Votes Matter ... or Do They?

[Pdxfashionpioneer]

To set the record straight:

Jenn: Politifact found that Trump was untruthful over 90% of the time. Hillary Clinton, under 30%.

Moonshadow: I felt Dennis was trying to provide some light-hearted, dry, British humor when he called you on spelling out your profanity. In most "blue" states you'll find that liberalism is an urban phenomenon and that the rural areas vote "red." It's another one of our divides as a nation. Also, post-election demonstrations are NOT standard practice AT ALL in the US. I'm about twice your age and I don't remember this happening before.

Oldsalt1: There are no grounds for referring to our President as a piece of garbage. Disagree with every single one of his policies and ideas. Vehemently if you will. But I'm sure even his harshest critics have to admit he's a class act. Read or listen to the speech he gave in Cuba.

The bottom line is just what Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton said, we all owe it to ourselves and our country to give President-elect Trump a chance to govern before we throw him under the bus. He's the best President-elect that we have!

[moonshadow]

Moonshadow: I felt Dennis was trying to provide some light-hearted, dry, British humor when he called you on spelling out your profanity.

If that's true then I do sincerely apologize to my British friend Dennis. Although emoticons work wonders to convey the correct context in the written world.

[Tor]

Well, not the outcome of the election I'd feared. Someone I know actually said to me in so many words "Since Trump got in, I think I can stay in the country."

As for the honesty of the vote, I'm not sure it was honest, but the reports of fraud I'm aware of were tilting things in Hillary's favour. If an election rigged against Trump comes out in his favour, I have to conclude that noticeably more than half of voters think he was the better (or less bad) choice. Still, that's on the order of 1/6th of the population who voted for the man.

We'll have to see over time, but I doubt he's remotely as bad as painted by the left-leaning media. Some of my friends who actually directly follow the matter are of the opinion that the buffoon was likely the mask used to break into the race, and the level-headed end-game and now face we see is the real Trump.

Dave, on the other question earlier in the thread, I haven't forgotten, but this is the first thread I've read on SC in a week, and I'm headed back out to get some work done before bed after I post this, so an answer will have to wait.

[Sinned]

Moon, lighten up a little. I wasn't singling you out on the b word. I hate all profanity especially the f word and I wince when I read them in print and spoken. I think I have voiced my displeasure in the past but I am mature enough to try and ignore the words. In this case I was just trying to inject a little tongue in cheek humour and no, I don't have a problem with you. I think that except for MOH problem we are very similar in nature and are tolerant enough to get over our religious differences. You are welcome to visit me anytime though the distance be great. And I enjoy your posts and photography.

[Jim]

To set the record straight:
Oldsalt1: There are no grounds for referring to our President as a piece of garbage. Disagree with every single one of his policies and ideas. Vehemently if you will. But I'm sure even his harshest critics have to admit he's a class act. Read or listen to the speech he gave in Cuba.

I'm glad you said this. I agree entirely. If we allow political discussion here, we must keep it civil. For example, I believe Trump's character is the opposite of many of the traditional Christian virtues, but believe God created him and loves him. God does not create garbage. Trump is redeemable.

[Jim]

As for the honesty of the vote, I'm not sure it was honest, but the reports of fraud I'm aware of were tilting things in Hillary's favour. If an election rigged against Trump comes out in his favour, I have to conclude that noticeably more than half of voters think he was the better (or less bad) choice.

As of the current count, more people voted for Clinton than Trump, even with all the voter suppression. But it is the Electoral College that chooses the President.

[crfriend]

Perhaps one way around the discrepancies between the popular vote and the Electoral College vote would be to require some sort of super-majority in the popular vote, say 60% to 40% for the election to be valid. Even a 55% to 45% super-majority might do the trick. The current 48.5% to 49% break clearly does not work. Or, for that matter, a simple majority.

The idea here is to invalidate the election when it's ridiculously close; clearly there's no mandate, much less a margin of consensus. A run-off election could then be held following a six-week campaign and the disqualification of the candidates with less than 5% of the popular vote (allowing newcomers would likely cause too many problems). A failure of the run-off might then promote the sitting vice-president to president (who would get to appoint his VP, subject to the approval of Congress) and serve the next term.

I'm just thinking "out loud" here. Several countries have run-off elections to decide very close ones, and the US Constitution allows the President to appoint a VP with the consent of Congress. That's happened a few times in US history, including one time where we had a sitting president who wasn't elected to the post (Gerald Ford following Nixon's resignation.), although the usual case happens if the president is killed or terminally incapacitated.

