I don't believe the bolded and don't want to discuss this issue if you are arguing in bad faith, so never mind.

How much value do we give to the popular vote when so many people in deep red and deep blue states probably didn't show up to vote because they knew it wouldn't make a difference to the outcome?

Essentially none. If candidates go into it knowing vote is purely popular, it's a totally different election. This popular vote argument is just sour grapes.

Wrong i think regarding the not going to vote thing (although i see your point towards those that are totally careless) because there are tons of local issues voted each time and local representative etc so you still want to pass the positions you have for your community and also add the president choice as well.

So only those that dont really care about their local communities and representatives will use that argument eg in California to not bother to show up. And of course the same argument holds in red states for democrats so it evens out.


It is absolutely no sour grapes at all. Trump himself had said so in 2012 remember?


No bad faith. I went back and checked all presidents after ww2 to make my argument before i did because the current system hasnt failed the popular vote in modern history and Gore Bush was the first time. Its not important as much what happened in 1800s because it was a different world. There was so much lack of proper information and so fewer people and lack of voting of so many (over 60%of the population say) that the system was already in worse trouble as selecting from a sub-population class of people really (for that problem to be seen as so terrible as it has to be seen today with our greater standards).

Yeah, I was thinking about that, but lots of people don't follow local politics and only vote every four years. Just look at the 2014 mid-terms, where 37% of eligible voters voted. Compare that to 57% this year. That's over 40 million who only came out to vote for president.

But that argument works also for those that want to vote for the one that typically wins and say ok lets not bother they will win anyway. So they dont go to vote. I mean it affects both sides in terms of the why bother argument. I am not disputing there is a reduction when its not about presidency. But it will be less of reduction if it is also voting for presidency by the way because of the whole fanfare about it. You still want to say hey California lost it but we gave him a 45% say (more like 33% now but to see my point of why not try to give him as much as possible to make a statement the state is turning say).

Plus i am ok with it from an ethical point of view because ideally i want people that care for voting in all aspects of voting to be deciding the president also. Its like a decent natural weighting towards those that care enough.

Of course even if it weren't such it's still a similar effect in all states that are not close and a similar don't care effect on the winner and loser side.

We are not talking here some small numbers either.

By the time it is over she will be ahead by close to 1.5mil if i estimated properly or 1.3%.

That is not unimportant. It definitely deprives the other side from claiming they have any mandate for extreme measures and should force them to create a united parties administration (even if a minority of course) actually if they were interested in uniting the country. .

You realize that Trump is not president if 100k people had voted differently in 2-3 states total? There is something profoundly pathological to have 100k decide and 1.5 mil to be irrelevant. My point being where he won in the critical states he didnt win by huge numbers. They were still divided states basically that now appear as solid red in the map.

A few days ago after salmon fishing, I was resting in my bed playing with my toes and I was thinking about why Trump won. It came into my head that the main reason was Obama. More or less along the lines outlined by OriPos. That we both came to the same conclusion is worrisome enough. As to the particulars of the whys and how's this came about, that will be debated by the pundit crowd for a long time. A mostly humorless exercise in political masturbation that I will refrain from. Others may indulge as the spirit drives them or their political erections dictate.

Yeah Clinton may very well have still won more of the popular vote if that's what mattered, even more than now, but my point is we can't know because that's not how the election is scored. It may still have gone for Trump. Either way neither would have a mandate, whatever that means. This country is split.

**** NATO.
https://www.google.ie/webhp?sourceid...p+nato&tbm=nws

Stick to your guns Trump.

General strike. Why not? Assuming the violence continues and remains denied it's an option to have on the table. Safety in the streets teaching each other nonviolence beats being isolatable and counting on unreliable methods like violence.

Validated concerns is like the phrase of the evening. Breathing exercises anyone?

Trump is a bad joke.

Can imagine his staff telling him: "Maybe we can't do that Mister President". In the end everything he says is taken as a joke. And he will probably agree, because he doesn't know a ****.

Would be fun to watch if nothing else.

What is an eternity?

I already gave my conditions for supporting Trump. Only it this proved an ocean's 16 con job on deplorables to get rid of the other tool republican candidates and Clinton in one move and then prove he is just a middle place deal maker/uniter guy for both parties to bring people together by cutting the excessive bs that both sides have (but that republicans have more of).

I dont mind if Trump proves a bit conservative on everything and more pro responsibility but i will mind if he selects morons and serious bigots for various positions and starts the xenophobic crap, the war on middle class and poor people to benefit the standard 1% again and various stupid on taxes and education and science choices and on top of that gets in trouble worldwide with bs angry emotional unintelligent moves.

