So let's say you eliminate the electoral college. Do you really think that New York and California get LESS influence or that Wyoming gets MORE?
Apply even the slightest logical and you know it's ridiculous. Here's two examples:
The New York Metro Area has about 20 million people. That's more than the combined populations of Nevada, New Mexico, West Virginia, Nebraska, Idaho, Maine, New Hampshire, Hawaii, Rhode Island, Montana, Delaware, South Dakota, Alaska, North Dakota, Vermont, DC, and Wyoming. Those states currently represent 60 electoral votes or 11% of the electoral college. Their population is roughly 6.6% of the national population. How would eliminating the electoral college, and making these states combined equal in clout to NYC empower these states?
California has 55 electoral votes or 10% of the total electoral votes. It has about 35.5 million people and growing (2003 estimate) which is 12% of the population or more. Popular vote would give California more power. Conversely, Wyoming has 3 electoral votes, or 0.5% of the total. It has a population of about 500,000, or .16% of total US population. Wyoming would then have less power.
So what exactly are people trying to accomplish?
Mathmatically small states have more power in the Electoral College. In actual application however, they have ZERO power in the Electoral College. With the exception of swing-state New Hampshire, in 2004 12 of the 13 smallest states received ZERO campaign visits from the candidates and ZERO dollars spent on television advertising. So in essence these small states had absolutely NO power, and played no role whatsoever in the campaign. A vote in these small safe states didn't have any impact whatsoever on the final result.
Would more attention be paid to populous areas under this plan? Sure. But with small states having absolutely no say and no influence in the current system, this system would actually make it worth it for candidates to advertise and campaign in small states.
What is absurd is the notion that small states need to be more empowered than they are. If there are more people in a state, then it is logical for them to have more of a say in voting for the President. It is a lot fairer than swing states regardless of size getting the lion's share of attention because of the electoral college system of state winner take all.
I agree. We shouldn't think about it as the importance of this state vs. that one, or small states vs. big. Each person's vote should be totally equal, no matter which state they live in. My point is that big state, small state, rural area or big city, if you don't live in a swing state, you are totally ignored by the candidates. If candidates time is divided amongst the country based on where people live, that is far more fair then just a handful of states getting ALL the attention.
