Goose wrote:

Logic compels me to state that, with a popular vote system we would have this "abnormality" 0 % of the time

Fair enough. I still think there just be other problems that would pop up by going to a direct vote.

1 - If we push future POTUS candidates to the populations center of the country, rural areas will be just as forgotten now as certain states are now in our current system.

2 - Unimaginably expensive elections will become even more expensive

3 - Sucking up to corporate honchos will only increase

 

Goose wrote:

How much attention do the rural parts of Kansas or Oklahoma, or New York get now?

None. It's a big country. All we would be doing is swapping what part of the country is ignored. 

That said, I would say a greater swath of the country is represented under the current system with the upper plain states (solid R) and west coast (solid D) being the exception.

Think about the swing states as they are today. They are fairly apportioned regionally.

New Hampshire = New England

Pennsylvania/Virginia/North Carolina = Mid-Atlantic

Ohio/Michigan/Wisconsin = Rust Belt

Florida = Southeast

Iowa = Midwest

Colorado = Mountain West

Nevada = West

I think the sense of the electorate is accurately represented under our current system
 

Just Fred wrote:

I think the sense of the electorate is accurately represented under our current system ....... and that explains why the person with the most votes can lose an election in a democratic society. 

Yea, cray.
What better measure is there of the sense of the electorate than counting the electorate's vote?
 

tennyson wrote:

You guys are "beating a dead horse". 

 

Let me take another swing. 

It looks like 7 electors jumped ship yesterday, setting off much handwringing amongst the talking heads.
Since the electors are bound to vote as their state went,,, couldn't you avoid the melodrama by just sending each governor to Washington to cast his state's electoral votes?
You would in effect keep the electoral college but get rid of the electors.
Less Drama, same result.
Of course, we would have been robbed of the excitement of this 24 hour nonstory.
 

My statement was more meaning that it isn't going to happen vs whether it has merit or not. 

Well, I for one, am going to get involved.  Not to change the system pushing for a Constitutional amendment, but instead to focus on instituting a proportional system in PA.  I'm not buying that Nebraska and Maine could do it, but it's just too hard for Pennsylvania.  I've already been corresponding with one of our state legislators.

If I'm going down, I'm going down swinging, and I'm getting involved in a cause I believe in.