Donald Trump

[Phi for All]

So people who see a bright but different future for America are evil? How intellectually diverse of you.

 

That's so far off the mark it's obvious you read nothing of what you quoted, but that's OK (isn't that a grating, passive-aggressive, juvenile tactic of his?). The bright future you speak of seems full of doom and gloom for those who aren't as well off as you are (big deal, right?), and you seem to be saying that all the bad stuff I described is actually good for you, so I'd like to hear about that at great length, obviously.

 

My real point was that I don't think most conservatives would agree with Republican leadership if they realized what was really going on, that the Republicans aren't going to stick it to the bankers, they aren't going to hire American workers if they can find them cheaper elsewhere, and they only want to war with Islam because working things out doesn't sell the bombs. Most people I know who identify as conservative simply don't want tax dollars spent foolishly, but are as quick as anyone to jump on a smart idea no matter how liberal it may be. They don't want children to starve, they like public museums and parks, they'd be happy to see everyone healthy as long as they didn't have to support any "malingerers". They're decent, hard-working People who misunderstand that the Republican party cares about their well-being, instead of just about how cheaply, quietly, and productively they'll work. They've been squeezed by the Ameri-publican corporations until they have to work multiple jobs, with two weeks paid vacation a year, and told to be glad about it.

 

My point is that American conservatism hasn't been about smart spending, or common sense, or even national pride. It's been about rampant capitalism with fewer and fewer restrictions trampling over the common People the way it always does, separating rich from poor by squeezing the middle. And many Republicans still hold on to Eisenhower values, or Reagan values, when the new GOP is a far cry from either.

[iNow]

Speaking of smart spending and reduced deficits, it's a shame that credit is so frequently given to people who literally have zero to do with achieving those results.

 

 

http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/11/16/13642304/republicans-economy-good-shape

One of the great paradoxes of the 2016 presidential election is that whatever you make of the generation-long course of the American economy, it was the best year of the 21st century in basic pocketbook terms by almost any measure.

 

And thanks to Donald Trump winning the election, Republicans are suddenly noticing:

This kind of comically large impact is why you can’t take poll respondents at their word when they explain to you how they voted. Trump’s message was that the economy was terrible, and Trump voters agreed with his message, but the causal arrow there could point in any direction. If Trump starts saying in March that the economy is now fixed, Republicans will believe him. Not because of anything special about Trump or Republicans, but because that’s how human perception works.

 

The thing is, Trump will be right.

 

He has not taken office yet or done anything that could conceivably merit credit, but data from the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta shows that wages are growing at their fastest pace in eight years. Nobody noticed in the heat of the October campaign, but data released last month also showed that American wages reached an all-time high point. A little less than a year from now, we are due for a census report that will show that median household income is at an all-time high.

 

Members of the Obama administration whom I’ve spoken to this week are pained about many aspects of the election result, but this particular set of information stings especially badly to those who are aware of it. Had Clinton won the election, an easy narrative would quickly begin to emerge of how the Obama administration picked up an economy that had fallen to pieces and nursed it back to strength — handing over a rosy situation to its successor.

 

Trump’s hard rupture with Obama’s legacy means that the exact same 2017 economic data is going to play very differently, as a series of new highs hit thanks to Trumpian deregulation and Greatness Making rather than the pretty sweet situation he was handed by his predecessor.

[Airbrush]

"Members of the Obama administration whom I’ve spoken to this week are pained about many aspects of the election result, but this particular set of information stings especially badly to those who are aware of it. Had Clinton won the election, an easy narrative would quickly begin to emerge of how the Obama administration picked up an economy that had fallen to pieces and nursed it back to strength — handing over a rosy situation to its successor."

 

"[Trump] has not taken office yet or done anything that could conceivably merit credit, but data from the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta shows that wages are growing at their fastest pace in eight years. Nobody noticed in the heat of the October campaign, but data released last month also showed that American wages reached an all-time high point."​

 

Seems stupid that the Clinton campaign didn't make a major issue of positive trends, something to repeat over and over, the way Trump cleverly does to imprint HIS message. Clinton lost the election, among other reasons, because of her stupidity and the stupidity of her campaign. I'm sorry to say that because I voted for her, but she shot herself in the foot one time too many, by what she failed to do.

Edited November 16, 2016 by Airbrush

[Ten oz]

"Members of the Obama administration whom I’ve spoken to this week are pained about many aspects of the election result, but this particular set of information stings especially badly to those who are aware of it. Had Clinton won the election, an easy narrative would quickly begin to emerge of how the Obama administration picked up an economy that had fallen to pieces and nursed it back to strength — handing over a rosy situation to its successor."

