Clinton lost the 2016 election because she did not understand the Electoral College: Here is why

In this video I’m going to talk about the electoral college. I’m going to define democracy, republic and tell you why governments fail. I’m going to share why our Constitution is so important and why the Constitution helps our style of government last. I will also explain why Hillary Clinton lost the 2016 election according to the electoral college system.
As I said, in this video I want to go over the Electoral College as I understand it personally. While admittedly, I am not an expert, I know enough to understand, as others will not, that the electoral college is important. I am making this the topic of this video because I think that too often people assume that because it’s this obscure thing in our voting system that it doesn’t matter. But it does matter. It matters a great deal.
As I’ll explain later, the electoral college is kind of a catalyst of sorts for our union. It’s the voting glue that keeps this country of colonies together as one whole. It’s very important, it should not be tossed as some of our elected officials would like us to believe.
Now I’m going to define some things. I’m going to define what a democracy is, what a republic is and what our Constitutional Democratic Republic means.
Lets start by going over what everyone assumes. That the United States is a Democracy. According to Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary of the English language of 1785, Democracy is “One of the three forms of government; that in which the sovereign power is neither lodged in one man, nor in the nobles, but in the collective body of the people. The majority, having the whole power of the community, may employ all that power in making laws, and executing those laws…”
In simple terms, the populous runs the country. The popular vote wins, all eligible voters of a society are counted equally, and you run your merry little country based on the popular vote of all voters. So, all people vote, the popular vote is in charge. If you are thinking to yourself that sounds like us, you’re only kind of right.
We are not solely a democracy. Because Democracies alone, fail. As Churchill said, “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.”
Fortunately for us, our Founders were wise enough to examine history.
They, like Plato and others, feared and discovered that Democracy alone will result in tyranny and subjugation. Meaning, that Democracy as a form of government will fail. Horribly.
All forms of government are doomed to fail. I believe this to be because of humans. Human nature is like the Freudian infant ID. The ID, according to Freud is driven by the pleasure principle, which demands immediate gratification of all desires, wants, and needs. While it is the theory that individual humans grow to contain and restrain this, to me, it seems like human nature and the human race, as an enduring thing through time, never will contain or restrain their desires. This will result in humans ceaselessly destroying anything and everything because of their willful inability to control themselves.
It's a dark thought to be sure. It means that governments fail because humans are a part of the equation. People are corruptible and will always work to benefit themselves above the whole. Humans will always put what they want above lasting goodness and success. For this reason, societies will crumble given time.
This is why we are not a Democracy, but rather a Constitutional Democratic Republic.
The reason I mentioned that bleak opinion about failing societies was because I believe that that nightmare of failure had to have been in mind when the founders formed this nation. In order for them to build something unbreakable, they had to know what broke countries before. Democracies are easily broken. We, being a Constitutional Democratic Republic, have extra lines of defense against human nature. Our government was designed to withstand human corruption for as long as possible.
So, let’s go over these pieces. I’ve already defined democracy. Now, I’m going to define what a republic is. The American Heritage Dictionary defines a republic as “a political order in which the supreme power lies in a body of citizens who are entitled to vote for officers and representatives responsible to them”.
In simple terms, in a Republic, people are elected to represent citizens. So, you vote for people, those people represent you. They are beholden to you. They work for you as We the People.
Now, throw a Constitution in there.
The Constitutional bit simply means that those elected or otherwise employed, even to the highest of offices available, (Supreme Court, Presidency, Congress) are still below the Constitution. Meaning these offices, as with all offices, must adhere to the Constitution and must protect it. Officials, I don’t care who they are or what they say, Do NOT, nor will they ever, supersede or become more powerful than the Constitution. It CANNOT happen.
Think about it, this document created these elected positions of power and gave those positions their duties AND their limitations. How much sense does it make that those positions would then be above that which gave them their power? How much sense does it make that that which gave them limitations, can be overridden? That’s like saying elected officials can be above the law if they choose to be.
This is super important. Super important. And really should be stressed in everyday life. Having leaders answer to a document, written during the most central of times, rather than to their own selfish, erratic, and impulsive wills, was a brilliant idea. Why, because the Constitution was written during a time when men could still remember the feel of tyranny and the battlefield where they defeated it. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness were a flourishing dream hard won. During that time, nothing was more important than building this new dream country.
Meaning that those intense feelings and dreams are enshrined forever in our Constitution. And because we can never supersede it, those feelings and dreams will always be the driving force of this nation. That’s why the Constitution is so important. And that is why we answer to it before we answer to ourselves. It may not be perfect, it may even be remiss, but it is still far better than us. The Constitution remembers what it felt like to suffer under tyranny. It remembers the blood spilt. But most importantly, the Constitution remembers what The United States was meant to be. Its not just some old dusty forgotten relic. It is law. And it is still, to this day, capable of leading us into the future.
