Summations Only

Thank you for the respectful request.Please see my post in the Moderation Link.

That was weird.I get it that you desperately want to burn me by using my own words against me (like I easily did to you).But since the last words I directed toward you were thanks for sharing, it is therefore rather non-sensical to use my words: No need to be irritated. No one has a gun to your head forcing you to read my posts against me.

I'm doing neither. I have been talking about how systemic issues may be behind the loss and various ways one might tweak the system to minimize these causes going forwards. Rrhain is arguing she won the election when in fact she won the popular vote and lost the election. That's what I was arguing against. Rrhain's position, as he stated it, would suggest the popular vote is the election. He doubled down on this position when I challenged it. This particular subthread is about the people that disliked Clinton and their possible role in her loss. I'm not suggesting there's some clear message. The only point is that there was some small number of people that didn't vote for Clinton because they explicitly did not want to vote for her, but would have voted Democrat for some other candidate. Since the margin was small, that small number of people may have been sufficient to cause the loss. There were not insignificant numbers saying they would not vote for her on the lead up and this was a warning sign that there was a problem afoot. It's flaws stand alone. They are there regardless of the results of any given election. Approval voting does give more specific information in this regard. But I presented no evidence because you explicitly claimed earlier you were not interested in that kind of discussion. So I stuck to a few simple examples of circumstances how that would look and simply stating my view that more optimal selection is desirable and may avoid a Trumpesque character in the future. Yeah - I think I already explained my disdain at absolute numbers for this exact reason - indeed, the uselessness of absolute figures was what I was arguing against. So here are bottom 15 of winners by margin, to 1 significant figure:

1. JQA: -10%
2. Hayes: -3%
3. Trump: -2%
4. Harrison: -0.8%
5. W. Bush: -0.5%
6. Garfield: 0.09%
7. Kennedy: 0.2%
8. Cleveland: 0.6%
9. Nixon: 0.7%
10. Polk: 1%
11. Carter: 2%
12. W Bush: 2%
13. Cleveland: 3%
14. Wilson: 3%
15. Obama: 4%

If Clinton won, Trump wouldn't be there and Clinton would be between Carter and Bush. Indeed -- about 28% of them get a margin lower than 5%. I'm not focussing on the unusualness of the situation, just pointing out that her absolute number of votes is not important - it's the margin that has more meaning. In this case, it puts her in the bottom 15 of 58 had she won. Except it hasn't. By only resonating with the number she did, that put her at real risk of falling afoul of the electoral college bumpiness. Blame the opponent who couldn't see the distinction between these two positions that forced me into having to explain it, not me. Or someone else. The point I was making was that the people that voted for Clinton wasn't sufficient to overcome
a) Those that wanted Trump
b) Those that preferred Trump to Clinton
c) Those that voted for neither, particularly those who would have voted Democrat had it not been Clinton standing. We've gone over how picking a single preferred nominee may produce results other than the one who would accrue the most votes.You think it obvious that there are more Clinton voters that would have declined to vote Sanders than Sanders voters that would have declined to vote Clinton in an election against Trump. Maybe that's the case, but it's hardly on point so I won't belabour it further. Something not being a good sign is certainly not the same as saying 'this means they are guaranteed to lose the next election'.

Today Jeff Flake, Republican Senator from Arizona, announced that he would be retiring from the Senate after his current term. In his retirement speech he was deeply critical of the Trump administration. It is well worth reading. It is good to hear another Republican stand on principle - there seem so few.If you have trouble accessing the Washington Post website, here's a link to a copy of the speech at the New York Times.--PercyEdited by Percy, : Add title.

This is a video of an CNN interview earlier today with Republican Senator Bob Corker from Tennessee where he unloads again on Donald Trump: --Percy

Still, it seems to me to be an "I'd rather quit than fight" thing. If they really want to stand on principle, they should switch to being an Independent or a Democrat, and caucus with the Democrat side.MooseNote: By edit, fixed to "I'd rather quit than fight", although "I'd rather quiet than fight" might be as accurate.Edited by Minnemooseus, : It's "quit", not "quite".Edited by Minnemooseus, : Had "that" instead of "than" in 3 places - D'OH.

