The Politics Thread (PLAY NICELY!)

Hillary never promised to take down the "Establishment". Trump did. So obviously it's worth reporting that he'll put his rich republican friends, part of the worst part of the Establishment, into important positions. That's not what he promised he'd do.

You're like a religious madman defending his cults leader. "No you're just misunderstanding all of what he says".
Apparently it is needed to constantly interpret between the lines with massive good faith and blind trust for Trump and turn a blind eye to all the obvious bad things as you and others do.

Well yes.
Let's make a bet: He'll do tons of ****, nothing to help most of the people who voted for him and in the end his supporters will go "He was great", turning a blind eye to all his mistakes and the fact that America has taken a massive turn for the worse in any metric you might objectively use. Like a true religious cult and its leader.

Let's stop the discussion here. I've seen enough. You guys lost your ability to think clearly.

omg
STFU

that roughly translates to: "Elodea's making all the argument's I'm too stupid to piece together myself".

Trump in 2012 after thinking Romney won the popular vote and not the EC. As all results hadn't come in yet, the irooony.




As we talk about hypocrisy in politics kek.

I'm hoping Trump does well in his fight for the working class, of course. For what he promises in that regard I will work with him. However- If he were to push Pence's religious agenda on America's people, not gonna have a good time.

I'm hoping for a total retaking of the Democratic party back to it's roots, Hillary was a failure and so is the DNC. In an attempt to have lost not even a little power in this country they now have zero. As the Republicans have rolled into the three branches over the misguided actions of the DNC. Every time I look at the DNC I see a shitty publisher like EA playing the safe route instead of making the change the people want.

All politics are hypocritical. Since you aren't supporting Gary Johnson, you're doing more damage to your own argument than you are bracing an argument for yourself. (Note, this applies to die-hard Trump supporters too, they also shoot themselves in the foot when they smear the opposition.) Remember when Hillary was Anti-LGBT? Peppridge Farm remembers. She's also super corporate, don't know what motivation she had to fix the wage gap for the poor. They say "she can evolve and change her stance". Can't Trump? Or does that only apply "to people I like"?

They are ALL hypocritical, the least of which would be Johnson, Stein, Sanders, Warren... you know, the people who AREN'T being nominated. The only successful outcome of that argument, is that it didn't matter who we elected. Hell, maybe there should have been a serious voting option for "no president this term", and just left the spot vacant. That'd be a popular option, the only option your argument supports, considering "nobody" would be completely unbiased and consistent.

lol, the popular vote is not even done yet. It's predicted that trump will have more popular votes as more military and absentee ballots come in. Those tweets are still retarded though.

False. Absentee ballots in California and Washington still coming in, reportedly 4 million in California alone. Clinton's popular vote lead projected to increase to 2 million.

You are arguing this:


They are arguing this:


So which do you go by? The nation's Constitution demands it be the latter, because it gives a weight of 2 votes per state to even the least populated states. "Empty space" gets a vote, because it's the "empty space" belonging to rural folk who have to suffer the same laws, as crowded areas with 10 million people in it. You understand why that makes sense? If not, look at the following:


These shaded areas, would decide the president for the entire country, and doesn't even represent half the states. They're all democrat-heavy, btw. Notice New York, California, Miami, California, the Liberal Texas cities, and California. Did I mention California? Why bother campaigning anywhere else? Why bother catering to anything but city law? Why not secede from the cities of a country that does that to you, is the better question. "Taxation without representation" caused a nation to declare independence before. They can't say they weren't represented now. *Shrug*

Why should one Wyomingian's vote be worth 4 Californians? By what virtue is a Wyomingian deserving of being worth four times as much as a Californian?

TIL I learned in democracy it's the space that votes, not the people.



I think I get the idea though. Basically if your population is 90% in the cities then you'll give all the nice things to people in the cities, causing people outside of cities to move to cities, further increasing the population of your cities. Until everyone lives on top of each other in the cities.



Still it's a weird system. "Your vote counts more if you live somewhere in the desert".

But actually: Should not the number of election-points winning a single state give relate to the number of people who live in that state? So it's not actually a complete "empty space votes"?

I dunno the details of your election system. Is it like that?

In the end the popularity vote isn't exactly that clear cut as well. Nearly 50:50. A nation split in two either way.

Because candidates don't campaign in low-populated areas. They spend money in the dense places.

This video has already done the rounds pretty widely, but I think it's a particularly brilliant piece:



As someone with views that are very much on the right of the traditional political spectrum, I am in complete agreement with this. Whenever I say anything vaguely political around my predominantly left-wing friends, I very rarely get reasoned debate or counter-arguments. Usually my comments and I both get dismissed as "something-ist".

This thread, despite getting quite heated at times, has largely been a positive step as far as the criticisms levelled in this video are concerned.

The fact that Clinton would be considered "left" sure is funny. There simply is no left in the USA. Just right and insanely-over-the-top right. Sanders would've been a little left.

