Donald Trump

Merkin Baller said:

How the f can anyone defend what he says about women in the media? How is this ok? 

https://twitter.com/leannenaramore/status/880466261960007680

eddiec said:

I just went to Breitbart to get their spin. His base loves him even more after this.

Gern Blansten said:

Kat said:

Re: the earlier posts....I've had to come to the conclusion that the Electoral College is crooked. How did it get that way? Whose math is this and how did someone decide it was fair to do this to people?

From Slate: "The states with the fewest people per electoral vote, and therefore the highest “vote power,” are Wyoming, Vermont, and North Dakota. In Wyoming, there are 143,000 people for each of its three electoral votes. The states with the weakest votes are New York, Florida, and California. These states each have around 500,000 people for each electoral vote."

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/map_of_the_week/2012/11/presidential_election_a_map_showing_the_vote_power_of_all_50_states.html

Yeah I think it's time to scrap it.  It made sense when it was installed but that was before TV, radio, internet, etc.

Definitely not the will of the people any more.

HesCalledDyer said:

Albert Almora Jr's finger about sums it up...

benjs said:

Kat said:

Re: the earlier posts....I've had to come to the conclusion that the Electoral College is crooked. How did it get that way? Whose math is this and how did someone decide it was fair to do this to people?

From Slate: "The states with the fewest people per electoral vote, and therefore the highest “vote power,” are Wyoming, Vermont, and North Dakota. In Wyoming, there are 143,000 people for each of its three electoral votes. The states with the weakest votes are New York, Florida, and California. These states each have around 500,000 people for each electoral vote."

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/map_of_the_week/2012/11/presidential_election_a_map_showing_the_vote_power_of_all_50_states.html

Kat, there are some mathematics involved that seem complicated on the surface, but keep in mind that a floor and ceiling to proportional power were critical in the eyes of the drafters of the Constitution. These were largely divided States who needed to be assured that one State's power could never be so low as to be immaterial, and never so high as to make others irrelevant. I'll try my best (aided by some wonderful Wikipedia information and graphics) to explain.

The number of Electoral College votes is 538. Of those:

100 are for two senators per State, leaving 438.

A simulation of the assignment of electoral votes (States only - D.C. is not eligible) then determines the lowest number of electors a State would win, and that quantity of electors is assigned to D.C. as per the 23rd Amendment. This leaves D.C.'s weighting on the Presidency perpetually at the minimum. Currently, that's 3 electors which then get assigned to D.C., leaving 435 electors to assign to various States.

First, one elector is assigned to each of the 50 States. This 'floor' was necessary at the time of the writing of the Constitution, to ensure largely divided States to feel that, regardless of their population, they would never be put in a situation where they had no Congressional or electing power. This leaves 385 electors to assign.

The Electoral College assignment from here is done equivalently to Congressional seat assignments, using what's known as the Method of Equal Proportions. As per Wikipedia, which explains it far better than I can, "The apportionment methodology currently used is the method of equal proportions,[1][18][19][20] so called because it guarantees that no additional transfer of a seat (from one state to another) will reduce the ratio between the numbers of persons per representative in any two states.[21] The method of equal proportions minimizes the percentage differences in the populations of the congressional districts."

Moving past the jargon! 

The first round of assignments take place, with the formula here. A(1) means the Priority per State for elector 1, and P is the State's population. This is done for all States, and the highest A(1) receives the electoral vote. This is directly proportional to the highest populated State for the first round.

https://wikimedia.org/api/rest_v1/media/math/render/svg/dd342b4514c54dfb31964bca3e5725ed7d14e614

After this, votes are doled out with the following formula, where A(n+1) talks about the hypothetical new Seat. n+1 indicates how many seats would be had by the State if they win the round, and n indicates how many seats are already had based on the rounds which have taken place. For example, after the first vote has been assigned to, say, California (the largest populated State), California's Priority would be A(2) = [square root of ( 1 / (1 + 2))] * the Priority from the 1st seat's round.

https://wikimedia.org/api/rest_v1/media/math/render/svg/5c8cfbec4453698e84b14b86c67af54df33f72b7

This is repeated until all 385 votes are assigned to the States.