You're asking me to define Democrat (which should be capitalized)? Why? Not something I ever said. Also not something I ever saidI was able to make sense of very little of the rest of what you wrote, not enough to compose a response, plus there's no hint of progress toward a better understanding of each other.--Percy

You're using the electorate's views as a proxy for your own. It's really your own views you're talking about. But you think such a radar must exist only because you're hoping for candidates closer to your views. And Clinton did win the most votes in the election. It was in the electoral college that she lost. Well, you sure sounded for a long time like you were saying that Clinton's loss indicates the system is flawed, especially with all your talk about the proper radar identifying candidates who would have received more votes. Okay, let's remember that I already covered Sander's negatives when we examine what you say next: So as I already described, Sander's received less votes in the Democratic primaries than Clinton, and he carried the additional baggage of being a democratic socialist, but you think I'm just making up what would have happened had he been the Democratic candidate. Not only possible, but given what we know by far the most likely. Your own link said that such polls often don't hold up. Well, you're not alone in arguing that Sanders would have defeated Trump, but it remains a hypothetical. What we know is how near a thing was Clinton's loss. It goes up all the time but not every time - you say such strange things sometimes that it makes me wonder if there isn't some difference between British and American English that is causing a communication problem. We don't seem to be getting anywhere.--Percy

You're doing both. Over and over again you've stated that it was the electoral college Clinton lost and that that's all that matters, not the popular vote. You've been doing that, too, but there's no point denying something you've said repeatedly. For instance, in your Message 1416 you said: Again, your disagreement stems from differing terminology, not the facts on the ground. Is that what you want to argue about, how his terms interpreted with your definitions yield different conclusions? You both know what you mean, why not argue about that? Yes, so? You stated what you thought my views were, and I noted one part where you had characterized them incorrectly ("I'm not expressing some wish that more people felt more positive about Clinton as a candidate."), then went on to explain why that difference was significant, that it wasn't the number of people who disliked Clinton that I'm focused on, but on the irony of casting a vote to send a message to the Democrats that contributes to the election of the opposite of a Democrat, indeed, the opposite of anyone deserving of such office. Yes, I understand all that, but that doesn't change the fact that 2016 was not the right election to register a protest vote. There was too much at stake. Very, very few in the general political neighborhood of the Democrats would have wanted to show their dislike of Clinton by registering a protest vote that got Trump elected. They wanted to show their dislike of Clinton by withholding their vote from her because they thought that a safe thing to do because Trump was so far behind in the polls and not a threat. Well, it seemed that you were arguing earlier that Clinton's loss was evidence that the Democratic primary process was flawed, that that was why you thought it was flawed, but if you think it's flawed regardless I don't see any value in arguing the point, though I will say again that the Republicans use a nearly identical process. Since you like hypotheticals it's worth noting that if both parties used the process you prefer then both parties may have had different candidates and the Democrats may still have lost. I disagree that "her absolute number of votes is not important" and that "the margin had more meaning" in 2016. I think both are significant factors. Except that it has been shown false. You conclude that "too many" people (however many that is) didn't like her when the reality is that it is just where 0.05% of the total votes were cast that made the difference. Conclusions like yours from such tiny numbers can't be justified. Had those votes fallen differently and Clinton won would you really have concluded that "enough" people liked Clinton? No, of course not. That conclusion isn't justified, either. Yes, of course, I should have realized that you're never vague or claim distinctions without a difference or are nuanced to the point of oblivion. Yeah, c) is a good part of my main point, the irony of those who wanted a Democrat, just not Clinton, and voted in such a way as to end up with Trump. You're basing this on polls during the primaries that are notorious for not holding up in the main election.Just Googling around I ran into this random fact: 10% of Sanders supporters voted for Trump. Talk about voting against your own best interests! Our discussion is not taking into account that there's a perverse or at least random element among the voters.--Percy

This whole argument seems rather unimportant to me. I'm more concerned what the current possibilities are that Trump could conceivably win a second term and who the worthy opponents are out there who could viably challenge the current status quo. I don't like the path that the US has veered towards.

