Doug Jones on Sunday morning

[Rvaughn]

[KeithE]

[Tim Bonney]

Everyone knew about Trump's inappropriate sexual behavior long ago. What would mean he should leave office to me is if he was actually involved in collusion with the Russians and obstructed justice to cover it up. If that happened, he is a traitor and should leave office.

[Sandy]

[Tim Bonney]

[Sandy]

The electoral college was an anomaly for the American "experiment in Democracy" with philosophical ties to the old European idea of protecting the "landed aristocracy." In the case of the US, the main purpose it served was to secure support of the smaller colonies as smaller states for the ratification of the constitution. There are plenty of reasons why it should have been abolished after the Civil War, since it was the primary means by which politicians supporting slavery were able to hang on to power, and was the reason why the Civil War occurred in the first place. At any rate, the anomalies which have occured since the beginning of this century are large enough to demonstrate that the EC is obsolete, and needs to be abolished and replaced. If we're not going to have a consistent system of voting nationwide, at least everyone's vote should count the same.

[Dave Roberts]

[Sandy]

The electoral college is a limit that was deliberately placed on national interests, based on fear of monarchy, and on what was at the time a very inequitable distribution of population and resources in the colonies. Each colony was thinking of itself as a political and national entity, not as part of a whole. Several of them even went to war with each other over economic interests and territory prior to the adoption of the constitution. As a result, there is no place in the government where the national interest is directly represented.

[Rvaughn]

[Dave Roberts]

[Sandy]

[Rvaughn]

Circumstances and differences notwithstanding, the point I was making is that we have never elected the POTUS by popular vote. Tim seemed to imply we have something new in saying, "We now have a system where the least qualified candidate of any of the parties of any of the individuals running was the man who got elected without a majority of the national vote." We have room for a discussion of changes that could be made, but "the majority of the popular vote" will only guarantee the election of the person who gets the majority of the popular vote -- not that the least qualified candidate doesn't get elected. I don't think we would have to look at all that many politicians to find that some "least qualified candidates" have been elected by popular vote in state, district, and local elections.

BTW, re the OP, I also agree with Doug Jones on things that were already known and Trump still elected despite them.