In terms of "we need more discussion": While it's somewhat interesting to see the reasoning behind what some people with some views say I don't think it has really done anything. Quite often both sides of the argument are 110% convinced of their own views and are absolutely certain that the other side is wrong. There is a very deep divide in the political landscape, not only in the US, but in many other places.

I'd guess the reason why you're often not seeing a big willingness to talk about politics is because people have often made the experience that trying to talk it out feels like talking to a mirror setup to reflect anything you say flipped by 180°,. This thread sure feels like that to me. Whatever view I have, somebody will come around and tell me how they thing the polar opposite is true and that I am just misguided by something or someone. Obviously. While it's a somewhat good thing to be reminded not the whole world shares my viewpoints, it's still kind of annoying at times.

Nice graphic, reminds me how ridiculous this whole thing is to begin with where 20% of the population can impose their values on the other 80% because the opposing 19.99% didn't didn't have as many votes. There is no system more destructive of personal choice and individual expression of values.

Not to mention in order get a party voting bloc in the first place people are already compromising their values with each other.

If california wants to secede, they should be allowed to do what they want. Let people vote with their feet on an individual basis within a free marketplace of ideas. People who want trump should live under him, people who want clinton should live under her. Same with people who want neither.

I am really liking how Trump is waking people up to libertarianism, although it will take some time to deprogram these new liberals coming in .

"I pledge of allegiance, to the flag, of the United States of America, and to the REPUBLIC, for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."

A lot of that is being bent recently, the "God" bit being the least of my worries, the "indivisible, with liberty and justice for all" is the most worrisome.. It is a REPUBLIC, however.

So, how it works, is every state has as many votes as it has representing members in the legislative branch. EACH STATE has 2 Senators, each state has at least 1 House Representative, each state has at least 3 votes. Population causes a state to have more House Representatives, meaning the House legislates for population more than state equal-voice, and also means that states with more population have more votes for president.

So, there are 100 senators, 2 for each state, and 435 representatives in house, divided by percent population, California having 53, Alaska and company having 1 a piece. D.C. gets 3 electoral members for Presidential elections (but lack a senator or representative, it is not a state nor a part of a state). There are 100+435+3(D.C.)=538 electoral votes for president amongst the states.

So, California has 55 members of senate and house, it has 55 votes, to a low populated Wyoming/North Dakota/South Dakota's 3 votes. It has a SIGNIFICANTLY higher vote, but if it were "by population", for California's 55, Wyoming would be lucky to have 1 vote. It gets 3x more vote than it "should", but it has that many fewer people, gun control would really damn you if you also live 3 hours from the nearest police station or grocery store...

California has 53 representatives, but each state has at least 1. There are 435 representatives, 50 for the one each state gets, and California gets an additional 52 more. California has 53 representatives + 2 senators = 55 electoral votes. Texas has 36 + 2 senators = 38 electoral votes. Wyoming gets 1 rep + 2 senators = 3 electoral votes. Wyoming, again, has a really low population, but it gets 2 votes for being a state, and 1 vote based on population.

The exact weighted formula, for any State's Citizen's vote for President, then, is roughly...

[DELETED FOR BAD MATHS, REVISED FURTHER BELOW]

That is why the electoral college is, what it is. It doesn't give more than a 3 vote weight to the least heard voters, and most voters are within the ballpark of each other.

[REVISED]

Delegates = {3+[Pop/760,000]}

(State Electoral %)/(100%) = (State Delegates)/(Total Delegates)

(State Electoral %) = [(State Delegates)/5.38

(State Electoral %) / (State Voters) = (Voter Influence in Election)

(State Electoral %) / (State Population) = (Vote Worth Per Individual)

So, what percent of the vote does each voter have, dependent on their state? Well, Each state has at least 3 votes, their senate and 1 representative. Each state also has 1 vote per extra representative for every 760,000 population it has. This is a rough number and should correctly add up to the number of senate and house seats a state has, in California's case, 55. Now, that number, over 538, is the percent of vote the state represents, but you want to set it over 100 instead, so you divide by 5.8 so you are left with 9.48% out of 100% of the electoral vote. Now, you take that percent, and divide by how many voters in that state participated in the election. In California, that would be 9 million 600 thousand. 0.000000988%. Each voter in California represents roughly 9.8/10,000,000 votes.

In comparison to a Texas voter, their 38 electors, divided by 5.38, equals 7.06% of the total electoral college. divide that by all the voters in Texas in 2016, 8.7 million, 0.000000812%, or 8.2/10,000,000 votes. Each person represents 8.2 votes a piece toward the president, out of 10,000,000 votes.

Now, let's contrast it to Alaska. They have a population of 735,000, too little for another representative. They have a mere 3 representatives, divided by 5.38, for a mere .5576% of the total electoral college. They don't get 1/50th a representation, not even 1/100th, but slightly over 1/200th a voice in the presidential election. there were a mere 14,000 voters in Alaska though, so each person gets 0.0000398%, or 398/10,000,000 votes for president. Less than 1/10th of Alaska's population voted though, almost 1/50th of their population voted, so those that did vote, voted with the representation of their state and the population in it that didn't vote, making the per-vote representation almost 50x more per-person than Texas.

