IBCoupe wrote:

stebo0728 wrote:Consulted, sure, prioritized, NO. If the prioritization exists, Im not making that claim outright, just saying I would not be surprised to see that its happened.

Are you suggesting that international policy considerations should always take a back seat to domestic policy considerations? Isn't that a little short-sighted? Doesn't it presuppose a certain absolute value to any given policy implications, and presupposes a clear and unambiguous divide between them?

Ok, I am always out front in condemning zero tolerance policies, they equate to zero common sense. So in that light I dont want to say that we approach the balance of domestic and international with a stern zero tolerance rubber stamp, but an exceptionally good case would have to be made as to why said issue would be better if ruled in favor of international interests above domestic interests.

IBCoupe wrote:

stebo0728 wrote:Maybe I misread, I thought you said "by State and population". "by State" no longer exists. This is the flaw.

Ah, there's the confusion. "By State and population" does exist in the context within which I wrote it. That referred to the representation of interests through the Executive Branch of the government. The President is elected through the electoral college, and a State's electors are determined by a combination of the number of members in the House of Representatives (proportional to a State's population) and the number of Senators a State has (a flat number of two per State, to adequately represent a State's interest regardless of its population). That's why it often looks like a Wyoming voter has a disproportionate share of the vote, as their state is the lowest populated, but still gets two Senators and so those two electoral votes.

And how are these delegates appointed? Not even considering democratic legislation that would force delegate counts to reflect the popular vote, most often those counts DO reflect the popular vote. The State has no functional say so on electoral delegates.

stebo0728 wrote:Ok, I am always out front in condemning zero tolerance policies, they equate to zero common sense. So in that light I dont want to say that we approach the balance of domestic and international with a stern zero tolerance rubber stamp, but an exceptionally good case would have to be made as to why said issue would be better if ruled in favor of international interests above domestic interests.

I wonder what makes you think it's not that way now.

stebo0728 wrote:And how are these delegates appointed? Not even considering democratic legislation that would force delegate counts to reflect the popular vote, most often those counts DO reflect the popular vote. The State has no functional say so on electoral delegates.

They are popularly elected.

And yes, it most often does reflect the popular vote, except when it doesn't reflect the popular vote, like the 2000 Presidential election. I remember a column written shortly afterward that said, "President Bush will have to turn out to be an extremely bad President for America to reconsider the electoral college."

I'm having trouble with the concept that a State's interests are not adequately protected by a popularly-elected office-holder. As if each Representative and Senator weren't doing enough to funnel money to their district and doing their damndest at every moment of every day to be reelected by their district. I just don't see the problem.

IBCoupe wrote:

stebo0728 wrote:Ok, I am always out front in condemning zero tolerance policies, they equate to zero common sense. So in that light I dont want to say that we approach the balance of domestic and international with a stern zero tolerance rubber stamp, but an exceptionally good case would have to be made as to why said issue would be better if ruled in favor of international interests above domestic interests.

I wonder what makes you think it's not that way now.

I dont necessarily think it is that way now, thats why I said originally "if it exists" but the propensity is there for such a status.

IBCoupe wrote:

stebo0728 wrote:And how are these delegates appointed? Not even considering democratic legislation that would force delegate counts to reflect the popular vote, most often those counts DO reflect the popular vote. The State has no functional say so on electoral delegates.

They are popularly elected.

And yes, it most often does reflect the popular vote, except when it doesn't reflect the popular vote, like the 2000 Presidential election. I remember a column written shortly afterward that said, "President Bush will have to turn out to be an extremely bad President for America to reconsider the electoral college."

I'm having trouble with the concept that a State's interests are not adequately protected by a popularly-elected office-holder. As if each Representative and Senator weren't doing enough to funnel money to their district and doing their damndest at every moment of every day to be reelected by their district. I just don't see the problem.

