The tilde is the squiggly line, e.g., over an 'n' in Spanish.

é, title line security risk.

will get you a é.

Aha! Does that mean the alt key and the + sign and then 130? Technology often stumps me.

Thanks, in any event.

while you input numeric value 130 = "é"

The Founding Fathers discussed this issues at length in the Federalist Papers and offered the Electoral College as a compromise to succeed in obtaining ratification of the Constitution. It was supposedly designed to protect the minority. Nearly every election, especially most recent elections, has had the losing party question its validity creating a catch-22 situation. The winning party isn't going to allow the validity of election, although not receiving the majority of votes, be in question. I am of the opinion that it should and must be change to reflect the reality of citizen concentration in urban areas. This irregularity is also associated with the critical problem of gerrymandering. There were several compromises made due to the urgency of obtaining ratification. That two senators from each state regardless of the number of citizens was also a compromise that was even further compromised when they were appointed by their legislatures. This rule was changed and the electoral college system should have been abolished at that time. By any type of reasoning, it isn't acceptable that a person can lose the election yet win the popular vote by millions. Hope of changing it on national level is probably hopeless. A very possible solution is on a state level in which the totality of the votes cast would determine their weighed vote nationally. A handful of states have made attempts but to date they are not actually different from the present system by providing system of proportional allotment of electors, but again this can be construed by gerrymandering.

If I spend too much time looking in the rear view mirror, I tend to smash into things ahead of me.

making much on your list possible in the first place

There's zero justification to take away someone's vote based on a criminal conviction other than for republicans to manipulate the vote.

I hope one day that those who voted for Trump will realize what a horrible mistake they made.

You will NEVER convince me that the three blue states that went for Trump by just enough votes to not need a recount were 'won' by voters and not Russian hackers. And remember that Hillary won the popular vote by 3,000,000 votes.

is being done to avoid a repeat in 2018 and 2020. Trumpco isn't making any effort to improve the voting process.

Even with ALL of that, she still got almost 3 million more votes and only lost by 80,000 votes in 3 states. I don't think they'll be able to overcome all of the pissed off people this fall or in 2020. Blue WAVE!!

Any one of a number of factors could have tipped the extremely close votes in the key Electoral states.

Which by the way, is the actual counting of the votes as cast by people.

If you have something substantive to add, please feel free to do so.

Hillary blamed Comey for her loss

But after your question I re-read the OP and your response and I see what you meant. My apologies!

“There are lots of reasons why an election like this is not successful,” Mrs. Clinton said, according to a donor who relayed the remarks. But, she added, “our analysis is that Comey’s letter raising doubts that were groundless, baseless, proven to be, stopped our momentum.”

All that has been mentioned adds up to HRC losing. I think left leaners who voted 3rd party or not at all should be on that list too. We have a two party system. Why folks don't get that is dangerous.

would have yielded a substantially larger number, IMO. Had that occurred.

She layed it square on Comey

And was she wrong about Comey playing a part?


https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-comey-letter-probably-cost-clinton-the-election/

Can't let truth get in the way you know. Those russian bots got to a lot of people.

Got to get to the root cause and fix it.

I am convinced that Russians, or Republicans, hacked machines in those few specific counties that were needed to swing the electoral college to where it needed to be to ensure a Republican win. You will never convince me otherwise.

Despite the Comey thing Hillary had three million more votes than shitstain. Despite everything else, America spoke loudly and clearly that they wanted Hillary. The presidency was stolen from her, and from us, right under our noses.

I mean, if Russia can get into the machines to look at voter rolls, are they really going to be content with just looking at the voter rolls?

We've got to deal with all of it.

And the Cambridge Analytica piece is by no means small.

Flipping a few votes in few dozen counties in WI, PA and MI is so imperceptible it’s effective.

That gives me some, albeit small, comfort.

I have my doubts.

Once the historians get the narrative away from the journalists who were complicit in the reprehensible treatment of her - and they will, they always do - the story will be told.

I just hope it happens in her lifetime so she will get at least part of her due.