 

"[Trump] has not taken office yet or done anything that could conceivably merit credit, but data from the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta shows that wages are growing at their fastest pace in eight years. Nobody noticed in the heat of the October campaign, but data released last month also showed that American wages reached an all-time high point."​

 

Seems stupid that the Clinton campaign didn't make a major issue of positive trends, something to repeat over and over, the way Trump cleverly does to imprint HIS message. Clinton lost the election, among other reasons, because of her stupidity and the stupidity of her campaign. I'm sorry to say that because I voted for her, but she shot herself in the foot one time too many, by what she failed to do.

No major party candidate has every faced FBI investigations (initially directed by Republicans in Congress) and cyber attacks by a foriegn power in the middle of a presidential campaign. Add to that that this was the first presidential election since the Supreme Court stripped the voting rights act and laws were changed all across the country. Saying Clinton should have focused on X, Y, Z is much easier said than done when at every press conference reporters demanded to know about emails and wikileaks. When ever media outlet felt that to be fair they had to give equal time to Clinton lies as Trump lies even though Trump was lying at a rate several times higher.

 

In my opinion progressive voters and Democrats let Hillary Clinton down and not the otherway around. Media the media reported on illegally obtained (hacked) material where were liberals pointing out if was wrong? Bill Maher had Jullian Assange on his show via satelite a week after the DNC hacks. Michael Moore went to visit Jullian Assange and called him a hero. Turns out Jullian Assange may have been releasing info against Clinton at the request of Russian intelligence to help Trump win. Shame of liberal for being asleep at the wheel.

[MonDie]

I've done more research, and now I've moved beyond asking why Trump won to asking why the Republicans get more electoral votes per percentage point of popular vote. Delta mentioned how rare it is to win the electoral college vote without the popular vote. Upon further investigation, I learned that this has only happened when the margin in the popular vote was less than 1 percentage point, which has happened 7 times in our nation's history: 1980, 1984, 1988, 1960, 1968, 2000, and 2016. In only three of these instances did the winner win without the popular vote: 1888, 2000, and 2016. Perhaps most interesting of all is that the Republicans have only won the popular vote once in the past seven elections, but setting that aside we have the question of why more recently they've been winning without the popular vote.

 

The equations are for lines in slope intercept form, with x indicating popular vote and y indicating electoral college vote. The first line is Democrat and the second is Republican. I also included the intersect of the lines. This is, ideally, the percentage of popular vote above which the electoral college starts to favor Democrats instead of Republicans. As we can see, the lines might become more similar as we move further back in time, but at present there is a notable Republican bias wherein they receive significantly more electoral college votes per popular vote percentage point when the popular vote is below the threshold of 60 percent.

 

Democrat function, Republican function, intersection of the lines

First I included all data 1952 to 2016.

21.6x-786, 18.8x-612, x=62.1

Removed the 2016 Trump-Clinton data.

21.6x-787, 18.9x-618, x=62.6

Removed 2016 and 2000 Bush-Gore.

21.6x-786, 18.8x-615, x=61.1

1952-1996

21.4x-776, 18.3x-574, x=65.2

1952-1988

21.8x-828, 19.8-655, x=86.5

1952-1980

21.1x-784, 19.3x-634, x=83.3

1952-1972

20.4x-748, 18.9x-631, x=78

1940-1972, added the three preceding elections

22.8x-839, 21.6x-793, x=38.3

 

I did the calculations in the free, open-source CAS "wxMaxima", and I've included instructions and the data in spoiler tags should anybody want it.

 

 

DEM:matrix([54.7,449],[53.4,432],[49.6,303],[44.3,89],[42,73],[49.7,303],[61.1,486],[42.7,191],
[37.5,17],[50.1,297],[41,49],[40.6,13],[45.6,111],[43,370],[49.2,379],[48.4,266],
[48.3,251],[52.9,365],[51.1,332],[47.8,232])

REP:matrix([44.8,82],[45.9,99],[45.1,189],[55.2,442],[57.4,457],[49.6,219],[38.5,52],[43.4,301],
[60.7,520],[48,240],[50.7,489],[58.8,525],[53.4,426],[37.4,168],[40.7,159],[47.9,271],
[50.7,286],[45.7,173],[47.2,206],[47.2,306])

lsquares_estimates(DEM,[x,y],y=A*x+B,[A,B]) // calculates a line of best fit from the data in the matrix

float(xxxx) // converts fraction into floating point value

wxplot2d([DEM-function, REP-function], [x,0,100]) // draws a graph from the functions supplied

wxplot2d([22.75*x-839, 21.6*x-793], [x,0,100]) // example

 

 

I think that third-party voting could explain the disparity if (a) more people vote third-party when their major party candidate is doing poorly and (b) third-parties steal more votes from the more liberal party. This effect might become weaker as we go further back in time because the Republican party used to be the more progressive of the two, working to abolish slavery and defend the rights of African-Americans.

