Academic historians like Kevin Kruse and Manisha Sihna take to social media to criticize the current President. There is merit in using history to critically analyze current events.
Their analysis begins to fall apart when they bemoan the manner in which Donald Trump was elected. Like many “progressive” intellectuals they despise the electoral system and argue for plurality when electing our President. They go as far as to claim Hillary Clinton is the legitimate election winner, and the electoral system is harming society because it attacks our democracy.
- It appears two prominent American Historians have deep-seated philosophical opposition to our representative democracy- the United States is a republic.
- There is absolutely no proof that the Electoral College was created to protect the interests of slave owners.
- Professors Sihna and Kruse are quick to cite 2016 and 2000 as examples of our electoral process failing, most likely because they supported the two losing candidates. Where is their outrage at the election of 1876? A Democrat won the popular vote but not the election….
It is difficult to argue with the results of the election. Samuel J. Tilden would have been a disastrous President.
If Trump had won the popular vote and Hillary had won the electoral vote, they would be praising the electoral college for denying Trump the Presidency.
If they media hadn’t screwed up royally in 2000 by calling Florida early, I believe that Bush would have won the popular vote as well as the electoral vote. It has been shown that when a candidate wins early in a landslide, voter that favor the losing candidate tend to stay home at a higher rate than voters that favor the winning candidate. That is why in landslides the winner generally sweeps or nearly sweeps the Pacific & Mountain time zones.
I wrote my on article on the electoral college that can be seen here: https://sdu754.wordpress.com/2020/08/29/the-electoral-college-2/
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Thanks for the link. I’ve written about its importance too. I like to compare it to the 1960 World Series. Plurality cannot tell the entire story.
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If it had not been for the Electoral College, Lincoln might never have become President.
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Lincoln did win the popular and electoral votes.
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