The weak point here is the quality and character of the sitting VP come the quadrennial election. Imagine the scenario above putting a Dan Quayle into the driver's seat (or Pence or Kaine, both fairly hard-line religious types). All of a sudden the general populace would have to really pay attention.

[Stevie D]

Perhaps one way around the discrepancies between the popular vote and the Electoral College vote would be to require some sort of super-majority in the popular vote, say 60% to 40% for the election to be valid. Even a 55% to 45% super-majority might do the trick. The current 48.5% to 49% break clearly does not work. Or, for that matter, a simple majority.

The idea here is to invalidate the election when it's ridiculously close; clearly there's no mandate, much less a margin of consensus. A run-off election could then be held following a six-week campaign and the disqualification of the candidates with less than 5% of the popular vote (allowing newcomers would likely cause too many problems).

This is exactly what happened last June in the UK with our remain/leave the European Union referendum, which was 51.9% to leave, 48.1% to remain. The result was (and still is) a huge amount of gleeful chortling by the leavers (let's take our country back, etc) and complete dismay on behalf of the remainers. Anyone who complains about the result is accused of being undemocratic or worse.

Yet the reality is, just as with your Trump fiasco, such a near-equal split has left nearly half the country totally disaffected. That's not democracy, it's bullying of one half by another, largely brought about by lies, disinformation and outrageous claims and counter-claims during the campaigns, together with a flawed system of voting. As far as the EU referendum was concerned, such a complex set of decisions was never going to be resolved satisfactorily by a simple yes/no vote of the general population; there were too many ill-informed personal agendas held by individual voters.

I'm in total agreement with Carl about a 'super majority' being needed before any result can be considered valid to decide such complex and emotive issues, be it EU membership or a US presidential election. There has to be a way found to lessen the huge negative impact on people who supported the narrowly losing side. It's no good merely telling them to accept the result and shut up - as I've already described, that approach is bullying. As many people as possible need to feel that their voice is being heard and taken notice of. Such a consensus method of deciding important issues is then far more likely to yield positive results, thoughts and actions by a far greater proportion (if not all) of the population.

[moonshadow]

In this case I was just trying to inject a little tongue in cheek humour and no, I don't have a problem with you. I think that except for MOH problem we are very similar in nature and are tolerant enough to get over our religious differences. You are welcome to visit me anytime though the distance be great. And I enjoy your posts and photography.

No worries Dennis. We're cool.

Jenn: Politifact found that Trump was untruthful over 90% of the time. Hillary Clinton, under 30%.

While I'm not really saying one way or the other, it's a general belief that "politicians lie", you know the old joke by how you can tell when they are... when their lips are moving.

But seriously, all jokes aside while I'm not claiming Trump to be a 100% honest man because I don't really know (I don't live inside his head), I don't believe anyone can say with absolute certainty that Hillary Clinton is an honest woman. Even those that know her intimately can not vouch for absolute certainty of her integrity. Only Hillary Clinton knows her own trustworthiness. And let me say here that this is NOT singling her out, it's simply human nature to lie and Clinton is not above human nature. I'm not saying this makes her a bad human being... I'm just saying she's human and prone to lie.

Nobody knows Clinton's heart and soul better than Clinton herself. However being such a major player in all things politics, that in itself is an indicator of conniving personal interest, which again is not singling her out, as virtually all politicians are self serving above all else. Personally I believe by looking at the outward evidence and the "pulse" I get from the national situation, Clinton's overall position was more a power grab from a woman who want's to be first in everything. Which in itself is not an immoral or "bad" position to take. There is nothing wrong with anyone looking out for number one, but in Clinton's case, the word from the wires seems to indicate she has little interest in serving the country and more of an interest in serving her own interest and ego. Which again, also seems to be the Trump position (lets face it). But to paint one as a hero and villainize the other, regardless of who that "other" is I feel is somewhat short sighted and biased. To put it another way, I'm not saying Clinton is Satan's spawn, but she ain't no saint either, and I'm not saying Trump is a saint, but he ain't Satan's spawn likewise. (That title [Satan's spawn] goes to Pence )

Then again, I live in a region where I'm exposed to a constant diet of anti-Clinton rhetoric so my view on this could be somewhat clouded I will admit.

Imagine the scenario above putting a Dan Quayle into the driver's seat (or Pence or Kaine, both fairly hard-line religious types). All of a sudden the general populace would have to really pay attention.