I understand what you are saying, I always remind people of the same, especially regarding the 2000 election. Again you said that the delegates are "popularly voted" that means people, not state governments. Perhaps your struggling to see state legislatures as individual entities that need representation in Washington, both in the executive and legislative branches.

If Senators represented the state legislatures as they were intended to do, then these border state legislatures would each have 2 votes, thats 10 votes, in the senate, and thats enough to get a ball rolling, and one of the balls to start rolling would most definitely be border security, and immigration policy. The final coffin nail was hammered in states rights when the 17th Amendment was, knee-jerkingly no less, signed into law.

You seem to operate under the assumption that these border-state Senators aren't doing the same thing they would otherwise be doing.

Immigration enforcement union took a no-confidence vote in its leadership

By: Joel S. Gehrke Jr.
Special to the Examiner
08/04/10 5:35 PM EDT

Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents believe overwhelmingly that their department leadership has become so politicized as to compromise the effectiveness of ICE and the safety of American people. Their union has released a letter announcing its recent unanimous “vote of no confidence” in ICE agency heads, accusing them of “misleading the American public” regarding illegal immigration in order to further a pro-amnesty agenda.

In June, the National Immigration and Customs Enforcement Council — an AFL-CIO affiliate — and affiliated local councils cast a unanimous 259-0 vote of no confidence in ICE Director John Morton and Assistant Director Phyllis Coven. In a letter announcing the vote, the National Council criticized the directors for “misguided and reckless initiatives,” and said their leaders have “abandoned the Agency’s core mission of enforcing United States immigration laws and providing for public safety, and have instead directed their attention to campaigning for policies and programs related to amnesty.”

Janice Kephart at the Center for Immigration Studies has the letter, which includes several biting indictments of ICE failures by ICE agents. For instance:

Senior ICE leadership dedicates more time to campaigning for immigration reforms aimed at large scale amnesty legislation, than advising the American public and Federal lawmakers on the severity of the illegal immigration problem, and the need for more manpower and resources within the ICE ERO to address it. ICE ERO is currently overwhelmed by the massive criminal alien problem in the United States resulting in the large-scale release of criminals back into local communities.

Kind of puts the Arizona illegal immigration enforcement in perspective, doesn’t it?

While ICE reports internally that more than 90 percent of ICE detainees are first encountered in jails after they are arrested by local police for criminal charges, ICE senior leadership misrepresents this information publicly in order to portray ICE detainees as being non-criminal in nature to support the Administration’s position on amnesty and relaxed security at ICE detention facilities.

The majority of ICE ERO Officers are prohibited from making street arrests or enforcing United States immigration laws outside of the institutional (jail) setting. This has effectively created “amnesty through policy” for anyone illegally in the United States who has not been arrested by another agency for a criminal violation.

Good to know.

Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opini ... z0vlKDdmpK

IBCoupe wrote:You seem to operate under the assumption that these border-state Senators aren't doing the same thing they would otherwise be doing.

You seem to operate under the assumption that they do.

I certainly don't make that assumption, and you can tell because I'm not the one asserting something's wrong. I'm simply being skeptical of your assertions to that effect.

Assertions you base solely on the theory that they might be doing their State a disservice because they're not appointed by a State legislature. As if popular election would necessarily produce different results. Your argument would be strengthened if you came up with something solid.

IBCoupe wrote: As if popular election would necessarily produce different results. Your argument would be strengthened if you came up with something solid.

I'll admit, I'm having a tough time following here... However, I'm gonna have to agree that a popular election wouldn't be likely to change outcomes. At present, our system favors the two top-spenders in a race. Without getting back into the "third-party votes don't count" discussion, AZ is a perfect example of this. Our Senatorial race is all but decided already. I'm not a fan of a lot of McCain's positions, although I think he's reasonably harmless... But there's just no challenger that's even CLOSE to giving him a run for the slot. None. Hayworth is a buffoon, and the remainder of the dark-horse candidates are so far behind, they're not even running campaign ads - no one knows their names.

