Hillary says it's time to eliminate the Electoral College

[Zorba]

No I'm tired of years of this discussion it's part following when they go low we go high. That has never worked in my life, I suspect it's never worked in your life. That is the reason they go low.
Yes the previously mentioned guys all had the stink of I'm smarter than you & I know it. Except maybe Carter or Mondale, I was pretty young then. Obama managed to pull a Bill Clinton and own the insults, he didn't hide from the press, he didn't drive around in a prententuos scooby van. Hillary is not good with words that is why she followed carefully prepared speeches and comments. Her candidacy was run by committee, just look at the huge party goals from the DNC that summer. They have been posted here before, do you know of anyone who followed such a complicated plan and had success?
Democrats need to be better at protecting their reputations it's a fault we all have.

The original reason Bill was called bubba is it was supposed to be an insult, he's a country bumpkin but Bill turned it around and owned it.
Hillary needed to do something similar

Problem is most people that vote Democrat have no interest in the low intelligence smearing BS, while prior that vote Republican love it. So going low would make a dem lose a ton of his base and not do anything to win over Republicans.
The real problem is mass availability of pure Republican propaganda that softens even smart people's brains. There is a reason Democrats don't have similar propaganda machines, it's because Democrats generally use critical thinking skills and don't blindly believe everything negative about Republicans or everything positive about Democrats.

 

[spacejamz]

You don't really know what you're talking about, do you?

Exactly which part am I not understanding??? Why the founding fathers created the EC or that 3/4 of the states would need to ratify any changes to the EC system?

 

[TheVrolok]

Exactly which part am I not understanding??? Why the founding fathers created the EC or that 3/4 of the states would need to ratify any changes to the EC system?

Both, actually. Fortunately, your answers are above in the thread.

 

[fskimospy]

No because McCain went high, I would suggest Obama should have gone after the loons harder.

So you're saying McCain would have won if he had smeared Obama as a secret Muslim? I find that unlikely.

You own it by confronting it in a sincere way and explaining why it's not true. A good example on the Uranium to Russia thing would be to talk about the Steele(sp) document. I'm sure it was brought to her attention. You go crazy on me I'll go crazy on you.
I would prefer our Politics not go in that direction but that point passed years ago.

How did Clinton not confront this all in a sincere way and explain how it wasn't true? She literally sat in a public forum for like twelve hours straight and sincerely explained why the Benghazi nonsense wasn't true.

Also, you really think she would have won the election if she accused the guy who was just caught on tape saying he sexually assaulted women of watching two hookers pee on each other? To me the far more likely answer is they would have used the unverified nature of the Steele dossier at the time to distract from what he was actually verified as doing. Everyone knew Trump was a creep and a scumbag. They didn't care because he was part of their tribe.

These are generally pointless counterfactuals but I do not find them convincing.

 

[Jhhnn]

Exactly which part am I not understanding??? Why the founding fathers created the EC or that 3/4 of the states would need to ratify any changes to the EC system?

The part where the EC was designed to prevent the election of dangerous demagogues like our current President.

 

[fskimospy]

The attacks against Hillary that I was aware of was that she took millions of dollars from the terrorist supporting Saudis and supported their bloody agenda in the Middle East, that she took millions from corrupt banking interests and that she was in the back pocket of big pharma. No sane person took the strawman "allegations" you posted seriously.

Trump took tons of money from the terrorist supporting Saudis and he emphatically supports their bloody agenda in the Middle East. Corrupt banking interests have donated millions to every presidential candidate for decades now and when Obama won he was the biggest recipient of Wall Street money of all time. The idea that someone who proposed Medicare bargaining for lower prices and penalties for price gouging is in the pocket of 'Big Pharma' makes no logical sense.

Plenty of people took the 'strawman allegations' I posted seriously, including major media outlets that reported on them breathlessly despite them having no merit. Your allegations are equally ridiculous.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

So you're saying McCain would have won if he had smeared Obama as a secret Muslim? I find that unlikely.



How did Clinton not confront this all in a sincere way and explain how it wasn't true? She literally sat in a public forum for like twelve hours straight and sincerely explained why the Benghazi nonsense wasn't true.

No you are unintentionally diverting and this is a completely separate question from the first. That would take far more time to dig into which I do not want to do

That was done at a Senate hearing, she should have been talking to reporters 24/7 about it and how the Teabaggers blocked a spending bill to reinforce the Embassies, which was suggested under her leadership

Also, you really think she would have won the election if she accused the guy who was just caught on tape saying he sexually assaulted women of watching two hookers pee on each other? To me the far more likely answer is they would have used the unverified nature of the Steele dossier at the time to distract from what he was actually verified as doing. Everyone knew Trump was a creep and a scumbag. They didn't care because he was part of their tribe.

