[duaneb]

> I'd like to see most independents / democratic people unite under a real progressive platform next election and stop the extremist cycle of social issues vs fear mongering.

There's virtually zero chance of this happening without another party collapsing first.

Hell, even then, independents are harder to herd than cats.

[fixxer]

Because very few of them are truly independent.

[duaneb]

I don't necessarily disagree, but how does this follow from what I said? I'd argue people are TOO independent to reach a third party consensus.

[fixxer]

Independent white men are generally Republican voters, for example. Big difference between being independent and not identifying with a party.

Hence, they are hard to herd because they are actually already decided.

This isn't conjecture. I've seen the base files.

[duaneb]

I'm gonna need a massive citation here.

> This isn't conjecture. I've seen the base files.

Until you share, it's conjecture.

[dlp211]

http://themonkeycage.org/2009/12/three_myths_about_political...

[leereeves]

Where does that link support the statement that:

> Independent white men are generally Republican voters

?

[fixxer]

DNC base files (back when I worked for that side), but based on how shit their polls were, feel free to question my claim.

The name of the game isn't changing hearts and minds (generally), but turnout. 2016 isnt an outlier. Look at county level returns.

[vacri]

It's more because 'independent' is a simple description, not a political manifesto.

[zanny]

Its impossible to happen under the system as it is established, but you just needed to push for a constitutional amendment and / or state compact like the one to overturn the electoral college to change the voting system to support either proportional (doesn't work when you elect a single seat like the president) or STV (ie runoff voting).

The chance of that happening in the next four years? Really low. About as unlikely as it has been since the Internet established itself as a place to talk about how to fix the voting system. But unlikely doesn't mean you don't try, and don't talk about it where you can.

[fixxer]

Changing from electoral college to pop vote also means the nature of campaigning will change.

California, for example, has a huge population of Republicans and now their vote would matter. I don't think Trump did any non military focused rallies there.

I am in Illinois. I didn't vote in 2008 or 2012 because I knew my vote would have no impact. Give me a popular vote and you might have Romney... Be careful what you wish for.

[rhblake]

> California, for example, has a huge population of Republicans and now their vote would matter.

And at the same time votes from Democrats in California would also matter more. I'd assume a number of people who'd vote Democrat in CA don't vote because they know the Democrats won't lose anyway.

[fixxer]

Maybe. My point isn't partisan, but more along the lines of "you don't know how this will play out."

I'm all for a popular vote, but I don't think you're going to see a swing to the left necessarily.

[serge2k]

It would drastically reduce the voting power of several red states. Only recently (since 2000) has the EC being different than the popular vote been a problem. Both times it's gone in the republicans favour.

It would definitely be radical change though.

[fixxer]

Kind of a small sample size, right? I guess I'm hesitant to change the political dynamic of a nation based on just that.

[caf]

It doesn't matter which way the partisan advantage would run (and it most likely wouldn't be to the permanent advantage of one side anyway), if it increased turnout then that would be an unalloyed Good Thing.

[m_mueller]

Wouldn't Romney in 2012 have been better if it avoided Trump 2016?

[fixxer]

Lol. Bill Maher misses W.

[CalChris]

Romney lost 51-47 in the popular vote.

[hdctambien]

Of those that voted. I think fixxer is saying that there are alot of people that don't vote (about half of the voting population) because they are an X in a Y state so they don't think their vote will change that. But if the electoral college went poof, a lot more of the missing 50% would vote and that could change the expected value of a popular vote.

[dllthomas]

This isn't so much directed at you, but this seems a great place to note that there are races on the ballot other than president, usually your local elections will have a bigger impact on your day-to-day life than the national ones, and your vote carries orders of magnitude more weight. Pay attention down-ballot!

[_ea1k]

In my district, the margins on those were even larger than the presidential margins. I still voted, but the outcomes were all very predictable here.

[matwood]

Exactly. As long as we are in an electoral system, discussing the popular vote as anything more than a novelty is a waste of time.

[twblalock]

That's not a useful fact, because both candidates would have campaigned differently if the president was chosen by popular vote rather than the electoral college. It's very unlikely that the popular vote would have been the same.

[MichaelBurge]

The electoral college doesn't need to change. The two bigger problems to me are:

* Winner-takes-all means that in any state that is %60/%40, the 40%'s votes don't affect the election at all.

* Congressmen are representing too many people.

If more states worked like Nebraska and Maine, then people in rural counties in California could decide a few seats on the electoral college. And there's an amendment outstanding to change the number of representatives:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congressional_Apportionment_Am...

Ranked choice voting is also interesting, but I think not as important right now.

[75j]

It's actually more likely to happen than ever:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Intersta...

But, ditching the electoral college is only a small part of the solution to the core problems in US politics.