Right, and just to make sure you're up to speed (and, perhaps, to make sure that I am), I think what Stebo is arguing is that there would be better results on a national level if those two Senators weren't elected - if they were appointed by the Governor, as it was originally.

In all likelihood, you'd still end up with the same politically-connected people in the same seats, arguing the same things. Only, instead of arguing on behalf of their own individual reelection, they'd be arguing on behalf of the Governor that appointed them (or the Governor's party). I really don't think that there's a substantial difference to be had (least of all a negative one) by switching over to popular elections for Senate seats.

That said, I am in favor of restructuring to account for the actual State populations or eliminating altogether the electoral college.

IBCoupe wrote:...eliminating altogether the electoral college.

NO, you get rid of that and you eliminate what makes us NOT a democracy. The electoral college adjusts for any one regions overbearing population. Strict popular vote = mob rule = 2 wolves and a sheep deciding whats for dinner. NOT GOOD IN ANY WAY, and is everything, EVERYTHING our founding fathers argued against. Did you know calling someone a democrat before the civil war era was an epithet? Democracy only leads to complete socialism, which only leads to complete communism. The day the electoral college goes is the day I go.

And yes AZ, I advocate that our founding fathers had more wisdom in their pinky than any legislator today would have in their entire body. Think about it for a minute. If the congress AND senate both are popularly elected, whats the point in even having both? There is none. Get rid of the senate if you aren't gonna let them speak for the state legislatures. Any time you have platforms of government, it is essential that each rung down have some sort of representation in what the rung above is doing. I cant understand why no one else seems to get this. No perhaps there arent terrible examples of the folly of this, the fact remains, the propensity for it is there. Do you want to one day have some state punishing legislation on the docket, only to see it pass only because the states were voiceless? An example: lets say an amendment was being considered that would make it impossible for states to levy their own taxes, income sales or property, take your pick, but lets say its being decided, and the congress knows the people want this cause they are tired of paying taxes to the state, DUH who wouldnt be? The congress would pass it hands down, they have to answer to the people. Now lets say its the senates turn to decide. If they also answer ultimately to the people, then whats the difference, the vote will go for the people, screwing the state out of any source of revenue, and condeming it to federal kickback reliance. This is a recipe for impending disaster, especially as our social desire for self interest continues to increase. We have reached the point where people can vote for income, and its only going to get worse. A lack of definite urgent problem does not dismiss notions of impending potential problems. The 17th Amendment was an attack on states rights, plain and simple.

Without the electoral college the smaller states would have no say in anything as the larger states could simply ignore them. It's like a family of 4 going to dinner; parents make the decision unless one of the kids happens upon an idea the parents support.

stebo0728 wrote:NO, you get rid of that and you eliminate what makes us NOT a democracy. The electoral college adjusts for any one regions overbearing population. Strict popular vote = mob rule = 2 wolves and a sheep deciding whats for dinner. NOT GOOD IN ANY WAY, and is everything, EVERYTHING our founding fathers argued against. Did you know calling someone a democrat before the civil war era was an epithet?

I'm pretty sure that the three branches of government that we have each make us not a democracy. There's nothing inherent about the electoral college that separates it from a democracy.

Our founding fathers also argued against political parties. What say you now?

stebo0728 wrote:Democracy only leads to complete socialism, which only leads to complete communism. The day the electoral college goes is the day I go.

That's the wackiest slippery slope argument I've ever seen. A popular vote to elect the head of the Executive Branch of the government is a step towards socialism? What are you on?

audtatious wrote:Without the electoral college the smaller states would have no say in anything as the larger states could simply ignore them. It's like a family of 4 going to dinner; parents make the decision unless one of the kids happens upon an idea the parents support.

Except for, you know, Congress and the Courts.

My intent was not that it would make us COMPLETELY a democracy just to eliminate the electoral college, but that it would move us further in that direction. And it flies in the faces of our founding fathers.