In fact, if you look at third-party voting in Wisconsin and Michigan for this election, it is sufficient to explain how Trump flipped these states. Had nobody voted thrid-party, Hillary Clinton probably would have won these states.

My real point was that I don't think most conservatives would agree with Republican leadership if they realized what was really going on, that the Republicans aren't going to stick it to the bankers, they aren't going to hire American workers if they can find them cheaper elsewhere, and they only want to war with Islam because working things out doesn't sell the bombs. Most people I know who identify as conservative simply don't want tax dollars spent foolishly, but are as quick as anyone to jump on a smart idea no matter how liberal it may be. They don't want children to starve, they like public museums and parks, they'd be happy to see everyone healthy as long as they didn't have to support any "malingerers". They're decent, hard-working People who misunderstand that the Republican party cares about their well-being, instead of just about how cheaply, quietly, and productively they'll work. They've been squeezed by the Ameri-publican corporations until they have to work multiple jobs, with two weeks paid vacation a year, and told to be glad about it.

 

Special interests is a real problem. Big businesses are using their money to fund the campaigns of politicians who will enact policies that will help their big businesses stay big. I would like him to fight this problem, but I don't have confidence that he will. Firstly, he is a rich businessman who has probably had a money addiction all of his life. Secondly, I believe he exemplifies an us-vs-them mentality. He cares more about whites because he is white, more about men because he is a man. I believe we actually identify with groups in order to benefit ourselves. We help ourselves by helping the group to which we belong. In fact, the desire to punish traitors can be explained from an evolutionary perspective, for punishing a traitor would be worth the effort in a small-sized group wherein the punisher will reap a significant slice of the rewards. It is a sign of selfishness, in my opinion, to appeal to the interests of the groups to which one belongs.

Edited November 16, 2016 by MonDie

[Delta1212]

MonDie, 538 did an analysis of past elections to attempt to approximate the electoral vs popular advantage of each party even when both lined up. Mostly by looking at "tipping point" states, defined as the state that puts the winning candidate over 270 if you start counting from the states they won by the widest margin.

 

The theory goes that if there were any overall shift in the national popular vote across all states by fewer points than they won the tipping point state by, all of the states that flipped as a result wouldn't change the outcome, while a change of the margin of victory of that state or more would flip the election. Then you can analyze whether such a shift would flip the popular vote before or after the EC flipped and thereby see who had Electoral advantage.

 

I'm not completely convinced of the accuracy of the analysis just because of the inherent assumption of how individual states would shift if there was a large change in the voting trends across the country as a whole. It's still interesting to look at, though, and the advantage isn't consistent from one election to the next despite Republicans winning when it actually made a difference to the outcome (I don't know whether this is a coincidental fluke or an indication of somewhere to look for the flaw in their analysis). http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/will-the-electoral-college-doom-the-democrats-again

 

 

Also, incidentally, the votes for the current election are still being tallied, and it looks like Hillary Clinton's margin of victory in the popular vote is going to wind up being larger than 1%. Not by a lot, probably still sub-2%, but still the widest margin anyone has won the popular vote by and still lost the election.

[MonDie]

I will read it, Delta1212.

 

I forgot to add that the bias toward Republican victories in the electoral college could be explained by a tendency for Democrat held states to vote Democrat more strongly than Republican held states vote Republican. That is, a skew toward Democrat in the distribution of the Democrat/Republican voting of each state. While researching this I found the Cook Partisan Voting Index (Cook VPI) and learned that the opposite is actually true. Republican held states have a stronger voting bias than Democrat held states. http://cookpolitical.com/file/filename.pdf

 

Wikipedia

 

 

PVIs are calculated by comparing the district's average Democratic or Republican Party's share of the two-party presidential vote in the past two presidential elections to the nation's average share of the same. The national average for 2004 and 2008 was 51.2% Democratic to 48.8% Republican.^[1] For example, in Alaska's at-large congressional district, the Republican candidate won 63% and 61% of the two-party share in the 2004 and 2008 presidential elections, respectively. Comparing the average of these two results (62%) against the average national share (49%), this district has voted 13 percentage points more Republican than the country as a whole, or R+13.

[Ten oz]

I will read it, Delta1212.

 

I forgot to add that the bias toward Republican victories in the electoral college could be explained by a tendency for Democrat held states to vote Democrat more strongly than Republican held states vote Republican. That is, a skew toward Democrat in the distribution of the Democrat/Republican voting of each state. While researching this I found the Cook Partisan Voting Index (Cook VPI) and learned that the opposite is actually true. Republican held states have a stronger voting bias than Democrat held states. http://cookpolitical.com/file/filename.pdf

 

Wikipedia

It also is no coincidence that Republicans work to limit access to voting with laws that target specific groups of people.