You can calculate all 3 against population instead, to find the "vote worth per population" of all the population and not just the voting population. The benefit of this, is that their weight, if they do not vote, is voted through those that do vote. For everyone that doesn't vote, everyone else's vote in the same state gets stronger, as though a vote not placed, is a vote surrendered to the rest of your peers to vote on your behalf.

California has 9.48% of the electoral votes, divided by their represented population of 39,000,000, each person is worth 0.000000243% a vote, or 2.43/10,000,000 votes. For everyone 3 people who don't (or can't) vote, each person that does vote, does so with the strength of 4 people by population.

Texas has 7.06% the electoral vote, and has 27,000,000, each person is worth 0.000000261%, or 2.61/10,000,000 votes. Each voter votes with the strength of 3.3 other represented people who make up the population but don't/can't vote.

Alaska has .5576% the electoral vote. Alaska has 735,000 population. Each person is worth 0.000000759%, or 7.59/10,000,000 votes. The population is worth 7.59 a piece, but only about 1 out of every 52 vote, so each voter votes on behalf of 52 other people in his state who didn't/couldn't vote.

Ofcourse it's annoying when people don't share your view. The church also found Galileo pretty annoying. And the Greeks found Socrates annoying enough to vote for him to poison himself. The point is having productive discussion in good faith where we point out blindspots in each other and try to keep reason over emotion.

I can't say I also didn't try pointing out our areas of agreement. For one thing, you convinced me that Trump may not be as anti-establishment as he says he is, which calls into question whether he will keep his word on everything else he says. Same thing happened with hopey changey Obama, and you saw it straight away when he started appointing the old democratic guard within his cabinet. Unfortunately, the media did not pick up on that as much as they should have.

And then there is Sanders who endorsed Hillary even though she rigged the nomination against him, and then went on to live in a nice holiday house paid by donations with seemingly no intention of giving all that money back. All of this raises interesting questions about whether voting to change the system is an effective method or not.

Anyway, I was just trying to tell you that the world is not filled with angry white men, xenophobes, racists, mysoginists, islamophobes etc etc. You should take these words seriously and reserve their power for the real deal instead of as common argumentative weapons to bludgeon an opponent with. It was Trump's economic message that resonated with people in the rust belt who were seeing their livelihoods decline. Same deal with Brexit. Look at how Wisconsin surprised everyone by going to Trump.

Be careful not to fall into this new anti-free speech culture forming on the far left.
http://www.occupy.com/article/sickness-left-are-student-progressives-real-authoritarians

We have the same arrangement in the UK, although I think it's probably more extreme due to the population distribution- I'd need to double check this but I think it's something like a little over 1/3 of the entire population is based in London / greater London. there has been campaigning for equal representation based on number of voters however that would simply hand control of the country entirely to London and the south of England. it would also ensure the conservative party are always elected. As someone who doesn't live in London and doesn't want one party to have total control I think the current system, whilst imperfect, is the better option....

Because of the electoral college, with the right combination, a person could win the presidential spot with only 23% of the popular vote. Has it ever happened? No. Is it ridiculous for being a possibility? In my opinion, yes.

This was back from 2012. The left most column is the State, the second is the total votes in 2012, third is how many votes are needed to win that state, and the last is how many electoral college votes the state is worth. This table shows how, at least in 2012, a candidate could win with 23% of the popular vote.

It was also used back in the day to use slave populations as a count for southern votes. Since otherwise the south was dwarfed by the North in popular vote. (As of course slaves couldn't vote.)

“The right of suffrage was much more diffusive [i.e., extensive] in the Northern than the Southern States; and the latter could have no influence in the election on the score of Negroes.” In other words, in a direct election system, the North would outnumber the South, whose many slaves (more than half a million in all) of course could not vote. But the Electoral College—a prototype of which Madison proposed in this same speech—instead let each southern state count its slaves, albeit with a two-fifths discount, in computing its share of the overall count.

you have no notion whatsoever of what the left is (despite there being not much left in american politics through and through).

It bewilders me you're able to trip over the word "liberals" as you threaten they'd be the barrier to "libertarianism" and manage to pretend not to notice they bear the same root. truly an astonishing feat. *clap* *clap* *clap*

You know what you're doing. you're willingly conscientiously defacing the truth to forward your narrative. One day hopefully your conscience will catch up with you.

oh please,

as if southern states had slave's interests at heart.

See what I mean guys?

See what I mean about the north not having freed slaves for the same reasons we would have today? they still didn't see them as humans. it was them being sick and tired of seeing mistreated animals.

baby steps guys. baby steps.

changes in mentality especially when the concerned group who's mentality to change ranges in the millions are made with baby steps.

and as you can witness in this thread, the job is never over.