re: What is the argument for the electoral college instead of a popular vote?

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But those states with higher populations get more EC votes anyway.

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Not nearly enough more to balance the scales. One voter in, say, Wyoming has as much impact on who wins the Presidency as something like six voters in California. Not only does adding the two extra electoral votes per state drastically imbalance the election in favor of smaller states, but there is huge imbalance in the number of people per congressional district in different states, so even discounting the two electoral votes per state from the senate seats, a state with, say, five times the population of another state usually does not have five times as many seats in the House or five times as many electoral votes. The people of the smaller states, having enjoyed this unfair advantage for a long time, don't want to give it up.

It's even more unbalanced on state-by-state things like ratifying constitutional amendments. A constitutional amendment must be ratified by 3/4ths of the states, or 38 out of the current 50. That means it only takes 13 states to defeat a constitutional amendment. The combined population of the smallest 13 states is roughly 14 million people, according to 2013 estimates. If those states went by popular referendum to decide whether to ratify an amendment, it would take only about 7 million people in those 13 states (or just 2.2% of the U.S. population) to block a constitutional amendment.

It's stupid, it's ridiculous, it's unfair, but the smaller states are never going to let it change, so there's no point even discussing it.