I've been debating with myself about whether to write something about this -- I generally avoid politics on this blog. And on Facebook, which is relevant since I link all of my blogposts to my Facebook feed. I didn't join Facebook to argue politics. But WTH.
Since it's relevant, I should say how I voted in the recent Presidential election. Faced with two egregiously bad choices, I wrote in Evan McMullin. I had the luxury of doing that since I live in a deep blue state. Had I lived in a purple state I would have held my nose and voted for Clinton. It seems odd to talk about deep blue versus purple, since until November 8 I assumed that Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania were blue. Go figure. Since It's also relevant, in 2000 (the last time the winner of the election didn't get the plurality of the popular vote), I voted for Gore. Though I did so with severe misgivings.
Before I go on, I should note that I am not interested in arguing who was the better candidate, or such matters. I am posting this specifically to talk about the electoral college.
With the electoral college vote (the election that truly matters) looming, many people who were disappointed with the November 8 results are hoping against hope to flip enough electors to make Clinton the next President. Or at least to make someone other than Trump the next president. Electors have been barraged by emails and phone calls. Some have been receiving threats. None of these attempts to flip the election results will succeed.
Why won't they succeed? Since Trump won 306 electors on Election day, 37 electors would have to go rogue for him to not win outright when the EC votes are counted. That would be unprecedented. And even then the election would go to the House of Representatives, which would be almost certain to make him the winner. In order for Clinton to win the election she'd have to win the EC vote outright, which means she'd have to pick up 38 of the electors sworn to Trump. Put simply, it ain't gonna happen.
Nor should it.
There are essentially two arguments for handing the election to Clinton:
1) she won the "popular vote"; and
2) Trump is egregiously unfit.
She won the "popular vote"
Irrelevant. The rules of the election are clear. You need 270 EC votes to win. Clinton knew that as well as anyone; she entered a contest that requires you to win 270 electoral votes regardless of the popular vote. Running up the score in New York or California doesn't change a thing. Had she won every vote in those states, it wouldn't change the electoral votes.
If you want to change the rules, go ahead and fight to have the rules changed. But you can't apply changes retroactively. Seems to me that should be Civics 101.
People saying that Clinton would have won the election if it went by popular vote are simply wrong. She would have won the election if it went by popular vote and everyone voted (or didn't vote) the same way. That's a really big assumption, and it's wrong. The candidates and their strategists knew the game, and played to win. That is, they were trying to maximize their chances of winning the EC. They were not trying to win the popular vote.
There are other arguments, but they generally fall into the more general issue of whether we should switch to a popular vote system. I'll address them when I address that question. As far as the issue at hand -- determining the 2016 winner, the simple fact is that you don't change the rules after you've played the game.
Oh, and if you're making this argument, I have a simple question: Suppose the shoe were on the other foot. If Clinton had won the EC, but Trump had won the popular vote, would you arguing that Clinton's electors should flip to make Trump the president? If not, then you're not really arguing on principle.
Trump is egregiously unfit
I actually have some sympathy for this argument. One of the reasons we have the system we do is so that electors can act as a last stand, preventing an unfit candidate from becoming president. So, at least in principle, the argument makes sense.
While Trump is a terrible choice for President, is he so egregiously unfit that he should be denied the presidency? I think that denying him the presidency now would be tremendously harmful to the country. More harmful than he would be. A big reason that Trump won is that there are millions of people who feel that the political class ignores their concerns and doesn't listen to them. Now they have gone to the polls, and Trump emerged as the apparent winner. Denying him the presidency will simply confirm their concerns about the political class.
Also, it's a dangerous path to go down -- overturning a clear EC victory. That would be the height of arrogance on the part of the elites.
Now is the time for those of us who don't like Trump to hope he's better than we fear, to support him when he's right and to oppose him when he's wrong. There are two other branches of government to counter his overreach (assuming he does overreach), and impeachment is a possibility in case of extreme circumstances. And even without anything that extreme, we'll have a chance to trade him in in four years.
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