re: The main reason I love Trump more today than a few weeks ago

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You're either missing the point entirely or just being obtuse. I don't know how else to put it. The vast majority of the rural area states electors have to vote in conjunction with the popular vote. Those states are republican states and therefore the EC is always going to follow the popular vote anyways.

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Legitimately not. I think part of my confusion is that when I'm reading what you're saying, I am conflating "popular vote" in each state to "popular vote" for the country. I'll explain my confusion.

But I'll restate what I'm getting at because it just feels like we aren't communicating. The electoral college is designed in part to give slightly disproportionate value to lower population states. One way to accomplish this is to make the state a winner take all. Some states don't do this, like Nebraska and Maine, but it dilutes the purpose of the Electoral College. If the votes were split proportionally and not assigned completely to the popular vote of the state, then it would essentially fall in line with the popular vote of country. If you layer the proportional representative model at the state level, you're diluting the weight of proportional representation.

Why? Because all those things that say, "a vote in Wyoming is worth THREE TIMES what it's worth in California"... is a complete misrepresentation of the system. It's only worth that much IF the following conditions are met.

1) The population of eligible voters as a percentage of the the overall population in the previous census, is identical in each state.

2) Everyone only votes.

3) Everyone only votes for only one of two candidates.

4) Every state uses a winner take all format.


But not understanding these statements and how to contextualize that "3 times" number is dangerous. It makes you think that Californians forever and always have the least representation in the Electoral College. Look at the overwhelming votes for Hillary. 8,753,788 votes accounted for 55 Electoral College Votes! That's 159,159.9 Californians finding their way to the Ballot Box per vote for their candidate. Only 174,419 people in all of Wyoming voted for Trump, but they got 3 votes, at 58,139.7 to the Ballot Box. That's 2.737 to 1!!! Californians should be outraged, right? They have the biggest population, a huge margin for Hillary. But guess what. Because of the faithless electors in Washington, a vote for Hilldog in the Evergreen State was actually 36% less impactful than a vote in California. It would have been even less impactful if the votes went to Trump, instead of Colin Powell and Spotted Eagle. In Maine, where the vote went to the opponent netting out the impact... all 357,734 votes for Hillary only accounted for two votes. A vote in California, in their winner take all system, accounts for 12% more than a vote in Maine if the districts splits.


Where I'm confused is why you are making a distinction of states using that popular vote within the state as if it is contrary to believing in the Electoral College. Using a popular vote and a winner take all format is crucial to the format. Nebraska and Maine NOT doing the winner take all format is to their detriment in light of others doing it.


But let's say every state copies Maine and Nebraska. Let's say that every district voted the for whatever party that currently holds the House of Representatives in their district. That's 241 votes for Trump. And Trump won 30 states(Nebraska and Maine use the popular vote to decide the two extra seats), so that's 301 EC votes for Trump. Now, I know the Republicans Gerrymandered a ton of states and this helps their House of Representative numbers... but in this hypothetical scenario where Hillary won 20 states and D.C. for 42 EC votes and Trump won 30 states for 60 votes, you're looking at 18 votes. Let's look at a state that wasn't Gerrymandered by Republicans... California. California voted 61% Hilldog, almost a 2:1 margin over Trump, but in this scenario, 77% of their EC votes go to Hilldog. Think about that. By the nature of California being California, and by that I mean having fairly similar shared values, even if they are different than the rest of the countries, and even if those shared values mean they feel they aren't free to share their values with eachother, but force them on other states, they've reached a critical point that would make their votes CRAZY powerful.

Let's think of a swing state in this hypothetical land where every state is by Congressional District instead of Winner Take All. California's 27 built in margin is almost insurmountable. And in New York's built in margin of 11, and you have something insurmountable. Meaning by those two states being 60% + in one camp, they would be infinitely more powerful than a coalition of states, even with more people at 55%. Which is why everyone going by Congressional District wouldn't work. Throw in a couple more states, and why a winner take all is crucial for the Electoral College. Throw in Connecticut and Massachusetts that are all blue, Illinois that's mostly blue, and you've shut out everyone else. Any dissension, even small, it's game over. Which is the issue.

Getting 75% of a few key areas should NEVER be the goal. And it's even MORE true in a straight popular vote/ If you get 75% of California and New York, which is only 13% of the population... if you just appeal to big government tailored to JUST those two states... every other state is almost irrelevant. Okay. Lemme put it this way.

Pure popular vote do decide the President. Let's say I'm a run of the mill Democrat. I stand for certain left wing things that 25 of the country buys in to. But on TOP of that, I specifically target the West Coast, D.C., Chicago, and New England. Now. Let's just round up. This is roughly 33% of the population People in touch with urban wants and desires. At the same time completely out of touch with most middle American interests and life challenges. As opposed to someone in the Midwest, Texas, the Rust Belt, which are all MUCH more different than New York/Chicago/LA/Seattle/San Fran/D.C.

But let's just take that solidly blue thing and say I can get 75% of that. The rest of the country could be 60% against me, and it wouldn't matter. Think about that. 60% of 200 million people is less valuable than 75% of 100. You interpreted that correctly, 75 million people's voices under a straight popular vote would matter more than 120 million.