He needs to get smart on immigration and protect responsibly all the decent people that are already here with families, jobs, lives of some content etc and are not criminals. Laws must be protected and respected but they need to be smart and ethical and productive laws not moronic laws that do not connect well with reality. If an immigrant legal or not exactly or whatever that is not a criminal can prove they can help the country in some simple or important manner they must be able to stay without having to go over torturing stupid processes for many many years. He needs in particular to make it very easy for top talent and well educated people from all over the world to become citizens.

He needs to protect environment and go vertical pro technology as much as possible anywhere and appoint centrists to supreme court, maintain or improve not kill Obama care and offer incentives for internal companies to invest in US again and to go crazy on all kinds of infrastructure build up and responsible energy policy.

He needs to continue and improve on the best parts of Obama's work and there are a lot he can objective recognize as such. The country was in ruins in 2008.

If he simply proves exactly what deplorables thought he was, he will be soon hated by 70% of people , he will go down the drain like Bush did and the economy will suffer a new massive recession.

People can unite in grassroots style efforts and oppose with the mother of all strikes and civil protests and blocking of as much of the economy airports, ports, roads, not pay taxes, whatever imaginable, as much havoc without violence as possible, every time he tries to pass some extreme legislation that he doesnt have any mandate to do given the fact he lost the popular vote by 2 mil when the count is finished.

He needs to add a few clean record liberals to his administration too and prove he is serious about uniting the country given the result that got him elected with less votes and only a few lucky wins in critical states by 100k people or less.


Trump needs to ask himself does he want to be Bush part 2 "the total collapse finally in place" or the most creative hijacker of US politics that stopped the division and united the country the smart responsible deal making way forward.

He can turn to be a great president if all his methods were just a very intelligent ploy. Only then! Fat chance of that but whatever. It is not too late as soon as Jan 20 comes to show his true colors are very different than the approach he took to get "elected". The problem is that more likely than not the approach is who he is and not a ploy. Either Trump wants to come out as some 170-180 IQ guy that got lucky to write history or not!

My voting precinct had somewhere around 95% turnout out of almost 500 eligible voters. I like seeing so much participation, wish it was contagious.

That would be a good start, but voting smartly is also important.

The 95% looks almost North Korea though

Or a place near where voting rights were cultivated and fulfilled with blood, sweat, and tears on a bridge, or as Trump would say, the inner city.

When you vote in the US, you have two votes.

Counting votes has become a joke already. http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2016-election/president

1 week later and California still at 70%. The difference now is 1 mil vs 2 mil possible final one. Gore-Bush was 500k. This is indeed monumental insult to this stupid system to be at 1 mil and only halfway there yet. In your face idiots (those that think this system this modern era is wise or works as it was intended to do anyway). As if electorates have any testicles anyway ever.

Of course it doesn't help the bs "need for peace" the system requires to have a 2mil fast result the first 5 days to keep people in the streets super motivated that the ethically true winner is Hillary with a massive 2 mil more votes when only 100k decided in critical points. What mandate? None, none, none! Only a mandate for coming together exists at this point either as one people (if he had what it takes and he doesnt) or as divided social revolt when needed against the deplorables and their enablers. So we kept for a week things sub 1 mil with the asterisk "if things hold" hahaha whatever, to preserve peace in the world lol and make friends with Obama and try to claim there is such a thing as political capital lol.

What a joke the republic is indeed gentlemen. It is a banana system like the others in the rest of the world have become as well. How great it is to "belong" to no country (myself now - only the planet really as we all should) and hate both "elected" governments in the 2 systems you have split living your life. What a joy! And to have lived to see the one of the two in recent past you liked to be also opposed for 6/8 years anyway by the mother of all stalling parties. I give it all to you to enjoy but i know you wont. None for me. Thanks. Hence i "live" in my scientific society future and give a finger to this world before it does it to itself as it will for sure do one day.

Your view is like saying that it isn't fair to decide the winner of a baseball game on the basis of runs if the losing team got the most hits.

Not at all!!! Because in baseball it's part of the game to save yourself from a tough situation that didn't materialize after all. It is precisely in the heart of the game to save the thing from the brink by not allowing the last step to happen.

Now for our problem here.

Take this result for example;

I bet nobody in the main f*cking media ever did this calculation to tell it to people to understand that in fact Clinton won everything;

What calculation?

Keep the stupid electorate system as it is with the stupid bias towards rural areas being over represented. Fine with me. But award the electorates in each state according to the % each got and not a winner take all bs.

