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The majority of US citizens did not vote for Trump. Just thought I'd point out that most people DO NOT want this president.
by ItendToDisagree 9y ago
The majority of US citizens did not vote for Trump. Just thought I'd point out that most people DO NOT want this president.
- bkor 9y agoAround half did want him? That's a significant of people to me, no matter if they have the majority or not.
- klausjensen 9y agoTechnically, only ~57% of eligible voters actually voted. Of those, about half voted for Trump. So only about 27% of all eligible voters actually voted for Trump. That is pretty standard for a US presidential election. Those are the rules for democracy, so he is the legitimately elected president. https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/11/10/13587462/trump-election-2016-voter-turnout https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/11/10/13587462/...
- danieldk 9y agoSo only about 27% of all eligible voters actually voted for Trump. The remaining 43% voted for 'I'll take whoever wins'. So, ~72% of the eligible voters can be held accountable for him becoming president. Those are the rules for democracy, so he is the legitimately elected president. Definitely, it is legitimate, even if we don't like the outcome ;).
- laGrenouille 9y agoNot really a fair statement given the oddities of the electoral college. I know a lot of people in big coastal cities (New York, Boston, LA, San Fransisco, Seattle) who don't vote but are very anti-Trump. They know it doesn't matter because their states were always going to go strongly for the Democrats.
- sgift 9y agoI'm not from the U.S., so my knowledge here is a bit sketchy, but wasn't one of the problems Clinton had exactly that some states which always voted for the Democrats fell to the Republicans this time?
- rco8786 9y agoNot really. Both bases stayed pretty true to their colors.
- dagw 9y agoThat's a slight simplification. There where over 200 counties that voted for Obama twice and now voted for Trump.
- rco8786 9y agoRight i wasn't including those in the "bases". 200 counties represents about 6% of the total number of counties in the country, and few of them are from states that "always vote for democrats"
- Pxtl 9y agoWell, sort of. There were several states that Democrats traditionally won federally, but those weren't the "safe" ones like new York and California. The big thing Trump took from the Democrats was the Rust Belt states - the old industrial places like Michigan, which usually vote for Democratic Party presidents but have strong Republican contingencies and often have Republican governors.
- Spooky23 9y agoThe difference is that the Democratic party "rebased" itself. They've basically removed blue collar white people as a constituency that they focus on. This created a problem, as the get out the vote efforts from groups like unions and others were tepid as a result, and the GOP isn't stupid and courted these voters pretty heavily. The other thing is that the Democrats over-relied on minority voters as a key base, which didn't work out for a variety of reasons. I think strategically they missed the fact the ethnic voting requires an ethnic candidate. They also missed that certain key platform positions alienate ethnic factions of their voting base. In the old days, the Irish-Catholic political machines didn't run aging teetotaler baptists as candidates for a good reason! Basically, Mrs. Clinton ran a campaign that was divided, disorganized and poorly administered, which crippled her ability to make appropriate decisions. Trump's opportunism, marketing savvy, and tight team made his campaign agile and tightly focused on the objective. When the campaign had internal divisions, he purged the dissenters and moved on.
- Mithaldu 9y ago> The remaining 43% voted for 'I'll take whoever wins'. Or they lived in some of those insane regions where only a single voting office served thousands of people and couldn't affording standing outside for 8+ hours, or they couldn't get a tuesday off (sane countries allot a whole weekend for voting), or they couldn't afford to get sufficient id to satisfy their state's demands. (Yes, i know, mail-in voting is a thing, but i'm sure there are good reasons to keep people from using that as well.) There's plenty of reasons otherwise eligible voters didn't vote beyond "didn't care" and many of them are "they were prevented from doing so by institutional problems".
- mamon 9y agoonly a single voting office served thousands of people and couldn't affording standing outside for 8+ hours Really, that's how it is in US? Any semi-decent country is responsible for creating comfortable conditions for anyone to vote. Here in Poland there were 28k voting offices for 30 million of potential voters, so there's on average little more than 1k voters per office. It is almost impossible to be waiting in line for more than 5-10 minutes, even in the most crowded offices.
- dashundchen 9y agoIt's one of many voter suppression tactics in urban areas. https://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/25/opinion/long-lines-at-minority-polling-places.html https://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/25/opinion/long-lines-at-min... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_suppression_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_suppression_in_the_Unite... Elections are mostly regulated at the state and county level, which causes a lot of disparities in registration law and polling place funding. Invariably every election during the non-stop coverage, you'll see the pictures of the long lines wrapped around blocks in cities throughout the country, but especially in Republican controlled swing states. I think it's an utter failure of our society that we can't hold elections with fair and accessible voting methods.
