Here's How I See the Election
The election boils down to two areas of voters. The large city populations went to Clinton giving her the popular vote. The rest of the country went to Trump giving him the Electoral vote. This poses many questions in my mind. 1) Why do large city populations vote liberal? 2) Do we really want to eliminate the Electoral College and have mob rule?
Presidential preference popular voting began in the election of 1824, which due to its newness had the lowest voter turnout of all subsequent elections. Out of the 49 presidential elections with popular voting, the 2016 election had the 19th lowest voter turnout, tying the 2012 election. It was the 11th lowest electoral vote win percentage, nowhere close to being a landslide as Trump spins it. It was a photo-finish, buzzer-beating, razor-thin victory in Florida and 3 rust belt states. The 2016 election was the 7th lowest popular vote win percentage out of the 49 referred to above. It was also the 3rd worst popular vote margin win percentage (-2.1%) and only the 5th time in history that the loser of the popular vote became president.
Based on an objective analysis of the numbers above, this was not a mandate election. Plus, anecdotal evidence points to the outcome being primarily driven by who voters thought was worse, since they were primarily voting against the other major candidate. Dissatisfaction with the 2 main candidates produced 3 times as many third party votes as usual (almost 5.9% of the total vote). Also, in several battleground states with competitive U.S. Senate races (FL, WI, PA, NH, for example...), the GOP senate candidate earned more votes than Trump. It's practically unheard of that the top of the ticket doesn't earn the most votes compared to down ticket races. So, the Trump team can try to spin the election numbers a number of ways, but this was by no way a primarily satisfied electorate enthusiastically selecting a president with a strong mandate. It was a muddled mess, in a number of ways...
"The founding fathers believed strongly in both Federalism ... and Democracy."
I agree regarding Federalism and that the electoral college serves a valid purpose that should continue..
However, to the contrary, many of the founders thought democracy was a terrible form of government. They intended to establish a republican form of government, not a democracy.
"Democracy is the most vile form of government. ... democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property: and have in general been as short in their lives as the have been violent in their deaths."
- - - James Madison (1751-1836) "Father" of the Constitution, 4th President of the U. S.
“We are a Republic. Real Liberty is never found in despotism or in the extremes of Democracy.”
- - - Alexander Hamilton (1755-1804) Lawyer, Secretary of the Treasury & Secretary of State
“A simple democracy is the devil's own government.”
- - - This quote is attributed to several American patriots. Most often to Benjamin Rush, or Jedidiah Morse.
“Democracy will soon degenerate into an anarchy; such an anarchy that every man will do what is right in his own eyes and no man's life or property or reputation or liberty will be secure, and every one of these will soon mould itself into a system of subordination of all the moral virtues and intellectual abilities, all the powers of wealth, beauty, wit, and science, to the wanton pleasures, the capricious will, and the execrable [abominable] cruelty of one or a very few.”
- - - John Adams (1797-1801) Second President of the United States
“The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.”
- - - Thomas Jefferson, Author of the Declaration of Independence, 3rd President of the U. S.
“A democracy is a volcano, which conceals the fiery materials of its own destruction. These will produce an eruption, and carry desolation in their way.”
- - - Fisher Ames (1758-1808) Founding Father and framer of the First Amendment to the Constitution
“Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide. It is in vain to say that democracy is less vain, less proud, less selfish, less ambitious, or less avaricious than aristocracy or monarchy. It is not true, in fact, and nowhere appears in history. Those passions are the same in all men, under all forms of simple government, and when unchecked, produce the same effects of fraud, violence, and cruelty. When clear prospects are opened before vanity, pride, avarice, or ambition, for their easy gratification, it is hard for the most considerate philosophers and the most conscientious moralists to resist the temptation. Individuals have conquered themselves. Nations and large bodies of men, never.”
- - - John Adams (1797-1801) Second President of the United States
“Pure democracy cannot subsist long nor be carried far into the departments of state, it is very subject to caprice and the madness of popular rage.”
- - - John Witherspoon (1722-1794) Educator, Economist, Minister, Writer & Founding Father
"The known propensity of a democracy is to licentiousness which the ambitious call, and ignorant believe to be liberty."
- - - Fisher Ames (1758-1808) Founding Father and framer of the First Amendment to the Constitution
“We have seen the tumults of democracy terminate, in France, as they have everywhere terminated, in despotism.”