You then get this result ;

Clinton 257 > Trump 253.

This is by the way not according to population totals. This is according to state by state awarding the electorates according to the % they got in that state only using the current electorates per state. I do that to disprove the bs impression that America is mostly red right now. It isnt. Trump lost in all counts that make sense to people with elementary dignity and understanding of what is fair and closer to the real will of people even under current system.

The US population did the right thing. They didnt vote him for president as their first choice. The bs system did. The people didn't. He has no mandate whatsoever.


If you ignore the other 2 parties that take a fraction eventually of the electorates and award the electorates in each state only among the top 2 you get Clinton 271 > Trump 267 instead. This is how it should have been done by the way if we insist in a 2 party system allocation of the electorates.

Here it is as the results stand right now;

Alabama 9 99% 34.60% 62.90% 3.114 5.661 3.193846154 5.806153846
Alaska 3 76% 37.70% 52.90% 1.131 1.587 1.248344371 1.751655629
Arizona 11 80% 45.40% 49.50% 4.994 5.445 5.262381454 5.737618546
Arkansas 6 99% 33.80% 60.40% 2.028 3.624 2.152866242 3.847133758
California 55 70% 61.50% 33% 33.825 18.15 35.79365079 19.20634921
Colorado 9 92% 47.30% 44.40% 4.257 3.996 4.642311887 4.357688113
Connecticut 7 94% 54.50% 41.20% 3.815 2.884 3.986415883 3.013584117
Delaware 3 99% 53.40% 41.90% 1.602 1.257 1.681007345 1.318992655
District of Columbia 3 81% 92.80% 4.10% 2.784 0.123 2.873065015 0.126934985
Florida 29 99% 47.80% 49.10% 13.862 14.239 14.30546956 14.69453044
Georgia 16 93% 45.60% 51.30% 7.296 8.208 7.529411765 8.470588235
Hawaii 4 95% 62.20% 30% 2.488 1.2 2.698481562 1.301518438
Idaho 4 99% 27.60% 59.20% 1.104 2.368 1.271889401 2.728110599
Illinois 20 97% 55.40% 39.40% 11.08 7.88 11.68776371 8.312236287
Indiana 11 97% 37.90% 57.20% 4.169 6.292 4.383806519 6.616193481
Iowa 6 99% 42.20% 51.80% 2.532 3.108 2.693617021 3.306382979
Kansas 6 96% 36.20% 57.20% 2.172 3.432 2.325481799 3.674518201
Kentucky 8 99% 32.70% 62.50% 2.616 5 2.74789916 5.25210084
Louisiana 8 99% 38.40% 58.10% 3.072 4.648 3.183419689 4.816580311
Maine 4 98% 47.90% 45.20% 1.916 1.808 2.058002148 1.941997852
Maryland 10 87% 60.50% 35.30% 6.05 3.53 6.315240084 3.684759916
Massachusetts 11 99% 60.80% 33.50% 6.688 3.685 7.092258749 3.907741251
Michigan 16 96% 47.30% 47.60% 7.568 7.616 7.974710221 8.025289779
Minnesota 10 99% 46.90% 45.40% 4.69 4.54 5.081256771 4.918743229
Mississippi 6 95% 39.70% 58.30% 2.382 3.498 2.430612245 3.569387755
Missouri 10 94% 38% 57.10% 3.8 5.71 3.995793901 6.004206099
Montana 3 96% 36% 56.50% 1.08 1.695 1.167567568 1.832432432
Nebraska 5 97% 34% 60.30% 1.7 3.015 1.802757158 3.197242842
Nevada 6 98% 47.90% 45.50% 2.874 2.73 3.077087794 2.922912206
New Hampshire 4 98% 47.60% 47.20% 1.904 1.888 2.008438819 1.991561181
New Jersey 14 93% 55% 41.80% 7.7 5.852 7.954545455 6.045454545
New Mexico 5 95% 48.30% 40% 2.415 2 2.734994337 2.265005663
New York 29 95% 58.80% 37.50% 17.052 10.875 17.70716511 11.29283489
North Carolina 15 98% 46.70% 50.50% 7.005 7.575 7.206790123 7.793209877
North Dakota 3 99% 27.80% 64.10% 0.834 1.923 0.907508161 2.092491839
Ohio 18 94% 43.50% 52.10% 7.83 9.378 8.190376569 9.809623431
Oklahoma 7 99% 28.90% 65.30% 2.023 4.571 2.147558386 4.852441614
Oregon 7 87% 51.70% 41.10% 3.619 2.877 3.899784483 3.100215517
Pennsylvania 20 99% 47.60% 48.80% 9.52 9.76 9.875518672 10.12448133
Rhode Island 4 96% 55.40% 39.80% 2.216 1.592 2.327731092 1.672268908
South Carolina 9 95% 40.80% 54.90% 3.672 4.941 3.836990596 5.163009404
South Dakota 3 99% 31.70% 61.50% 0.951 1.845 1.020386266 1.979613734
Tennessee 11 99% 34.90% 61.10% 3.839 6.721 3.998958333 7.001041667
Texas 38 99% 43.40% 52.60% 16.492 19.988 17.17916667 20.82083333
Utah 6 91% 27.80% 45.90% 1.668 2.754 2.263229308 3.736770692
Vermont 3 93% 61.10% 32.60% 1.833 0.978 1.95624333 1.04375667
Virginia 13 96% 49.90% 45% 6.487 5.85 6.835616438 6.164383562
Washington 12 94% 54.40% 38.20% 6.528 4.584 7.049676026 4.950323974
West Virginia 5 96% 26.50% 68.70% 1.325 3.435 1.391806723 3.608193277
Wisconsin 10 95% 46.90% 47.90% 4.69 4.79 4.947257384 5.052742616
Wyoming 3 99% 22.50% 70.10% 0.675 2.103 0.728941685 2.271058315