These are generally pointless counterfactuals but I do not find them convincing.

No but flipping the Russia thing sure would have been smart. Maybe add a People are saying Trump likes Hookers & Pee, I'm not so sure but plenty of people are talking about it.

That is how its done.

 

[disappoint]

The Electoral College says it's time to eliminate Hillary

Pathetic...absolutely pathetic...

I know right?

 

[fskimospy]

No you are unintentionally diverting and this is a completely separate question from the first. That would take far more time to dig into which I do not want to do

I'm not diverting at all. You said that no one has won by going high in our lifetimes and I offered two examples of exactly that. When presented with a counter-example you said it was only because McCain did not 'go low'. The logical conclusion from that is that McCain would have won if he did 'go low', otherwise my example would stand. It has to be one or the other.

That was done at a Senate hearing, she should have been talking to reporters 24/7 about it and how the Teabaggers blocked a spending bill to reinforce the Embassies, which was suggested under her leadership

'Congressional Republicans didn't adequately fund embassy security' really, REALLY does not sound like a winning presidential campaign slogan to me, especially when he opponent had nothing to do with that.

No but flipping the Russia thing sure would have been smart. Maybe add a People are saying Trump likes Hookers & Pee, I'm not so sure but plenty of people are talking about it.

That is how its done.

She did mention the Russia thing on numerous occasions. Again, I have trouble understanding why allowing Trump to cloud the narrative by feigning indignation about weird sex stories instead of focusing on confirmed weird sex stories would be better.

 

[BoomerD]

The electoral college should have been eliminated decades ago. It was useful once upon a time...in the days before near-instant communication and quick, easy travel, but nowadays...just go with the popular vote.

 

[fskimospy]

I know right?

I love how often conservatives post that map as if it means anything. It only makes sense if you think dirt votes instead of people, hahaha.

Here's how the map by county looked in 2008, a Democratic blowout:

Look at all that red where nobody lives!

Here's what 2008 looked like if you weight it by actual voters, you know, the things that count:

 

[bshole]

Trump took tons of money from the terrorist supporting Saudis and he emphatically supports their bloody agenda in the Middle East. Corrupt banking interests have donated millions to every presidential candidate for decades now and when Obama won he was the biggest recipient of Wall Street money of all time. The idea that someone who proposed Medicare bargaining for lower prices and penalties for price gouging is in the pocket of 'Big Pharma' makes no logical sense.

Plenty of people took the 'strawman allegations' I posted seriously, including major media outlets that reported on them breathlessly despite them having no merit. Your allegations are equally ridiculous.

Both sides do it..... EXCEPT that Justice Democrats are a thing and they don't do it. Cavalier acceptance of political corruption on all sides is not progressive, it is regressive. Ask Noam Chomsky what he thinks about the current Democratic party:

Explaining the popularity of Mr Trump to US voters, the academic said: “The Democrats gave up on the working class 40 years ago. The working class is just not their constituency.
:
That changed in the ’70s with the onset of the neoliberal era that we’ve been living in since. And if you ask yourself what this era is, its crucial principle is undermining mechanisms of social solidarity and mutual support and popular engagement in determining policy.

It’s not called that. What it’s called is “freedom,” but “freedom” means a subordination to the decisions of concentrated, unaccountable, private power. That’s what it means. The institutions of governance—or other kinds of association that could allow people to participate in decision making—those are systematically weakened.

PS: I am curious as to why you think that if Trump (without question the worst human to ever hold the presidency) does something, it makes it ok for Clinton to do it. I can see the argument the other way but I don't understand the logic the way you put it. This shouldn't be a race to the bottom but rather a climb to the top.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...ory-donald-trump-administration-a7730086.html

 

[BurnItDwn]

I agree,
get rid of the electoral college

But just as important, and on the same subject, we should treat people of American territories the same as people in the states.
Puerto Rico needs to get counted.
And the 700K or so people in DC should be counted
Guam, the northern marinara islands, and the virgin islands need to be counted.

And have a "run off" election if no candidate reaches > 50% (no punishment for voting 3rd party.)

Also, mandatory voting, make election day national holiday, and allow ALL citizens to vote, including criminals or people in prison.

 

[fskimospy]

Both sides do it..... EXCEPT that Justice Democrats are a thing and they don't do it. Cavalier acceptance of political corruption on all sides is not progressive, it is regressive. Ask Noam Chomsky what he thinks about the current Democratic party:

It's interesting that our good friend Noam is still arguing about that after the largest increase in the social safety net since the 1960's happened during the last Democratic administration along with some of the most sweeping regulation of that concentrated, unaccountable, private power that's happened in decades.

