this post was submitted on 15 Oct 2024
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If half the people weren't voting for him, the EC wouldn't be an issue.
Depends how loose your definition of half is, I guess. Trump got 46.8% of the popular vote in 2020 vs Biden’s 51.3%.
2016: Trump 41.1% (still won) vs Clinton 48.2%. 2012: Obama 51.1% (winner) vs Romney 47.2%. 2008: Obama 52.9% (winner) vs McCain 45.7%. 2004: Bush 50.7% (winner) vs Kerry 48.3%. 2000: Bush 47.9% (still won) vs Gore 48.4%. 1996: Clinton 49.2% (winner) vs Dole 40.7% vs Perot 8.4%. 1992: Clinton 43% (winner) vs Bush 37.4% vs Perot 18.9%. 1988: Bush 53.4% (winner) vs Dukakis 45.6%. And that's as far as I could be bothered to go back.
With the exception of Bush in 2004, every Republican president since 1988 won only because of the electoral college. See the problem?
It is still bonkers that 40% of the people vote for him. No matter how bad first past the post voting, electoral collage or party polarization is, if you can convince 40% of the people to vote for this man as president, that's a problem with the voter base, not the EC.
Yes, and my initial comment was:
we’re in violent agreement
I'm aware of the history. The EC should go. I also don't need to miss the context of the discussion to make that point.
Going by current polling, the two are statistically tied, with a few percentage points still going to RFK Jr and some undecideds. GP is correct to say "this guy has a half the vote", and this would be true with or without the EC. If we had a population that wasn't bending over backwards to justify sending a demented narcissist into the White House, the EC would not even be close to an issue this election.
Speaking of missing the context, my initial comment, to which you replied, was:
Two things can be true at the same time. It’s maddening that so many vote for him, the electoral college is why republicans still win, and, I’ll throw you a bone, the electoral college probably wouldn’t be a problem if fewer people voted for Trump—but it would still be a damn stupid way to run an election.
Let me introduce a hypothetical: the electoral college didn’t exist, Republicans saw they couldn’t win on current policies as far back as 2012 and were forced to moderate to win the popular vote. We might not be in this current political climate in the first place