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Gilphon (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#154901: Nov 14th 2016 at 12:11:14 AM

It's hard to make voters enthusiastic about something that doesn't affect their lives in any way, yeah. Probably the stink being raised about it now will have died down to basically nothing in 2020.

KarkatTheDalek Not as angry as the name would suggest. from Somwhere in Time/Space Since: Mar, 2012 Relationship Status: You're a beautiful woman, probably
Not as angry as the name would suggest.
#154902: Nov 14th 2016 at 12:13:01 AM

I don't know - we live in a different world than we did in say, 2000. It might be easier to create a mass movement advocating for its removal today...

Oh God! Natural light!
Irene (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Crazy Cat Lady
#154903: Nov 14th 2016 at 12:16:02 AM

While I do believe some wouldn't care about the Electoral vote if Hillary won(or at least wouldn't have made a noted complaint), it would be just as easy to point out how bullshit it is by design, regardless of who won.

I agree with getting rid of it because it makes many votes worthless around the US. It discourages votes by design. If Trump would've won the popularity vote, it'd be annoying due to what he stands for, but it'd be a respectable and proper vote count instead. It's hard to respect the voting system which it's not a proper democratic one. And this isn't just because I'm a Democrat, it's because of the point of a voting system. That the one that gets the most votes win. Plain and simple. I don't like how worthless it feels.

That said, I'm not sure how trying to play the blame game amounts to anything at this point. You're probably right, some wouldn't care, but this overall event brought to attention the problem with the electoral voting system, so... I guess one good thing came out of this election? Sucks how we figured out this problem, though. :/

Shadow?
M84 Oh, bother. from Our little blue planet Since: Jun, 2010 Relationship Status: Chocolate!
Oh, bother.
#154904: Nov 14th 2016 at 12:24:55 AM

[up] Trump not winning the popular vote is the only reason I'm not seriously considering leaving the U.S.A. for another country. I take comfort in the fact that, ultimately, more voters were against him or for her or both.

edited 14th Nov '16 12:25:13 AM by M84

Disgusted, but not surprised
Irene (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Crazy Cat Lady
#154905: Nov 14th 2016 at 12:37:08 AM

Funny thing is, there's a lot of mixed messages on what the final popularity vote was. Could somebody link a proper source of the final vote, please?

Shadow?
Gilphon (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#154906: Nov 14th 2016 at 12:39:13 AM

I don't think the actual final vote is in yet. Still a fair number of votes that haven't been counted.

AceofSpades Since: Apr, 2009 Relationship Status: Showing feelings of an almost human nature
#154907: Nov 14th 2016 at 12:54:34 AM

Well, I googled it and according to this article they're still counting like a million votes out in California. There's a reason it's got fifty five electoral votes. And they may still be counting Michigan, but I couldn't find anything else newer than three days ago.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-elections/us-election-hillary-clinton-more-votes-popular-vote-any-candidate-barack-obama-donald-trump-a7413596.html

Irene (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Crazy Cat Lady
#154908: Nov 14th 2016 at 1:04:16 AM

I was sure it wasn't finished yet.

So we cannot even say Hillary did win the popularity vote. We're just hoping for it.

Anyway, regardless, down with the electoral votes~

Shadow?
AceofSpades Since: Apr, 2009 Relationship Status: Showing feelings of an almost human nature
#154909: Nov 14th 2016 at 1:05:37 AM

Well, considering that most of them are from the solidly blue California and the reports are that popular vote is increasing in her favor, it seems a pretty dang reasonable guess.

Irene (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Crazy Cat Lady
#154910: Nov 14th 2016 at 1:11:58 AM

Point was we don't know for sure.

I agree she's most likely to win, but the final numbers should be interesting in itself.

That said, I do have one question about the popularity vote; Does it include the electoral vote numbers, or are they entirely separate?

Shadow?
Lanceleoghauni Cyborg Helmsman from Z or R Twice Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: In my bunk
#154911: Nov 14th 2016 at 1:18:45 AM

So how about that whole "Trump appointing a White Supremacist" thing.

"Coffee! Coffeecoffeecoffee! Coffee! Not as strong as Meth-amphetamine, but it lets you keep your teeth!"
SonOfSharknado Love is Love is Love Since: Oct, 2013 Relationship Status: And they all lived happily ever after <3
Love is Love is Love
#154912: Nov 14th 2016 at 1:25:56 AM

What do you mean a? :P

My various fanfics.
RedSavant Since: Jan, 2001
#154913: Nov 14th 2016 at 1:41:14 AM

Yeah, but specifically Reince Priebus or however the hell you spell his silly name.

