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Donald Trump's win in 2016 was a landslide only in the fevered minds of Donald Trump and his followers.
In terms of the Electoral College, Trump won 56.88% of the vote. That ranks 46th out of the total of 58 Presidential elections. A little over 79% of Presidential Elections have resulted in bigger wins than Trump in 2016. Here’s the list of the 12 elections where the winner received a smaller percentage of the Electoral College than Trump received in 2016: Kennedy (1960), Taylor (1848), Nixon (1968), Carter (1976), Cleveland (1884), George W. Bush (2004), Jefferson (2000), Wilson (1916), John Adams (1796), George W. Bush (2000), Hayes (1876) and John Quincy Adams (1824).
Yes, but the thing is, your opinion is probably only recently formed and clearly has bias. Abolishing the electoral college is something that a super-majority of Americans, regardless of party affiliation, were in favor of from 1948-2011, according to polls by Gallup.
We should soul search on all of our beliefs. Those currently in support of the EC should ask themselves a couple of questions:
1) Was I against the EC prior to 2016 or 2000? Did I even haven an opinion on it at all?
2) Would I feel the same way if those elections had gone to my party's opponent instead of my candidate?
And let's stop with the "we're a republic, not a democracy" line. As a nation, we've been trending more democratic since before the ink dried on the Constitution.
I am not sure that, if one understands the electoral college now or in the past they would really think changing it would be better for our country and I really care what these polls show. As so many have pointed out over time,how many of us have ever really been polled and by who? Polls, like studies are set to prove the point the group doing the poll wants to get, even if it is gallop.
I am not sure that, if one understands the electoral college now or in the past they would really think changing it would be better for our country and I really care what these polls show. As so many have pointed out over time,how many of us have ever really been polled and by who? Polls, like studies are set to prove the point the group doing the poll wants to get, even if it is gallop.
I know it's popular after the last election to just dismiss any poll out of hand. I mean, if you want to dismiss 8 decades of data just because "you didn't happen to get polled," then I guess there's nothing more to say. Gallup does tons of polls; not sure they were out there cherry-picking data for the EC.
Can you really say you had a strong feeling about the EC one way or the other in 1999?
Are there any other countries where the person who finishes 2nd in an election is the winner? Just asking.
Trump didn't finish second in the election. He won 304 electoral votes and crushed Hillary's Electoral College "Blue Wall" that all of you bragged about until it came tumbling down. The days that you all talked about "the path to 270" that Trump didn't have are long long gone.
So now you guys bleat about Russians and the EV. We know what you are like.
Trump didn't finish second in the election. He won 304 electoral votes and crushed Hillary's Electoral College "Blue Wall" that all of you bragged about until it came tumbling down. The days that you all talked about "the path to 270" that Trump didn't have are long long gone.
So now you guys bleat about Russians and the EV. We know what you are like.
America’s Founders created the Electoral College to prevent the Executive branch from becoming polarized by partisan politics. They despised the Parliamentary system of democracy in England, where the majority party filled the ministerial posts, from Prime minister on down, and who executed the laws enacted with bias for their own party.
Since it would be highly unlikely for the voters to be able to meet and examine all candidates for office, the solution was for the local electorate to choose one from among them whose judgment they trusted, to be an Elector in the Electoral College, investigate and examine the candidates, then cast two votes, limited to no more than one from their home state.
The genius of the original E.C. was that the candidate with the most votes would be president, but the next most votes would likely be his rival and his ‘vice’ (pun intended). Thus the V.P. could be the counterbalance to any partisanship or bias in the execution of the laws enacted by Congress, as well as the appointment to executive positions. Sadly, it worked too well and George Washington disliked his V.P., the fiery John Adams (twice elected V.P.!), and sought the amendment that made the E.C. vote for a team.
Unfortunately, once the executive was a team, there was nothing to prevent partisanship. Now, the political parties had a ripe plum - executive appointments - to pay off supporters.
It went downhill, after that.
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