On the evening of April 30, the Colorado Senate voted not to consider HB 1299, the National Popular Vote Plan bill. The bill’s sponsor asked the Senate to take the bill off the agenda, since he calculated that if it were considered, it would be defeated. It had passed the House earlier.
So, how is it better that the bill is off the agenda? Can it still be voted on later? But then, why do you write “kills”?
This development still does not answer the de facto disenfranchisement of the ‘winner-take-all’ unit rule imposed by 19th Century political machines.
To reflect the diversity of a state in presidential elector selection, the District Plan ties the vote to congressional political communities based on population.
It avoids the politics of what Texas historian T.R. Fehrenbach called “out frauding” one another. Whatever corruption may be is contained, and any minority community arising in a state has an independent voice.
The wherever there is a political machine or ‘permanent majority’ whether big-city or agri-business, they get a two-elector vote bonus.
Bills that don’t pass by mid-May are dead, and the bill has been postponed beyond that date.
VirginianHistorian –
Plans to allocate electoral votes on the basis of Congressional Districts suffer from several serious flaws.
First, it means that the disproportionate representation of individual votes in the EC tally will be even more disproportionate. We will have “red” CD’s, “blue” CD’s and those which are “battleground” CD’s. A fewer number of people living in those contested CD’s will be electing the president.
Second, as the allocation of EC votes becomes more granular, the mathematical likelihood of a need or call for recount becomes greater.
And this is what I regard as the most serious flaw. With modern polling science refined as it has been, campaigns will be able to identify those 40-50 CD’s which are actually, “in play”,” (and that number may be an overestimation). That done, the temptation of and reward for electoral fraud will become greater, as will be the ease with which it can be accomplished. It’s much easier to bury a few hundred votes than a few hundred thousand, it’s much easier to “box” a small group of newly registered voters in one CD than the number required statewide to swing a state election, local officials are more easily intimidated and corrupted than are state officials, etc., etc.
No, I believe the best plan is this – one person, one vote, counted with equal weight. That’s what NPV will achieve.
Hurray!
The NPV is an evil plan for the f a s c i s t – s o c i a l i s t takeover of the US.
Only the Maine/Nebraska plan can fix the National election process. We should perfect the Electoral College system by choosing electors based on 2 for each state and 1 for each Congressional District. This will make the system fair, stable, and reduce the incidence of fraud to the minimum level possible. We should also increase the size of the House to 600, 800, or even 1200 members. This will improve the operation of the Legislative branch and the Electoral Vote campaigns for Pres and VP.
Other large nations should follow the US and adopt an Electoral College system. The world would finally be able to move away from the government control that is destroying our liberty in every nation.
Our goal is liberty. Democracy and elections are only a tool, and a bad one at that. There is no value in holding direct elections that will undermine our liberty. We need to limit the power of the state and limit the scope of power politicians can grab, no matter what means are employed. We need to move as many decisions as we can away from the political process and toward the free market.
Promoting this crazy idea of more so called direct election at the national level increases the greed and expectations of the masses to suck at the tit of big government. This, in turn, increases the power of the politicians and the state.
Direct elections on a large scale increase the power of the state and of the political class. Direct national elections will lead to massive uncontrollable fraud. Fraud will occur in districts large and small wherever one party can take control and hope to swing the entire nation by adding fake votes to the totals. The numbers of vegetative senior citizen voters, multiple district voters, deceased voters and nonexistent voters will increase massively.
The likelyhood of violence during or following a recount increases with the size of the population being recounted. Splintering and factions will increase the likelyhood of close elections. And there will be recounts in every other election under NPV.
In the end, it will be possible and eventually likely that candidates with far less than 25% of the national vote cast, who have carried few if any electoral votes prior to the calculation of the NPV vote, will end up with the NPV majority and be elected.
Disenfranchised citizens will turn to violence. States will move for secession.
The NPV will lead to massive corruption and turn America into a banana republic.
Of course, maybe a little civil war, violence and rioting will cleanse the nation and, when it’s over and millions have died, we can adopt a new Constitution with a severely restricted government and with a well designed limited, indirect way of choosing term limited, unpaid, educated, IQ tested citizens who will be leaders working for liberty instead of politicians.
CominbacktotheLP –
Uh…let’s see…
Have a nice day?
Sorry, but I can’t think of any other response at the moment.
Re: ComingBackToTheLP
I get it: You want to trash our Constitution, you despise Democracy, and you would rather have millions die in a civil war and rioting to “cleanse the nation” than accept a democratically elected President. In short, you hate America because of our freedom. You wish to instigate a murderous reign of terror and ultimately force everyone to adhere to your half-baked ideology. Here’s the only question I have: What are you doing debating on Ballot Access News? Shouldn’t you be planning and executing attacks for Al Qaeda? Bin Laden is going to be pissed when he finds out that one of his adolescent recruits is surfing the net instead of purging the nation through arbitrary acts of violence.