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Culture War Roundup for the week of July 29, 2024

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Presuming that Trump's children are also residents of Florida, choosing them would forfeit Florida's electoral college votes under the 12th amendment.

The Electors shall meet in their respective states and vote by ballot for President and Vice-President, one of whom, at least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves;

This is a weird rule formulation. Why not just plainly state that the President and Vice President shall not be residents of the same state?

Because that would be a different rule? Under the current rules, it is absolutely possible for the President and VP to be from the same state, so long as they get a majority of electors (across all states) to vote for them—it’s just that the electors of their home state are barred from voting for both of them.

Concerns about one state lording it over the others, such as Holland did during the era of the Dutch Republic, were very prominent in designing the Electoral College (and other parts of the Constitution) and concerns about party tickets were very not prominent.

Pretty much everything to do with choosing the President is one of those things the Framers got extremely wrong and their mechanism broken pretty much right away.

I think an election that worked the way the founders intended would be extremely fascinating. They appear to have essentially wanted the voters to elect a single-issue legislature to be elected on their own merits then thoroughly vet the actual candidates for president, and then vote for the actual president. It's hopelessly naive once the votes that mattered expanded beyond one room in Independence Hall, but I wonder if swapping electors to citizens drawn by lot might actually work.

Sounds like they were visualizing some papal ass shit where they all meet in a closed room and then when smoke comes out the top we know we have a new President.

Would be kinda cool tbh