[POLL] United States Presidential Elections 2016

[McLaren]

I also find the irony hilarious in a sick sort of way, considering what the left was saying about Trump's statements regarding acceptance of the outcome.

Because it's so easy for the Left to turn face at the drop of a dime & start doing what they condemn others of.

 

[Joey D]

I'd like to know why Jill Stein is seeking recounts in the first place. Unless she's shilling for Hillary.

My guess is that she's attempting to prove she got 5% of the popular vote so the Green Party can get federal funding in the future for campaigns. I think Johnson would have a better shot at trying to get a recount in his favor for 5% than Stein would.

It still amazes me in 2016 that we have to recount votes. It seems like it would be so much easier to standardize the voting process and figure out some way to properly count the votes.

The electoral college cannot simply be abolished. It would definitely require a constitutional amendment. That means no practical chance.

This is what the Facebook generation seems to forget, it's part of the Constitution and to get rid of it would...literally...require an act of Congress. Most of the people calling for the Electoral College to be abolished have zero understand of why it exists in the first place and what it actually does. They also don't understand the US isn't a direct democracy.

It's a flawed system, since candidates still neglect certain states, but it's still better than the election being determined by 4 or 5 states out of 50.

Because it's so easy for the Left to turn face at the drop of a dime & start doing what they condemn others of.

MSNBC is such a 🤬 network. I'm not sure how any of that actually passes for news.

 

[Johnnypenso]

Deeply saddened by the senseless act of gun violence at Ohio State this morning. Praying for the injured and the entire Buckeye community

— Senator Tim Kaine (@timkaine) November 28, 2016

 

[SlipZtrEm]

Not even 90 minutes later:



Considering all the comments about Kaine's first status being led by an agenda, I'd call this a bit of irony.

 

[mustafur]

My guess is that she's attempting to prove she got 5% of the popular vote so the Green Party can get federal funding in the future for campaigns. I think Johnson would have a better shot at trying to get a recount in his favor for 5% than Stein would.

It still amazes me in 2016 that we have to recount votes. It seems like it would be so much easier to standardize the voting process and figure out some way to properly count the votes.



This is what the Facebook generation seems to forget, it's part of the Constitution and to get rid of it would...literally...require an act of Congress. Most of the people calling for the Electoral College to be abolished have zero understand of why it exists in the first place and what it actually does. They also don't understand the US isn't a direct democracy.

It's a flawed system, since candidates still neglect certain states, but it's still better than the election being determined by 4 or 5 states out of 50.

If it's not 1 person 1 vote I don't care why it's in place, People in Swing states are not more valuble as voters then other states.

 

[McLaren]

MSNBC is such a 🤬 network. I'm not sure how any of that actually passes for news.

I agree that it's a real cluster. Posted it merely because someone there also found Clinton's willingness to have a recount funny, after her comments about Trump being a "direct threat to democracy" if he didn't respect the results.

 

[stonesfan129]

Trump wins Michigan, so it won't matter if Pennsylvania or Wisconsin suddenly switch to Clinton after recount.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201...gans-16-electoral-votes-state-board-says.html

 

[TRGTspecialist]

The electoral college cannot simply be abolished. It would definitely require a constitutional amendment. That means no practical chance.

This is what the Facebook generation seems to forget, it's part of the Constitution and to get rid of it would...literally...require an act of Congress.

A change to the constitution isn't strictly necessary; since the states are free to set the rules by which they appoint their electors, if each state changed their rule to "we'll give our electors to whoever wins the national popular vote", the electoral college would effectively be bypassed. That's what the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact is trying to do - but to take effect it needs to represent a majority of electoral votes, and it'd probably need some swing states to agree to it to get there, which is just as unlikely to happen I guess.

 

[ryzno]

Trump wins Michigan, so it won't matter if Pennsylvania or Wisconsin suddenly switch to Clinton after recount.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201...gans-16-electoral-votes-state-board-says.html

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Pennsylvania say the deadline to file a recount was on the 21st?
And if I'm not mistaken, she has till 2pm EST Today, to file in Wisconsin. Seems like a lost cause to me.

 

[Joey D]

If it's not 1 person 1 vote I don't care why it's in place, People in Swing states are not more valuble as voters then other states.

I'm curious as to why you care if it's in place anyways? As an Australian the dynamics of the electoral system in the US has little, if any, bearing on your country.