[Delta1212]

I will read it, Delta1212.

 

I forgot to add that the bias toward Republican victories in the electoral college could be explained by a tendency for Democrat held states to vote Democrat more strongly than Republican held states vote Republican. That is, a skew toward Democrat in the distribution of the Democrat/Republican voting of each state. While researching this I found the Cook Partisan Voting Index (Cook VPI) and learned that the opposite is actually true. Republican held states have a stronger voting bias than Democrat held states. http://cookpolitical.com/file/filename.pdf

 

Wikipedia

The other possibility, which I haven't actually looked at, is that Democratic leaning states have a larger average number of electoral votes per state than Republican leaning states. The more Electoral votes a state has, the more diluted the amplifying effect of the two extra "Senate" votes gets.

 

A state with 30 electoral votes should tend to have around 28 times the population of a state with 3 electoral votes. So winning a state with 30 electoral votes is liable to net you a far higher vote total than winning 10 states with 3 votes each, even though the total number of electoral votes is the same.

[Ten oz]

California has 55 electoral votes (EV):

- the GDP of CA accounts for 14% of the total U.S. GDP. If realized as EVs California would deserve 75

- the population of CA acounts for 12% of the total U.S. population. If realized as EVs California would deserve 64.5

- the income tax & employment tax of CA accounts for 12% of the total collected in the U.S. If realized as EVs California would deserve 64.5

 

Idaho has 4 electoral votes:

- the GDP of ID accounts for 0.3% of the total U.S. GDP. If realized as EVs Idaho would deserve 1.6

- the population of ID acounts for 0.4% of the total U.S. population. If realized as EVs Idaho would deserve 2

- the income tax & employment tax of CA accounts for 0.3% of the total collected in the U.S. If realized as EVs California would deserve 1.6

 

 

Some states simply get a much better deal. In addition to EVs Idaho also gets the same number of U.S. Senators as California.

[waitforufo]

California has 55 electoral votes (EV):

- the GDP of CA accounts for 14% of the total U.S. GDP. If realized as EVs California would deserve 75

- the population of CA acounts for 12% of the total U.S. population. If realized as EVs California would deserve 64.5

- the income tax & employment tax of CA accounts for 12% of the total collected in the U.S. If realized as EVs California would deserve 64.5

 

Idaho has 4 electoral votes:

- the GDP of ID accounts for 0.3% of the total U.S. GDP. If realized as EVs Idaho would deserve 1.6

- the population of ID acounts for 0.4% of the total U.S. population. If realized as EVs Idaho would deserve 2

- the income tax & employment tax of CA accounts for 0.3% of the total collected in the U.S. If realized as EVs California would deserve 1.6

 

Some states simply get a much better deal. In addition to EVs Idaho also gets the same number of U.S. Senators as California.

Gee, it seems that pesky constitution of the United States just keeps getting in the way of progressive dreams and goals. I know, why don't you push for a constitutional amendment change to Article II, Section 1 of the constitution. All you need to do is get three fourths of the states to agree. That process gives every state one equal vote. Why don't you show the CA vs. ID math for that one. Now the states can apportion their EV as they choose. Some states divide there EVs based on vote totals. I think these are all smaller states. I think it would be great if progressives in states like NY and CA would show the way by changing their state's apportionment from winner take all to divided by vote. Don't you? My guess is that those states understand the clout that come form there current system of winner take all.

 

There is actually a very good reason for the electoral college. The presidency is the only office elected by the entire country. This country is the United States, not the United Populous. To insure that each state in these United States has a voice, EVs are set to equal congressional representation. Hence, ID has three. This forces presidential candidates to pay attention to the needs and concerns of small states as well as large ones. Take a look at the following map.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/2016-election/how-election-maps-lie/

 

 

In 2012, about the same number of votes were cast in these 160 counties as were cast in the rest of the country. But, your run-of-the-mill election map won't show you that.

 

 

If presidential elections were determined by popular vote, would needs and concerns of states without any counties marked in red even be addressed during presidential election campaign's? To insure they are addressed, the founders set up the electoral college system. This forces presidential candidates to address the needs and concerns of small states as well as large. Presidential candidates that ignore such small states do so at their own peril. Donald Trump did not make that mistake.

Edited November 18, 2016 by waitforufo

[swansont]

 

If presidential elections were determined by popular vote, would needs and concerns of states without any counties marked in red even be addressed during presidential election campaign's? To insure they are addressed, the founders set up the electoral college system. This forces presidential candidates to address the needs and concerns of small states as well as large. Presidential candidates that ignore such small states do so at their own peril. Donald Trump did not make that mistake.

 

 

Pretty sure that most of the counties in red were not part of the US when the Constitution was adopted.