I appreciate Chomsky's perspective but he's like a broken record at this point and I find the term 'neoliberalism' to be one of the dumbest things our political discourse has invented in a long time. It's basically shorthand for 'anything I don't like'.

PS: I am curious as to why you think that if Trump (without question the worst human to ever hold the presidency) does something, it makes it ok for Clinton to do it. I can see the argument the other way but I don't understand the logic the way you put it. This shouldn't be a race to the bottom but rather a climb to the top.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...ory-donald-trump-administration-a7730086.html

Whatever you think the characteristics of a president SHOULD be, we were talking about winning elections. I don't find it convincing that people decided to vote for Trump over Clinton because of her imagined corruption or whatever when Trump's corruption was not imagined, but blatantly obvious. Democratic voters might have cared about those things but Republican voters didn't. Making your own candidate act in objectionable ways to your voters seems like a bad idea. This is part of the reason why I find the argument that Democrats should act like Republicans in order to win unpersuasive.

 

[kage69]

I agree,
get rid of the electoral college

But just as important, and on the same subject, we should treat people of American territories the same as people in the states.
Puerto Rico needs to get counted.
And the 700K or so people in DC should be counted
Guam, the northern marinara islands, and the virgin islands need to be counted.

And have a "run off" election if no candidate reaches > 50% (no punishment for voting 3rd party.)

Also, mandatory voting, make election day national holiday, and allow ALL citizens to vote, including criminals or people in prison.

With the exception of the current criminals there at the end, yeah sounds good to me.

 

[bshole]

Whatever you think the characteristics of a president SHOULD be, we were talking about winning elections. I don't find it convincing that people decided to vote for Trump over Clinton because of her imagined corruption or whatever when Trump's corruption was not imagined, but blatantly obvious. Democratic voters might have cared about those things but Republican voters didn't. Making your own candidate act in objectionable ways to your voters seems like a bad idea. This is part of the reason why I find the argument that Democrats should act like Republicans in order to win unpersuasive.

I have hard time accepting that there were people out there who could have gone for either candidate. In the last election, there was never a question about whether I would vote for Trump. The question was whether I would vote for Hillary, not vote, or do a third party protest vote.

And yes I agree with you that on the corruption scale Trump trumps Clinton by a country mile and that was quite obvious long before the election.

 

[1sikbITCH]

Yes let's speak plainly. Please put forth the evidence you have that she is likely corrupt and guilty. When you do, you'll realize that claim isnbullshit.


Man was Clinton right in her book, the irrational hatred of her makes absolutely no sense.

My hatred of her is not irrational. She stayed with a cheating husband because he was the president. I lost all respect for her then and at first I thought she was just weak but we soon found out she was just another self-serving politician. She sent a message to millions of young girls it's ok for your husband to cheat on you. That always irked the shit out of me about her.

Evidence that she is "likely" corrupt and guilty. "likely" is subjective and the Clintons have been involved in some black dealings or other since I first heard of them in 1992 and probably before. They were doing dirt while they were still in Arkansas. Go read up on Whitewater, Travelgate, Filegate, and I would like some definitive answers on Benghazi. Always plenty of smoke and always they slither away. Her husband was a snake charmer (I still thought he did a good job overall); HRC is a snake. You will never learn half the shit these folks got away with just like they'll never get Trump either.

Now actual evidence, here you go: https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/3183007/Memo-from-Bill-Clinton-aide-on-how-Teneo.pdf

https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/36761#content
I'm also starting to worry that if this story gets out, we are screwed.

I would say that those docs are evidence that corruption is likely. Could be proven fake or whatever I guess.

But I don't say she is poison because she is corrupt. She's poison because the very mention of her name pollutes the discussion whether it's her fault or not, and now she is just a distraction. Now instead of talking policies etc. here we are talking about HRC again. Plus she IS the establishment. Even democrats want to drain the swamp or the DNC would not have had to rig the primary to keep Bernie from winning the nomination.

I still voted for her because Trump, but I would have voted for any other candidate I can think of other than Ben Carson this election cycle especially after how they handled Bernie.

Feed her to Trump so the party can move forward from this sordid past.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

I'm not diverting at all. You said that no one has won by going high in our lifetimes and I offered two examples of exactly that. When presented with a counter-example you said it was only because McCain did not 'go low'. The logical conclusion from that is that McCain would have won if he did 'go low', otherwise my example would stand. It has to be one or the other.



'Congressional Republicans didn't adequately fund embassy security' really, REALLY does not sound like a winning presidential campaign slogan to me, especially when he opponent had nothing to do with that.



