Raider5678

No, just ignore that rambling. Inside of the United States of America there are two chambers of Congress. The House and the Senate. How many House Representatives each state gets depends on the population of the state. How many Senators a state gets simply depends on if it's a state: Each state gets 2 senators. Regardless. This is to prevent smaller states from getting completely ignored in terms of politics. The Republicans did not "build in" an advantage for them as Ten Oz suggests, he's just trying to blame something on them that predated Republicans by almost 100 years. With the Senate, because it doesn't depend on the population, it comes down to individual races. The Senate isn't chosen by the nation as a whole, it's chosen by state voters. If a smaller state wants to vote Republican Senators in to represent them, I don't have a problem with that. I don't think they should be forced to have a Senator representing them that they don't like. I assure you, had the shoe been on the other foot, Democrats wouldn't be complaining its unfair, and the Republicans would be. Because really neither of them care about the American people, they care about getting in office and making themselves money. If you'd like an example, simply look at the 2016 election. Democrats complain they won the popular vote but still lost the presidency. Yet, I have yet to hear Democrats complaining that Republicans won the popular vote in the House, yet lost 6 seats. I have heard Republicans complain about losing 6 seats even though they won the popular vote for the House, yet I have yet to hear Republicans complain about winning the Presidency and losing the popular vote. Anyone can cherry pick data. I encourage you not to take their word for it and actually research the facts as well.

Not me.

Would that be a good thing or a bad thing? You like to use sarcasm a lot and I'm not sure if this is it or not. Basically, write it out in crayon for me. Preferably with pictures of animals too. Something simple.

Game theory the youtube channel or are you insinuating something else? I mean "game theory is what you have" is used to reference the youtube channel where I'm at when someone comes up with a theory about a game, but I get the feeling that's not what you're saying.

I guess this is relatively on topic, so I'll explain. The first past the post system is where the person with the most votes wins, period. However, this can easily result in large amounts of gerrymandering, unproportionate representation, and minority rule. Let's assume there are 8 candidates who can run. The first gets 5%(1st) of the vote, the second gets 10%(2nd) of the vote, the third gets 12%(3rd) of the vote, then 15%(4th), 21%(5th), 19%(6th),13%(7th), 5%(8th) respectively. In FPTP, whoever got 21% of the vote would win automatically, even if those who voted for the 6th, 7th, and 8th candidates, all would have rathered the 6th candidate over the 5th who won. So, in the next election, they strategically all vote for the 6th candidate. Likewise, the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd voters all would have wanted the 4th candidate over the 5th. So they all strategically vote for the 4th candidate next time. Now the vote becomes: 4th: 42% 5th: 21% 6th: 37% Now, this time, the 4th candidate wins. In the next election, the people who voted for the 5th candidate are split. They know that 5th candidate won't win again, so they all vote for the candidate they'd rather instead. As a result, 7% of them go to the 4th candidate, and 14% go to the 6th candidate. During the next election it becomes: 4th: 49% 6th: 51%. Seem familiar? And, over time, votes always select either candidate #4 or Candidate #6, with #5 voters being the swing voters, which are slowly becoming more partisan over time. Now, let's say the 7th candidate decides to try to run again. 4th: 49% 6th: 39% 7th: 12% Now the 4th Candidate wins, even if all those who voted for the 7th candidate would have rathered the 6th candidate. This is known as the spoiler effect. Additionally, a good amount of #7's campaign funding came from voters who supported the 4th candidate, knowing that it would spoil the vote and increase their chances of winning. This, is the state of elections we have today. A two-party system with third-party candidates typically just spoiling the vote. A single Transferable Vote system would work much better, however, that's extremely complicated to explain in words, and I'm running short on time. I'll try to explain it better later, or you can try to look it up. Note, that the STV system applies to votes where multiple people are elected, like house or Senate positions, not positions like the president.

Agreed. That, as well as changing the voting system from First Past the Post to other voting systems, such as a Single Transferable Vote System.

Agreed. Often as well, there are simply unintended consequences to laws that seemed logical until we saw them play out. Hindsight is a beautiful thing.

Agreed. It's one of the downsides of a two party system. Once the two parties have been established everyone thinks they know what both parties want, so the parties can then proceed to attack their opponent and instill as much fear as possible into the voters without ever having to even touch on policy. The last three elections, 2014, 2016, 2018 were won(and lost) in my opinion not because one side was massively more popular, but because the other side simply convinced their voters that if the enemy won it was all over.

I'm skeptical about which party it'll benefit more, however, I'm 16 so I got no idea really. One thing I do know is that this is one of the major steps forward we needed to take. Also, side note, it was put on the ballot by a Republican-controlled government there.

