I'm for the retention of the electoral college. Its purpose doesn't have anything to do with outdated technology, although some of the mechanism is outdated.
One of the principal "fears" of the founders was that, lacking sufficient information on a candidate, each region would tend to favor a "favorite son" from its own region - giving a HUGE advantage to the most populous states. Without the Electoral College, there was almost no chance that anyone but a Virginian would ever be elected, in the earliest days.
Now try to imagine the concept applied to Maryland, where Baltimore and the suburbs of DC dominate the state, which is essentially rural outside those regions. The good people of Maryland could vote to run highways through every rural region, because hey - they VOTED on it. A *popular* vote. The metropolitan crowds had the 'right' to run roughshod over the more rural regions. Sucks, don't it?
NOW, we have a nation where, by looking at the now famous red and blue map where the metropolitan regions vote Democratic, and the more suburban and rural areas vote Republican. And thus, a "popular" vote would SCREW the rural areas, because a candidate could win without a SINGLE vote from the more rural areas. Sorry. THAT, to me, is what sucks.
A popular vote makes sense in a nation where geography is irrelevant, because it's basically homogeneous and any part of the country is similar to any other more or less.
Imagine if they found gold in Southern Maryland, and the state voted to tax the hell out of this place and give all the money to the folks in Baltimore. That's how it's like. No, I like the idea that a candidate must demonstrate broad support in addition to most or nearly most of the votes.
One of the principal "fears" of the founders was that, lacking sufficient information on a candidate, each region would tend to favor a "favorite son" from its own region - giving a HUGE advantage to the most populous states. Without the Electoral College, there was almost no chance that anyone but a Virginian would ever be elected, in the earliest days.
Now try to imagine the concept applied to Maryland, where Baltimore and the suburbs of DC dominate the state, which is essentially rural outside those regions. The good people of Maryland could vote to run highways through every rural region, because hey - they VOTED on it. A *popular* vote. The metropolitan crowds had the 'right' to run roughshod over the more rural regions. Sucks, don't it?
NOW, we have a nation where, by looking at the now famous red and blue map where the metropolitan regions vote Democratic, and the more suburban and rural areas vote Republican. And thus, a "popular" vote would SCREW the rural areas, because a candidate could win without a SINGLE vote from the more rural areas. Sorry. THAT, to me, is what sucks.
A popular vote makes sense in a nation where geography is irrelevant, because it's basically homogeneous and any part of the country is similar to any other more or less.
Imagine if they found gold in Southern Maryland, and the state voted to tax the hell out of this place and give all the money to the folks in Baltimore. That's how it's like. No, I like the idea that a candidate must demonstrate broad support in addition to most or nearly most of the votes.