Probably.The democrats have not fixed any of their problems and are instead hunkering down and purging Berniecrats from the DNC. If they win any seats in 2018 it will be due to failure on the republican party ... which is possible given the divisions in the party that makes them unable to pass any significant legislation.If there are no changes then it becomes more likely. Schrubbia was, when it seemed his popularity was lower than the first time.The average voters are idiots that get their information from the media they watch and they aren't interested in fact checking.Enjoy?

I think what he means is that the population is always growing...thus more potential voters...but the turnout varies from election to election.

Winning the popular vote by 3 million in a presidential election would be a "problem" most political parties would dream of having.It would seem that the major problems they have to conquer are local, as in gerrymandering. Each state is going to have its own quirks and type of viable candidate, so I don't think there is any single magic idea that is going to work.

quote:

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With preliminary data now available about nationwide congressional voting trends this year, we can begin to tackle some of these questions. First, while Republicans, as of this writing, received a plurality of votes cast for Congress nationwide this year49.9 percent, again according data from the Cook Political Reportthey received a greater share, 55.2 percent, of the seats. Democrats, as a result, won a smaller share of seats than they did votes: 44.8 percent of seats as compared to 47.3 percent of the votes. (These numbers may change as final vote tallies are updated.)
Republicans in Congress got a seats bonus this election (again)

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It would seem that the real problem is in congressional candidates and not the vote at the top of the ticket. While the scales are still tipped in the favor or Republicans, the Dems still can't complain too loudly since they got fewer votes by a couple percentage points.You may have echoed these same sentiments earlier in this thread, so I apologize if I am retreading well worn ground.

