Direct popular vote should replace electoral vote in presidential elections.

I will rebut my opponent's contentions in this round. Then, he can rebut my contentions and then my rebuttals as well. I guess that is the advantage of going second. First, I will rebut his third contention of most people supporting popular vote. I would like to say that popular sentiment is not enough to change our system. Here is a good and informative quote from Senator James Eastland that explains this. "How, it will be asked, could an idea which enjoys such widespread popular support be so dangerous? The answer, we believe, is to be found in an examination of certain influences which have attended the current debate over electoral reform. It must be acknowledged, first, that direct election is a simple and easily communicable idea. That fact alone may account for its great popularity and for the widespread and uncritical support it has had from the communications media. Simplicity in the governance of human affairs, however, is not always a virtue; nor is it the distinguishing characteristic of this 200-year-old Republic which seeks to secure the blessings of liberty for 200 millions of people. Human hopes and fears are complex; politics is complex; and the Constitution is complex. Still, simplicity has its charms, and not the least of them is the capacity to conceal danger." I will next rebut his first and second contention. He says that faithless electors are a problem. But, even he admits that faithless electors are a rare occurrence. Historically, most electors have actually been faithful to the presidential and vice presidential tickets winning the most votes in their respective states. Only on a few occasions have there been faithless electors and none have changed an outcome of a race. He says that the Electoral College goes against democracy. But one man, one vote was not the founders' intention. As I said before, the cornerstone of democracy is not majority rule. It is reasonable majority rule with the protection of minority rights. A nation is far better served when moderate ideologies prevail. Nothing could be clearer in the Framer's thought than their rejection of a merely numerical concept of representative government. If the Constitution stands for nothing else, it stands for the idea that mere numbers have no capacity to make legitimate that which is otherwise-illegitimate-whether those number be 51 or 90 percent of the whole. All the unique features of the Constitution are explicit departures from simple majoritarianism. This is true of the federal system, which, among other things, prevents the less populous States from being engulfed by the more populous states; this is true of bicameralism, which divides legislative responsibilities between House and Senate on grounds other than those of population; this is true of the separation of powers, whereby, among other things, great power is invested in a nonelective judiciary; and this is true of the electoral college, which incorporates the Federal principle and grants to each State, however small, a minimum weight of three electoral votes. Next, I'd like to talk about his contention about problems about winner-take all format. The winner-take all format is beneficial. Here is a quote from John Samples from CATO institute. "Of course, states legislatures need not choose a winner take all rule for selecting electors. They could divide electors according to the popular vote if they believed it would attract attention from presidential candidates thereby benefiting their state. But few states do so. That suggest most legislators believe winner take all benefits their state more than the candidate attentition that might come froma division according the the popular vote. Since these legislators are elected by the people, why do we have to reason to think the winner take all system reflects the popular will. This judgment by legislators raises another issue. Why should citizens in a state be concerned about being ignored because of a lack of competition? Voters can easily gather sufficient information from the national media to cast their ballot." My opponent brings up the Gore/Bush election. First, I would like to say incorrect election results are unlikely and overstated. While the disputed vote in Florida led to a concern about who had legitimately won the Electoral College, most ordinary Americans seemed to have no trouble accepting the notion that the winner of the Electoral College vote was entitled to be president even if some other candidate had won more individual votes. An analogy was made to the World Series, where the winner was the team winning four of seven games, and not the team that had batted in the most runs overall. As well we would not know if Al Gore had won the popular vote if the popular vote was the method of electing president at that time. This is because candidates probably would have campaigned differently and different results could have occurred. Next, I'd like to rebut his second contention about candidates only focusing on swing states. According to Johnson, Bonnie from Oxford University, though, no state is structurally more important. Patterson is correct; competitive states do change all the time. However, because the identities of competitive states change, the spectators change as well. The bias in the Electoral College toward competitive states actually allows different states to be the focus of national attention at different points in time. The Electoral College does not systematically advantage particular states. These findings further undergird the federal-ism defense of the Electoral College. Lastly, I urge the voters to keep my contentions of voter fraud, moderate ideas prevailing, recount problems, and more in their mind. Sources: http://www.cato.org... http://www.ashbrook.org... Samples, John. Whitaker, Paige. James, Eastland.Johnson, Bonnie