Assembly Bill 413 would change the way the President of the United States is elected without going through the messy process of, you know, actually amending the Constitution. If passed, Nevada’s electoral votes would go to whichever candidate won the national popular vote, not necessarily who won Nevada.
Barry Fadem, president of the national National Popular Vote organization, claims a person in a focus group came up with the “best” reason for passing this measure. “Shouldn’t the person with the most votes win?” the focused asked. “Duh. That’s the American way.”
Um, duh. No, it’s not.
The only people who would claim that a national popular vote is “the American way” are people who have learned their American history in a public school. The Founders had very sound and thoughtful reasons for setting up our electoral system the way it is. Anyone who claims that a national popular vote for president is “the American way” is woefully ignorant of our nation’s history.
Alas, that would appear to be the vast majority of Americans today. How sad.
Posted on May 3rd, 2009 by chuckmuth
Filed under: Uncategorized
Assembly Bill 413 is a bad, bad idea. If the people of Nevada vote for a candidate, such as Barack Obama for example, then their state’s electoral votes should go to that candidate. It would be interesting to consider what effect such a bill would have if it passed in battleground states. A candidate could completely blow past Ohio during an election season and still receive its electoral votes.
I just find it amazing that someone actually came up with such a strange idea. I mean, I’ve heard of proposals to have states electoral voters divided by proportional representation or have be based on congressional district. But to have are states electoral votes alloted based on how OTHER states vote is just a surreal concept.
Besides, in the next Presidential election Obama will be receiving both the national popular vote and Nevada’s electoral votes regardless.
This bill stinks! What ever possessed representatives who were voted in by the people of Nevada to sell away our votes to other states?
I’m sorry, but if the WHOLE NATION voted one way and Nevada voted the other, we deserve as a state and as a people to have our vote registered and our electors awarded the way we voted. To do anything else is a theft of our vote.
Why don’t we just have people in NV NOT vote at all, and we’ll send them an email telling them how the rest of the country decided for them? Maybe we should let Wyoming decide who will go to our legislature in 2010….. would that matter to the geniuses in Carson City?
I’m just sayin…..
Tim’s last blog post..Moving From Republic To Mob
The current system used in Nevada was not envisioned by the founders as the norm for the country. It wasn’t until decades later that states were pushed to it by parochial, partisan reasons — once some states started to give all their electoral votes to one candidate, other states had to do it to make sure their favored candidates didn’t lose out.
Liberty is threatened when your votes don’t matter to presidential candidates. Candidates ignore ALL voters in most states under the status quo.