They don't give a shit if they had to get help from the Russians. They'll just keep on using the same tactics as shraby mentioned and more, unless we start dramatically changing our electoral system.

and never focusing on Hillary and her solutions on the issues as opposed to an empty stage for 20 min witing for the moron to speak to his cult.

That said, COMEY is the first, biggest and obvious reason for her loss. Period!

or $5BIL/year

that's the whole reason comey felt the pressure to do that - that's the real reason for the pressure, and if dems stopped ignoring it the country and comey would have known most of it was nothing to worry about, and coming out of the asses of limbaugh and a few hundred wannabes on 1500 radio stations.

his cult are dittoheads

the russians knew it and that's why trumps bunch were told to study talk radio in 2014 to prep for the elections (gabriel sherman - new york magazine 4/3/16)- so they could coordinate trolling and messaging

stealing an election isn't winning an election.

I was just saying yesterday how sick to death I am of people (especially progressives) saying "This is why Hillary lost" or "This is why 45 won." HE. DIDN'T. WIN.

and that was to get out and vote for Hillary Clinton, the one and only candidate who could have stopped Trump from winning the presidency. Apparently many on the Left were either like Comey and were sure that Clinton would win or they hated her as much as anyone on the right who voted for Trump.

"...vote for Hillary Clinton, the one and only candidate who could have stopped Trump from winning the presidency."


63 million of our fellow citizens thought this vulgar man was more qualified to be president than HRC. What the goddamned fuck?

In any case, if we had a direct vote for president, it would not be possible to determine the outcome by tampering with votes in a few precincts or states.

I doubt that we would be complaining about the Electoral College at all.

It's kind of like the loser of the World Series claiming they should be the champs since they scored more runs even though their opponent won 4 close games but lost one game by a score of 10-1. It's not the runs you score, but the goal is to win 4 games. It's not the popular votes you get, but the goal is to win 270 electoral votes.

In the end nobody seemed more surprised he had won than Donald Trump himself.
In my state of Wisconsin, 23,000 people chose to vote for Jill Stein and that was about Trump's margin of victory. In Milwaukee County, 55,000 fewer people voted than in 2012 and 2/3 of that number typically would have voted Democratic. So close was the election here and yet Clinton chose not to make a single general election campaign stop in Wisconsin.
We have met the enemy and the enemy is us.

There is no one explanation, and never will be. We will never even be able to measure the specific effect of any of the factors at work.

Fortunately, this leaves everyone free to blame his or her favorite, and to pretend that the others don't exist. Fun!

Does this have something to do with Maine?

The info is out there, abundantly. Sorry my iPad doesn't cooperate.

Assuming we're talking about gerrymandering of Congressional districts, I was wondering how the OP thought it affected Clinton adversely in the 2016 election.

NE and ME can split their respective electoral votes, so, in theory, that could have an effect. NE didn't split theirs, but ME did. Is that what OP is talking about?

Is there some other effect gerrymandered Congressional districts might have on Presidential election, given that the other 48 states allocate all electoral votes based on the winner of the popular vote of the state as a whole?

Democrats were not addressing hometown America too well

In an ordinary election year, Comey's letter that Gowdy released would have had less impact, if that is the purpose of your OP.
No way they knew it was a gamechanger to the extent it was.

If you doubt me, do the math.

What is one vote of one voter worth in small states like Montana, Wyoming, Vermont, etc. with populations under 2 million compared to one vote of one voter worth in California, population over 38 million?

To begin, seven states have fewer than one million in population. They are Wyoming with 582,658, Vermont, D.C. (I know not a state), North Dakota, Alaska, South Dakota and Delaware. Then there are Montana, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Maine, Hawaii, Idaho, West Virginia and Nebraska with populations of less than 2 million (each with less than the 3 million votes by which Hillary won the popular vote).

http://www.enchantedlearning.com/usa/states/population.shtml

I'm not going to do the details of the math here although I have done it before. These tiny states, however, added up together have at most 17 million in population less than half the population of California with over 38 million, probably closer to 39 million. I'm using conservative numbers on the populations of all of these states.

