(03-10-2018 03:13 PM)Tom in Lazybrook Wrote:  

(03-10-2018 10:22 AM)bullet Wrote:  

(03-09-2018 10:44 PM)Tom in Lazybrook Wrote:  

(03-09-2018 08:20 PM)bullet Wrote:  

(03-09-2018 05:41 PM)Tom in Lazybrook Wrote:  Ok, what would YOU call a situation where the system is designed so that a candidate can win with fewer votes than the other candidate?

I'd call it gerrymandering. Others would call it 'the legacy of a racist electoral system designed to protect slavery' that has the same impact as a racial gerrymander today. I think you'd prefer gerrymandering.

General rule, if you can get more votes than your opponent and still lose, then its effectively gerrymandered. Especially if it helps one race or party over another repeatedly.

WARNING - If you even try to argue that the solution is for Democrats to move to other areas, then I WILL bring up discriminatory practices in the Homestead Act, and the fact that other minorities are effectively shut out of economic and educational opportunities in many 'red' areas.

Its called the electoral college. Its the way our elections have worked since 1789. No its not gerrymandering. You have 51 individual races. It doesn't matter if you get 3 or 4 or 5 million more votes in one state. That is irrelevant to the rules.

If you don't like it, amend the constitution or move to someplace without an electoral college, like Iran or Russia. Don't continue the delusional nonsense about being cheated.

Iran or Russia don't have free elections. Try again.

Basically, you guys got 3 million fewer votes and you don't even care that it got you fewer votes. Because to you, it appears as if you don't see that as undemocratic or even a problem. How do you define a democratic election?

To your point, our current system is a system that disproportionally discounts the votes of minorities, and was created for the purpose of protecting slavery. Racist system then, racist impact today.

Would you prefer we just call it gerrymandering?
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But back the topic of Texas. Remember that the EC could come back to bite the GOP on the butt, bigly. Not in 2020, but eventually Texas WILL flip and will flip permanently. When it does, the Conservatives are absolutely f*cked. Not if but WHEN Texas flips, you're going to rue the day the Dems wanted to discuss a popular vote for President. Don't whine when it happens and don't expect the Dems to help you out of that jam.

Consider the following scenario. Its 2028 and Texas and Arizona have flipped. You guys are going to be so unbelievably screwed. The EV has been a mechanism to discount minority votes, but will, within 10 years, become a mechanism to give Latino Americans, and Mexican Americans specifically, an absolute hammerhold on who becomes President. All thanks to the EV system. Not if, but WHEN it happens, you can thank yourself.

No, our system was designed to protect minorities against the vagaries of the majority. Small states agreed to join the union on the grounds that they didn't get bossed around by the large states-so the Senate was split evenly while the House was based on population. The president was elected based on a mix of those two.

That protection of minorities is also one of the reasons we are a Republic and not a Democracy. It didn't have anything to do with slavery as most states had slavery at the time and the population was evenly split between north and south. In the first census, Maine and Massachusetts were the only states without slaves.

Sounds like you had a pretty sorry history teacher.

As for a permanent majority, look at the 1976 election. Except for a handful of northeast and mountain west states, it has almost completely flipped parties. Republicans thought they had a permanent advantage in the presidency with California rock solid Republican at the presidential level and a permanent advantage in the House. California flipped in the 90s and the House flipped in 2006. Democrats thought they had a permanent advantage in 2008. State houses are more Republican now than ever before in their history and the Republicans have all 3 branches of government.

Ok, when Texas and Arizona flip (and have even more EVs than they do today) don't whine.

Basically Trumpism is Pete Wilson on steroids. He won reelection (and unlike Trump actually got more votes) in 1994 by demonizing Mexican Americans. The impact of that race was pretty much the permanent end of any hope for the Conservatives of even being mildly competitive there (Arnold wasn't a conservative).

Trump and the GOP have a coalition that is already a minority. It consists, almost exclusively of straight, white, nominally "Christian" people (yes, you have some Batista era Cuban immigrants too - but that's a tiny portion of the population - although its a huge portion of the GOP's small Hispanic support base). You guys have done everything possible to deeply offend just about every other group. As well as white people that support the environment, womens rights, humane treatment of LGBT persons, people who question the wisdom of turning our country into a free fire zone, and many non-religious persons as well. What's your plan to get them back? You think they're just going to forget what y'all are doing now? Its going to take DECADES before you'll get many of them to even listen to you. And you're going to have to concede on a LOT of points to do it.

Its really interesting really. To have a party have a minority of support, and then do just about everything conceivably possible to piss off everyone who they don't already have the support of.

Oh, and Trump/GOP voters are also SIGNIFICANTLY older than Democratic voters too. So you're going to have to either convert those that don't have your support, or find new voters to help you maintain what was already a rail thin, gerrymandered, win.

Getting more white industrial voters doesn't help you much if you can't figure out how to win in an election where African American, LGBT, and Mexican American voters in Texas largely loathe the GOP and make up 51% of the electorate. And that day is coming. Not as fast as Democrats would like, but certainly faster than the Republicans think.

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My guess is that we're not changing the EC system. I suspect that it will be the GOP that is really going to rue that, and will do so within 10 years.

And the Democrats are a minority and try to offend everybody who isn't part of one of their preferred groups. Both parties are declining as a percent of the population. Democrats right now are significantly more unpopular than DJT!