TED Conversations

Melissa Seideman

This conversation is closed. Start a new conversation
or join one »

Direct popular vote should replace the Electoral College.

Please state your opinion here about this debate and respond to one other person.

Pro- Lindy and Miranda
Con- Claudia and Caitriona

Debate is on Thursday.

Topics: Electoral College Presidential Election elections
0
Share:

Showing single comment thread. View the full conversation.

  • Diana Martinez

    • 0
    Jan 2 2013: I believe that eliminating our Electoral College would bring our country ot a true democracy. The Electoral College diminishes the value of one man's vote but magnifies the vote of another. Depending on where a person lives in our counrty is what determines how much his vote is worth. Candidates and people in certain states always assume that the state will always vote one way or another by what color their state is shaded on the College map. If a state is typically Democratic, the state will assume to be Democratic always. However, if you live in a Swing State, that is where most of the election energy is focused towards. Those are the states in which a Candidate is fighting to get the College votes from. States such as Florida have 29 Electoral Votes and they are a Battle Ground State.That diminishes the value of the consistantly one way states, and our democracy. -Daija Green

    • Melissa Seideman

      • 0
      Jan 3 2013: @Diana The electoral is made to give all minorities a say in an election. Twenty-Nine states have laws and penalties that vote against the way the people had voted in the election. The electors do take into account the word of the people and try to stay faithful to their decisions.

      • Susan Anthony

        • 0
        Jan 4 2013: National Popular Vote would give a voice to the minority party voters in each state. Now their votes are counted only for the candidate they did not vote for. Now they don't matter to their candidate.

        And now votes, beyond the one needed to get the most votes in the state, for winning in a state are wasted and don't matter to candidates. Utah (5 electoral votes) alone generated a margin of 385,000 "wasted" votes for Bush in 2004. 8 small western states, with less than a third of California’s population, provided Bush with a bigger margin (1,283,076) than California provided Kerry (1,235,659).

        With National Popular Vote, elections wouldn't be about winning states. No more distorting and divisive red and blue state maps. Every vote, everywhere would be counted equally for, and directly assist, the candidate for whom it was cast.

        Candidates would need to care about voters across the nation, not just undecided voters in a handful of swing states. The political reality would be that when every vote is equal, the campaign must be run in every part of the country.

        When and where voters matter, then so are the issues they care about most.

Showing single comment thread. View the full conversation.