I know it seems absurd, but it's actually a very clever way to (relatively speaking) evenly distribute power, not penalizing States too much for having smaller populations, and not rewarding States too much for having larger ones. 

HesCalledDyer said:

Albert Almora Jr's finger about sums it up...

Gern Blansten said:

benjs said:

Kat said:

Re: the earlier posts....I've had to come to the conclusion that the Electoral College is crooked. How did it get that way? Whose math is this and how did someone decide it was fair to do this to people?

From Slate: "The states with the fewest people per electoral vote, and therefore the highest “vote power,” are Wyoming, Vermont, and North Dakota. In Wyoming, there are 143,000 people for each of its three electoral votes. The states with the weakest votes are New York, Florida, and California. These states each have around 500,000 people for each electoral vote."

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/map_of_the_week/2012/11/presidential_election_a_map_showing_the_vote_power_of_all_50_states.html

Kat, there are some mathematics involved that seem complicated on the surface, but keep in mind that a floor and ceiling to proportional power were critical in the eyes of the drafters of the Constitution. These were largely divided States who needed to be assured that one State's power could never be so low as to be immaterial, and never so high as to make others irrelevant. I'll try my best (aided by some wonderful Wikipedia information and graphics) to explain.

The number of Electoral College votes is 538. Of those:

100 are for two senators per State, leaving 438.

A simulation of the assignment of electoral votes (States only - D.C. is not eligible) then determines the lowest number of electors a State would win, and that quantity of electors is assigned to D.C. as per the 23rd Amendment. This leaves D.C.'s weighting on the Presidency perpetually at the minimum. Currently, that's 3 electors which then get assigned to D.C., leaving 435 electors to assign to various States.

First, one elector is assigned to each of the 50 States. This 'floor' was necessary at the time of the writing of the Constitution, to ensure largely divided States to feel that, regardless of their population, they would never be put in a situation where they had no Congressional or electing power. This leaves 385 electors to assign.

The Electoral College assignment from here is done equivalently to Congressional seat assignments, using what's known as the Method of Equal Proportions. As per Wikipedia, which explains it far better than I can, "The apportionment methodology currently used is the method of equal proportions,[1][18][19][20] so called because it guarantees that no additional transfer of a seat (from one state to another) will reduce the ratio between the numbers of persons per representative in any two states.[21] The method of equal proportions minimizes the percentage differences in the populations of the congressional districts."

Moving past the jargon! 

The first round of assignments take place, with the formula here. A(1) means the Priority per State for elector 1, and P is the State's population. This is done for all States, and the highest A(1) receives the electoral vote. This is directly proportional to the highest populated State for the first round.

https://wikimedia.org/api/rest_v1/media/math/render/svg/dd342b4514c54dfb31964bca3e5725ed7d14e614

After this, votes are doled out with the following formula, where A(n+1) talks about the hypothetical new Seat. n+1 indicates how many seats would be had by the State if they win the round, and n indicates how many seats are already had based on the rounds which have taken place. For example, after the first vote has been assigned to, say, California (the largest populated State), California's Priority would be A(2) = [square root of ( 1 / (1 + 2))] * the Priority from the 1st seat's round.

https://wikimedia.org/api/rest_v1/media/math/render/svg/5c8cfbec4453698e84b14b86c67af54df33f72b7

This is repeated until all 385 votes are assigned to the States.

I know it seems absurd, but it's actually a very clever way to (relatively speaking) evenly distribute power, not penalizing States too much for having smaller populations, and not rewarding States too much for having larger ones. 

Right....but it doesn't work.  The vote allocation isn't accurate/fair.

You can't tell me that it is fair that Clinton had 3 million more votes and still lost.  Bush/Gore was bad enough at 500,000 votes