true, it's just another way the United States is an outlier.

[glocke12]

Originally Posted by Technarchy

Keep in mind this is cyclical.

California and New York and many other blue states are bleeding residents who are relocating to red states.

I wonder how many of these people who are moving are democrats who will continue to vote D.

[rdowns]

Originally Posted by glocke12

I wonder how many of these people who are moving are democrats who will continue to vote D.

I can't recall where I read it but it was an article on how retiring boomers, still a big Democratic stronghold, will be retiring and moving down south and out west in numbers that will likely turn several red or swing states blue. IIRC, they mentioned North Carolina, Florida, Texas and Arizona.

[MuddyPaws1]

Originally Posted by dscuber9000

i would love to have presidential elections decided on popular vote rather than electoral. Not as a democrat, but as someone who wants a more representative democracy.

that

[Ugg]

Originally Posted by Technarchy

Keep in mind this is cyclical.

California and New York and many other blue states are bleeding residents who are relocating to red states.

Texas gained four House seats and Florida picked up two, New York and Ohio each lost two seats. Utah, Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, South Carolina and Washington each gained one seat. Losing seats were Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

This will balance out over time.

I'd like to see some evidence about California hemorrhaging residents. I think it's mostly imaginary.

Good weather states are going to gain residents, there's no doubt about that but the traffic problems of states like Texas, Arizona and Florida and lack of urban amenities mean they don't attract as many of the creative class.

[rdowns]

Originally Posted by Ugg

I'd like to see some evidence about California hemorrhaging residents. I think it's mostly imaginary.

Good weather states are going to gain residents, there's no doubt about that but the traffic problems of states like Texas, Arizona and Florida and lack of urban amenities mean they don't attract as many of the creative class.

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0004986.html