She did mention the Russia thing on numerous occasions. Again, I have trouble understanding why allowing Trump to cloud the narrative by feigning indignation about weird sex stories instead of focusing on confirmed weird sex stories would be better.

This is what I mean, the smartest guy in the room says it's wrong. Keep on keepin on, worked out real well last election didn't it

 

[sandorski]

A decent idea, the wrong person to lead the charge.

 

[fskimospy]

This is what I mean, the smartest guy in the room says it's wrong. Keep on keepin on, worked out real well last election didn't it

Worked real well in two of the last three, haha.

 

[Jhhnn]

America needs a system where any President has an honest mandate from the People. The Parties & personalities are really immaterial in that broader context. Unlike the preceding 100+ years, the EC has failed to deliver that for 2 of our last 3 Presidents & failed to prevent a dangerous demagogue of the minority from holding that office in 2016. It's not just useless for the purposes of honest democracy but rather counter productive.

We need less divisiveness, not more, and the EC in its current form just makes the problem worse. That's why the National popular vote compact is such a great idea. It satisfies the Constitutional requirements & will make the popular vote winner the President every time. Every voter gets an equal measure of respect.

 

[Zorba]

My hatred of her is not irrational. She stayed with a cheating husband because he was the president. I lost all respect for her then and at first I thought she was just weak but we soon found out she was just another self-serving politician. She sent a message to millions of young girls it's ok for your husband to cheat on you. That always irked the shit out of me about her.

Tons of spouses work through cheating. If the only reason she stayed with him was for political reasons, why is she still with him? I've never understood this line of attack from republicans, if it was any other women she'd be held up as an example of forgiveness and putting her family and vows before spite and revenge. This line of attack just shows the pure irrational hatred of Hillary. I promise if she had left him, the attack would still be used just "she didn't give him a chance! She broke up their family! She embarrassed the US by making a seating president go through a divorce."

Do you hold the same issue against Jackie Kennedy? I don't think I've ever heard anyone attack her for staying with JFK and how she was a horrible role model for girls.

 

[Jhhnn]

My hatred of her is not irrational. She stayed with a cheating husband because he was the president. I lost all respect for her then and at first I thought she was just weak but we soon found out she was just another self-serving politician. She sent a message to millions of young girls it's ok for your husband to cheat on you. That always irked the shit out of me about her.

Evidence that she is "likely" corrupt and guilty. "likely" is subjective and the Clintons have been involved in some black dealings or other since I first heard of them in 1992 and probably before. They were doing dirt while they were still in Arkansas. Go read up on Whitewater, Travelgate, Filegate, and I would like some definitive answers on Benghazi. Always plenty of smoke and always they slither away. Her husband was a snake charmer (I still thought he did a good job overall); HRC is a snake. You will never learn half the shit these folks got away with just like they'll never get Trump either.

Now actual evidence, here you go: https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/3183007/Memo-from-Bill-Clinton-aide-on-how-Teneo.pdf

https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/36761#content
I'm also starting to worry that if this story gets out, we are screwed.

I would say that those docs are evidence that corruption is likely. Could be proven fake or whatever I guess.

But I don't say she is poison because she is corrupt. She's poison because the very mention of her name pollutes the discussion whether it's her fault or not, and now she is just a distraction. Now instead of talking policies etc. here we are talking about HRC again. Plus she IS the establishment. Even democrats want to drain the swamp or the DNC would not have had to rig the primary to keep Bernie from winning the nomination.

I still voted for her because Trump, but I would have voted for any other candidate I can think of other than Ben Carson this election cycle especially after how they handled Bernie.

Feed her to Trump so the party can move forward from this sordid past.

Gawd. Keep killing the messenger.

 

[trenchfoot]

Proof positive that Hillary hate is a pathological condition.

Now that we have the luxury of a bit of telling 20/20 hindsight, I think it would be a really good time to ask Trump voters why having Trump as POTUS is so much better than having Hillary. Methinks it would confirm without doubt what you are positing in your post.

What sort of scares me though is how many Trump supporters spew out word for word every bald faced lie coming out of Sarah Sander's face as their proof of why voting for Trump was such a good idea.

Preponderance of factual evidence have absolutely no meaning when it comes to why Trump still enjoys the support of the Repub base. I really don't think our founding fathers could have ever imagined how their intentions toward creating a successful and prosperous system of government could have been so corrupted and skewed by big moneyed interests such that a guy like Trump could one day be the leader of the free world.

 

[soulcougher73]

I guess we should assign senators by population too. Mob rule, why not? There is a reason we are not a democracy.

Youd rather minority rule? that is silly. where do you stop? the guy who only got 1 vote for something? Majority rules because it makes the most sense.