About increasing the size of the House of Representatives... The UK House of Commons has 650 members for about 62.2 million people. New Hampshire has 400 members for 1.3 million people The U.S. House has 435 members for 314.6 million people I think we can afford to increase the size of the House.
Nothing in the Constitution defines how EC votes are determined other than by saying it's up to each state. I'd love to see a big state like California or Texas or New Jersey adopt some kind of proportional vote, so that a smaller party has a chance for a couple votes. No, that won't win them anything, but it might give a platform to get more diverse views out there. And that would be a good thing.
Germany has 82 mil. inhabitants. Bundestag normally has 599 seats. This day due to overhang seats it has around 620. A new voting law for next year will likely increase the number of seats up to around 700. Of course you can.
Didn't the decision explicitly state that it couldn't be used as precedent for any future case? Seems like they weren't so sure they had correctly interpreted the law themselves.
Meh, politics in New Mexico is becoming boring. Even our "swing" house district is no longer competative. Long gone are the days when John Kerry was stumping in Espanola and W. in Roswell during the final week of the campaign. We might as well sign up for that national popular vote thing.
EDIT: Giuseppe beat me to it. Even the Supremes didn't believe their interpretation was correct. That's why they said that you couldn't use their reasoning in any other case. As a liberal, I would have gotten some solace from using their reasoning and having liberal advocacy groups sue their states to make sure each jurisdiction had the same voting system. That would have enfranchised voters from poor counties throughout the nation. But, of course, the Supremes preemptively said you couldn't do that. Because their ruling was bullshit.
I guess it would be nice to see some history on why we set up the EC in the 1st place. http://uselectionatlas.org/INFORMATION/INFORMATION/electcollege_history.php
I think the bolded part still stands, except "largest, most populous state" would be replaced with "most densely populated and politically homogenous urban centers" and "smaller ones" with "less densely populated, more politically diverse areas".
Mexico (corruption and fixed elections aside). I imagine most countries with a President have Direct elections (if democratic) Most Parliamentarian elections do not have direct elections (Canada and England) France has both, a President elected directly and a Prime minister elected British Style. In some other countries, the President appoints the PM or the PM appoints the President.
i'd been taught that though the repartition of electoral votes was a gesture towards smaller states, the mechanism of voting by an electoral college at a date later than the actual public polling was due to the logistics problems of rounding up and counting all the ballots over what was even then a large and disjointed country, especially considering the infrastructure and technology of the time. a lot could happen between voting day and investiture. in france the first thing people ask me when discussing the election is "what's all this about les grands électeurs?" they have the idea that these people are real elected public figures (though shadowy ones) who have a real choice in the matter. i have to explain to them that their term grands électeurs is absolutely flawed and they should substitute it with voix électorales. then they understand that the president is elected directly, though by a kind of federal first past the post system and not proportionally. to look at this question you have to take into account not only the distinction between head of gov't and head of state (the potus is both) but also the fact that the two functions vary greatly country by country. moreover the respective roles are rarely clearly defined, and evolve both over time and according to the individuals in place. in france the president is chosen in a two-round direct election. but the president names the premier ministre. in fact a prime minister (who is not a magister) is by definition a kind of servant to the head of state. in the UK (as in most monarchies) he (or in extremely unfortunate cases she) is invested by the sovereign... who obviously however has no more carte blanche than the electoral college: under pain of disappearance corps et biens of the monarchy the leader of the parliamentary majority is chosen. that's why the heads of parties in britain are more important than in france where they are little more than bathroom monitors for controlling internal squabbles.
i say we dug the panama canal in the wrong place. it should be the panama city canal. and it should 100 miles wide and 100 fathoms deep. and filled with every salty croc, great white and box jelly australia can spare. and pirates. indonesian pirates. with big cutlasses! and mines! don't forget the mines! and...
They have to keep the Electoral College or make voting compulsory. My guy (Nobody) wins the popular vote every 4 years and I know they don't want that.
I think the biggest misconception about the American constitution is that it was designed to govern something that in many ways resembled the European Union more than a single nation prior to the Civil War.
disney world is entertainment for little kids... and indirectly for parents who like to see their kids having a good time... so are you saying we need to give 8 year olds the vote?
Hey, I have a 4yo so Disney is king, but my wife and I enjoy the parks and the kids movies, not to mention that Disney owns ESPN, StarWars and so many other franchises targeted at different age groups... Don't be so patronizing...
If 8-year-olds voted, Republicans would never win an election, ever. Though it's going to devolve into chaos when everyone realizes Justin Bieber is Canadian.