US politics: How to fix the electoral college

[EquALLity]

I don't understand. That's how the Presidency works, half of the country abides by what the other half decides.

But... the city of Los Angeles is totally different from Weed. The basic argument is that the cities have an unfair advantage over the sub-urban and rural areas. (Remember, devil's advocate. Historically, the electoral college was started to give the south a bigger voice, specifically by the 3/5ths rule)

Are you saying that it gives liberals an advantage, because liberals populate cities disproportionately, and since cities have a lot of people, politicians are more likely to go there? So then that makes politicians cater more to liberals?
Well... Ok, honestly, that makes sense. But it's still more democratic than the electoral college.

Since 2000, 2/5 times, the person who won the popular vote didn't become President. That's 40% of elections- nearly half.
To be fair, Al Gore ALSO won the electoral vote, but the conservative leaning Supreme Court at the time struck down any hope at justice for that.

But still, the electoral college is inherently undemocratic, because the states are winner take all. It's not proportionate to percentages of the vote. Trump won Florida by like two points, but he didn't get a little more than half the delegates there. He got ALL of them. He won handily in the electoral college despite getting hundreds of thousands less votes.

In a lot of ways, America is not a democracy.
Bernie Sanders is the only candidate who most people in America actually LIKE, but he wasn't even in the general election. It was between Trump and Clinton due to the terrible closed primary system (in a lot of states, only people registered in the party could vote during the primaries) which made Bernie lose the primaries even though America likes him much better than the other candidates.
On election day, as Trump was becoming our Presidents-elect, 57% of people said they would be upset with Trump winning compared to 53% saying they'd be upset with Clinton winning. As for Bernie, the poll had him beating Trump 56% to 44%. Bernie would have beat Trump in a landslide in both the popular vote AND electoral college.

So basically, we had three politicians.
1) Bernie (most people like him)
2) Hillary (most people don't like her)
3) Trump (even more people don't like him)

Instead of Bernie winning, who most people like, and Trump coming in last, we have it backwards. Bernie didn't make it to the general election, and Hillary lost the general election to Trump. WTF? >.<
We shouldn't just abolish the electoral college and replace it with the popular vote, we should make all primaries open to all voters.

[PsYcHo]

We shouldn't just abolish the electoral college and replace it with the popular vote, we should make all primaries open to all voters.

That would definitely have gave the nomination to Bernie. Us independents don't usually vote in primaries, since both parties suck, and you have to choose one in most states.

And it's not really about liberal vs. conservative, it's about rural/suburban vs. cities. To keep using California, should an area of 100 square miles control what happens in 1000 square miles? (calculations are not accurate, but you get the point)

[EquALLity]

We shouldn't just abolish the electoral college and replace it with the popular vote, we should make all primaries open to all voters.

That would definitely have gave the nomination to Bernie. Us independents don't usually vote in primaries, since both parties suck, and you have to choose one in most states.

And it's not really about liberal vs. conservative, it's about rural/suburban vs. cities. To keep using California, should an area of 100 square miles control what happens in 1000 square miles? (calculations are not accurate, but you get the point)

It would've, and he should have gotten the nomination, because of of the three most people prefer him.

I don't understand the relevance of the amount of land. The amount of PEOPLE matter, not the amount of land. Land is totally arbitrary.

[PsYcHo]

I don't understand the relevance of the amount of land. The amount of PEOPLE matter, not the amount of land. Land is totally arbitrary.

On the face of it I agree with you, but a single high rise in New York can house more people than a small county in Nebraska. If your family has 100 people who all agree that pot should be illegal, but 9 other families of ten each think it should be legal, your 1 family outweighs nine others. Population density is the issue.

[EquALLity]

I don't understand the relevance of the amount of land. The amount of PEOPLE matter, not the amount of land. Land is totally arbitrary.

On the face of it I agree with you, but a single high rise in New York can house more people than a small county in Nebraska. If your family has 100 people who all agree that pot should be illegal, but 9 other families of ten each think it should be legal, your 1 family outweighs nine others. Population density is the issue.

I understand what you're saying the issue is, but I don't see it as relevant.
In a real democracy, the will of the majority is supposed to be what we implement. Population density is irrelevant.

Democracy = one person one vote.

[PsYcHo]

In a real democracy, the will of the majority is supposed to be what we implement. Population density is irrelevant.

Democracy = one person one vote.

But it can be trickier than the obvious. What if the majority of people vote for proposition 123- All Americans are to receive 1 billion $ from the government? Should the majority rule still stand?

[miniboes]

I don't understand the relevance of the amount of land. The amount of PEOPLE matter, not the amount of land. Land is totally arbitrary.

On the face of it I agree with you, but a single high rise in New York can house more people than a small county in Nebraska. If your family has 100 people who all agree that pot should be illegal, but 9 other families of ten each think it should be legal, your 1 family outweighs nine others. Population density is the issue.

I understand what you're saying the issue is, but I don't see it as relevant.
In a real democracy, the will of the majority is supposed to be what we implement. Population density is irrelevant.

Democracy = one person one vote.

That's not true. There don't even have to be votes; you can have a sortition system too. This is just your normative definition of democracy.