I haven’t seen a good argument for the Electoral College yet

I would mean the major population centers determine the election. A hand full of big cities would be enough to make a president, several of which are in California.

Well, yeah... that’s true... but lots of people live in population centers, by definition. Doesn’t having a lot of people mean you should get more of a say?

As it stands, presidential candidates pretty much skip our country’s cities (NYC, SF, LA, Chicago, Houston, Dallas) for all but fundraising purposes because they are located in states that are not battlegrounds.

If Republicans had to really contest these big cities, and couldn’t just coast off of the battleground state votes, you bet the GOP’s platform would modernize in a big hurry.

Except most of those big cities are solid blue and republicans couldn't win in them no matter what they did. Also if representation is centered around big cities, they could them by vote screw over areas that are need for the country to function. Cali has done so in state by cutting ff water to farmers.

These are good points. It’s tough to say how they’d all play out if we did move to a popular vote. Any system of representation you pick, there are always going to be winners and losers.

As I predicted above, the GOP platform would have to change substantially to seriously contest these urban/suburban votes. And I don’t think that’d be a bad thing. In terms of messaging, there’s be a LOT less tolerance of racism and homophobia, and less shitting on the coastal cities.

Bottom-line for me is that a system in which someone can lose by 3 million votes and still be elected president has some major flaws in correctly representing the will of the people.

Thing is we are a republic designed to protect the minority from being abused by the majority rather than a democracy. One aspect of this is that states elect the president, not the people directly. If the states wished it to be so, they could give all their votes to whomever wins the popular vote.

"Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number
of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the
State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person
holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an
Elector."