 

Also pretty sure Trump spent only a tiny fraction of his time and money in those small states, and almost all in the swing states.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/11/10/donald-trump-spent-more-time-in-the-states-that-handed-him-the-presidency/

 

Nothing in Idaho, Wyoming, Kansas, Oklahoma and Alabama, and more with very few visits.

[waitforufo]

 

Pretty sure that most of the counties in red were not part of the US when the Constitution was adopted.

So? The Constitution was in place when their state joined the union.

 

 

Also pretty sure Trump spent only a tiny fraction of his time and money in those small states, and almost all in the swing states.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/11/10/donald-trump-spent-more-time-in-the-states-that-handed-him-the-presidency/

 

Nothing in Idaho, Wyoming, Kansas, Oklahoma and Alabama, and more with very few visits.

One does not need to visit a state to address that state's needs and concerns.

 

 

Edit:

Maps showing Trump / Clinton Americas.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/11/16/us/politics/the-two-americas-of-2016.html?_r=0

Edited November 17, 2016 by waitforufo

[Sriman Dutta]

I never believed that Donald Trump would win.

[Ten oz]

Gee, it seems that pesky constitution of the United States just keeps getting in the way of progressive dreams and goals. I know, why don't you push for a constitutional amendment change to Article II, Section 1 of the constitution. All you need to do is get three fourths of the states to agree. That process gives every state one equal vote. Why don't you show the CA vs. ID math for that one. Now the states can apportion their EV as they choose. Some states divide there EVs based on vote totals. I think these are all smaller states. I think it would be great if progressives in states like NY and CA would show the way by changing their state's apportionment from winner take all to divided by vote. Don't you? My guess is that those states understand the clout that come form there current system of winner take all.

 

There is actually a very good reason for the electoral college. The presidency is the only office elected by the entire country. This country is the United States, not the United Populous. To insure that each state in these United States has a voice, EVs are set to equal congressional representation. Hence, ID has three. This forces presidential candidates to pay attention to the needs and concerns of small states as well as large ones. Take a look at the following map.

In my experience when people benefit from something in the Constitution they pretend that the Constitution is perfect and when they don't they call for change. For example Donald Trump is calling for term limits in Congress. The Constitution is clear on this matter. Members can serve unlimited elected terms. Torture is outlawed in the Constitution yet Donald Trump says he will tortore and "a hell of a lot worse". In the past Conservatives have also pushed for Constitutional Admendments to define Marriage.

 

What the Constitution states in not written in stone. A President use to be able to serve unlimited terms but we changed that. In my opinion it goes against the spirit of the Constitution to treat it as monolithic when it suits ones argument. If you feel the electoral college is good and serves a useful purpose than by all means express those thoughts. Don't just claim the Constitution is final as a way to position your argument above others. The Constitution was final when it made slaves 3/4th a person. Everything in the Constitution isn't perfect and it was not written with any knowledge or foresight of the country we would have in 2016. Laws change as times change. We can have a discussion about this. The popular vote and electoral vote wen the same way in every presidential elect held for over a hunder years 1888-1996 and now just since the 2000 it has split twice. Conditionals have clearly changed and in my opnion it justifies of reconsidering how we elect our Presidents.

 

 

Pretty sure that most of the counties in red were not part of the US when the Constitution was adopted.

 

Also pretty sure Trump spent only a tiny fraction of his time and money in those small states, and almost all in the swing states.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/11/10/donald-trump-spent-more-time-in-the-states-that-handed-him-the-presidency/

 

Nothing in Idaho, Wyoming, Kansas, Oklahoma and Alabama, and more with very few visits.

Good point. When the Constitution was ratified there were only 13 states, slaves were 3/4 a person, only land owners could vote, we did not have a standing Military, and Presidents could serve unlimited terms. It was written for a different. We can respect the philosophical insights it contains while admending it to the modern era.

[swansont]

Good point. When the Constitution was ratified there were only 13 states, slaves were 3/4 a person, only land owners could vote, we did not have a standing Military, and Presidents could serve unlimited terms. It was written for a different. We can respect the philosophical insights it contains while admending it to the modern era.

3/5, but the point is valid.

[waitforufo]

In my experience when people benefit from something in the Constitution they pretend that the Constitution is perfect and when they don't they call for change. For example Donald Trump is calling for term limits in Congress. The Constitution is clear on this matter. Members can serve unlimited elected terms. Torture is outlawed in the Constitution yet Donald Trump says he will tortore and "a hell of a lot worse". In the past Conservatives have also pushed for Constitutional Admendments to define Marriage.

