Sunday, May 20, 2018

The Move to Make the Electoral College Irrelevant

Just like all the insane "resistance" movement going on in society, refusal to accept an election if your preferred candidate doesn't win, the move to overthrow the electoral college system is still pushing on.  We kind of talked about this in March, but the Daily Signal updates us on a vote from Connecticut to counter their voters.
Opponents of the Electoral College achieved an important victory last weekend when Connecticut’s legislature passed the so-called National Popular Vote compact. Democratic Gov. Dannel P. Malloy is expected to sign the measure.
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States that approve this legislation enter a simple compact with one another. Each participating state agrees to allocate its electors to the winner of the national popular vote regardless of how its own citizens voted. The compact goes into effect when states holding 270 electoral votes (enough to win the presidency) have agreed to the plan.
Most of us haven't heard of this "National Pact", by which states potentially counter the will of their voters.  Author Tara Ross points out they're almost two thirds of the way to locking up the necessary 270 electoral votes to win the presidency.
[Counting Connecticut] 11 states and the District of Columbia have now approved the measure, giving the compact a total of 172 electors. It needs only 98 more to reach the 270 mark.
It's inevitable that, at some point, the state will vote for a Democratic candidate (it's Connecticut after all) and a Republican will win the national popular vote.  When that happens they will counter the will of the majority of their voters to change their electors over to the Republican.
What would Founders such as Roger Sherman think? That Connecticut statesman was an influential delegate at the Constitutional Convention of 1787. The Great Compromise—sometimes called the Connecticut Compromise— which gave Congress its bicameral structure, might never have been brokered without him.

Moreover, Sherman was one of many delegates from small states who refused to go along with the idea of a direct popular vote for the presidency. He knew that little Connecticut would be outvoted time and time again.
Recall that Hillary won the popular vote by a little over 2 million votes.  In the 5 counties that encompass NYC, (Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Richmond and Queens) Clinton received well over 2 million more votes than Trump. (Clinton only won 4 of these counties, Trump won Richmond).  Why would any candidate visit a state like Connecticut?  Why wouldn't the next Democrat candidate just rent an apartment in New York City or El Lay and mostly stay there.  Work harder in those big population centers to reach a few more voters who lean toward you anyway rather than build a diverse coalition.  Or to quote myself from March:
Whether they know it or not (and I assume they do know it), the desire to get rid of the electoral college is a desire to avoid those icky flyover-country people (with their bibles and their guns!) and have candidates just campaign in a few big cities.
One thing we can be sure of.  If this becomes law, and passes the Supreme Court, you can bet that there will never be any effort devoted to the issues affecting people in flyover country.  There will never be another minute wasted (after the primaries, which are state by state) talking about any of the concerns of any state less than the top third of the national population.  

Our country was designed to protect the small states from the big ones, and to protect the minority from the majority.  The bicameral legislature with one house's representation proportional to population and the other equal representation is just one example.  The electoral college with its incentives for presidential candidates to build broad-based coalitions is another.  There is a full-time, well-funded effort to destroy that. 

13 comments:

  1. They want a civil war? This is how to get a civil war. Make 50 % of the inhabitants of a country absolutely irrelevant politically.
    The sole purpose of politics is to provide a system whereby differences can be resolved without the use of force. Eliminate that avenue and violence will result.

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  2. Violence? That would require the big cities to make war on the rurals. Perhaps they'd use the heavy industry factories they ran out of the cities to build a new generation of Ospreys and F-35s and Zumwalts, employing the salesman they exchanged for skilled trades. They'd want to send these vehicles to bomb the cornfields and stockyards the city used to eat from, but the battery power won't have the range.

    The logistical support for self-sufficiency of big cities is so weak their policy demands can simply be ignored.

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    1. Actually, violence will NOT be necessary between the Communists and the Deplorables. There is not even one hive in this country which can sustain itself without leeching off flyover country. When the fun starts, cut their supply chains and they will destroy themselves.

      Especially start with their water and power. Each of those originate well outside their boundaries, and are relatively easy to break. How many flights of stairs is a hive dweller willing to climb in one day? And how much hive real estate is ABOVE that level? All of that is unusable without power for the elevators. And how much actual "work" can hive dwellers do without electricity for their computers and such? Plus every hive in this country celebrates the "Strength" of their "Diversity", since "All Cultures are Equal!!!" That means they have plenty of "urban youfs" who are only kept in check by streetlights - which let decent people see and avoid them - and security cameras - which let "Law Enforcement" identify and arrest them. When they get through with their coffee and donuts, of course. Now "urban youfs" are not the sharpest tools in the shed. But after a few days without power, even THEY will recognize that they are finally "Free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty they're free at last". At that point, "Law Enforcement" will have better things to do than attack and kill anyone who does not grovel before their Davos and Bilderberg Masters. Because, after all, that IS what this is all about. An overwhelming desire to build their "utopia" of One World Government.

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    2. Well, when the city dwellers start leaving the city and bringing the disaster with them, there will be a need for some sort of clean up operation. Belt fed would be best.

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    3. Belt-fed is good, belt-fed is wise. Bring along a friend to carry the ammo box...

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    4. Well the other part of the action is to delete the bridges on roadways leading too or from the hives. One fuel tanker catching fire mid-span per bridge will do the job. And if it happens outside the hive limits, there's less risk to the drivers of said tankers. Of course, that is mid-span, which is not necessarily mid-bridge. And if it happens over a shipping channel, well...

      Matt Bracken's "Foreign Enemies And Traitors" spells out what happens to the communities around Memphis who let the hive dwellers survive as they leave the shiitehole...

      Of course, belt-fed isn't needed if one starts as soon as the exit begins, and leaves the corpses where they fall. Especially if that is on the hive side of a destroyed bridge...

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    5. Mark, funny you should mention that. When I worked for CHP (California Highway Patrol) as a dispatcher, we dispatched for CalTrans, too. I worked out of Yreka, which is north of Redding and about forty miles south of the Oregon state line, with the conector being I-5.

      The folks up there are a bit less enamored of government and city-folk. Several Cal Trans workers said they had plans (and the necessary materials) to drop the bridges to the north and south of us, if TSHTF.

      This was _not_ an empty boast on their part. Our area had cattle ranches and farms, and a lot of us grew most of our own food, as well. Not to mention a lot of game available in the mountains around us, with a low population of humans.

      Some of us thought it might not be such a bad thing to have happen.

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    6. Gotta think ahead for festivities. Tacticool is fun. And tacticool is important. But if one cannot think strategically, then all will be for naught.

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  3. Water. Power. Telecomms. Interstates. Rail lines.

    They have no idea how fragile the economies of modern cities really are.

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    1. They think their Only Ones are invincible. And indeed they are if the supply chains remain intact. The Blue Wall can sortie out from their hives at will and wreak havoc across the countryside, killing anything that moves. And with air support - either the current helicopters and planes with IR video, or the military killer drones - they can identify any FreeFor groups before contact. Then when they're done with the killin', they can withdraw back to their citadel to celebrate.

      However, if the power and/or water are cut, then the Only Ones will have more important tasks to deal with beyond murdering Deplorables...

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  4. I would say they claim to be opposed to the electoral college but in fact are using it to distort the vote for Democrats. Make no mistake no Republican states/cities are in favor of this. It is just as much a ploy to elect Democrats as giving felons the vote was.

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  5. Not just belt-fed, but belt-fed and water-cooled. Or have a good supply of spare barrels on hand.

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