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Protect the flock! From JP and Hachette!

Besides posting on here and replying to this thread. Original credit for this goes back to Fate and Nathan on MX.

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I've watched like eight videos on the American voting system and I can still barely understand the system and now I get why everyone thinks their vote doesn't count... Because it kind of doesn't. 

It actually doesn't. We send our opinion to our representative at the electoral college, and they decide whether they like it or not. Theoretically, Everyone in a county could vote one way, and the electoral rep could say "well, screw you!" and vote the other.

That rarely happens though.

Alternately, when you consider yourself as 1 voice in 300,000,000, it's humbling.
Same psychology as this:

Please excuse the pictures, the original version is (somehow) NSFW.

XD Well yes there's that flaw too.

And obviously the (many) issues of first past the post voting. Which most countries other than like, New Zealand do. >.>

But there's also that whole we vote as a state thing. I mean, what is that and why... It's just so flawed and messed up. :/

The vote as a state thing is a way to make it so that every state feels that it has a substantial amount of say. If it was population-based, some states like Wyoming has no say at all. This is done to keep people both in these states, and keep the state from getting frustrated and leaving.

But that's why we have the Senate (at least here).

Lower House is population based, so there are tonnes of reps from Victoria/ NSW/ Qld, barely any from like WA. But since everything has to be approved by the Senate, where every state has an equal voice and an equal say.

But anyway. I /really/ don't get the US voting system. Still. How we vote is one thing we've definitely gotten right in Australia, imo. 

Our political system basically runs on voodoo and spite.

Yes, and our legislature works in a similar fashion, with each state getting equal say in the Senate, and a population based say going on in the House of Representatives.

Thing is, when our founding fathers set up the government in the 1790s, they were a bunch of really smart people. They looked around and they came to the conclusion that many of us come to today:

"Wow, how does this world run with so many idots, jerks, and impulsive folk?"

So because they didn't want a country run by idiots, jerks, and impulsive folk, they developed a representative system of democracy (instead of a direct democracy) in hopes that, because no one actually listened in on most of the government meetings, that they'd let the politicians be to conduct inteligent policy.

Instead, Americans managed to vote idiots, jerks, and impulsive folk into office, and since the invention of widespread media of any sort, insist that idiocy, jerkiness, and impulsivity is key to any candidate.

So, yeah, its a lose-lose-lose situation. Maybe in 200 years the government will be run by Skynet, but until that happens, idiots, jerks, and impulsive people all the way.

So, why are you voting as states then, as opposed to by population? Isn't the President like aligned with the House of Reps, not the Senate? And if it is to give states more equal power, then why bother giving some states so many more votes than others?

Yeah, no. I get representative democracy. Funnily enough they use that pretty much everywhere else too, but thanks for the lesson.

It's the method of counting and shit I don't get. Like third party voting is apparently bad? And why on earth you'd vote for other people to let them vote as opposed to just voting for a representative. 

You don't actually have to answer. I really don't need to know. Just... the whole thing seems unnecessarily complicated.

It's not quite voting by state. The electoral votes (in all cases but two) go to the popular vote winner of the state - assuming that the electors behave, which they do.

Currently, the president's party is the same as that in the Senate, not the House, although this isn't a requirement and doesn't always happen.

The allocation of electoral votes to the states is based on population, so those with the most people get the most votes in the electoral college.

Also, third party voting is "bad" because it never (or rarely, I guess) produces presidents, and it takes away votes that could have gone to the main party candidate more aligned with those voters' values.

I s'pose it just seems utterly daft that in Florida you've got like... 30 votes or something. And it's 50/50 pretty much, and 100% of those votes will go to whoever ends up winning the state. 

Oh right, he's the equivalent to the Queen/ GG, above and separate from both. Though the role's a bit different, seeing as he actually does stuff and has an influence. 

*nods* So... what was End's thing about it being not population based but state based? 

That was less a question, more a frustration. Like, here you need over 50% of the vote to win, so 3rd party votes end up redistributed to your next indicated preference. Unless they get 50% of the vote straight off, in which case they'd win anyway. Which means you can say you're unhappy with your preferred main party, without helping to elect the other main party.

The third-party thing is something about how our voting system works -- a third party is one not as big as the Democrats or Republicans, and so they can't get enough votes anyway to vote in a president. So a vote for the candidate they run might as well be a write-in for Mickey Mouse, since it doesn't count.

Or I think that's kind of how it works. Fuck.

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