 

What the Constitution states in not written in stone. A President use to be able to serve unlimited terms but we changed that. In my opinion it goes against the spirit of the Constitution to treat it as monolithic when it suits ones argument. If you feel the electoral college is good and serves a useful purpose than by all means express those thoughts. Don't just claim the Constitution is final as a way to position your argument above others. The Constitution was final when it made slaves 3/4th a person. Everything in the Constitution isn't perfect and it was not written with any knowledge or foresight of the country we would have in 2016. Laws change as times change. We can have a discussion about this. The popular vote and electoral vote wen the same way in every presidential elect held for over a hunder years 1888-1996 and now just since the 2000 it has split twice. Conditionals have clearly changed and in my opnion it justifies of reconsidering how we elect our Presidents.

I think you need to go and read my post (#911) again. Here is my suggestion from that post.

 

 

I know, why don't you push for a constitutional amendment change to Article II, Section 1 of the constitution. All you need to do is get three fourths of the states to agree.

 

 

Above I am explicitly encouraging you to attempt to change the constitution while at the same time acknowledging that the constitution permits such changes under specific rules.

 

Personally I'm not two worried that such a change would be approved by three fourths of the states. Why would small states with fewer than five EVs choose to be ignored in presidential elections? Why would they further diminish there small voice? Take Hawaii for example. It has 4 electoral votes. Currently it votes Democrat. Do you really think however, that they will choose to have almost no voice in all future presidential elections by agreeing to a constitutional amendment to switch from the electoral college to the popular vote? My guess is they would not.

Edited November 18, 2016 by waitforufo

[swansont]

So? The Constitution was in place when their state joined the union.

You phrased it as if the founding fathers knew this would be the case. When the Constitution was written, these large population centers didn't exist. The US was a rural country — most of the people lived outside of the cities. Total population in 1800 was 5.3 million, with 320,000 living in towns of 2500 or more people. We didn't flip to more than half urban until sometime around 1920.

 

So "To insure [rural area needs] are addressed, the founders set up the electoral college system" is a bunch of hogwash. Current demographics is not why the electoral college was implemented.

 

https://www.census.gov/population/censusdata/table-4.pdf

[waitforufo]

You phrased it as if the founding fathers knew this would be the case. When the Constitution was written, these large population centers didn't exist. The US was a rural country — most of the people lived outside of the cities. Total population in 1800 was 5.3 million, with 320,000 living in towns of 2500 or more people. We didn't flip to more than half urban until sometime around 1920.

 

So "To insure [rural area needs] are addressed, the founders set up the electoral college system" is a bunch of hogwash. Current demographics is not why the electoral college was implemented.

 

https://www.census.gov/population/censusdata/table-4.pdf

Your point being? The fact is we have a constitutional government. That constitution that defines that government permits changes by specific rules. If you want to change the constitution, follow those rules, and see if you can get it done. Other than that, arm yourself and start a revolution. The second amendment was put in the constitution for that specific purpose.

 

Why do you keep explaining the rules to checkers when the game we are playing is chess?

[Delta1212]

"If you want to change it, amend the constitution" is not really an answer to the question of whether or not it should be changed.

[swansont]

Your point being?

 

 

My point is that you are spouting nonsense again, and you can't validly derive a conclusion from a false premise.

 

I wasn't arguing about whether we have a constitutional government. I was arguing that your (unsubstantiated, as usual) claim that the electoral college was put in place to make sure that rural areas weren't ignored is a big steaming pile of bullsh*t.

 

Nothing I posted indicated (AFAICT) that I was discussing amending the constitution. That you change the subject (again) without actually defending the claim (again) tells me you know you are wrong. And yet that doesn't seem to make you make more rigorous arguments.

[waitforufo]

 

 

My point is that you are spouting nonsense again, and you can't validly derive a conclusion from a false premise.

 

I wasn't arguing about whether we have a constitutional government. I was arguing that your (unsubstantiated, as usual) claim that the electoral college was put in place to make sure that rural areas weren't ignored is a big steaming pile of bullsh*t.

 

Nothing I posted indicated (AFAICT) that I was discussing amending the constitution. That you change the subject (again) without actually defending the claim (again) tells me you know you are wrong. And yet that doesn't seem to make you make more rigorous arguments.

You can disagree with me all you want. I don't care if you think my arguments are bullsh*t. All that matters is can you follow the rules to change the constitution and get it done. First you have to propose an amendment and either get two thirds of both the house and the senate to approve it, or have two thirds of the states call for a constitutional convention. Then if the amendment gets approved by either of those means it still needs to receive approval by three quarters of the states. Those states don't need to put it to the people for a vote, their legislatures can decide.

 

So what do you think your chances are? The states have never called for a constitutional convention. Republicans control two thirds of all state legislatures. Republicans control the US house and senate. Republicans just put their candidate in the white house because of Article II, Section I of the constitution. So please ignore my arguments and explain how your are going to pull of this progressive wet dream of eliminating the electoral college and moving to the popular vote for presidential elections?

