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Faithless electors

The 10th Circus Court in Denver just struck a blow against the Popular Vote Compact by acknowledging what has been true since to adoption of the Constitution ;that electors are free to vote for whoever they choose regardless of how the state directs them to vote. The case stems from elector
Micheal Baca, a Colorado Democratic who was required to cast his ballot for Evita who won the state's popular vote. Instead, he crossed out her name and wrote in John Kasich.
The secretary of state removed Baca as an elector, discarded his vote and brought in another elector who voted for Evita . But the court said the nullification of Baca's vote was unconstitutional. The court said that the states are empowered to appoint electors only but they have no power to nullify an electors vote. Assuming this decision holds up in SCOTUS (and I believe it will ) . That could weaken all the ideas of the compact to have the election of the President decided by the popular vote. The 10th Circus' decision only applies to states in it's jurisdiction including
Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Kansas, Oklahoma and New Mexico. However ,if other Appeals Courts rule differently ,or if Colorado appeals this decision then SCOTUS could take up the case before Dec 2020 .

Be so simple taking the politics out of the election and just going with the popular vote. The founders had to have a fail safe in case the people wanted to vote the elites out didn't they? Appointing senators and Electoral College delegates served that purpose, though choosing senators have been the province of the people since the 17th amendment.

We should make it so for the highest office of the land too.

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Be so simple taking the politics out of the election and just going with the popular vote. The founders had to have a fail safe in case the people wanted to vote the elites out didn't they?

In the most recent election, HC was very much the political elite and DT was the outsider, non-politician trying to get elected. I guess the founding fathers would have been much happier if HC had gotten in?

Irrelevant what the founding fathers would have thought about the 2016 elections outcome, it's modern man who suffer the consequences of bad choices in the first place. The next election is the opportunity to correct that choice. 2016 was but a wake up call to the fallibility of human error by non participation.

The dufus is no longer the outsider ,but the insider who is part of the problem, and obviously not a good solution.

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The dufus is no longer the outsider ,but the insider who is part of the problem, and obviously not a good solution

Yeah. You can vote for some of the really non-political elite like Biden, Harris, or Spartacus. Don't kid yourself. Trump is the only real outsider in the whole group. I don't like his big mouth or his deficit spending, but he is not a part of the politically elite.

OKAY, fine with me. If we get rid of the dufus, however YOU define him, and Moscow Mitch, it would be a great improvement.

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OKAY, fine with me. If we get rid of the dufus, however YOU define him, and Moscow Mitch, it would be a great improvement.

I understand you feel that way. I just think you are wrong in trying to say that you are somehow standing against the election of the elite.

The framers reasoning was as sound now as it was then. I live in a state where the vast majority of the people live in an urban and suburban environment while the largest areas of the state has the smallest populations . I can tell you that most of NY state still lives in a 1930s depression like existence and they not virtually ,but in reality have no representation in Albany to address this . That is why the electoral college is still relevant . The a$$wipes like the Clintonoids would campaign in a handful of the urban areas where most of the people live ,cater to them and wouldn't give a rats a$$ about the rest of the country.
You know it's true . Evita called Trump supporters a basket of deplorables . Peter Strzok said he went to Walmart and smelled Trump supporters . Imagine how they would be if they didn't have to make at least a half a$$ed effort to get those hayseed yahoos in flyover country to support them ?

But if you don't like that reasoning I'll give you another .
Under the Constitution, the person who receives the most electoral votes becomes the president, even if he or she does not receive either a plurality or a majority of the popular vote.
1992, Bubba received a majority of the electoral votes and became President, even though he only had a plurality (43 percent) of the popular votes. Ross Perot, received almost 19 percent. In fact, Bubba did not win a majority of the popular vote in either of his elections .But there was no doubt he won because the rules say you have to get the most electoral votes . And that was with only one 3rd party challenger . Even in 2016 Evita did not get a majority because of very minor 3rd party candidates .Imagine multiple 3rd party challengers like in the Parliamentary systems where every special interest could join a crowded field hoping that they could squeeze out enough of a plurality to get elected . It would be absolute chaos ;pro-life and pro-choice parties; free trade and anti-trade parties; pro-immigration and anti-immigration parties; and parties favoring or opposing gun control just to mention a couple of the possibilities . Remember that guy who ran on the rents being too high ? What would prevent him from eeking out a plurality ? We don't have a parliamentary system to accommodate these multiple special interests . In that system they get together after the fact and horse trade to build majorities . We would out of necessity have to scrap our constitutional system .

