2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumThe Obama-Romney battlefield: Electoral college ensures it's weird
It is one of the oddest features of American democracy. Presidential candidates need only win 270 electoral votes not the popular vote to become the leader of the free world.
Electoral votes are awarded state by state, based on congressional representation. So a series of narrow wins in enough states beats huge losses in the others.
INTERACTIVE: Predict a winner
Map and more at:
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-electoral-college-10-states-matter-20120525,0,90732.story
DonCoquixote
(13,616 posts)It was meant to ensure that a candidate would have to speak to everyone, but now, it has become a means to ensure that only a few states matter; I say this as someone in Florida, a state that has suffered because the GOP have made sure to send in lawyers, guns and money to keep us locked down.
phleshdef
(11,936 posts)...popular vote. But I'm all for just scrapping it. Its definately unnecessary.
The Magistrate
(95,255 posts)As gentlemen in those days referred to all who were not....
edcantor
(325 posts)Of course, I can live with it, and really would prefer an auditable paper based system of voting, where no-one can tamper with the machines, where people can vote anytime in the first 7 days of November, and where people are fined .1% extra in income taxes for not having voted. A corporation would be limited to giving only the same amount that a human being can give to a candidate, and the same amount to any one PAC.
Retrograde
(10,156 posts)A.K.A. the Democratic party's ATM. We're expected to vote for Obama in November, so the only attention we get is being asked for $$$. Obama swooped in and out for his 3rd fundraising trip to my neighborhood last week (betcha you didn't hear about it - no press allowed): 2 $35K+ dinners and a less pricey event where tickets started at $250. Now, there's no way I'm going to vote for a Republican come November, but it would be nice if candidates did occasionally spare some time for the country's most populous state.
But as long as the constitution requires 3/4 of the states to support any changes we're stuck with a system that favors the less populated states.
dinopipie
(84 posts)with that being said, a Democrat can win a national election without winning a single southern state, crunch the EC numbers by state, yet a Pub cannot win without winning a whole bunch of Blue States.
IMHO the Democratic Party needs to stop wasting their time and resources on lost causes and bolster their strongholds.
TBF
(32,090 posts)and I have to believe the other side does as well. Certain battleground states will garner much more attention (money and volunteer activity) than others.