But to give you a response, the US isn't a direct democracy, it's a republic and one that strives to protect the minority from the majority. If you didn't have the electoral college there would be less state representation. Right now there's 13 states that are considered swing states, without the electoral college there would be 4 dominate states that hold almost 40% of the US population. It would make states like Utah, where I live, meaningless in the election, where now it actually plays a part (and weirdly almost really played a part in this election since it wasn't a shoe in for Trump).

As I've said it's not a perfect system, but in a republic, which elects people to represent the population, you need to have a system in place that doesn't make it so the major population centers in 4 states control the outcome of every election.

 

[TenEightyOne]

As I've said it's not a perfect system, but in a republic, which elects people to represent the population, you need to have a system in place that doesn't make it so the major population centers in 4 states control the outcome of every election.

Why not? If that's where the people are then that's where the equal number of votes should be?

I'm curious as to why you care if it's in place anyways? As an Australian the dynamics of the electoral system in the US has little, if any, bearing on your country.

If you think that American politics has no effect elsewhere in the world then I'm afraid you're wrong.

 

[Dotini]

Why not? If that's where the people are then that's where the equal number of votes should be?

Before there was a United States, there were 13 colonies which evolved into states. In order to join into a union, agreements and understandings were entered into in a document we call the constitution. This document established the rights of the states, which are largely preserved today. This is the basis, our foundation. Notions of "one man, one vote" were unheard of, and did not apply. The question is not what "should be", but what is. This is where you must start - at the beginning, and not some hypothetical or imaginary end.

 

[DDastardly00]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Pennsylvania say the deadline to file a recount was on the 21st?
And if I'm not mistaken, she has till 2pm EST Today, to file in Wisconsin. Seems like a lost cause to me.

I was curious about this too. I thought I read state officials saying the deadline has passed to request a recount in Pennsylvania but I can't seem to find anything about it now.

 

[Exorcet]

I'm curious as to why you care if it's in place anyways? As an Australian the dynamics of the electoral system in the US has little, if any, bearing on your country.

I don't see why people can't be concerned about the fair treatment or representation of others in another country. I don't think a person's location factors in to the validity of their opinions on the US at all.

Why not? If that's where the people are then that's where the equal number of votes should be?

I tend to agree with this. I can go further and question why states even exist at all as separate government entities. It just allows for more variations in laws across arbitrary borders. Federal law should inherently protect the minority from the majority by preventing anyone who would violate people's right from exercising power. There isn't a need to artificially balance votes.

 

[mustafur]

I'm curious as to why you care if it's in place anyways? As an Australian the dynamics of the electoral system in the US has little, if any, bearing on your country.

Why does America care about countries that don't have democracy?

But to give you a response, the US isn't a direct democracy, it's a republic and one that strives to protect the minority from the majority. If you didn't have the electoral college there would be less state representation. Right now there's 13 states that are considered swing states, without the electoral college there would be 4 dominate states that hold almost 40% of the US population. It would make states like Utah, where I live, meaningless in the election, where now it actually plays a part (and weirdly almost really played a part in this election since it wasn't a shoe in for Trump).

As I've said it's not a perfect system, but in a republic, which elects people to represent the population, you need to have a system in place that doesn't make it so the major population centers in 4 states control the outcome of every election.

All I see is it makes the Minority more important then the Majority, they know the swing states are more important and the big states generally vote one way or another so they ignore them completely.

Having the same effect but less democracy.

If every Vote counted, every vote would count. That alone is enough reason, the electoral collage makes the losing vote in each state completely useless and out of the equation.

 

[BobK]

Tyranny of the Majority

 

[Exorcet]

Tyranny of the Majority

Meddling with votes is a roundabout protection method. The direct method would be to remove the government's power to take away rights.

Who the president is shouldn't matter that much in the first place. The president shouldn't be able to influence individual citizens in any meaningful way. The role of the president should be limited to running the government.

 

[Sanji Himura]

All I see is it makes the Minority more important then the Majority, they know the swing states are more important and the big states generally vote one way or another so they ignore them completely.

Having the same effect but less democracy.

If every Vote counted, every vote would count. That alone is enough reason, the electoral collage makes the losing vote in each state completely useless and out of the equation.

Okay. I may be off point, but let me ask you this, if we had a direct popular vote, would you agree that there shouldn't be any oversight in regards to the election was done? In a way, that is what the Electoral College is for, to make sure that the election is fair and that every state has equal representation.

 

[mustafur]

Okay. I may be off point, but let me ask you this, if we had a direct popular vote, would you agree that there shouldn't be any oversight in regards to the election was done? In a way, that is what the Electoral College is for, to make sure that the election is fair and that every state has equal representation.

Sorry what do you mean by no oversight?

