A Fix for Presidential Elections

We are tinkering around the edges of how to elect the President. Georgia, Arizona and (soon) Wisconsin are changing the rules for that the state's politicians can overrule the voters in their states. In 2020, their new changes would allow a flip of three states and a "win" for Trump.

But let us, for a moment, forget about Trump or Biden or Reagan or Washington.

For a moment, let us think about the most obvious answer. One that would be the most democratic (small d). How about... whoever has the most votes wins. 

Not at the state level, but just in the country. Most countries that have elections follow this path. And many of them are based on the United States model of elections, just fixing this one glaring problem.

And think about it, for a moment. The United States will often scold (call it object, or call it "point out undemocratic policies" or call it cheating) we will raise valid objections to other countries when the winner isn't made President.

And yet, we don't make the winner President automatically. President Biden won by at least 6 million votes. Not nearly that same percentage in the electoral college, but he was the winner of the popular vote.

Even trump endorsed this by saying, "If we both had to compete in an nationwide contest, I would have campaigned differently and won that."

But what about "If the framer's wanted that, they would have set it up that way?"

Well, the framer's included many who believed in slavery. Many who believe that not only should Native American's not vote, but not be allowed to live in the country. Nearly all who believed only land owner's should vote. All who believed women should not vote.

And we have changed the rules often. We changed the rules to outlaw slavery and later to allow Blacks to vote. It wasn't until the 1900s that women were allowed to vote. We changed the rules in the 1900s so that we voted  for Senators. In the 1900s we changed the rules so that one person can only be President twice. We changed the rules so that 18 year olds could vote.

The Constitution was specifically called out to be changeable.

But that is "controversial" because it would supposedly harm the Republicans. 

First: So what. No taxation with representation, remember that one?

Second: I don't think it would harm the Republicans. The Republicans would change their positions to ones that are more palatable.

Third: The House and Senate would still be gridlocked, so what's the big deal?