 

I think you have a better chance of convincing all those icky people who voted for Trump in all those deplorable places to vote for your progressive candidates. I'm sure that will take a lot of nose holding on your part. Perhaps you need a little more time in your safe space playing with play-doh to come to grip with the reality of your situation.

[MonDie]

The other possibility, which I haven't actually looked at, is that Democratic leaning states have a larger average number of electoral votes per state than Republican leaning states. The more Electoral votes a state has, the more diluted the amplifying effect of the two extra "Senate" votes gets.

 

A state with 30 electoral votes should tend to have around 28 times the population of a state with 3 electoral votes. So winning a state with 30 electoral votes is liable to net you a far higher vote total than winning 10 states with 3 votes each, even though the total number of electoral votes is the same.

 

California has 55 electoral votes (EV):

- the GDP of CA accounts for 14% of the total U.S. GDP. If realized as EVs California would deserve 75

- the population of CA acounts for 12% of the total U.S. population. If realized as EVs California would deserve 64.5

- the income tax & employment tax of CA accounts for 12% of the total collected in the U.S. If realized as EVs California would deserve 64.5

 

Idaho has 4 electoral votes:

- the GDP of ID accounts for 0.3% of the total U.S. GDP. If realized as EVs Idaho would deserve 1.6

- the population of ID acounts for 0.4% of the total U.S. population. If realized as EVs Idaho would deserve 2

- the income tax & employment tax of CA accounts for 0.3% of the total collected in the U.S. If realized as EVs California would deserve 1.6

 

 

Some states simply get a much better deal. In addition to EVs Idaho also gets the same number of U.S. Senators as California.

That is an interesting point. The average Democrat held state has about 10.5 delegates compared to about 10.166 for Republican held states. However, my math so far suggests that this won't account for the discrepancy of Democratic presidential candidates receiving fewer electoral votes per percentage of popular vote.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_2016#Results_by_state

To test whether the explanation is that simple, I determined what the 2016 Clinton-Trump popular vote would have been if each party had won each of their respective states by the same margin. The margin of victory for each state the party won was set to be the average victory margin over all states the party won, and therefore the procedure shouldn't have removed the effect of a Republican skew in the non-normal distribution of Cook PVI scores.

I took all the Democrat-won states from the 2016 election, determined the margin of victory for each Democrat-won state, and then the average margin of victory, which came to 18.118%. Next I determined the total votes they would have gotten from these states if they had won each Democrat-won state by that same margin, obtaining a 59.0554% [should have been 59.059%] share of the non-third-party voting in each. Next I calculated the same for Republican margin of victory in Republican-won states.

The final result showed Donald Trump winning the popular vote by a nearly 4% lead, instead of losing by 0.5% to 2%.

 

Once again, below in the spoiler is the data and wxMaxima calculations should anyone want to check my work. I excluded Maine and Nebraska because they did not use a winner-take-all system. Furthermore, I attribute Clinton's nearly 2% lead mostly to the district of Columbia, which overwhelmingly voted for her and without which her lead is more like 0.5%. The district of Columbia was not included in the Wikipedia table of voting by state, and so it was not included in the calculations.

 

 

 

float((

(61.78-32.80)+

(46.91-44.80)+

(53.86-41.73)+

(53.35-41.92)+

(90.54-4.02)+

(60.98-29.44)+

(55.41-39.41)+

(59.50-34.79)+

(60.81-33.52)+

(46.41-44.95)+

(47.89-45.53)+

(47.62-47.25)+

(54.77-42.03)+

(48.26-40.05)+

(57.89-36.84)+

(49.89-39.49)+

(53.83-39.46)+

(61.12-32.64)+

(49.49-44.68)+

(55.57-38.17)

)/20)

 

18.118

 

 

float((

(62.89-34.55)+

(52.89-37.72)+

(49.20-45.34)+

(60.59-33.65)+

(49.06-47.79)+

(51.20-45.74)+

(59.32-27.46)+

(57.12-37.87)+

(51.21-41.71)+

(57.22-36.13)+

(62.54-32.69)+

(58.09-38.44)+

(47.60-47.33)+

(58.32-39.74)+

(56.88-37.84)+

(56.52-35.97)+

(49.90-46.13)+

(62.95-27.24)+

(52.06-43.51)+

(65.33-28.93)+

(48.84-47.60)+

(54.90-40.71)+

(61.53-31.74)+

(61.06-34.90)+

(52.43-43.32)+

(46.80-27.81)+

(68.65-26.47)+

(47.87-46.94)+

(67.40-21.63)

)/29)

 

18.7403448275862

 

 