As far as the election - the electoral college is all that matters. Analysis of the results takes into account all sorts of numbers, and that's fine and I've employed both State popular vote and nationwide popular vote in my doing this.
I have indeed discussed said popular vote and I have indeed considered causes.What causes do you think we should discuss? The main one I've seen from you is the electoral college. As we agree, this is however, just a fact on the ground. It's not something that is going to change to any significant degree. So while it is true, so what? It verifies my initial point to you that systemic causes may be the primary ones to examine. Do you have others you think we should touch on? Luck seems a bit...well random...so not much point going there. I'm stuck as to what else you may have championed as a possible cause so far.To introduce fresh information to the discussion I present gaming the electoral collegeSoWinner takes all: If all States used Winner takes all the results would have been different. Not much. Trump gained a vote in Maine he would otherwise not have won. Result 305:233Congressional district popular - 2 votes to the winner of the popular vote in a State, then the rest are distributed according to the number of CDs:
290:248CD majority - 2 votes to the party that wins the most congressional districts, the rest according to the number of CDs won: 297: 241Proportional popular - 2 votes to the State winner, the rest based on percentage of votes gained. 276:257 with 5 going to third partiesPure Popular vote - all State's electoral votes distributed based on the percentage of votes gained. 267:265 with 6 third party votes. 4 for Johnson, 1 for Stein and 1 for McMullenSo these methods would not have been sufficient for a Clinton win. I think the tie in the last method would likely favour Trump though I'm not entirely sure - the one State one vote concept here makes it tricky to be sure, but I'm leaning Trump given the House's makeup.Of course, this all assumes people vote the same under different election rules - which is a terrible assumption to make!In 2012 Stein got 0.36% of the popular vote. In 2008 McKinney on 0.12%. In 2004 Cobb got 0.1%. We could argue, rather arbitrarily naturally, that the Green's 'base' is the average of these at 0.2%In 2016 Stein got 1.1% About 0.9 points above baseline. Assuming, unsafely of course, that all of these extra votes came from people who would otherwise have voted Democrat - those numbers could easily have tipped the balance. Suggestive that protest votes could have been a significant factor. That said - the right leaning third parties split the Republican votes by more I think. This is suggestive that the Republicans may have done a worse job at selecting a candidate (which is probably a given, from a variety of perspectives).Of course, those votes may have gone to Greens regardless if we instead interpret the numbers differently, that a recent surge has seen them approximately tripling their numbers in the last two elections. In this case, no hypothetical Democratic Candidate is likely to have both stopped this surge and kept votes from their 'side' swinging to the right. By your own words then, I cannot possibly be "Fixating on just the electoral college results while refusing to consider what happened to cause those results". This is the Rrhain and xongsmith sub-discussion - which narrowed the discussion to the 'dislike' issue. You can focus on other areas if you like - but your focus of... Has been expressed multiple times. I'm not sure what else there is to say about it other than the merry-go round of 'this election's results weren't necessarily the focus for those people'. Yes, we agree that voting for someone other than Clinton while wanting Clinton to win resulted in ironic consequences for those people who did this. And that's a fine opinion to have. There isn't much mileage left in that, I suspect. It really boils down to you saying that the consequences of a Trump presidency today outweigh the benefits of the strategy of protest voting. That may, or may not, be true. It's going to be impossible to predict if it is true. So where does avenue of discussion really lead us? I've asked before; you seem certain of this point. You might well be right, but do you have anything to back it up with? Then I will reply again that wouldn't it be great if the DNC used a better one than the Republicans? The Democrats losing isn't great, but is basically inevitable from time to time, right? Three in a row is an anomaly in modern Presidential races after all. But in your scenario the consequence wouldn't be Trump, so that's a bonus I suppose, right? By 'important' I was referring to the context of comparing her to historical elections. That she got more votes than Reagan isn't meaningful. If she had gotten less votes than Reagan - that'd be an meaningful point in a historical comparison.We can also raise the point that Trump's popular vote margin as a percent was very small relative to history, which is also meaningful - in the context of Trump's mandate of the people etc. His electoral college percent was also pretty small compared historically, which also speaks to his mandate regarding the States. Well, given that her Supporters lived where they live, and we're not imagining a hypothetical scenario of voters that could have just moved around -if 0.1% more had liked her enough to vote, either globally or locally in those right places - her victory would have been assured. So again, I don't see how it is false.Sure, you could argue with margins that luck played its role. I've not disagreed with this. My point has been that had she had more support she could have lessened the impact that luck would have had. Had the numbers been very slightly different, and she won it would still have been by luck. I've argued that in order to get over the bumpiness of the electoral college, or generally of luck, she needed more. Indeed - it would undermine my point that tight marginal results are a result of not gaining sufficient support to overcome the element of chance (traffic conditions, one's kids getting sick etc etc), the bumpiness of the college and so forth. Well sure, but that's true regardless of the voting system used to pick the candidate. Seems about right as a number. I have commented earlier that a significant group of people weren't voting Party allegience or 'left/right'. They were voting 'shake things up' or simply 'change'. The question one is left wondering then is, what percent of Clinton's primary supporters would have voted for Trump had Sanders won the nomination?That 'let's shake things up' mentality was quite a clear element of the zeitgeist of 2016.

So I'll repeat what I said about that: getting a massive vote in states you have already won the electoral college votes, but failing to win electoral votes in swing states is to my mind a failure to properly manage where the election energy, cashflow, ads, etc was spent. ie - less time in california and more in pennsylvania and michigan could have made a difference. The extra votes were wasted when a few more votes in specific areas were needed.This is a problem at the DNC/campaign level, and I don't see any discussion of changing game plans. Hubris.From what I have seen, Hillary's book is pathetic. The democrats don't seem to know how to campaign in "off year" elections, letting republicans win in state and federal races for representatives etc.Wasserman-Schultz was particularly myopic in that regard, when several issues -- like $15/hr minimum wage, universal health insurance, paid family leave, etc -- were available but ignored.Going for corporate sponsorship is a huge mistake when your base is working people trying to make ends meet.The more they campaign as "republican lite" the fewer people will be interested, especially in off-years.So yes, Trump will likely win a second term, because the democrats will be running the same losing campaign.Enjoy