256.967(Clinton) 253.209 (Trump) (method 1) 270.8250999 (Clinton) 267.1749001 (Trump) (method 2)


Isn't the predominantly most important ethical thing in an election to elect the person the people wanted (locally or globally whatever way both lead to Clinton ) and in an electorate system to do the same thing provided the electorates approve it to avoid extremist situations of manipulation of the public by horrible characters? Here you can have both the true will of people and still electorates deciding it. But they decide it from a much better representation system of the true local will of the people in every state.


Any winner in this current system that doesn't prove also the winner in the above calculation is not the legitimate winner and they need to either resign the position or invite members of the other party to form a united government and then proceed to change the system for the next time. It must matter how proper the final result is to all that participate in it. There is nothing more proper/natural than awarding the electorates per state according to the true percentages there. One shouldn't be a president by the accidental weakness of a system. The majority of people given the above facts will refuse to accept the legitimacy of such winner even if they will yield to the current wrong rules. Faced with such violation of common sense they must instantly want the rules changed because this is how we arrive at better systems. This is how we improve as civilization by acting on the wrong things and not closing our eyes to them when forced to recognize them.

Notice that the above probably almost never happens (past 100 years minus maybe also 2000 not sure yet) but it did happen this time. This is why this time deserves a revolt (if necessary now or down the road) or Trump to read the situation better and behave accordingly as a president. At some point in life you have to take a stand for what is proper, otherwise you are fundamentally a coward or worse, a cynic!

That is part of election campaign strategy as well. For instance, late in the campaign, the Clinton campaign began to realize that there were problems in Michigan and so did a last minute, ultimately unsuccessful, push there to shore up what they had thought was a fairly safe state.

Here's an even clearer example. In the 1960 World Series, the Yankees scored twice as many runs as the Pirates, but still ended up losing. Should they complain? After all, modern sabrmetrics has taught us that runs is a more accurate measure of a team's quality than wins.

Your problem is that you are ignoring the role of power in politics. Thus, all of your comments here are useless. The reason we have the Electoral College is not because James Madison, et al. thought it was the best way to pick a president (he opposed it if I recall correctly). Rather, it was because any negotiation requires compromise, and this was the compromise that larger states were willing to offer smaller states in order to convince them to join the Union.

That compromise was then voted on and ratified by each state. It is still the basis for the cooperation between the states in the creation of a federal government. Thus, pointing out that this compromise isn't a perfect match onto the popular will doesn't tell us anything new. We know that. It is a feature, not a bug. Nonetheless, it is the agreement that we made. Going back on it now, just because we don't like the outcome of a particular election, would be a sign that we were actually lying all along. That we never intended to keep our promise to abide by the terms of the compromise. My acceptance of the Constitution is a good faith acceptance - I really do agree to abide by its terms, even those I would prefer to see changed. Do you?

A headline I never wanted to see, but died laughing when I did.

http://www.alreporter.com/america-is...e-big-alabama/

I'm stone cold sober but posting here anyways. What are your opinions on fighting? Im typically a peaceful man, a pacifist in fact. However I've never been so mad in my life. Please help me transcend this anger.