Now in the extreme case where electors cannot give a majority to the candidates then the 12th amendment kicks in and Congress decides who is President .Without the electoral college this could easily be the norm.

Your logic is very compelling as usual Tomder, and ending up with a dem and repub as prez and vice would be interesting indeed. Give the repubs credit for abject unity even after the dufus ran a coup and took over the party. For better or worse, impressive, even if all they really accomplished was tax cuts for the rich and judges, and made a few happy campers, but screwed most of us.

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We would out of necessity have to scrap our constitutional system .
Now in the extreme case where electors cannot give a majority to the candidates then the 12th amendment kicks in and Congress decides who is President .Without the electoral college this could easily be the norm.

You speak as if this would be a bad thing, but you have a system where unelected persons decide who is to be President. Ok the people have decided and electoral college voting is a formality, nevertheless, those persons could go against the popular vote, or in the case of HC confirm the popular vote

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For better or worse, impressive, even if all they really accomplished was tax cuts for the rich and judges.

When the bottom 80% of the income earners only pay a little more than 10% of the taxes, how are you supposed to give tax relief to them?

Clete 10 electors changed their vote . Evita lost 5 ,Trump 3 and 2 had their vote overturned by their state .Here is where the votes went ;
Colin Powell , Kasich ,Bernie Sanders ,Ron Paul
and Faith Spotted Eagle each got some elector votes .

In over 2 centuries there have been a total of 167 times where electors went against their state There is no threat to our system .

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Originally Posted by tomder55

In over 2 centuries there have been a total of 167 times where electors went against their state There is no threat to our system .

The threat occurred in 2016 and when Bush Jr. was elected.

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Originally Posted by jlisenbe

When the bottom 80% of the income earners only pay a little more than 10% of the taxes, how are you supposed to give tax relief to them?

Your ability to miss the point is uncanny.

It wasn't about tax relief to the lowest, it was about giving tax relief to those who had no need of it and therefore increased the deficit HUGELY.

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Your ability to miss the point is uncanny.

It wasn't about tax relief to the lowest, it was about giving tax relief to those who had no need of it and therefore increased the deficit HUGELY.

What do you suppose the 20% do with that money that does not end up in the government's hands?

When taxes were higher under Obama, are you saying we had no deficits then?

I think you completely miss the point, the deficit isn't about taxes, it is about spending, spending money the government doesn't have. If you confiscated the entire GDP for one year you couldn't repay the debt

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I think you completely miss the point, the deficit isn't about taxes, it is about spending, spending money the government doesn't have. If you confiscated the entire GDP for one year you couldn't repay the debt

Just about right. I don't fault Trump for cutting taxes so much as for not controlling spending.

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Originally Posted by paraclete

I think you completely miss the point, the deficit isn't about taxes, it is about spending, spending money the government doesn't have. If you confiscated the entire GDP for one year you couldn't repay the debt

When there is a huge tax cut for the rich, it increases the deficit by that amount in loss of revenue. Get it? Right-wing/Republican theories that reducing taxes generates revenue that pays for the reduction has been proven to be false, most recently in Kansas.

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When there is a huge tax cut for the rich, it increases the deficit by that amount in loss of revenue. Get it? Right-wing/Republican theories that reducing taxes generates revenue that pays for the reduction has been proven to be false, most recently in Kansas.

Obama increased taxes and had huge deficits. Trump lowered taxes and has huge deficits. I'll just bet that controlling spending has something to do with this whole thing.

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Originally Posted by Athos

When there is a huge tax cut for the rich, it increases the deficit by that amount in loss of revenue. Get it? Right-wing/Republican theories that reducing taxes generates revenue that pays for the reduction has been proven to be false, most recently in Kansas.

In a perfect world such policies might work, however, the world is not perfect, and people don't respond the way economists think, the economy is not a model any more than the climate is a model. Right now in Brazil right wing expansionist theories are creating an environmental disaster which will soon be an economic disaster when other economies react

The supply side tax cuts theory is ONLY false when you can't control spending . It was proven sound theory in 1963 when proposed it and it was passed in 1964 The tax cuts fueled the growth of the golden era of the mid-1960s …..
eight 1/2 year of uninterrupted growth of over 5% per year.
That growth created jobs .
Tax revenues INCREASED from $94 billion in 1961 to $153 billion in 1968, The same was true of the Reagan cuts . It was out of control spending that created an expanding deficit .Add to that unsustainable long term obligations of mandatory spending like Social Security Medicare and debt service . and you get to the point where we now owe more than 100 % GDP.