And aparantly you havent caught onto some of my other posts regarding political parties. I advocate on a regular basis that we dump this whole partisan notion and get back to people with ideas, and representatives that can think for themselves.

I must be smoking the same herb our founding fathers smoked. You should try some, its enlightening.

Right, but that didn't happen for a reason, and it won't happen for a reason. Things aren't the way the founding fathers expected them to be. We have big glowwy square boxes that we stare at for most hours of the day, and those big glowwy square boxes can feed us with information almost the instant it happens. I can be in Florida this evening, if I want. The reasons we needed the electoral college are nullified by the modern age.

IBCoupe wrote:Right, but that didn't happen for a reason, and it won't happen for a reason. Things aren't the way the founding fathers expected them to be. We have big glowwy square boxes that we stare at for most hours of the day, and those big glowwy square boxes can feed us with information almost the instant it happens. I can be in Florida this evening, if I want. The reasons we needed the electoral college are nullified by the modern age.

Respectfully of course, I COMPLETELY disagree.

IBCoupe wrote:Except for, you know, Congress and the Courts.

True...Only impacts the Executive branch.

stebo0728 wrote:

IBCoupe wrote:Right, but that didn't happen for a reason, and it won't happen for a reason. Things aren't the way the founding fathers expected them to be. We have big glowwy square boxes that we stare at for most hours of the day, and those big glowwy square boxes can feed us with information almost the instant it happens. I can be in Florida this evening, if I want. The reasons we needed the electoral college are nullified by the modern age.

Respectfully of course, I COMPLETELY disagree.

Electoral college represents a fundamental aspect of a representative republic. Maybe we have televisions and instant news now, but that does not stop regions of people from formulating collective interests, which the balancing provided by the electoral college corrects for. This is human nature and will never change as long as we are humans. Dont poo-poo the electorate concept lightly, it starts to reveal your true colors.

Which colors are those? The colors of somebody who grew up in one of the densest states in the union and didn't like being counted less? In a Presidential election, each Wymoning voter had, if I recall correctly, twice as much a voice as I did.

Collective interests can be conveyed on a national stage without the disparity in executive elections. Like through the Senate.

Awesome article on that topic: http://www.heritage.org/Research/Report ... -Democracy

What I gather from it? IBC is exhibiting a rare case of oversimplification - perhaps a function of partisanship, perhaps a lack of understanding of the perils of doing away with the electoral college. I'd agree that the process appears flawed, but I don't have a valid alternative.

IBCoupe wrote:Which colors are those? The colors of somebody who grew up in one of the densest states in the union and didn't like being counted less? In a Presidential election, each Wymoning voter had, if I recall correctly, twice as much a voice as I did.

Collective interests can be conveyed on a national stage without the disparity in executive elections. Like through the Senate.

The colors I am starting to see are a much darker shade of blue than I had originally theorized.

At the forming of the UN, would you have conceded to the USSR to give them a vote for each province they held? Thats what they wanted, and they damn near got it. But then USSR would have ran the UN, and we couldnt have that. Unfortunately they got 3 votes out of the deal, which was arguably 2 too many.

But your solution is heading opposite in direction from mine. In reality the populous was never designed to vote on the executive branch anyway. You want to end the electoral college, I want to end the popular vote. Diametrically opposite views I know.

I don't like voting based on arbitrary geographic classifications. My opposition to a base number of votes per State suggests that I would oppose an arbitrary "by-province" vote count. Perhaps you're not really reading what I'm writing, Stebo.

The executive branch, designed to be the weakest branch of government, has no real stake in having State representation. Whether the President is elected by States or elected by citizens makes literally no difference at all today. You give an educated nation the vote or you give a State elector, chosen by the educated population of that state, the vote and I posit that you'll get no noticeable difference in voting results. When was the last time an elector chose to cast his vote against the popular vote?

