For those who are unaware of how presidents get picked in our country, each state has a number of votes attached to it based on its population.  The smallest states, Alaska, Wyoming, Rhode Island, and so on, get three or four votes.  The populated states, California, Texas, Pennsylvania, New York, and so on, get 30 to 50 votes.  Here's the deal.  If a candidate (the person running) wins a majority, they get all the votes.  That means Person A can beat Person B by maybe a few thousand votes and they get 50-odd electorial college votes.

It is conceivable that a person can lose a popular election but win the states necessary to win the Presidency.


Does anyone think it's time for a change or should we continue things the way they are?

I think that is exceptionally backwards. I also think that the parties wouldn't change it.
Right now it favours the democrats and republicans.
Any change to make it fairer runs the risk of inviting in other candidates. Granted it wouldnt happen immediately, but when people saw the increased vote count for non dems/cons, they would realise they wouldnt have a better chance of forcing out the old guard.

thenumberone : I disagree that there is a difference between popular votes and electoral college and favoring third parties.

If we went to pure popular elections, Independents, the Green Party, Constitutionists, LIbertarians and *maaaaaybe* U.S. Tax Payers would see more of their folks represented at the lower level but they wouldn't have a shot at the Presidency.  The U.S. loves good guy vs. bad guy, us vs. them, one on one, two foes for one championship.  Our culture isn't that of political coalitions and finding bonds across party lines to form groups for the interest of those involved.

I agree it's backwards.  I think it'd be a while before people broke away from picking Republican or Democrat until they saw a few rounds of elections (12-16 years) start tallying up.

I'd love it.  We have the technology.  It'd make things more Democracy!  Freedom!

And I agree.
I was speaking long term. I'd be surprised if it was as little as 10 years before it happened.
But this would start the ball rolling.
The problem with having so few party's is that they know all they need to do is criticse the government.
Republicans:The democrats have cost us business and are squandering our tax money while our army goes unfunded.
Republicans get in next year.
Democrats:The republicans are marginalising the poor and pandering to the whims of the 1%.
Democrats get in the next year.

Essentially there is no accountability. All the opposition have to take is take pot shots at the main party. And they are the only real opposition, so people will forget they screwed up the last time, and go right back to them.
Even the UK has drifted into that rut. Ever since ww1, its been either labour or the conservatives.
Their are independents, and many other party members, but they never get into power because people just vote for who they think can win.
I prefer the scottish parliament because there is a much better distribution of party's.
Conservatives used to be bi here, now they have very few seats. Labour used to be big, now they are about to lose at least half their UK seats in the UK election, and a bunch in the next Scottish one. The Scottish national party,took the majority of seats for the first time. The greens and the Scottish socialist party look set to fly up the rankings. Maybe one day the greens will govern. Change can be good.

The same problem persists in most country's that people have party loyalty's. They vote for a party because their dad did.
The governements know this, and they capitalise on it.
I doubt either party would ever change the electoral laws, and when you think about it, how could they be forced to?
They know only one of the 2 will get in power. Unless people actively work together to force change its going to be the same old for the foreseeable future.
A pity really. The more party's the more the government can reflect all its people. Obviously it would be chaos if there were around 200 different party's, but only 2 is really no better.

The game deus ex is interesting, as it deals with the alienation of those who never get representation, versus a government (and corporations) that has been allowed to consolidate its control to the point they can't be removed. The solution in the end is that everyone directly up links their votes, and the need for elected officials becomes unnecessary.

Unfortunately that's probably never going to be a feasible option. I don't know what the politics of nations will be 5, 10, 20 years down the line. But from an outside perspective each U.S government looks largely the same. I'd regard them both as conservatives.

warmaker :

This is something that has always got to me, but I wasn't sure what to think of it.

I mean, I understand why we would want a president who represents most all of Americans, but we don't want smaller states to have less of a chance either.

One thing I think that is forgotten is that even though this country is a union, it is a divisive territory.

Different states are allowed to do what they want, (Then they all got on the Federal government's paycheck, and lost loads of freedom in exchange for extra bills.)

Our states are not exactly United. A huge difference in policy can be found in aggravating issues. Like abortion, the definition of marriage, treatment of infants, and so on.

Because of such political division, one can see why this system might have been used to make sure a state with a higher population did not force it's ideas on a state with a lower population.

Other then that, I'm not sure, I would have to look into it more. Good topic by the way.

This controversial topic lies in the question, Will you concede to the mass or not? In other words, will you start a riot with others like you if you did not get your way? 

For those who are ignorant, they think our president is elected because they voted. Good for them. For the smart ones who knows of our representatives, power to them. The thing is if we don't have an electoral college, it will be like Sword legion said, it will be unfair to smaller states. But on the other hand, if I recall correctly, George W. Bush won not by the people's choice. No riots with ignorant or non ignorant people there. What happens if there is no electoral college then? Massachusetts and Hawaii would be damn pissed. So will they riot? Maybe not in the same sense but there will be deep animosity and there will be lots and lots of angry people. The problem is people are taking the electoral college for granted I think. Most presidents wins with a popular vote but sometimes the electoral college disagrees and we just need to accept that. We elected them to represent us and it is our own fault for doing so. For those who didn't even vote, they don't have a right to voice their opinion. You can only rightfully complain if you voted and didn't get your guy, otherwise, shush. I am all for the disbanding of the electoral college but only if we can all get along and individual states don't come into too much conflict with each other.

Time for a change? Perhaps. What change would that be? Don't look at me. I increasingly feel that more about the systems laid out by our constitution are becoming outdated. Of course, that's why there's a specific part of the constitution that grants the right to make amendments. Honestly, the electoral college still makes sense. Dwelling on the topic sometimes brings me back-and-forth about it, but in the end it works out pretty well. Larger states get more votes because a bunch of people are there. It only makes sense. Rhode Island, for example, in now way represents as much of the population as California or New York. In a way, the electoral college still relies on the popular vote. I would definitely say it was time for a change if the electoral college numbers were constant, but they do get updated with each new population census, so I think the current system remains justified. Though like I've said it has been quite some time since the system was conceived and a change might even be more efficient, depending on what it would be. But I definitely can't think of anything better, so that's that. lol

TitaniumOxide : Hawaii already has the lowest voter turnout of any state because the president has already been decided without Hawaii's votes in every single election. What needs to happen is the US needs to have all polls open simultaneously and all the polls need to close at the same time so that 60% of votes are not tallied before the polls in Hawaii close.