It's been fun.
Vampireandthen In love with an Uptown Girl from Northern Ireland Since: Apr, 2016 Relationship Status: A teenager in love
In love with an Uptown Girl
#154914: Nov 14th 2016 at 1:44:17 AM

Bring back George Washington. wild mass guess

Please allow me to introduce myself, I am a man of wealth and taste. Nice to meet you, hope you can guess my name.
TheAirman Brightness from The vicinity of an area adjacent to a location Since: Feb, 2011 Relationship Status: Historians will say we were good friends.
Brightness
#154915: Nov 14th 2016 at 1:46:43 AM

@Irene: The popular vote is Exactly What It Says on the Tin: it is a count of every single vote cast by the eligible population - a popularity contest. The Electoral College is a seperate vote and hasn't actually happened yet, though it is essentially predetermined.

edited 14th Nov '16 1:50:53 AM by TheAirman

PSN ID: FateSeraph | Switch friendcode: SW-0145-8835-0610 Congratulations! She/They
Swanpride Since: Jun, 2013
#154916: Nov 14th 2016 at 2:01:33 AM

I freely admit, I really don't get how the election system in the US works...it seems to be overly simplified and complicated at the same time.

One thing for sure, the circus around the election is just idiotic. I am more used to the German system, which allows only one advertising spot per party, and ensures that there is only a very short time-frame for the actual campaign. Not this one year nonsense which only costs money.

Lanceleoghauni Cyborg Helmsman from Z or R Twice Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: In my bunk
#154917: Nov 14th 2016 at 3:01:04 AM

Basically, the way the electoral college works, a vote in ohio is worth ~4x as much as a vote made by a new yorker.

"Coffee! Coffeecoffeecoffee! Coffee! Not as strong as Meth-amphetamine, but it lets you keep your teeth!"
Krieger22 Causing freakouts over sourcing since 2018 from Malaysia Since: Mar, 2014 Relationship Status: I'm in love with my car
Causing freakouts over sourcing since 2018
#154918: Nov 14th 2016 at 3:44:23 AM

Steve Bannon, you mean?

Well, he's not really capable of being described as the alt-right's representative in Trump's government - the alt-right eats out of his hand.

Granted, Breitbart's impartiality issues are already sufficiently massive (mostly in relation to reality) that having their ex-editor work for Trump can't possibly make their news less credible.*

*Unless you're into Disdain For Plebs or other Facebook meme pages.

I have disagreed with her a lot, but comparing her to republicans and propagandists of dictatorships is really low. - An idiot
BestOf FABRICATI DIEM, PVNC! from Finland Since: Oct, 2010 Relationship Status: Falling within your bell curve
FABRICATI DIEM, PVNC!
#154919: Nov 14th 2016 at 4:25:15 AM

I freely admit, I really don't get how the election system in the US works...it seems to be overly simplified and complicated at the same time.

Presidential elections in the US work like this:

Each state is assigned a number of Electoral College seats based on its population. The largest is California, with 55 Electoral College votes. The total is 538, so with 270 you've got a majority of the votes. That's what you need to be elected President. If two candidates get 269 votes each, the House of Representatives pics the President, while the Senate picks the Vice President.

Almost all states have decided that whoever gets most votes in that state gets all of their Electoral College votes. There are two exceptions: Maine and Nebraska. Both of them have decided that they'll give 2 Electoral College votes to whoever wins the popular vote in that state, and 1 vote each for every one of their Congressional districts. Maine has 2 and Nebraska has 3 districts, so in each of them you can have both candidates winning some electoral votes by winning one or more regions even if they still lose the popular vote in the state. (Incidentally, the phrase is popular vote, not "popularity vote".)

Most states lean very heavily towards one of the two major parties. Usually, the vote in these states is so predictable that the major parties don't even want to spend a lot of effort activating their base or getting new voters during the campaign. Both sides simply expect the state to go the way it usually does, which practically disenfranchises people in those states (especially if they don't support the more popular party there).

States that don't tend to always vote the same way are called Swing States and they're the ones where the election really happens. The candidates will focus most of their campaign resources and time on those states. The most important swing states, because of their large population (and thus electoral vote count), are Florida and Ohio.

The Presidential candidates for all parties (though I suppose it would be enough to only ever speak of the two big ones) are picked in the primaries. Each party arranges a primary election campaign, with the candidates going from state to state to try to get that party's voters in that state to support them. The primary election's rules, in terms of the allocation of representatives in the party convention to vote for the Presidential candidate, vary by state and by party. Usually only members of that party (or voters registered with it) are allowed to vote in the primaries.

The inevitable consequence of this is that the candidates must try to appeal very strongly to that party's voters from the pool that are interested enough to go to the convention. That drives the candidates away from the centre during the primary season, and the one that is picked as candidate will then have to try to pivot back to the centre before the Presidential election really gets going.

From a Finnish point of view this system looks very poorly designed, as does the First-Past-The-Post system that the US (and UK and several other countries) use for other elections. FPTP means that each district chooses one representative. If you get 49% of the vote you get nothing. In practice, this system encourages parties that are rather centrist and try to appeal to a very broad range of political views (even if they're in conflict), and exclude the minority fringes if they don't happen to be sufficiently close to that party's centre. It also leads to almost all voters always opting for the "least bad" option.

FPTP systems discourage voting for third parties and bring down the share of eligible voters who bother to turn up at all. US Presidential elections tend to hover somewhere around 45-55% of eligible voters participating in the election. For comparison, in Finland we're very worried that turnout in Parliamentary elections is barely reaching 70%.

