POTUS

[KopsTheTerminator]

So I hear Hillary actually has the popular vote but lost in the "electoral college".

Can an American explain to me what that means? What is it and why is it necessary?

[FireAndSun]

The populace doesn't elect the president directly. The electoral college is what does. What a citizen is really voting for is an elector who votes for one of the candidates for you. They usually vote along party lines, but they don't have to. Each state has a certain number of electoral votes, the larger it is the larger the number, and a candidate needs at least 270 electoral votes to win. Usually, electors do vote how they pledged to, but they don't always. Some absain or vote differently, so it can result in a candidate winning the electoral college, but not the popular vote. Some states also just do a winner takes all system, and get all the electoral votes in a state if they win the popular vote in that state, so it doesn't matter if they lost the popular vote at large. This is the 4th time someone has won the electoral vote despite losing the popular vote. As for why we have it, the founders of the nation didn't think the average citizen was knowledgeable enough to directly vote for a presidential candidate, so they created the electoral college as a compromise for the issue. Today, it causes a lot of controversy, and this election is bound to exacerbate it.

[KopsTheTerminator]

Huh... yeah, that does sound like something that'd be controversial. I'll be honest, that does sound shady. Not that I have an answer for how democracy should really work...

I don't know, I expect a bit of an uproar in the US over this. Not sure what's gonna happen now.

[FireAndSun]

It's also controversial because it gives smaller states more power per vote than larger states, seeing as every state gets at least 3 electoral votes. And I've read there are protests going on now, so there are definitely an uproar on some level. I just don't know if I expect too much of one. Hillary just barely won the popular vote.

[Tora]

I'm sorry but she won the popular vote by such a slim margin of 188,810 votes. The system isn't something new it has been in place since the beginning and there are many times where a candidate has "won" the popular vote, but wasn't elected and it didn't cause an uprising. Hillary supporters need to calm down and accept the outcome like she preached. Winning a popular vote with 0.2% is nothing to flip out over. All this screaming leftist crudola about racism and sexism really needs to quit. They need to concede defeat like it is tradition in this country. I can't accept that this is a "hate filled, racist" country when Obama won the presidency with 65,915,795 votes as compared to Trump's 59,286,087. What that says is the same "racist" people voted for a man with black skin. Gee must all be racists...

[Carl]

^ No one's said anything like that here, so chill out. I'm the only one who said "hate-filled" and that wasn't referring specifically to Trump or this election, but to the way people act; people I've seen personally and the system itself. Anyway, most people here didn't want either Trump or Hillary to win. The system has been this way for ages yes, and it has been flawed all that time. A perfect system can't exist, though. The problem with this election is that we don't have other parties as big as the main two, both of which are jokes.

As for what the future holds, to anyone who was wondering, I have an idea:

Spoiler: show

It is a period of civil war. Rebel spaceships, striking from a hidden base, have won their first victory against the evil Galactic Empire.
During the battle, Rebel spies managed to steal secret plans to the Empire's ultimate weapon, the DEATH STAR, an armored space station with enough power to destroy an entire planet.

Pursued by the Empire's sinister agents, Princess Leia races home aboard her starship, custodian of the stolen plans that can save her people and restore freedom to the galaxy....

[FireAndSun]

I'm sorry but she won the popular vote by such a slim margin of 188,810 votes. The system isn't something new it has been in place since the beginning and there are many times where a candidate has "won" the popular vote, but wasn't elected and it didn't cause an uprising. Hillary supporters need to calm down and accept the outcome like she preached. Winning a popular vote with 0.2% is nothing to flip out over. All this screaming leftist crudola about racism and sexism really needs to quit. They need to concede defeat like it is tradition in this country. I can't accept that this is a "hate filled, racist" country when Obama won the presidency with 65,915,795 votes as compared to Trump's 59,286,087. What that says is the same "racist" people voted for a man with black skin. Gee must all be racists...

I'm not a Hillary supporter, and I acknowledged she barely won the popular vote. I'm merely saying this has happened before, and the last time it did the nation was not this divided, and it did cause a lot of controversy. And this nation does still have issues with racism and sexism. Perhaps not as overtly as it once did, but the legacy of that history is still here whether we like it or not. Just because people voted for a black president doesn't mean all issues regarding race are magically gone. I'm not saying there weren't legitimate reasons to dislike Obama or to be unhappy in general. But Trump was able to capitalize on the fear and dissatisfaction present in the population and work it to his advantage with a lot of people. This election was a very contentious one in general, so I and a lot of people simply didn't support either candidate. Voting for Obama does not mean the issues surrounding race are magically over. The current controversies surrounding race since Obama took office prove as such.

[Tora]

All I am saying is that is seems like the left insists that there is a gigantic racism problem in America, but that simply isn't the case. Is there racism throughout the country? Sure. Is it as a big as the media portrays it? No. There is always going to be racist people, but this election was never about race. And to say, not that you said it, that Trump supporters are all racist gets me. I voted for Obama in 2012, because Romney was a blabbering buffoon, but I couldn't vote for Hillary for a significantly long list of problems. To vote for a third part felt like a vote for Hillary, and I just couldn't do that. And to be honest I agree with Trump on a lot of things. Has he made stupid comments toward women? Yes. Has he said things that appear to be racist? Somewhat. What he said can be interpreted two different ways and I can see why some may think him a racist, but Clinton posed a serious threat to national security which just can not be accepted.

Edit: No not mad just probably sound like it. lol

[FireAndSun]

^ I don't think all Trump supporters are racist. I don't even think most are bad people. Nothing is that black and white. I'm merely saying Trump fueled a lot of people who were with his rhetoric. Whether Trump himself is racist or not is beyond the point. A lot of people either grudgingly picked a candidate or were swayed by Trump's charisma and promises to make everything better. How contentious this election was shows how divided this country is. Regardless of who won, that was always going to be an issue come the end of the election. Trump now has to be the one who can unite the nation, and I'm not sure if he can. I've made no secret I don't like or support Trump. But my fear and uncertainty goes beyond him. I fear one party having too much control. And I fear where we go from here, when we're clearly deeply divided. I would have felt similarly had Hillary won.

[KopsTheTerminator]

I'll read the full posts in a bit but honestly I've not seen a single one of us here claim they like/support Hillary at any point, so let's chill. Honestly I hate both candidates (and even thought Trump is the lesser evil at one point because yeah, Hillary's sketchy history is very much inexcusable), but I can't for the life of me feel good about Trump winning.

EDIT: One good thing about this is that at least Hillary didn't make it to the White House after scandals that would have landed a normal citizen in jail. That would imply an awful lot about democracy and the law not applying to "the elites".