Jenn and many of people I know have expressed extreme concern of Kaine's overly religious views, to somehow to compare him to Pence. While I will admit to being someone ignorant of the details of this I also remain somewhat baffled by all of the anti-Kaine rhetoric I constantly hear. I personally recall no major Earth shaking events when he served as Virginia governor, aside from the fact he served over the crash of 2008, which was taxing (pardon the pun) on I'd say many state legislatures. Judging from his Wikipeida article it seems like he is a slightly moderate- yet party line serving Democrat. Nothing too extreme at any rate. Sure he's a Catholic and has his religious convictions, which again according to the article seems to put him at odds with the general positions of his own party, particularly on the matter of abortion, but I'd hardly call him the Democratic version of Pence. In fact, I'd say that the fact that he is such a devout Catholic as well as a Democrat probably even's him out a fair amount.
I'd jokingly say that Kaine is to the Democratic party as I (Moon Shadow- a "man-witch") would be serving as a Republican- I'd certainly be considered a moderate. But there's another word for moderate Republicans- and they've come to be called Libertarians, which I have considered myself for a while now. Although in recently I've been thinking about shifting my political loyalty to the Green Party, but the jury's still out on that.

* * *

Changing gears now....

One thing I am hopeful for with a Trump administration is hopefully the elimination of the health care mandate (fine/tax/whatever). I despise the nuts and bolts of the ACA. I would have preferred a national medicare system, even if it came with a Social Security sized income tax. As it stands I already pay over $400 per month to my employer based private insurance. Logic would seem to indicate that if the $400 per month I pay combined with with the amount my employer pays can provide for my healthcare and turn a profit then the government should, in theory be able to accomplish this for less as the government- again in theory, operates "not for profit". It would be really nice to have a health care safety net in the even of job loss or disability, to know that you have a health care plan that will always be there regardless of what hurdle life throws at you.

But no. Instead we have a health care plan that more or less penalizes people for getting laid off/fired/etc. It's nice to know that in the event of such a blow we also get to look forward to paying the I.R.S. extra money out of pocket. To provide a private- for profit industry funds at a time when personal funds may be quite low.

But my biggest issue with the mandate is simply a matter of principle. As far as I know, this is the first time in American history that we have ever been legally required to purchase a private product from a for profit industry simply for being a citizen. Now I know, someone's going to come on here and say "but Moon Shadow, you have to buy car insurance in many states to register a car"... True... but you're not required by law to own a car. As I said above, the health insurance mandate is the first time we are required by law to purchase a private product simply for being alive.

It's asinine, and it's a 150% cluster-f__k (sorry Dennis- but it is )

And now, despite millions of additional people becoming insured, we are still seeing skyrocketing insurance rates. Scrap it... get rid of it.. start over, hell, I'd just assume go back to what we had before over this.

We need national medicare or the old voluntary- for profit system. No in between. No mandated paying of unelected insurance fat cats. That's basically taxation without representation.

[moonshadow]

In fact, I'd say the ACA is one of the few times in recent history that Republican and Democrats seem to be united on the common goal of screwing the middle class.

As Carl has pointed out in other post... it was basically designed by Romney (a Republican), and made national law by Obama (a Democrat)

What more proof does one need that both Democrats and Republicans serve the same master? And that my friends is why Trump is our president elect. Regardless of his actual intentions, he campaigned breaking for the status quo of his own party. Was it all an elaborate rouse by the Republicans? Possible. But only time shall tell!

[Fred in Skirts]

Another problem with the ACA is it not only made us buy insurance and taxed us if we did not, it contained many other items that have or are going to be laws we don't understand and have nothing to do with health care. This act is over 200,000 pages long and covers things nobody even knows about. Has anyone actually read it?? No not even most of the politicians who voted for it. If you have about 3 months to spare get a copy of it and about 12 good lawyers and read it. (And no I have not read it in it's entirety but I have read some small part of it and what I found is scary). As for Donald we need to give him a chance to work and try to bring this country together as one again. He now has the job and he has to have room to work. Lets see what happens 1 year down the road and see if he is able to do what he has said he will do.

[Ray]

If a country doesn't have a free healthcare system, it's a bit backward; uncivilised.

[Jim]

If a country doesn't have a free healthcare system, it's a bit backward; uncivilised.

I agree.

[moonshadow]

If a country doesn't have a free healthcare system, it's a bit backward; uncivilised.

I agree.

Technically it's not free. Somebody has to pay for it, even if it's tax payers. I would call it a "communal healthcare system"...

But I get what your saying and I too agree.

[denimini]

If a country doesn't have a free healthcare system, it's a bit backward; uncivilised.

Definitely. I was so thankful that we had a free health care system when my partner got cancer, nothing was spared and included being flown to a big city for treatment.