The system doesn't function as intended though. When the country was founded we were a loose association of a handful of states. Population dynamics has rendered it effectively useless. Regardless of intent, it now disproportionately weighs the votes of voters in only a couple select rural states. I don't think the founders intended for a couple counties to decide the fate of the entire country.

Under the current system, rural votes in upstate New York don't count. City votes in Texas don't count. Eliminating the EC makes opens the whole country up to competition. Republicans aren't going to abandon rural america. They're not relevant without it. Instead you'll see republicans campaigning in rural areas of blue states and Democrats campaigning in urban areas of red states. And you'll see people coming out to vote more because now their votes actually count. I'm a Democrat living in NYC. What incentive is there for me to vote? I know the Democrat is going to win in a landslide, so why would I? If we used the popular vote, my vote would count as much as everyone elses so I'd be more motivated to be involved in our democracy (I already do vote, btw). If I'm a republican in arizona, what incentive is there for me to get out and vote? The whole EC system is just voter supression for "safe" states.

Also, even if you concede that eliminating the EC would give more weight to population centers, I fail to see how that's worse than giving disproportionate weight to rural areas. At least the population centers are (largely) what drives the economy forward. I'd much rather see politicians campaigning on fostering innovation and technology than this farcical "We're going to bring back coal!" nonsense. Instead we get to watch this year long pageant of politicians, who are trying to get elected to run the entire country, pandering to incredibly specific regional interests that only affect very small fractions of the population.

I refuse to believe that a system that has only awarded the presidency to the most popular candidate once in 25 years is a system worth having in a country that claims to be a democracy.