Florida is looking suspicious however I think we can rule Texas out for suspicions of foul play causing the win. Almost every single county voted exactly as we thought they would. Additionally, the problems that Texas had at polling didn't add anywhere near 200,000 votes. I hate to say it but I think Republicans just happen to be more popular in Texas at the current moment. As for Florida, one good thing that nobody seems to be focusing on is that Florida voted to grant voting rights to Ex-Felons and to no longer bar them from voting. Seems like a win by me. Is it just me or is it looking like they might pick up 4 in total? https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/11/06/us/elections/results-senate-elections.html Additionally, I thought Democrats had just barely gained the majority so far as well: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/11/06/us/elections/results-house-elections.html Overall, at the end of the night, in the fight for the House Democrats got about 4 million more votes and gained anywhere from +26 seats to mid 30s. I'm satisfied with the results and how our system worked out. Anyone else? Speaking of Governors Mansions, what the heck is going on with Maine?

This seems like the more likely option.

Yeah. They also lost a Senate seat. The one race I do care about though is the Senate Race for Maine, and it's looking great in my opinion.

Well if providing more accurate statistics on a SCIENCE FORUM simply earns me a downvote and an accusation of "attempting to frame it in more palatable light." then I'm done with this thread. No. It's called not taking the thread further off topic. My apologies if it disgusts you @Ten oz and @CharonY

Um. Yes you did.

So we agree. Broad public support is not a democracy. I fear you've fallen into the trap of not looking at all the information. However, before we get into this, let me say something. I fully and 100% agree that Republicans have gerrymandered the election system. But they haven't gerrymandered it anywhere near as much as you seem to believe, and it would not have the effects on the congressional support that you also believe. Let's add the 2012 elections and the 2016 elections into the data you sent me previously. First, let's look at the House only. If you don't change your mind after this, we can go into the Senate if you'd like. 2008: Democrats win the popular vote by 13 million, gain 21 seats. 21/13, you get 1.65 seats for every 1 million more votes. (Not sure where you got less than half?) 2010: Republicans win the popular vote by 6 million, gain 63 seats. 63/6, you get 10.5 seats for every 1 million more votes. 2012: Democrats win by 1 million votes, gain 8 seats. 8/1, you get 8 seats for every 1 million more votes. (The Republican redistricting in 2010 affected this election.) 2016: Republicans win the popular vote by 1 million votes, lose 6 seats. -6/1, you get 8 seats lost for every 1 million more votes. Now, the point I'm trying to make is that the difference in gains/losses is not solely dependent on gerrymandering. In 2016 Republicans won the popular vote for Congress by 1 million votes, yet lost 6 seats. It's not that Democrats somehow went in and gerrymandered it. It's the fact that a much larger portion of the gains and losses are dependent on which seats are up for the running, what states they're in, how many of the seats are Senate seats(each state gets 2 senators, regardless of population. This is why you should look at the election vote tallies by each chamber individually, rather than together), and even more factors. Listen, man, all I'm trying to do is let you see that it's not as unfair as you think it is. You're an extremely smart guy, and you've done me the favor of pointing out when I was wrong several times, let me return the favor. I really don't want to debate this, as it's off topic, and looking at the numbers you can't deny that it varies massively for every election. Your entire post was built on 2 pieces of data, that when looked at alone, showed huge signs of being unfair, however when put into context with the following two elections as well, proved to simply be the way it worked out when it worked out. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections,_2008 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections,_2010 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections,_2012 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections,_2016 Please accept this when I say it, but because this is off topic I won't summarize the key points of the video. I would go back to edit it, but I can't. So I won't make another post devoted to it. My apologies.

Democrats controlled most of Congress and the presidency from 2009-2011(accounting for inauguration being in January). It jumped briefly and then plummeted once again according to your graph, and I suspect that was in part because of how popular Obama was. Democrats are not some magical exception where the people love them but just can't get public support to show it.

So North Korea is a democracy? I mean they have broad public support...

So broad public support matters more than democracy itself? Kin Jung Un is apparently pretty popular in North Korea...... I for one don't believe the public in general even understands enough about redistricting in 2010 and 2002 for those to be what caused the massive drop in redistricting.. Rather, I suspect the low approval ratings, which continued to drop for both Republican and Democrat politicians, are because the public is realizing they're both full of crap. They always promise that if they win the world will be perfect(This is a hyperbole. They don't specifically say this, but often times this is what it comes off as. I.E. "MAKE AMERICAN GREAT AGAIN!"), and it never works. With the growth of social media, things that politicians do are also spread a lot faster, further opening the door to looking at Congress. I mean, look at Hillary and Trump. Hillary lied like 50% the time. Trump lied like 99% of the time. Neither of them two should have even been close to suitable to run with those numbers. Yet they were. Just my opinion...........

Essentially, however, the only reason the UK system is primarily supporting evidence is that it's one of the worst. Not that it's the only evidence I need.

I've looked at several election systems throughout the world, and compared to most democracies, for example, the UK's( Off Notify me of replies However, in being "fair" it has the other side effect of being a two-party system. Meaning your choice matters more, however, you have fewer choices. If that makes sense. Regardless, just because we're one of the fairer ones doesn't mean we're 100% fair. Not by a LONG shot.