- bluejekyll 9y agoSadly, yes, but it's not everywhere. Jerrymandering is used by both parties to lock-in districts for particular candidates. Then voter suppression is used to keep people away from the polls, mostly used by the old Jim Crowe states, this nonsense dates back to slavery from which the US is still recovering. 'Democracy in America', by Alexis de Tocqueville is still about as valid today as when it was written. In that he describes this scene where townspeople literally shoot at a farmer to keep him away from the polls. Not all that different than the gun toting individuals who show up to polling places today to 'protect' the vote.
- Vivtek 9y agoYou know, "I'll take whoever wins" might very well be the best way I've ever seen of putting that.
- randallsquared 9y agoIt isn't a very good way, because it describes everyone who did vote, as well, no matter who they voted for.
- plandis 9y agoBlaming people who didn't participate is an interesting standard. Youre assuming at everyone eligible to vote can vote.
- woof 9y agoA large number of Democrats voted for Trump by not voting at all. They made a choice to let Trump win, just to tell Hillary (and the Democratic Party) that they didn't like her! https://www.forbes.com/sites/omribenshahar/2016/11/17/the-non-voters-who-decided-the-election-trump-won-because-of-lower-democratic-turnout/#2d0d5ce053ab https://www.forbes.com/sites/omribenshahar/2016/11/17/the-no...
- philliphaydon 9y agoThere's also voters who regret voting trump and voters who say they would switch from Hillary to trump.
- boomboomsubban 9y agoThis ignores the other parties, which can explain most of the disparity. In Michigan, other candidates got about 1% of the vote in 12 and 5% in 16. Even if it helped Trump win, labeling them "spoilers" just ensures that our terrible system will have this happen again.
- refurb 9y agoIs the system terrible because the person you wanted to win didn't?
- boomboomsubban 9y agoNo, I can't imagine wanting either of those people to win.
- woof 9y agoBut you still have to choose between those two. By voting -preferably.
- larelogio 9y agoDo you "have" to? Not voting is a form of expression as valid as any other. You really don't have to accept a very bad candidate and by doing so you signal future candidates the availability of "free" votes. Now, I admit that voting NULL is a stronger message, but is it really an option?
- keithpeter 9y ago"Those are the rules for democracy, so he is the legitimately elected president." Absolutely according to the rules in force in the USA. Other countries have different rules, and I don't think that there is some set of unique 'best rules' for this. UK tomorrow many of us are voting for the mayors of 'combined authorities'. The voting paper has two columns for each candidate and you get to state a first preference and a second preference - they call it the supplimentary voting system https://www.wmcaelects.co.uk/frequently-asked-questions/ https://www.wmcaelects.co.uk/frequently-asked-questions/ It will be 'interesting' to see how this one works in an election that noone especially wanted and that traditionally has a very low turnout - but at least we are trying different approaches.
- keithpeter 9y ago"Conservative Mr Street took 216,280 votes to Mr Simon's 210,259. He won by 3,766 votes after second preferences of those who opted for other candidates were counted. Mr Street said it was the start of a "new, urban Conservative agenda". Overall, 26% of eligible voters chose a candidate with most people staying away from the polling stations on Thursday." [1] So, the man has a majority of less than 2% in an election where just a tad over one quarter of those eligible actually voted. He is in charge of a unitary authority where most of the constituent authorities have Labour administrations. What kind of mandate do you think this chap has? [1] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2017-39817224 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2017-39817224
- croon 9y agoTechnically, 27% of eligible voters voted for the Republican party. How many of those voted for Trump is unknown. But it's definitely less than all of them.
- Veratyr 9y ago> Those are the rules for democracy, so he is the legitimately elected president. Those are the rules for American democracy, which has many flaws, an inherent two party system being one of the major ones.
- DougN7 9y agoYeah, but look at the alternative. There was no winning in that election :(
- danieldk 9y agoThanks for bringing up, since it is a relevant point. However, it still does not change the fact that he is now leading the most powerful nation, with all its consequences. I have always wondered how hard it would be to switch to direct voting rather as opposed to the system with an electoral college. Is it impossible because the current system is codified in the constitution, or does it 'only' require an amendment. If so, was there ever a serious attempt to change this system?
- watter 9y agoYou would have an NYC-LosAngeles government nearly every time. Clintons for life. The system was designed to avoid the concentration of power you desire.
- sgift 9y agoWhy exactly would this be the case? As far as I can see most people don't live in this two cities? And saying the US system "was designed to avoid the concentration of power" sounds like a sad joke from an European perspective (First-past-post-system, extreme presidential powers etc.)
- caseysoftware 9y agoThose "extreme presidential powers" were not in the system design. They were submitted as (sometimes secret) change requests by every president post WW2 and accelerated by presidents in the last ~20 years. Unfortunately, the code review team didn't remove the changes and tacked on their own during the process.
- sgift 9y agoWorst code review team in history. But thanks for the explanation, that makes it a bit more clear.