 

[Sanji Himura]

Sorry what do you mean by no oversight?

No way to make it fair to everyone.

 

[Joey D]

Why not? If that's where the people are then that's where the equal number of votes should be?

It's no longer a representative republic then. Right now with the electoral college each state essentially has it's own popular vote and then casts it's electoral votes based on the results. This ensures that every vote, from every state means something and not just votes from California, New York, Texas, and Florida. Given how this election was, there was a chance that Utah could have thrown a wrench into everything if they would have went with Evan McMullin. That means it's 6 electoral votes wouldn't have been cast to either Clinton or Trump and with how the election was going up until the day it happened, 6 could have been a game changer.

If you think that American politics has no effect elsewhere in the world then I'm afraid you're wrong.

Good thing I didn't say that then. I said the way we elect people has little impact on a global scale, who we elect is another story since their foreign policy does impact other countries.

I don't see why people can't be concerned about the fair treatment or representation of others in another country. I don't think a person's location factors in to the validity of their opinions on the US at all.

They can be concerned, but they should understand the system before questioning it. Most American's have a hard time understanding it and most of us have had some sort of civics education. I find it really hard to believe the most folks who live outside the US have a firm grasp on how and why we do things the way we do, same thing goes for most Americans not having a clue how things work in Europe or even Canada. If you don't live somewhere you only get bits and pieces of information and it typically comes from an extremely biased and less than factual media. Same thing goes for us here in the US. Take Brexit for example, the only thing we knew in the US was what the media portrayed and that was the vote was purely to get foreigners out of the UK and that it crashed our markets. I'm guessing that's only a small portion of what it was actually about.

Why does America care about countries that don't have democracy?

I don't have an answer for this, and I'm guessing most people outside of those who are high up in our government don't know either. But to be truthful, I'm not sure what you are trying to imply here.

All I see is it makes the Minority more important then the Majority, they know the swing states are more important and the big states generally vote one way or another so they ignore them completely.

Having the same effect but less democracy.

If every Vote counted, every vote would count. That alone is enough reason, the electoral collage makes the losing vote in each state completely useless and out of the equation.

Then you're not understanding the system if you think our government is making the minority more important than the majority. When you have representative government you need to represent all citizens, not just a majority of citizens.

And having less democracy isn't an issue, the US has never been a democracy and will probably never be one. We are a republic. In scaled down terms, democracies are were people decide on laws and polices directly, a republic is where elected officials decide those things. The Founding Fathers were actually afraid of democracy and @BobK already pointed it out with his link to the "Tyranny of the Majority".

Now if the US was a democracy and we had the electoral college, then I would agree that it needs to go since it would violate the principles of what a democracy stands for, but since we are a republic we have the electoral college until someone tries to rewrite the Constitution and reform our government.

 

[mustafur]

Then you're not understanding the system if you think our government is making the minority more important than the majority. When you have representative government you need to represent all citizens, not just a majority of citizens.

Well news flash you might want to look at the count of the General election, the minority was clearly over represented, by several million votes.

And having less democracy isn't an issue, the US has never been a democracy and will probably never be one. We are a republic. In scaled down terms, democracies are were people decide on laws and polices directly, a republic is where elected officials decide those things. The Founding Fathers were actually afraid of democracy and @BobK already pointed it out with his link to the "Tyranny of the Majority".

Then maybe you guys should look into Preferential voting because what is happening is exactly tyranny of the majority, when say a governor or Senate representive gets elected the losing votes (aka the minority) have zero value and merit and don't add to anything.

Now if the US was a democracy and we had the electoral college, then I would agree that it needs to go since it would violate the principles of what a democracy stands for, but since we are a republic we have the electoral college until someone tries to rewrite the Constitution and reform our government.

Look I get it you say this or that so this or that is why it needs to happen, I am simply disagreeing, and putting a hole into your tyranny of the majority thoery given it does the opposite effect in your current system especially when there is no preferential voting.

A Video that highlights what I'm saying:

 

[Biggles]

It's no longer a representative republic then. Right now with the electoral college each state essentially has it's own popular vote and then casts it's electoral votes based on the results. This ensures that every vote, from every state means something and not just votes from California, New York, Texas, and Florida. Given how this election was, there was a chance that Utah could have thrown a wrench into everything if they would have went with Evan McMullin. That means it's 6 electoral votes wouldn't have been cast to either Clinton or Trump and with how the election was going up until the day it happened, 6 could have been a game changer.

