Honestly, I can't believe I've never heard anyone suggest this before. Not only that we need the Electoral College federally, but that we should extend it to the state level to counteract the new 'big states', the megalopolis city-states that run our lives.
Razorfist's (aka Rageaholic's) shtick is to be crude and drop a lot of F-bombs- I even debated not posting the video- so be forewarned that there's more vulgarity here than you'd normally expect in the Hall- but it's too good an idea he's presenting to not post this- so I beg your indulgence this once-
I think this is an idea whose time has come, and even if we were unsuccessful in implementing it, a Democrat party/media complex would be too busy fighting this to go after the Federal Electoral College, which would itself be a win.
As I commented on a previous post, I think from Tex, what he's proposing is essentially overruling Reynolds v Sims that forced all state legislative districts to be equal in population where previously state Senates had often been apportioned by geographic extent the way the US Senate is.
ReplyDeleteYes- Reynolds vs Simms and the associated cases should be challenged. The reason for those decisions was to "equalize" the vote among persons, and it worked- the rural counties immediately lost power in the state government. So now we have weird situations where 9/10's of the counties in a state have a particular view, and legislation gets rammed though by the remaining 10%.
ReplyDeleteEvery state is now ruled by it's cities.
It's certainly true of Atlanta in Georgia, which has about half the population and half the economy in its metro area. If you're a citizen of down Waycross way, however, your interests are simply a matter of zero concern to the state government.
ReplyDeleteNorth Carolina is getting that way too. We really need to divide the state in half, letting the urban areas down east go and resuming the old state of Franklin (mentioned here occasionally, an early American state that was in territory finally claimed successfully by North Carolina and Tennessee). A mountain state would actually consider the interests of the mountain folk, which the lowland areas fail to do. (Just as a pragmatic matter, you should see the roads. Mountain areas require care in constructing roads due to the difficult and unstable terrain.)
Japan has been playing around with this from early in their post-WWII democracy. Many Japanese see it as a problem, but some think the ruling party allows it because it favors them. Interestingly, they've decided to adopt John Quincy Adams suggestion for apportionment in the future.
ReplyDeleteI should say the Japanese didn't necessarily do that intentionally, but their method of apportionment led to rural votes being weighted as much as 5:1 in some cases. Their supreme court has basically said they need to keep it down below 3:1.
ReplyDeleteI think changing the focus from votes to liberty is a good idea. His idea of extending the electoral college to the states is worth considering. How would that work in practice?
That's just it, I'm not sure there's any viable way to do it. I think the idea that counties should be represented, and that doing that would eliminate gerrymandering is a good pitch, but I just don't see people going for it, especially in the populous urban areas which are the problem. How does one get them to vote essentially against their self interest? I have no idea. Perhaps the trick is to figure out what state this might actually have a chance in and implement it there, and hope it's successful enough to sway others.
ReplyDeleteIt's been clear for a while to everyone that necessary changes to the way our government operates cannot be made within the constraints of the current system. People nevertheless disagree strongly about what they are, so the system persists precisely to prevent 'the other side' from making the changes they want.
ReplyDeleteSome people get that, and are 'conservatives' in some sense. Others don't, and are 'progressives' who want to proceed by throwing out as much as necessary to get their way. They don't see that doing so will destroy the stability for the parts they do want: the new order may turn out to keep gun rights and dispose of gay marriage, for all they know. Conservatives can see readily that they could end up losing gun rights if they gave up a constitution with the 2nd Amendment in it, and have no guarantee of getting these sorts of local government reforms in return (if that were worth the exchange, which it may not be).