In most Western countries the electoral districts are larger than just one representative, and the system is usually designed to favour smaller parties (at least to get one or two representatives through). The consequence is that a party with 5% support will get at least some representation, while a party with about 30% support will be one of the largest. There will usually be about 3 or 4 big parties that get to be the central power of a government coalition (the largest party usually getting the seat of Prime Minister), and they'll make compromises with smaller parties to get them to join the government coalition and share responsibility and power.

The ideal outcome is a government with a strong mandate (with the parties, combined, having well over 50% of the seats in Parliament) and sufficiently aligned political positions between the parties that they can get decisions done. They'll also be sufficiently diverse that each party's most outlandish positions will be vetoed by the other parties.

Of course, these systems with proportional representation do have problems. You can get governments that are not very united, which might necessitate new elections more frequently; or you might get a government that barely stays together and doesn't get a lot of legislation passed. Then again, in the US system you also get terms of Congress were next to nothing gets passed, especially if the President is from the other party.

I definitely favour a proportional representation system over a FPTP one. To me it's not fair that 45% of voters in a state can vote for a candidate and not end up helping that candidate at all. (You might get millions and millions of votes in a big state and get 0 electoral college votes for it, while a couple of million in a smaller state will get you electoral college votes.) To me it doesn't make sense that you've got below 60% turnout and celebrate your elections as successful. I am much happier in a system where a party that gets 15% of the vote will get at least close to 15% of seats in Parliament.

In case you're curious about how a President gets elected in a proportional representation system, I'm going to use Finland as an example because I think it's representative. In our system the Presidential election has two rounds. In the first round, each party gets to have its own candidate, and you get a campaign and debates and so on. Sometimes a party will opt not to have a candidate of their own, and support another party's candidate instead, but that's not common.

After the first round, the two candidates that got the most votes will enter the second round. (If someone got more than 50% in the first round the second round is skipped entirely, but that's almost impossible.) In the second round, you have a brief campaign just between the two remaining candidates, and you get another vote, and then it's just simple majority. The one who gets more votes wins.

Of course, in this case the President will probably have had something like 20-30% support in the first round, and it would be very weird to give a lot of power to someone like that. That's why the President, in our system, does not have the most power; that distinction if with the Prime Minister, who leads the government coalition.

The speaker of Parliament also has a lot of power, but ultimately the parties in Parliament tend to vote in blocs, with the parties in government usually supporting whatever the government does. (If a party does split from the government's line in a given issue, that legislation might not pass Parliament. Then again, the government will have hope that at least one of the opposition parties will happen to support that policy, even if it's from the government and they're in opposition. It does happen.)

edited 14th Nov '16 4:32:36 AM by BestOf

Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur.
IFwanderer use political terms to describe, not insult from Earth Since: Aug, 2013 Relationship Status: Wishfully thinking
use political terms to describe, not insult
#154920: Nov 14th 2016 at 4:34:03 AM

[up][up]I googled that page. I need some Brain Bleach now.

[up]We have something similar in Argentina.

1 2 We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be. -KV
MarqFJA The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer from Deserts of the Middle East (Before Recorded History) Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
#154921: Nov 14th 2016 at 5:20:44 AM

[up][up] [awesome][tup]

Yeah, one wonders what the hell at least some of the Founding Fathers were thinking when they designed those parts of the political system. Did they really distrust the common citizenry that much?

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
LeGarcon Blowout soon fellow Stalker from Skadovsk Since: Aug, 2013 Relationship Status: Gay for Big Boss
Blowout soon fellow Stalker
#154922: Nov 14th 2016 at 5:23:47 AM

Yeah. Trump is a perfect example of why. It's also why the Democratic party has superdelegtes in it's primaries.

Oh really when?
SilentColossus (Don’t ask)
#154923: Nov 14th 2016 at 5:24:57 AM

[up][up]

You weren't even allowed to vote if you were not a property owner. They really did not trust or respect common people.

edited 14th Nov '16 5:25:33 AM by SilentColossus

MarqFJA The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer from Deserts of the Middle East (Before Recorded History) Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
#154924: Nov 14th 2016 at 5:29:51 AM

[up][up] Actually, I think that one major reason behind Trump's rise is the whole "appeal to far-from-center groups" thing that was mentioned in that explanation. The GOP had been essentially hijacked by the Tea Party after Obama became president, all because appealing to them was an easy way to win the primaries, not caring or realizing that doing so would eventually make the GOP increasingly dependent on pandering to such far-right extremists lest they lose their edge on the Democrats.

So no, Trump seems to me as an example of what's wrong with the Founding Fathers' design, not what it was trying to guard against (though technically it's not mutually exclusive; it could be a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy thing, that they tried to prevent it but didn't realize they were instead causing it).

edited 14th Nov '16 5:32:37 AM by MarqFJA

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
Zendervai Since: Oct, 2009
#154925: Nov 14th 2016 at 5:35:26 AM

At least some of the founding fathers really did think people were too stupid to vote properly. Like, someone would come along and say "Vote for me, and I will be your king for life!" And people would actually vote for that. (Which has actually happened, in some places, so I don't think they were entirely wrong.)

Nowadays, that is somewhat difficult to achieve, if only because of the 8 year limit.


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