third party stole the election from trump

Author: n8nrgmi

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#1
n8nrgmi
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libertarian candidate and constitution candidates took around one percent of the vote. they did this in swing states where the margin of victory was less than a percent. if we assume those guys would have went for trump since they're all conservative, we can conclude that the third party stole the election from trump. 

this just shows the stupidity of third party voting and the spoiler effect in our type of voting system. would be much better to switch to approval rating voting or rank voting where a third party doesn't act like a spoiler and actually makes sense. 
#2
HistoryBuff
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@n8nrgmi
if we assume those guys would have went for trump since they're all conservative, we can conclude that the third party stole the election from trump. 
that is a big assumption though. if they thought trump was worth voting for, they likely would have voted for him. Without a 3rd party candidate alot of them might not have voted or even voted democrat. There is no way to know. 

this just shows the stupidity of third party voting and the spoiler effect in our type of voting system. would be much better to switch to approval rating voting or rank voting where a third party doesn't act like a spoiler and actually makes sense. 
yeah, the winner take all style makes the really tough though. if you get 0.1% more support in a state (in most states) you get 100% of that state's electoral college votes. In a system like that it is tough to reform. I think a good reform would be to award electoral college votes by % of the vote you get. you get 50% of the popular vote in the state, you get 50% of the electoral college votes. 
#3
Death23
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@n8nrgmi
There are many more factors than just the spoiler effect . The aggregate impact of these factors is in Trump's favor.
#4
Discipulus_Didicit
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@HistoryBuff
I think a good reform would be to award electoral college votes by % of the vote you get. you get 50% of the popular vote in the state, you get 50% of the electoral college votes. 
What if a state like New Mexico is split 50/50? (5 votes odd number).

I agree that the current winner-take all system needs to go but this specific solution has some potential issues.
#5
HistoryBuff
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@Discipulus_Didicit
What if a state like New Mexico is split 50/50? (5 votes odd number).
you would distribute them based on the results. the odds of both candidates getting the exact same number of votes is extremely unlikely. therefore one candidate would have more. IE they would get 3 and their opponent 2. 

But you are right. The electoral college itself is a wildly outdated system that should be replaced entirely, ideally. 


#6
Dr.Franklin
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well in michigan they added 138k votes out of nowhere


#7
Discipulus_Didicit
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@HistoryBuff
you would distribute them based on the results. the odds of both candidates getting the exact same number of votes is extremely unlikely. therefore one candidate would have more. IE they would get 3 and their opponent 2. 
An exact 50/50 is unlikely yes, but something like a 51/48 is not only likely but commonplace and to award a whole point based on the results of a 3 point difference seems to have some of the same problems as the current system itself.
#8
HistoryBuff
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@Discipulus_Didicit
An exact 50/50 is unlikely yes, but something like a 51/48 is not only likely but commonplace and to award a whole point based on the results of a 3 point difference seems to have some of the same problems as the current system itself.
there is no such thing as a perfect system. At least this way the discrepancy between representation and popular vote is only 1 per state. The way it is now is much, much worse. 

But ideally, the electoral collage should be abolished entirely. but lots of states would fight against that since the electoral college is designed to give some states much more influence and power than their population should give them. 

#9
RationalMadman
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What about green party taking from Democrats?  

I don't say 'taking' in a literal sense as neither Dems or Republicans are more entitled to votes, instead I'm using the terminology as applied in this thread.

#10
Conway
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@n8nrgmi
Donald Trump observed that George Bush should have made less sucking sounds.

Maybe the next president will learn not to hire an AG who thinks marijuana is worse than the kkk.



#11
SirAnonymous
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@Dr.Franklin
well in michigan they added 138k votes out of nowhere
No, they didn't. That came from Decision Desk HQ website. For one of the counties, the guy entering the data for the website accidentally added a 0 to the votes for Biden. The 138k votes were nothing but a typo on an election-tracking website that has nothing to do with actually counting the votes.
#12
Mopac
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I never did like the argument that voting for a third party steals votes from another candidate.

I like this argument about as much as the argument that to not vote is to vote for the candidate I don't support!


#13
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@SirAnonymous
so if it was a typo, why wasnt it fixed?
#14
SirAnonymous
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@Dr.Franklin
It was fixed.
#15
HistoryBuff
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@Dr.Franklin
so if it was a typo, why wasnt it fixed?
lol it was an unofficial count. And the error was caught and fixed within 20 minutes. But some right wing loon took a screenshot before it got fixed and started spreading misinformation which people (such as yourself) are still spreading long after the error was fixed. 

#16
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@HistoryBuff
no it wasn't, so many mistakes LOL
#17
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@SirAnonymous
same software all through the state
#18
SirAnonymous
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@Dr.Franklin
It wasn't the state that made the error. It was Decision Desk HQ.
#19
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@SirAnonymous
was it fixed?
#20
SirAnonymous
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@Dr.Franklin
Yes, they fixed it.
#21
Lemming
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Personally I'd say Covid19 stole the election from Trump, and really, no matter 'how he would have tried to deal with it, Democrats would have still weaponized it and put the blame on Trump, I 'suspect, but maybe wrong suspicion.

I'd imagine if Covid19 hadn't popped up, Trump would have won.
#22
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@SirAnonymous
so why didnt the vote tally go down?
#23
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@Dr.Franklin
It did go down. Read the article I linked earlier.
#24
HistoryBuff
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@Lemming
no matter 'how he would have tried to deal with it, Democrats would have still weaponized it and put the blame on Trump, I 'suspect, but maybe wrong suspicion.
i'm sure the democrats would have criticized his covid response no matter what. But if he had actually done a good job, it wouldn't have done anything. If people thought his response was a good one they wouldn't have cared what the democrats say. 

I'd imagine if Covid19 hadn't popped up, Trump would have won.
maybe, but we will never really know. 

But in my opinion, Covid was trump's golden opportunity. All he had to do was take it a bit more seriously and he would have crushed this election. Public opinion was overwhelmingly in favor of taking the crisis more seriously. But he just kept undermining it, questioning if it was real, if it would all magically disappear, if it was better to just let hundreds of thousands of people die to protect money. People did not like that. 

If he had come out in the early crisis and told everyone to take it seriously, to social distance and wear masks, I think he would have won big. Instead he royally screwed himself by showing everyone his incompetence and disdain for people's lives in probably the only real national crisis of his presidency.