It must have been a long time ago, for sure, because the all of the States bind their electors to the popular vote, and the last State to effect that change was South Carolina, in 1864. So the barrier between the popular vote and the election of the President is pretty thin to begin with. The only reason for the electoral college is to regiment a minimal representation of every State. But here's a novel idea: rather than force the system to disproportionately accommodate a minority on the basis of their being a minority, we could have the system accommodate the minority on the merits of their causes. If the farmers of the rural plains want to make the case that their demands should be heard because they're the ones that feed this country, then let them make that argument.

It's an open system, with national media. We have political parties for exactly that purpose - to advocate ideas shared by like-minded people. Let a region's ideas and arguments determine its persuasion in an election, not the fact that it's another region, arbitrarily segregated by imaginary lines on a map.

We don't need the electoral college. The system would function just fine without it, and might even function better.

IBCoupe wrote: When was the last time an elector chose to cast his vote against the popular vote?

Gore had more popular votes in 2000.

IBCoupe wrote: ... You give an educated nation the vote ...

Have you seen one of those lying around anywhere lately?

But perhaps you are not really reading what I am writing either. My main argument starting this portion of the debate, was the SENATORS should not be popularly elected, because thats what Congress is for. Then we got rabbit trailed into the electoral college (with which I share fault) which I firmly uphold the concept of the electoral college. I side firmly with our founding fathers on every issue I have encountered so far where we are at odds with them. As I said in a parallel thread, circumstances may change, but concepts dont, and our origins were of conceptual not circumstantial nature. Human nature is what it is, and collectivism will always exist, and the more you lean towards pure democracy, the more danger we are in for the abject failure of our nation as a whole. The majority is not always right, and giving the majority the controlling stake in the government is a recipe for disaster.

Look, you and I are clearly at odds over this, and neither can provide a clear enough reason to sway the other, and I respect you greatly in your position and I hope you feel the same, so I am going to bow out of this one at least for now, and let the readers of the debate decide for themselves.

IBCoupe wrote:We don't need the electoral college. The system would function just fine without it, and might even function better.

That's a bit of an arrogant statement.

Unless you can come up with solutions to the problems an abolition of the EC would create, you're just making noise.

After reading that article I linked, among others, I'm convinced that since even our best and brightest haven't been successful in finding alternatives, to say "the system would function just fine without it" is kinda misinformed.

EDIT: This is NOT to say I have a better idea or plan. I'm admittedly NOT very well-informed in this arena (frankly, it bores me).

wingFeather wrote:Gore had more popular votes in 2000.

Right, nationwide. When was the last time a State's electors voted against the popular vote (in that State)?

What are the problems created by abolition of the electoral college?

The rise of third, fourth, and fifth parties? Most here probably agree that this is a good thing.
The banding together of regions to get their views represented? Isn't that exactly what we have the electoral college for? I argued that, yes, the electoral college exists to ensure that each State's views are counted so that no region of the country is thoroughly ignored, but if one of the "problems" that's created by getting rid of it is that "States will find other ways to make this happen," it seems to me that this isn't exactly a problem. Just different.

I don't have an alternative, and I don't need to have one in order to point out the flaws in the existing one, or the flaws in the arguments of the proponents. That's the beauty of being a contrarian.

But here's something to consider: what if we amended the Constitution to require uniform electoral policies, and to eliminate the "winner-takes-all" policies of most States? So, while the vote of a Wyomingite may still be counted for twice as much as the vote of a Massachusettsian, at least that vote would matter were the Wyomingite to choose to vote for something other than a Republican and the Massachusettsian to vote for something other than a Democrat.

IBCoupe wrote:What are the problems created by abolition of the electoral college?

The rise of third, fourth, and fifth parties? Most here probably agree that this is a good thing.

What prevents this now is not the EC, the EC supports multiple parties, the fact that so much money is involved prevents success of more parties.