 

float((

(3287273+6191799)+

(1075770+1126384)+

(823360+637919)+

(185103+235581)+

(260223+11553)+

(266827+128815)+

(2982415+2121573)+

(878615+1502820)+

(1967667+1084400)+

(1364067+1321120)+

(537753+511319)+

(348497+345810)+

(1967444+1509688)+

(380923+316134)+

(4145376+2638135)+

(949319+751438)+

(227062+166454)+

(178082+95114)+

(1916148+1729932)+

(1210824+831631)

)*.590554)

 

2.8470825073318*10^7

assigned DW

 

float((

(718084+1306925)+

(93007+130415)+

(1123979+1219596)+

(378632+681765)+

(4487657+4607146)+

(1856509+2078064)+

(412525+190917)+

(1024180+1544609)+

(798923+650780)+

(656470+414572)+

(1202942+628834)+

(1178004+779535)+

(2264807+2277914)+

(678284+462127)+

(1585753+1054889)+

(273879+174281)+

(2162822+2339830)+

(93526+216133)+

(2320596+2776683)+

(419788+947934)+

(2817409+2890633)+

(850629+1147045)+

(227701+117442)+

(868853+1519926)+

(3867816+4681590)+

(222858+375006)+

(187519+486304)+

(1383926+1411432)+

(55964+174383)

)*.593702)

 

4.244954576190399*10^7

assigned RW

 

- - - - -

 

(DW+(RW/.593702*.406298))

5.7521031311414*10^7

assigned DT

 

(RW+(DW/.590554*.409446))

6.2189087688586*10^7

assigned RT

 

DT/(DT+RT)

0.4805026658724982

 

R/(DT+RT)

0.5194973341275018

 

 

Edited November 18, 2016 by MonDie

[Ten oz]

You can disagree with me all you want. I don't care if you think my arguments are bullsh*t. All that matters is can you follow the rules to change the constitution and get it done. First you have to propose an amendment and either get two thirds of both the house and the senate to approve it, or have two thirds of the states call for a constitutional convention. Then if the amendment gets approved by either of those means it still needs to receive approval by three quarters of the states. Those states don't need to put it to the people for a vote, their legislatures can decide.

 

So what do you think your chances are? The states have never called for a constitutional convention. Republicans control two thirds of all state legislatures. Republicans control the US house and senate. Republicans just put their candidate in the white house because of Article II, Section I of the constitution. So please ignore my arguments and explain how your are going to pull of this progressive wet dream of eliminating the electoral college and moving to the popular vote for presidential elections?

 

I think you have a better chance of convincing all those icky people who voted for Trump in all those deplorable places to vote for your progressive candidates. I'm sure that will take a lot of nose holding on your part. Perhaps you need a little more time in your safe space playing with play-doh to come to grip with the reality of your situation.

No, first we (the people) need to have a national conversation about it where the pros and cons are considered. You are arguing that rather than the issue being voiced and debated it merely be to a vote and then (when it fails) buried and put away. As with any political issue the more often it is brought up and discussed my more people know of it and the greater opportunity it has to be successful. We, the nation, are is the early stages of determining how to address this. Saying to just hold or vote no or shut up about it in constructive in my opinion. You are just looking to move past it.

Once again, below in the spoiler is the data and wxMaxima calculations should anyone want to check my work. I excluded Maine and Nebraska because they did not use a winner-take-all system. Furthermore, I attribute Clinton's nearly 2% lead mostly to the district of Columbia, which overwhelmingly voted for her and without which her lead is more like 0.5%. The district of Columbia was not included in the Wikipedia table of voting by state, and so it was not included in the calculations.

 

DC isn't a state and doesn't have voting representation in Congress. I mention this because one of the arguements regarding the electoral college is that it balances power between large and small states. I would argue that Congress accomplishes that. Wyoming has just over 500,000 people compared to California's 39,000,000 yet both states have the same number of representatives in the Senate. And in the House the average CA Rep. for the House represents 800,000 people WY has a House rep who speaks for just 500,000. Meanwhile Wasington DC (650,000 people) do not have voting members in Congress at all. Bad as some of us are arguing the system is in electing our executive branch, it possibly is worse in our legislative branch. I understand small states shouldn't be stripped of a vioce but the balance seems, in my opinion, to be making their vioce much greater.

[waitforufo]

No, first we (the people) need to have a national conversation about it where the pros and cons are considered. You are arguing that rather than the issue being voiced and debated it merely be to a vote and then (when it fails) buried and put away. As with any political issue the more often it is brought up and discussed my more people know of it and the greater opportunity it has to be successful. We, the nation, are is the early stages of determining how to address this. Saying to just hold or vote no or shut up about it in constructive in my opinion. You are just looking to move past it.

Have all the discussion and debate you want. I'm simply pointing out how high your hurdle is. I don't think you can clear it. If you want to focus your energy on eliminating the electoral college it will simply give you less time to do other things. I'm all in favor of that.

Edited November 18, 2016 by waitforufo