MESSAGE
| DATE | 2016-12-21 |
| FROM | Ruben Safir
|
| SUBJECT | Re: [Hangout-NYLXS] Serious danger to state sovereignty and your
|
On Tue, Dec 20, 2016 at 03:19:58PM -0800, Rick Moen wrote:
> Quoting Ruben Safir (ruben-at-mrbrklyn.com):
>
> > http://www.nationalpopularvote.com/state/ny
> > Serious danger to state sovereignty and your right to have your vote count
>
> {guffaw}
>
> I'll just repost here what I said elsewhere:
>
>
>
>
> Date: Fri, 11 Nov 2016 12:26:17 -0800
> From: Rick Moen
> To: skeptic-at-linuxmafia.com
> Subject: Re: [skeptic] Rural and urban divide
>
> Quoting James H.G. Redekop:
>
> [...]
>
> > I also wonder if the result would have been the same if every state
> > used the Maine & Nebraska approach to distributing Electoral Votes.
> >
> > Interesting development: Maine has just voted to start using
> > instant-runoff ranked-choice voting for Senate, Congress, Governor,
> > State Senate, and State Rep elections.
>
> Also encouraging is the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact
> (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact),
> implemented under the Constitution's Compact Clause (Article I, section
> 10, clause 3):
>
> No State shall, without the Consent of Congress, lay any Duty of
> Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of Peace, enter into any
> Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a foreign Power, or
> engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as
> will not admit of delay.
>
> Now, reading that, you would correctly read that as _banning_ compacts
> among the states without Congressional approval, but the US Supreme
> Court in Virginia v. Tennessee, 148 U.S. 503 (1893) clarified that the
> Compact Clause requires congressional consent only if the agreement
> among the states is "directed to the formation of any combination
> tending to the increase of political power in the States, which may
> encroach upon or interfere with the just supremacy of the United
> States".
Yeah, the supposed Blue states are run by severe machine politics and what they
want to do is coop the protections of smaller states wrapping about the
lie that the electorial college was invented for slavery, which it
wasn't. It was designed to protect the smaller states, like Delaware.
The bigger states objected, like NY. Same shit, different day.
Regardless. Those Blue states will be a lot less blue anyway, and there
will likely not be any more democrats in a decade. The Democrats are
all about coruption and machine politics. Whereever they they are,
political coruption is not far behind. It just ticks them off when the
counrty fails to be run by socialist autocrats.
That the electorial college does do is assure local control in
elections. Unfortunaely for NY that means curropt machine politicians
at every turn. Next they will want to get rid of the senate.
How has NY voted n the Presidential election in the last 50 years?
9-3 dems over repulicans.
and yet we went 20 years without a Democratic Mayor.
I might agree to a popular vote if they split california up into 4 or
five states.
>
> Ten states plus D.C. have ratifief the National Popular Vote Interstate
> Compact, constituting so far 165 electoral votes (61.1% of the 270 votes
> at which point it would activate and have legal force). The Compact
> states that the signatory states agree that, in any year where their
> combined electoral votes constitute an Electoral College majority, they
> agree to cast _all_ of their Electoral College votes for the nationwide
> popular vote presidential/VP winners.
>
> The problem, as usual, has been getting states who benefit from the
> present embarrassingly distortive system to agree to join -- 'red'
> states and swing states that get disproportionate power and funds from
> the present skewed system. In that regard, the Electoral College
> distortion is as addictive as gerrymandering, voter suppression tactics,
> lifetime disenfranchisement of former felons, the Three-Fifths
> Compromise, poll taxes, and voter literacy tests -- all of those being
> thumbs on the national scales.
>
> Governor Schwarzenegger vetoed the California Legislature's
> ratification of the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact in 2007,
> on the insultingly obvious specious grounds that 'it could require their
> states' electoral votes to be awarded to a candidate who did not win a
> majority in their state', one of the times IMO when Der Gubernator most
> let the state down. (This was a bullshit sleight-of-hand objection
> because, under a national popular vote system, state-level majorities
> are irrelevant: In any state, votes cast contribute to the nationwide
> tally, which determines the winner. The preferences of individual
> voters are thus paramount, while state-level majorities are an obsolete
> intermediary measure.) However, current Governor Jerry Brown signed it
> when the current Legislature ratified it again in 2011.