IBCoupe wrote: The banding together of regions to get their views represented? Isn't that exactly what we have the electoral college for? I argued that, yes, the electoral college exists to ensure that each State's views are counted so that no
region of the country is thoroughly ignored, but if one of the "problems" that's created by getting rid of it is that "States will find other ways to make this happen," it seems to me that this isn't exactly a problem. Just different.

You underestimate the danger of mob rule.

IBCoupe wrote: I don't have an alternative, and I don't need to have one in order to point out the flaws in the existing one, or the flaws in the arguments of the proponents. That's the beauty of being a contrarian.

But here's something to consider: what if we amended the Constitution to require uniform electoral policies, and to eliminate the "winner-takes-all" policies of most States? So, while the vote of a Wyomingite may still be counted for twice as much as the vote of a Massachusettsian, at least that vote would matter were the Wyomingite to choose to vote for something other than a Republican and the Massachusettsian to vote for something other than a Democrat.

Sounds interesting, I have no problem letting EC delegates be awarded more regionally rather than the WINNER TAKES ALL per state. Not really sure why its this way now anyway, but that does not preclude the EC, its only an enhancement for it.

stebo0728 wrote:What prevents this now is not the EC, the EC supports multiple parties, the fact that so much money is involved prevents success of more parties.

The electoral college does not support multiple parties. Advocates of it tout the EC's ability to maintain stability in the system by promoting a two-party system as one of the EC's major selling points.

USElectionAtlas.org wrote:Proponents further argue that the Electoral College contributes to the political stability of the nation by encouraging a two party system. There can be no doubt that the Electoral College has encouraged and helps to maintain a two party system in the United States. This is true simply because it is extremely difficult for a new or minor party to win enough popular votes in enough States to have a chance of winning the presidency. Even if they won enough electoral votes to force the decision into the U.S. House of Representatives, they would still have to have a majority of over half the State delegations in order to elect their candidate - and in that case, they would hardly be considered a minor party.

In addition to protecting the presidency from impassioned but transitory third party movements, the practical effect of the Electoral College (along with the single-member district system of representation in the Congress) is to virtually force third party movements into one of the two major political parties. Conversely, the major parties have every incentive to absorb minor party movements in their continual attempt to win popular majorities in the States. In this process of assimilation, third party movements are obliged to compromise their more radical views if they hope to attain any of their more generally acceptable objectives. Thus we end up with two large, pragmatic political parties which tend to the center of public opinion rather than dozens of smaller political parties catering to divergent and sometimes extremist views. In other words, such a system forces political coalitions to occur within the political parties rather than within the government.

stebo0728 wrote:You underestimate the danger of mob rule.

As illustrated by? The argument that large states will drown out the voices of small states demands the assumption that things will continue to operate on a State-by-State basis, the way they do now. If my response is that States will band together, and we will see the regionalization of interests to get their voices heard, what does that do to your argument? Ultimately, your suggestion is that the system should account for their voices, and my response is that, via market-like trends, their voices will make themselves heard.

I see parallels to your argument in The Fairness Doctrine and in the current trend of mainstream media to consistently depict issues as two-sided, even if one of the sides is flimsy. It's almost as if you have an expectation that because there is diversity of opinion that we should make sure that all opinions are heard. I would respond that only the opinions that are persuasive and can fend for themselves ought to be heard, and that in this stream of twenty-four hour news that we enjoy, there's no reason to regulate that the opinions be heard.

stebo0728 wrote:Sounds interesting, I have no problem letting EC delegates be awarded more regionally rather than the WINNER TAKES ALL per state. Not really sure why its this way now anyway, but that does not preclude the EC, its only an enhancement for it.

It's that way because the method of awarding electors is left to the States to determine. All but two States have chosen to maintain a winner-takes-all method: Maine and Nebraska each award their electors in proportion to the results of their popular election.

These folks certainly are ready to fit in and become a productive part of our society eh?