- - - Gouverneur Morris (1752-1816) Statesman, Diplomat, writer of the final draft of the Constitution
"In democracy … there are commonly tumults and disorders … Therefore a pure democracy is generally a very bad government. It is often the most tyrannical government on earth.”
- - - Noah Webster (1758-1843)
“All such men are, or ought to be, agreed, that simple governments are despotisms; and of all despotisms, a democracy, though the least durable, is the most violent.”
- - - Fisher Ames (1758-1808)
“Republicanism is not the phantom of a deluded imagination. On the contrary, laws, under no form of government, are better supported, liberty and property better secured, or happiness more effectually dispensed to mankind.”
- - - George Washington (1732-1799)
"There is no good government but what is republican. That the only valuable part of the British constitution is so; for the true idea of a republic is 'an empire of laws, and not of men.' That, as a republic is the best of governments, so that particular arrangement of the powers of society, or in other words, that form of government which is best contrived to secure an impartial and exact execution of the law, is the best of republics."
- - - John Adams (1797-1801) Second President of the United States
“A pure Democracy, by which I mean a Society consisting of a small number of citizens, who assemble and administer the Government in person, can admit of no cure for the mischiefs of faction. A common passion or interest will, in almost every case, be felt by a majority of the whole; a communication and concert result from the form of Government itself; and there is nothing to check the inducements to sacrifice the weaker party, or an obnoxious individual. Hence it is, that such Democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security, or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives, as they have been violent in their deaths. Theoretic politicians, who have patronized this species of Government, have erroneously supposed, that by reducing mankind to a perfect equality in their political rights, they would, at the same time, be perfectly equalized and assimilated in their possessions, their opinions, and their passions.”
- - - James Madison, Federalist No. 10
The quotes above were researched by a friend and if desired I can provide links to sources.
Our national government is a Constitutional Republic. The two main principles of republicanism, which feature prominently in our form of government are: (1) opposition to kings, dictators, and other forms of authoritarianism, and (2) rule of Law, properly constrained by a constitution which limits government power. The Republican Party, founded in 1854, claims to stand for the principles of republicanism. However, in my mind, the first principle seems to not be as rigorously followed now, with many in the GOP increasingly accepting of strong-arm, bullying tactics from the president. That concerns me greatly...
He has the only mandate that matters, and the only one he needs; he won the election.
Undermining any possible mandate is the political goal of the current agitation of the progressives, who are trying to de-legitimize the election in the eyes of the public. If they can't overturn the election with phony accusations and appeals to the electoral college to vote for Clinton, they want to make it look like Trump has no popular support. They want to embolden more opposition in order to undermine the Trump appointments and legislative agenda in Congress.
On the other side, Trump is trying to manufacture the impression of a mandate he does not have in what was a very close election.
Regarding the EC, it should definitely not be eliminated. Like most other things it was carefully thought out by the Founders and is there for a good reason. We have to keep in mind that they were dealing with a less stable and established framework and these decisions were intended to not only build a solid foundation for themselves but one that would last through centuries of potential, well, "calamity" if I have to choose a word for what's going on now.
Seriously...think about it. How much sovereignty does one have in a city, how much can you rely upon yourself besides working, feeding yourself and paying your rent. Other than those things, you have no responsibility, your not allowed to fix anything when it breaks, you rely on the land lord, you have to rely on the government for all basic needs...your a hostage at the mercy of your captor...The city and it's government is your keeper.
The days when the city behind the castle walls was your protection from the world are looooong gone...we should abandon them. The city is now your foe. They should become only a place to visit but not a place to live.
Still scratchin my head over that one...
Second, of course we want the Electoral College. In fact, I want to see each State adopt a Gubernatorial Electoral College. Furthermore, I would like to see either (a) the same or similar state-wide Electoral College appoint Presidential Electors, or (b) have States choose two Electors at-large and let each Congressional district choose one Elector each. That's how they do it in Maine--and Maine, significantly, will field a split Electoral College delegation this year.
I'd love to see a rule that said: "Each county shall appoint, in such manner as the freeholders thereof may direct/Each independent city shall appoint, in such manner as the council thereof may direct, a number of Electors..."
Big city dwellers are in a sense slaves, however independent they may think they are. Large segments of their community feel compelled not only to act a certain accepted way, but to think in a way that doesn't get a hostile response from others around them. A conservative thinker in a liberal community receives a very hostile response from those in their vicinity, because the conservative is viewed as a threatening presence.