>
> California is also _among_ the states that have adopted pretty-good
> solutions to ending gerrymandering, via a Citizens Redistricting
> Commission
> (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Citizens_Redistricting_Commission),
> that starting in 2008 has had sovereign power to redraw districts after
> each decennial census and consists by law of five Democrats, five
> Republicans, and four commissioners from neither major party. Arizona
> has a basically identical setup, adopted in 2000.
>
> 21 states use some variant of this process for either just state
> legislature districts or those plus US House of Representatives
> districts, preventing incumbents from putting their thumbs on the
> scales. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redistricting_commission
>
> California also adopted in 2010 a unique 'Top-Two Primary' system
> (http://www.independentvoterproject.org/top_two_primary) to prevent the
> _political parties_ putting their thumbs on the scales. This has
> likewise been helpful in eliminating partisan divides and keeping the
> _parties_ from putting their thumbs on the scale.
>
> But then we have the states that still think 1820 was a really good
> year, and keep trying to go back.
>
>
>
>
>
> Date: Fri, 11 Nov 2016 13:51:51 -0800
> From: Rick Moen
> To: skeptic-at-linuxmafia.com
> Subject: Re: [skeptic] Rural and urban divide
>
> Quoting Michael D. Sofka:
>
> > I had not heard about this before, and leads me to yet another
> > scenario we haven't seen, but which at this point would not surprise
> > me. Imagine the Electoral Collage and popular vote go for one
> > candidate, but the result is close enough that one of the states,
> > whose legislator and governor are from the other party, pass a bill
> > directing a slate of electors for their own party, overturning the
> > decision. Not possible? Florida's legislator was threatening to do
> > just that in 2000 should the recount lead to a Gore victory in the
> > state.
>
> Yes. It's _always_ been the case that a state's slate of electors can be
> pawns of its legislature and governor, completely ignoring the will of
> the state's voters (unless of course they rise up and carry out an
> improbably rapid recall election).
>
> And all of this is because the Founding Fathers were dealing with some
> pretty skeevy political compromises that were inherent in the politics
> of their day, _and_ also really didn't have a lot of faith in their
> system _and_ were frankly petrified of democracy.
>
> If you can find Season 1, Episode 7 of 'Adam Ruins Everything' with
> Adam Conover, the episode entitled 'Adam Ruins Voting', you might find
> that a delightful explanation of that entire historical background.
> Trutv.com, alas, hosts the episodes for free online streaming only for
> 30 days, but perhaps here:
> http://www.watchseriesgo.to/episode/adam_ruins_everything_s1_e7.html
> http://projectfreetv.us/adam-ruins-everyth/season-1/episode-7/14419.html
> (Most of these 'free' video streaming sites are pretty skeevy. Expect
> popunders and other sorts of sleaze.) Much better, it can be torrented:
> http://1337x.to/torrent/1353641/Adam-Ruins-Everything-S01E07-720p-HDTV-x264-W4F/
>
> The one-hour Election Special is available for streaming, and is a hoot:
> http://www.trutv.com/full-episodes/adam-ruins-everything/2100491/index.html
> ...but only if you're a customer of a qualifying cable television provider.
> For the rest of us:
> http://1337x.to/torrent/1855403/Adam-Ruins-Everything-S01-Special-The-Adam-Ruins-Everything-Election-Special-HDTV-x264-W4F-SRIGGA/
>
> > The electoral college as constituted could not perform it's original
> > intent. All it can do is thwart the majority, which it has done
> > twice now in recent elections.
>
> Yes. And _if_ you are talling all occasions over US history
> (as opposed to just recently) when majority intent was foiled by the
> Electoral College, then four times.
>
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcZTTB10_Vo
>
>
>
>
>
> Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2016 11:25:02 -0800
> From: Rick Moen
> To: skeptic-at-linuxmafia.com
> Subject: Re: [skeptic] FW.....electoral votes
>
> Quoting Terry W. Colvin), citing Lou Shanley:
>
> > Just to give an update- - the founding fathers created the electoral
> > college and delegate votes to keep the election process fair and
> > balanced.