They can be concerned, but they should understand the system before questioning it. Most American's have a hard time understanding it and most of us have had some sort of civics education. I find it really hard to believe the most folks who live outside the US have a firm grasp on how and why we do things the way we do, same thing goes for most Americans not having a clue how things work in Europe or even Canada. If you don't live somewhere you only get bits and pieces of information and it typically comes from an extremely biased and less than factual media. Same thing goes for us here in the US. Take Brexit for example, the only thing we knew in the US was what the media portrayed and that was the vote was purely to get foreigners out of the UK and that it crashed our markets. I'm guessing that's only a small portion of what it was actually about.

Then you're not understanding the system if you think our government is making the minority more important than the majority. When you have representative government you need to represent all citizens, not just a majority of citizens.

And having less democracy isn't an issue, the US has never been a democracy and will probably never be one. We are a republic. In scaled down terms, democracies are were people decide on laws and polices directly, a republic is where elected officials decide those things. The Founding Fathers were actually afraid of democracy and @BobK already pointed it out with his link to the "Tyranny of the Majority".

Now if the US was a democracy and we had the electoral college, then I would agree that it needs to go since it would violate the principles of what a democracy stands for, but since we are a republic we have the electoral college until someone tries to rewrite the Constitution and reform our government.

Actually, many non-Americans are quite well-informed about American politics. On the other hand ... yes, most Americans don't have a clue about how things work in Europe or even Canada, For example: you should understand that hardly any "democracies" in the world have the "people decide on laws and policies directly". The vast majority are representative democracies.

Protection for the individual US states is already heavily ensured by the existence of the Senate. For example, the 28.4 million strong electorate of California has the right to elect 2 senators, a privilege shared by the Wyoming electorate of 584,153. In other words, it only takes 292,000 voters to elect a Senator in Wyoming, while in California it takes 14.2 million. This is already a powerful "undemocratic" element in the US political system designed to protect the less populous areas of the country.

The origins of the US electoral college, like a lot of other things in the US constitution, reflect the political reality at the time the US constitution was created. It was created by a wealthy, white, landowning elite & designed to ensure that its interests were protected. Part of the point of the electoral college was to assign electoral votes to states based on the population, but that population included a head count of people who actually had no right to vote. Specifically, negroes were to be considered 3/5ths of a person for the purposes of assigning electoral votes. This ensured that a slave state like Virginia (which was at the time the most populous state & included slaves as 40% of its population) would have political power far beyond that provided by its voting population.

In practice, the idea of the "tyranny of the majority" seems to be used more often as an excuse to guarantee the power of the elites rather than to protect the rights of vulnerable minorities.

 

[mustafur]

Actually, many non-Americans are quite well-informed about American politics. On the other hand ... yes, most Americans don't have a clue about how things work in Europe or even Canada, For example: you should understand that hardly any "democracies" in the world have the "people decide on laws and policies directly". The vast majority are representative democracies.

Protection for the individual US states is already heavily ensured by the existence of the Senate. For example, the 28.4 million strong electorate of California has the right to elect 2 senators, a privilege shared by the Wyoming electorate of 584,153. In other words, it only takes 292,000 voters to elect a Senator in Wyoming, while in California it takes 14.2 million. This is already a powerful "undemocratic" element in the US political system designed to protect the less populous areas of the country.

The origins of the US electoral college, like a lot of other things in the US constitution, reflect the political reality at the time the US constitution was created. It was created by a wealthy, white, landowning elite & designed to ensure that its interests were protected. Part of the point of the electoral college was to assign electoral votes to states based on the population, but that population included a head count of people who actually had no right to vote. Specifically, negroes were to be considered 3/5ths of a person for the purposes of assigning electoral votes. This ensured that a slave state like Virginia (which was at the time the most populous state & included slaves as 40% of its population) would have political power far beyond that provided by its voting population.

In practice, the idea of the "tyranny of the majority" seems to be used more often as an excuse to guarantee the power of the elites rather than to protect the rights of vulnerable minorities.

Need to add another 10 Million to California there though lol.

So yes, America has states that have the same Congressional Power as ones that it is less then 2% of the Population of, if that isn't over represented Minority I don't know what is.

 

[Sanji Himura]

I think that @Biggles forgets the original meaning of the Connecticut Compromise. Yes, every state has equal representation in the Senate, but when you look at the bigger picture and fold in the House as well, you will see that every state is not exactly equal here. California, going back to the two states that are mentioned in the post, can elect 53 representatives across 53 congressional districts, whereas Wyoming can elect one representative for the whole state. So in total, California has 55 representatives and senators whereas Wyoming only has 3.