Now even though I got a bit carried away in the middle there, All of this is to say that because the United States is a Constitutional Democratic Republic, the function of our voting system must operate in a specific way. Obviously.
This is where the Electoral college comes in. Remember that the ultimate point of this video was to explain why the electoral college exists and why we should never get rid of it.
And this is why Hillary Clinton lost in 2016.
The electoral voting system ensures that every part of this Union is counted and heard. Never forget that the United States is a union of colonies. And each of those colonies, or in this case, states, gets a vote.
If we were simply a Democracy only the most populated states would matter when voting for anything.
Why? Because they have the most people. But does having the most people in one area mean those people are a fair representation of the whole? No. It absolutely does not. Do you think that the voters who work on wall street will have the same concerns as voters who work on farms? Do, you think that one of those opinions supersedes the other? No. We are all important. We all contribute to what this country is and will be.
We need everyone’s vote.
Ok, that is why its important. Lets talk now about how it actually functions.
In this section I’m going to transition into how the electoral voting system works and how Clinton lost. For this part, I’m going to use some numbers and facts. If you’re not down for that, just take a nap or something.
Ok, how did Hillary Clinton win the popular vote, but lose the election. Clinton campaigned in the most populated states she assumed she could win and disregarded all others. While she got the most votes in general, she failed to get the most electoral votes.
What is an electoral vote. In an extremely simplified way, an electoral vote is a representation vote of your area. Electoral votes are equivalent to the number of representatives in each state, and the number of representatives is based on the population of the state. Loosely, the more populated a state is, the more electoral votes they have to give away.
Currently, there are a total of 583 electoral votes.
You need 270 electoral votes to win the presidency.
This is where I’m going to get technical. Did you know that the top 10 most populated states account for over ½ of the US population.
So, here’s a hypothetical. let’s say that you are running for president and you focused on, and won all the votes from the top ten most populated states. Those are CA (55), TX (38), FL (29), NY (29), PA (20), IL (20), OH (18), GA (16), NC (15), and MI (16). Obviously, they would never all vote the same but go with me. The population of all those states together is 179,199,880 or 180 million. Again, this is over half of the us population. So, you campaign in all of these states, and every single person who can vote, votes for you. You win all of the electoral votes for these states. That means you wins 256 electoral votes.
Remember, you need 270 votes to win. Thus, even winning all the votes from the top ten most populated states, the states with the most electoral votes to give, you have not made the threshold for winning the presidency.
This is what happened to Hillary Clinton.
Clinton, even winning the popular vote, did not win the necessary electoral votes. She lost the election, I believe, because she disregarded states that she did not value as important.
The most important thing to keep in mind thus, if you plan to run for president, is not simply getting the most votes but rather getting the most votes from all 50 states.
That was how the electoral college works.
Now I’m going to tell you why it is necessary. As if that has not yet become obvious.
The reason this is a necessary form of voting is because it makes sure all votes, from all states, are counted. Remember earlier when I said that wall street won’t vote the same way as farm country. They have different values and concerns. The electoral system hears them all.
A candidate who ignores this system, ignores US citizens. They attach value to popularity and selfishness, and care little about each of us. Here in the US, it shouldn’t matter if you are the richest person on the planet or the poorest. We are all equal. We shouldn’t let presidential candidates choose who to represent based on anything so shallow and archaic.
We don’t want candidates who only care about the popular. We need candidates who are looking to lift up the entire country as a whole. Every vote is necessary because every vote is a producing and valued piece of us. Everyone brings something to the table, so why would we want to elect a candidate who only focuses on their favorite people at that table?
We are meant to be a joining of states. Each with a certain amount of necessary sovereignty. But no matter how big or how small, each state has a voice and a vote. We all get to decide how this country looks. No state is more or less important.
But beyond this, the electoral system is a part of the Constitution. You CANNOT get rid of it.
Our constitutional democratic republic was designed with democracy, geography, phycology, physics, mathematics, and theology in mind. And we want to screw with it because the willfully ignorant say it’s not fair? That’s ridiculous.
So, a recap for those of you not paying attention.
In this video I spoke about the electoral college and why we need it. We need it because it makes sure that each state, no matter how small is still heard when it comes time to vote. The electoral college is important because it protects the peoples votes from candidates that only care about the few. It holds us together.
The electoral College assures a true vote. I defined democracy, and republic and told you why governments fail. They Fail, because humans are unstoppable in both intelligence and corruption. I told you why the Constitution is so important and why the Constitution helps our style of government last. The Constitution is important because it is law. It helps us last because it holds us to a standard that human nature can’t corrupt. I also explained why Hillary Clinton lost the 2016 election according to the electoral college system. She lost because she didn’t care about all the states, just the most popular ones. And while what she did was bad, she is still a necessary example.
You guys, We need the electoral college, like we need every state in this country.
Don’t get rid of it.