>
> No, they created the Electoral College because they really didn't trust
> democracy very much, because a national public election running from
> Vermont to Georgia wasn't feasible in the era of horse and buggy, and so
> that the slave states could have a thumb on the scales called the
> Three-Fifths Compromise.
>
>
> > it's removing the democratic process which is based on an honest
> > majority, which we all know is nearly impossible, especially today.
>
> No, it _used_ to be impossible, back in 1787. It's extremely possible
> _today_, except that the Electoral College, disenfranchisement of former
> felons for life (which is literally a surviving portion of the Jim Crow
> laws and exists for the same purpose), disenfranchisement of half a
> million D.C. voters in Congressional elections, and chickenshit
> voter-suppression tactics prevent it.
>
> > The smaller and less populated states needed a voice to be heard and
> > so this republic developed the electoral college.
>
> I think Lou forgot to add, 'and the more slaves a state had'.
>
> > It was advised wisely by founding fathers that all citizens cast their
> > vote and the delegates will represent your voice
>
> I think Lou forgot to say 'all white, male, adult citizens who own real
> estate and absolutely no others'.
>
> > As a former poll watcher who overlooked the workers and supervisors, I
> > can attest to corruption taking place at polling places.
>
> You know why this is so incredibly rare in the 21st Century (albeit
> it was common in particular local areas through most of the 20th)?
> Because it's a major felony.
>
> If your state or county is so very lawless that major felonies aren't
> prosecuted, then indeed you will have corrupt elections (as was still
> common in some parts of the USA though the 1960s), but you also have a
> lot bigger problems.
>
> But here's the thing that gets me about logic like Lou Shanley's, Terry:
> Let's assume that you live in a state where the electoral officials and
> local/state law enforcement authorities are so corrupt and slipshod that
> massive voting fraud goes deliberately unprosecuted. OK, we're now
> running with that assumption. _Given_ that, how on God's green earth
> does Lou reach the conclusion that the state electors, personally
> nominated by the state's corrupt power elites and then selected by
> statewide popular vote administered by the aforementioned corrupt
> electoral officials who are distorting the vote, are going to be an
> improvement and 'not a perfect system, but right now it is the best'?
> Because the electors are coated in special Founding Father sauce? I
> really don't think so. If Lou is arguing that his state's popular vote
> was corrupted, then his state's selection of electors was therefore also
> corrupted, because the first picked the second.
>
> Why is this so difficult for Lou to figure out? Perhaps, because he
> doesn't want to?
>
>
>
>
>
> Date: Sun, 18 Dec 2016 21:29:28 -0800
> From: Rick Moen
> To: skeptic-at-linuxmafia.com
> Subject: (forw) The Electoral College thing
>
> Rob Walker is a friend and former co-worker here in the S.F. Bay Area,
> whom I worked with at VA Linux Systems, and who comes from a very
> conservative family in rural Idaho and Montana. At a gathering
> recently, he hit me with a startling assertion that dropping the
> Electoral College would lead to 'the French Revolution'. Being somewhat
> taken by surprise, even after unpacking his meaning I said merely 'That
> bears some thinking over.'
>
> So, I'm getting back to him.
>
> ----- Forwarded message from Rick Moen -----
>
> Date: Sun, 18 Dec 2016 21:00:33 -0800
> From: Rick Moen
> To: Rob Walker
> Subject: The Electoral College thing
> Organization: If you lived here, you'd be $HOME already.
>
> You kind of took my by surprise with the polite question about whether
> popular election of US Pres/VP wouldn't tend towards 'French
> Revolution', i.e., effete liberal city-dwellers running roughshod
> over decent rural conservatives.
>
>
> There's a very, very legitimate question about how best to structure
> the election to balance interests. But I don't go around forming and
> expressing opinions on things that _simply aren't going to happen_.