Small communities experience less government presence, primarily because government services are more limited. The feeling of dire distress from others that have different views is less as well, because even liberals in this setting are more independent, without the rat warren claustrophobic setting of the big city.
The lesson I get from this is that rather than force more people into the rat warrens in the name of efficiency (Agenda 21), we should work to better distribute the American population. Reliance on telecommuting for non-physical labor, distributed transportation, power, and entertainment conserves wealth and energy, as well as reducing stress on the population.
Popular vote was close but Clinton won.
The electoral college was won by Trump.
That is the rules ( the most electoral votes )and I was taught that in grade school.
How about a smooth transition of power and vote him out the next time, if you can get a candidate that gets the most electoral votes...period.
Just ask winners like $hillary and Jill Stein.
That's over in Russia Hacking by the way.
It's been for a long time that ospreys I've seen are the only ones who can catch a decent sized fish out of that stuff.
Can't even cane pole fish for bream without "nibblers" devouring a worm right off the hook.
People in large cities are not independent to the extent that those outside are independent. People in large cities are more specialized in their working activity and do not have the knowledge of or experience in activities required for survival compared to people living outside large cities.
The young, ignorant, and inexperienced are moving in large numbers to large cities and lowering the average wisdom per capita. By the time they gain wisdom, the city will no longer attract them and they will take their wisdom to smaller towns as did the generations before them. They may have had more education, but that does not in any way equate to wisdom.
However, it says nothing about a human beings dealings with each other. To the extent human beings become "removed" or isolated from nature, they are able to do so only to the extent they are dealing with other human beings. This can, to the extent one has no rational philosophy of life consistent with Bacon's axiom - one that applies to human beings, allow for the development of a destructive psycho-epistemological pathology.
I propose a corollary to Bacon's axiom - one that applies when dealing with human beings.
"A man's life, in order to exist in harmony with the lives of others, must be his own."
To the extent a human being no longer must deal exclusively with nature for his survival, recognition and acting in accord with said axiom, must be philosophically understood, and politically instituted.
Absent such a reality, those who deal almost exclusively with others, either in large cities or in pockets of wealth that "insulate" them from nature, they can come to believe almost any absurdity however disguised.
There is little "nature" to thwart, frustrate, or ultimately, punish them with death for failure to "obey."
#2. No...our Founding Fathers were far wiser than any of our current leaders.
They little realizes that they are well on the road to becomingso conditioned to respond to the Progressive bell that they have little volition of their own to vote otherwise.
The other states, having less of the urban influx do not have the issues the large cities have and do not have the subsidies the large cities have. Look a a map colored by party winning each county. The map looks very different on a county by county basis. The urban counties are typically "Blue" and the others typically "Red" A map at this level shows the density of the progressive wing of the Dems in it's tru location the Large Cities. and almost no where else.
As for the argument for the Electoral College, it was made very eloquently by the founding fathers so as to limit the power of the large staes vs the small states, just as the creat compromise (The House being numbered by population and the senate being set to 2 members per state. Great foresight shown by the founders.
+1: it was marked down while I was entering my comment.
As for the electoral college, most other countries function without it. How? The important component of other nations' system of counting votes includes the concept of proportional representation. The parliamentary system is capable of representing a diversity of views by virtue of the fact that parties are rewarded seats in the legislature in proportion to the percentage of the popular vote which that party receives.
In the United States, we have a winner-takes-all system of representation. Thus, "third party" candidates are far and few between. This can be an advantage or disadvantage. The advantage is that no radical third party is supposed to be able to take control of the political system. Of course, that makes sense only when your party is in power. The disadvantage is that diversity of views are not possible. The parties tend to oppose each other in fundamentals but compromise on solutions. Thus, little "gets done" and a bull in the China shop gets elected by a more or less cynical populace.
If the Electoral College only protects the nation when the party you voted for succeeds in getting elected, then you believe more in your party and less in the Constitution. Whether this fact is good or bad, I leave to comment.
Interesting article and pretty scary regarding how those fools in Washington came awful close to changing to mob rule, and not that long ago.
2-Yes. It's called democracy and works in France-runoff if nobody gets over 50% on first ballot. One Voter One Vote One Value.I'd probably vote for Trump in a runoff with Clinton.
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