Comment by dragonwriter
4 years ago
> The Electoral College is a triviality that we get hung up on because every loser blames it for their loss.
No, it's not a triviality, and no, they don't.
There have only been a few superficially EC-caused losses, and it's not at all common for others to be blamed on it, even though the fact of the undemocratic nature of the EC has wide ranging effects shaping elections beyond just the immediately obvious times it produces results at odds with the popular vote at the end, because it creates pressure that acts on all stages of the process, including candidate selection.
> The real undemocratic institution in the US is its most powerful, the US Senate. It
The Presidency is more powerful than the Senate, though slightly less undemocratic. But the undemocratic nature of the Presidency through the EC is directly tied to the even more undemocratic nature of the Senate.
The Senate isn't the most powerful US institution, but it is the most structurally anti-democratic, and through it's structure directly contributes to the undemocratic nature of institutions which depend on it or the allocation of seats to it.
I strongly disagee that the Senate is not the most powerful institution.
Ask yourself this question: who has made more important, far-reaching decisions for the country, Mitch McConnell or Barack Obama?
Repeat the same question with Trump or Biden if you want, even though they have left time in office than Obama.
> Ask yourself this question: who has made more important, far-reaching decisions for the country, Mitch McConnell or Barack Obama?
Oh, so you aren't asking which institution is more powerful, but which faction is better at using power, the currently dominant faction of the Democratic Party or the currently-dominant faction of the Republican Party?
> Repeat the same question with Trump or Biden if you want, even though they have left time in office than Obama.
Considering all four, considering impact and not positive/negative polarity, and considering that in some cases certain of the decisions at issue involved both institutions, and weighting for time in office since we are assessing the power of the institution not the power a person can exercise over their tenure in the institution, my initial impression is Trump > McConnell > Biden > Obama, though that might unfairly promoting McConnell and/or Biden.