>
> Thing is, whoever are in power always want to keep the Electoral College,
> for the simple reason that they won. If you say to a politician of the
> winning faction 'Congratulations on your victory. Now, how would you
> like to amend away the voting system that put you in office?', your
> answer will always be some form of 'no'. Hence, the idea is always
> appealing only with a currently _losing_ faction, hence it never
> happens.
>
> Hence, I don't spend time thinking about it, because it won't happen.
> I care only about real-world politics, not about fantasy-world politics.
>
>
> To directly address the idea that the Electoral College prevents
> domination by big cities, actually, no it doesn't necessarily do that at
> all. Imagine the following 11 states' electoral votes all choosing one
> Pres/VP slate:
>
> California, 55
> Texas, 38
> Florida, 29
> New York, 29
> Illinois, 20
> Pennsylvania, 20
> Ohio, 18
> Georgia, 16
> Michigan, 16
> North Carolina, 15
> New Jersey, 14
>
> That's 270 electoral votes: Those 11 _urban_ states can completely
> ignore what the other 39 states + DC want. Now, those _are_ the states
> with most Electoral College votes, but also exactly the states
> containing most significant US cities.[1]
>
> Those 11 aren't likely to agree, but the point is that if they do, the
> Electoral College _is_ what would give the huge cities in them control
> over the election. So, the assumption in your question was mistaken:
> Nothing about the Electoral College is guaranteed to protect the rights
> of rural states, or small states, or less-populated states, or
> conservative states. It could make the opposite happen, in fact.
>
>
> That aside, I recommend these very entertaining videos on the subject
> by CGP Grey, especially #3:
>
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wC42HgLA4k (6 mins, 30 secs)
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcZTTB10_Vo (21 secs)
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3wLQz-LgrM (4 mins, 42 secs)
>
> The third is a slight correction to the other two. In the first one,
> he had defined population of a 'city' by whoever's in the city limits,
> which is plainly not quite right: One needs to consider metro areas.
> So, he did, in the third video. (As he notes, this is made complex by
> some metro areas crossing state lines, as with NYC metro extending
> across NY/NJ/CT.)
>
> Worth your time. Grey is interesting even when he's off-target -- and
> even his uncorrected first video makes thoughtful points.
>
>
> E.g., he points out that this equally unlikely but _possible_ edge case
> of a voter alliance _also_ tops 270: the aforementioned 'other 39
> states plus DC' (if you add New Jersey).
>
> Consider what happens if 50% plus 1 voters in each of these 40 places
> (and also 50% plus 1 vote in New Jersey) ever all vote for a single
> Pres/VP ticket:
>
> Wyoming, 3. District of Columbia, 3. Vermont, 3. North Dakota, 3.
> Alaska, 3. South Dakota, 3. Delaware, 3. Montana, 3. Rhode Island, 4.
> New Hampshire, 4. Maine, 4. Hawaii, 4. Idaho, 4. Nevada, 4.
> West Virginia, 5. New Mexico, 5. Nebraska, 6. Utah, 6. Kansas, 6.
> Arkansas, 6. Mississippi, 6. Iowa, 6. Connecticut, 7.
> Oklahoma, 7. Oregon, 7. Kentucky, 8. Louisiana, 8. South Carolina, 9.
> Alabama, 9. Colorado, 9. Minnesota, 10. Wisconsin, 10. Maryland, 10.
> Missouri, 10. Tennessee, 11. Arizona, 11. Indiana, 11. Massachusetts, 11.
> Washington, 12. Virginia, 13. New Jersey, 14.
>
> That's 281 Electoral College votes -- but, as Grey points out, involves
> only 21.91% of the popular vote: Less than 1/4 of the votes cast can nail
> the Presidency -- because of the Electoral College. That's certainly
> not right, either.
>
> The difficult way to change it is a constitutional amendment, which
> won't work because 2/3 of each house of Congress won't pass it. Even if
> that happened, or a constitutional convention called by 2/3 of the
> states approved one by a 2/3 supermajority, the required ratification
> by 3/4 of the states wouldn't approve it. Because politics.