 

[Johnnypenso]

Actually, many non-Americans are quite well-informed about American politics. On the other hand ... yes, most Americans don't have a clue about how things work in Europe or even Canada, For example: you should understand that hardly any "democracies" in the world have the "people decide on laws and policies directly". The vast majority are representative democracies.

Protection for the individual US states is already heavily ensured by the existence of the Senate. For example, the 28.4 million strong electorate of California has the right to elect 2 senators, a privilege shared by the Wyoming electorate of 584,153. In other words, it only takes 292,000 voters to elect a Senator in Wyoming, while in California it takes 14.2 million. This is already a powerful "undemocratic" element in the US political system designed to protect the less populous areas of the country.

The origins of the US electoral college, like a lot of other things in the US constitution, reflect the political reality at the time the US constitution was created. It was created by a wealthy, white, landowning elite & designed to ensure that its interests were protected. Part of the point of the electoral college was to assign electoral votes to states based on the population, but that population included a head count of people who actually had no right to vote. Specifically, negroes were to be considered 3/5ths of a person for the purposes of assigning electoral votes. This ensured that a slave state like Virginia (which was at the time the most populous state & included slaves as 40% of its population) would have political power far beyond that provided by its voting population.

In practice, the idea of the "tyranny of the majority" seems to be used more often as an excuse to guarantee the power of the elites rather than to protect the rights of vulnerable minorities.

The Connecticut Comprimise was an effort by the North to keep the voting power of the South reduced, not increased, by counting slaves as 3/5th of a person instead of a full person. The South of course wanted full representation of slaves to increase their power and influence even though only whites could vote. The North knew that if the slave population were given full voting rights, eventually the south would have a permanent majority influence in the House.

 

[Liquid]

Whatever you say about the popular vote and a federal first-past-the-post scenario requiring only the few most populous states to secure victory equally applies to the EC system.

Hypothetically, a candidate can carry just 10 states and win an election via the electoral college; California (55), Texas (38), Florida (29), New York (29), Illinois (20), Pennsylvania (20), Ohio (18), Georgia (16), Michigan (16), North Carolina (15) and New Jersey (14) for an exact total of 270.

Doesn't that make the other 40 states and DC irrelevant?

Well, it depends. What it does show is that whatever your thoughts, it's not as simple as a straight Popular Vote vs Electoral College shootout.

 

[ryzno]

So was Jill able to file for a re-count, or was this just a big money grab opportunity as I predicted?

 

[Biggles]

Need to add another 10 Million to California there though lol.

The figures I gave are for for the electorate rather than the total population.

I think that @Biggles forgets the original meaning of the Connecticut Compromise. Yes, every state has equal representation in the Senate, but when you look at the bigger picture and fold in the House as well, you will see that every state is not exactly equal here. California, going back to the two states that are mentioned in the post, can elect 53 representatives across 53 congressional districts, whereas Wyoming can elect one representative for the whole state. So in total, California has 55 representatives and senators whereas Wyoming only has 3.

Obviously, I'm not "forgetting" anything. Quite clearly: the allocation of the Senate seats was intended to provide (undemocratic) protection to the rights of the individual states, while the House gave (according to the standards of the time) democratic representation to all citizens. The electoral college was a further extension of unequal representation, based on political expediency rather than logic or the dictates of democratic principles.

The Connecticut Comprimise was an effort by the North to keep the voting power of the South reduced, not increased, by counting slaves as 3/5th of a person instead of a full person. The South of course wanted full representation of slaves to increase their power and influence even though only whites could vote. The North knew that if the slave population were given full voting rights, eventually the south would have a permanent majority influence in the House.

LOL. It's nice that the "special interest" of slave owners continues to have a present-day champion in JohnnyP. The elites of the slave states wanted to have their cake & eat it: deny basic human rights (let alone democratic rights) to their slaves while wielding national political power based on the existence of those slaves. And ... a primary goal of that power was to ensure that their right to own slaves continued in perpetuity. Nice "compromise" if you can swing it.

 

[Johnnypenso]

LOL. It's nice that the "special interest" of slave owners continues to have a present-day champion in JohnnyP. The elites of the slave states wanted to have their cake & eat it: deny basic human rights (let alone democratic rights) to their slaves while wielding national political power based on the existence of those slaves. And ... a primary goal of that power was to ensure that their right to own slaves continued in perpetuity. Nice "compromise" if you can swing it.

So I'm an advocate for slave states because part of the the comprimise was intended to attempt to mitigate the power of slave states not increase it? Not only is that illogical it's incredibly insulting.