Before 2000, it was an interesting thought experiment but dismissed as highly unlikely that a president could technically win office without winning the popular

Before 2000, it was an interesting thought experiment but dismissed as highly unlikely that a president could technically win office without winning the popular vote. Republicans (but also some purist democrats) were apoplectic when Bill Clinton took office with an electoral majority and a mere popular plurality in 1992. The ground shifted has shifted around the rules many times in the past, but the current rural vs urban divide of the two parties combined with the majority of Americans living in urban and suburban areas has led to some really distorted and unintended outcomes of the rules.