>
> The easier way is a state compact, such as
> https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact,
> which would take effect if states comprising a majority of Electoral
> College votes (currently 270) approved it. Ten states plus DC have,
> comprising 165 Electoral College votes, have approved it -- but it
> is pointless until there's 270, which won't happen, because politics.
>
>
> So, short answer: Electing Presidents by popular vote constituting a
> threat to conservatives, rural people, etc. is pure fantasy because
> (1) switching to popular vote wouldn't necessarily empower urban liberals
> anyway (the opposite can happen), (2) urbanites already _can_ control
> such a election via Electoral College given the right state alliance,
> and (3) anyway, the USA _won't_ switch, because politics.
>
>
>
> [1] Of the USA's 30 biggest urban areas, that 11 state list misses only
> Washington, DC (spread across DC, MD, and VA), Boston, Phoenix/Mesa,
> Seattle, Minneapolis/St. Paul, Denver/Aurora, Baltimore, St. Louis (the
> part that's in MO, but not the part in IL), Las Vegas/Henderson, and
> Portland, OR.
>
> ----- End forwarded message -----
>
>
>
>
>
> Date: Tue, 20 Dec 2016 14:41:06 -0800
> From: Rick Moen
> To: skeptic-at-linuxmafia.com
> Subject: Re: [skeptic] More from the state of fruits and nuts...
>
> Quoting Garrison Hilliard:
>
> [posting somebody's well-stated critique of clickbait site The
> Federalist Papers's Dec. 18 story 'Hillary's Popular Vote Win Came
> ENTIRELY from California']
>
> I don't have a lot to add, except that I checked the figures about that
> 1.4 million, and it's correctly calculated.
>
> Popular vote totals from The Cook Political Report are handy (unless you
> really want to glean the figures from all 51 official sources, which is
> what Cook Political Report worker David Wasserman did).
>
> Nationwide:
> Clinton 65,844,610
> Trump: 62,979,636
> Others: 7,804,213
> Total 136,628,459
>
> California's official figures, from Secretary of State Alex Padilla's
> Dec. 16, 2016 Statement of Vote:
>
> Clinton 8,753,788
> Trump 4,483,810
> Others 904,401
> Total 14,141,999
>
> Based on that, let's subtract California's votes from the nationwide
> totals. Then we get:
>
> Nationwide without CA:
> Clinton 57,090,822
> Trump 58,495,826
> Others 6,899,812
> Total 122,486,460
>
> Trump's theoretical popular-vote margin in a United States without
> California would thus have been indeed 1.4 million.
>
> Garrison's unidentified critique source said:
>
> > But that's not how it works. And -- as he has said many time -- if Donald
> > Trump was campaigning for the popular vote, rather than the electoral vote,
> > he would have campaigned much differently.
>
> I don't think any amount of campaigning in California would have gotten
> him anywhere near half of that 4.3 million vote shortfall. FWIW, the
> existing vote split mirrors party-preference registration in the state,
> pretty much exactly.
>
> And New York state knows Trump far too well to think he's a credible
> candidate for national office, which is basically why he crashed and
> burned in that state's tallies.
>
> > The purpose of the Electoral College is to prevent regional candidates
> > from dominating national elections...
>
> I'm not sure Garrison's unidentified source is really arguing this
> point, because the remainder of the piece appears to undermine it, so
> maybe this was supposed to ba part of what the Federalist Papers
> clickbait article said?
>
> But let's address it directly.
>
> The _original_ purpose of the Electoral College was partly to give slave
> states a thumb on the scales (3/5ths Compromise), but mostly to work
> around the practical impossibility of a national election across
> thirteen 18th Century ex-colonies with 18th Century transportation and
> communication -- and also frankly as a gesture of extreme doubt about
> the wisdom of democracy at all, which was quite understandable given
> their situation in 1787.
>
> For well over a century, it's had no purpose except to introduce
> weirdly random effects on the presidential election. Before the 2000s,
> there was a long period when those weird effects happen not to have
> manifested, so people forgot about the potential, but it was always
> there.