- boomboomsubban 9y ago>They were submitted as (sometimes secret) change requests by every president post WW2 and accelerated by presidents in the last ~20 years. They started way sooner than that, the first major one was the Louisiana Purchase. Basically non-Washington presidents have been trying to expand their power.
- tomp 9y agoDue to the electoral college system, correlation between "voting for Trump" and "wanting Trump as a president" isn't 100%, so you I'm not sure you can make strong conclusions based on 2.2% difference in popular vote.
- ItendToDisagree 9y agoYet... Depending on how the rules of the game work the outcomes are totally different. Worth pointing out.
- tomp 9y agoNo, the point is, depending on the rules of the game, people vote differently. E.g. under the current system it makes no sense for republicans in NY and CA to vote... If the popular vote actually counted, the popular vote would be different (it's like quantum mechanics applied to psychology - if people know that you observe them, they change their behaviour)!
- ItendToDisagree 9y agoNot voting because of being in a red/blue state seems to happen to both parties. A change to the voting system would probably change behavior and (hopefully) increase voter turnout in general. :)
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- tertius 9y agoThough if we look at where the majority of the population lives (NY/CA) and how blue those states are he has a point here. Speculation nonetheless though.
- croon 9y agoHe has half a point. The other half is that a lot of democrats avoid voting as well, since their state is already blue. And vice versa on both counts for red states.
- TheArcane 9y agoThat's irrelevant in this case, isn't it?
- ItendToDisagree 9y agoIn reality. Yup.
- Jare 9y agoYou could say that ~70% of the voters did not try to prevent him becoming president.
- ItendToDisagree 9y agoExactly! But this seems like a feature of a Two Party system rather than a bug? What happened to the Free Market and competition?
- path411 9y agoThe natural "free market" tendency to form monopolies as dominate parties buy out smaller ones.
- hollander 9y agoTrump voters of course didn't prevent him becoming president. They wanted him, so they voted for him. That doesn't count in my book. So with 55% turnout, that leaves 45% who didn't vote. Still a large portion.
- Markoff 9y agoyou can say that about pretty much any Democratic government with few countries exception where it's voting mandatory and actually enforced which is very rare combination
- pferde 9y agoBut that is US' problem, not the world's. It's up to you to clean up in your own house and not make excuses. The who-voted-for-whom discussion in one of adjacent subthreads just sounds like airing dirty laundry in front of everybody - nobody cares, it just makes you look bad.
- averagewall 9y agoHe won according to the system that's been in place for 100-200 years. You don't get to support it until it works against you and then complain about it.
- hobs 9y ago"That's been in place for 100-200 years" The gerrymandered system with even more party control is not the system that has been in place for anywhere near that amount of that time. The parties in place dont have that kind of history either. Our voting laws are different, even non-white men can vote now! (though they are disenfranchised as much as possible.) Basically, the system is constantly in flux, ad yes, we get to complain about it all we want and change it (again.)
- hueving 9y agoNope, gerrymandering has no effect on the presidential election because states are not having their borders redrawn. There are maybe two states that have large electoral college districts that could be impacted by it, but they are irrelevant in the larger picture.
- panglott 9y agoThe electoral college system has obviously been a terrible idea for years. Plenty of people also vocally complained about it in 2000, for example. But changing it requires changing the Constitution, which requires a supermajority of state legislatures—and the electoral college shifts power from citizens and the federal government to states.
- sbov 9y agoIt actually doesn't require changing the Constitution. States are allowed to allocate votes however they want. Several states have passed laws that say: when enough states pass a similar law to determine the presidency, all of our electoral college votes will go to the winner of the national popular vote. This hack lowers the barrier, but not by enough, at least yet.
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- ChairmanPao 9y agoI wanted him. What's your point?
- ChairmanPao 9y ago@DANG Moderators! This person is trying to hijack a thread into a political rant against our President. Off topic! Destructive! Ban Him!
- loco5niner 9y agoAnd others (such as myself), voted for Trump only because he was the only alternative to Hillary. (Better option than Hillary, but not by much. There were other options of course, but they did not have a chance at winning). I should also specify that I voted for someone else in the primaries.
- TheRealDunkirk 9y agoI don't know what it's going to take to break the 2-party system in the US, but people continuing to vote for "the other" candidate just because they hate "the one" certainly isn't going to influence change. I've been voting Libertarian in (almost) every race I can, for at least 15 years now, and I'll keep "wasting" my vote to send the signal that I want more parties in the system. (As in, I want to see BOTH Jill Stein and Gary Johnson at a podium in the debates, and given equal time.) I'm willing to "waste" my vote in order to tell BOTH the D's AND the R's that they do not represent my desires for governance.
- szatkus 9y agoWe also have 2nd turn of election in Europe. Basically people need to choose between 2 candidates. I'm under impression that most of libertarian voters would vote for Hillary if they had to choose between two options.