>
> Neither Clinton nor Trump in any way qualifies as a 'regional
> candidate', having broad support across the country albeit with
> interesting lumpiness. A 'regional candidate' would be someone like
> Evan McMullin. And, here's the thing, Garrison: Nothing about the
> Electoral College guarantees that candidates with popularity in big
> liberal-leaning states like California and New York cannot dominate the
> election. It all depends on how accidental state alliances fall. E.g.,
> I pointed out that if the 11 most urban states all pick the same
> candidate, that candidate wins in the Electoral College.
>
> Here's a scenario where 'regional candidate' Evan McMullin could have
> been handed the Presidency _by_ the Electoral College:
>
> Step 1. 37 or more electors pledged to Trump/Pence, in a fit of buyer's
> remorse, cast their Pres. votes for someone (anyone) else, depriving him
> of 270. Meanwhile, at least enough electors pledge to either or both
> slate vote to ensure that McMullin gets the third-highest number of
> clectoral votes for Pres.
>
> Step 2. Congress meets on Jan. 6th, and the House of Representatives
> holds a 'contingent election' per the Twelfth Amendment to pick the
> President from among the three top vote-getters. Each state has one
> vote per round, and 26 votes are required to win. If the House followed
> the example of the only other time this happened, it would meet in
> closed session, and only states for whom a majority of the delegation
> agree would be permitted to cast that state's vote. They could easily
> decide to jettison both major party candidates and pick McMullin, and
> nobody outside the House chamber would even have a firm idea of which
> 26 or more states opted for the ex-spook from Utah.
>
> This is only the beginning of the weirdness the Electoral College (not
> to mention the 12th Amendment 'contingent election' fallback) could and
> may in the future bring about.
>
> Anyway, no real point arguing about the stupidity of the Electoral
> College system and its Twelfth Amendment fallback. For reasons of
> practical politics, as I pointed out separately, we're stuck with them
> for the foreseeable future.
>
>
> > There is some validity to pointing out that the 2016 election is an
> > exemplar of a modern trend that generally sees Democratic candidates
> > tending to receive large numbers of votes from densely-populated
> > metropolitan areas in states such as New York and California, while
> > Republican candidates tend to collect votes from geographically larger but
> > less populated portions of the country -- one of the main factors behind
> > this election's disparity between the popular vote (which Clinton won) and
> > the electoral vote that actually decides the election (which Trump won).
> > This phenomenon could be viewed as a positive, that our electoral system
> > requires winning presidential candidates to have broad national support and
> > not just rack up huge margins in a relatively small number of
> > high-population centers. On the other hand, some argue that our government
> > should represent people and not geography, and therefore the location of
> > voters should be irrelevant.
>
> Yes, it's a legitimate question, and not an easy one, about how to
> appropriately balance interests.
>
> One thing the unidentified source misses is something else I've
> mentioned before, the additionally distortive effect of the
> Apportionment Act of 1911
> (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apportionment_Act_of_1911), which still
> applies today.
>
> In order to implement the effect of the decennial census on each state's
> number of House of Representatives members, Congress needed to approve
> an algorithm to convert the raw census numbers into seat counts, and
> it's gone through several such algorithms. One of the issues is what to
> do about fractional seats. The 1911 revision rounds them _up_.
>
> The effect of this change has been to put a small but significant thumb
> on the scale for small and less-populated states, making the votes of
> their residents count more than they should.
>
> _______________________________________________
> hangout mailing list
> hangout-at-nylxs.com
> http://www.nylxs.com/
--
So many immigrant groups have swept through our town
that Brooklyn, like Atlantis, reaches mythological
proportions in the mind of the world - RI Safir 1998
http://www.mrbrklyn.com
DRM is THEFT - We are the STAKEHOLDERS - RI Safir 2002
http://www.nylxs.com - Leadership Development in Free Software
http://www2.mrbrklyn.com/resources - Unpublished Archive
http://www.coinhangout.com - coins!
http://www.brooklyn-living.com
Being so tracked is for FARM ANIMALS and and extermination camps,
but incompatible with living as a free human being. -RI Safir 2013
_______________________________________________
hangout mailing list
hangout-at-nylxs.com
http://www.nylxs.com/
|
|