These states that have altogether a population less than half that of California, yet these small states altogether have a total of 47 electors, at least three electors each. Add the populations of these states together and it represents a relatively tiny population of the United States compared to the 38, nearly 39 million in California. Yet California has only 55 electors.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_College_(United_States)

Do the math. A group of very special, tiny, little states (in terms of population) have around twice per person the number of electors that California has. NEARLY twice. The vote of a Californian counts for less than one half the vote of a voter in Montana.

And we preach democracy to the rest of the world???? How is that????

Here is why this outrageous injustice exists.

Each of these tiny states gets an elector for each its representatives allotted for every so many residents PLUS two, that's 2 electors for its senators. California gets an elector for each of its 53 representatives and 2 for its 2 senators.

I know the term "disenfranchisement" sounds extreme, and I am probably making a lot of you angry, but that word accurately describes what the electoral college does to Californians and, to a lesser extent, to Texans and those who live in New York and Florida and other larger states.

We need to elect our president directly so that every vote is counted equally. To actually have a president that represents all who live in America, all Americans, we need to do away with the electoral college.

Other than GHWB for 1 term after Reagan, since Truman left office, we tend to go back and forth between Dems and GOP.

Truman Dem
Eisenhower Rep
Kennedy/Johnson Dem
Nixon Rep
Carter Dem 1 term
Reagan/GHW Bush Rep 3 terms
Clinton Dem
GW Bush Rep
Obama Dem
Trump Rep

IT WAS ALWAYS AN UPHILL BATTLE. I think we forgot that. HRC wasn't the shoe in we thought she was. The election was decided by swing states. Actually it was decided by swing voters in swing states. Add to that the folks who voted for Obama who just stayed home in those states.

We need a candidate and a platform that generates the enthusiasm that Obama did. We need to win back all those voters who traditionally vote for the Democrat who either stayed home or had a brain fart and voted for Trump, Stein and Thompson. We need to register voters and GOTV. Obviously we need to fight voter suppression and Russian tampering, but that IS NOT ENOUGH.

Gerrymandering has no effect statewide. I mention it only because you put it at the top of the list.

I wasn't sure if it was a list of what DIDN'T cause the loss.

The media made it look so lopsided that many people thought that it was okay to take the day off. The Democrats should have crushed him. Many thought it was in the bag so why not relax. The republicans took advantage of this aberration.

And the world wouldn't be in the tenuous mess we see today.

Campaigns need to be won in the face of all opposition, or you . . . lose.

And sometime history does turn on "want of a nail."

If Comey hadn't reopened the email case two weeks before the election, Clinton would be president.
If Clinton had never uttered the word 'deplorables,' she'd be president.
If Podesta (or the other 19 Clinton staffers) had a clue about email hygiene and phishing attacks, Clinton would be in the White House today.

And, of course, if all the systemic abuses you list didn't exist and if Clinton didn't have the largest baggage train in political history and had made fewer tactical and strategic errors.

And if millions of people like me hadn't said, "Americans are not stupid enough to put Trump in the White House." (Although I'm not sure what I'd have done if I'd seen Trump's win coming.)

Giuliani foreshadowed "big surprise" 2 days before announcement.

A number of threads here discuss investigation into the finding of emails on Weiner's laptop, the delay in Comey's stated awareness of them, the forces in the FBI in conjunction with Trump folks to force Comey's hand in releasing the info, etc. Erik Prince apparently involved.

https://threadreaderapp.com/user/SethAbramson

I do believe the voting machines were hacked and voted changed.

That said, we need to move on from the lost and focus on revenge.
We need to win in November and exact revenge that way.

If house and senate is democratic, the loss will not be so searing as Donald and his band of corrupt swamp things will be up before the endless investigations into corruption.

I think he was the convenient stooge they preyed upon. Many of the things he describes are conveniently placed in front of him. He thus thinking his duties on his job is how he got where he is and he did just that. The twisted idea of publicly going on about Hilary but omitting ongoing investigations about Donald to show what was really going on his mind.

It does at the time does lends to the flavor of him being republican first with law & order coming in only second. To the idea how things should run and get done. He goes as far as to say that it is up to the American people to get him out of office by voting him out. Typical republican cop think, somehow it's us citizens job to see that the criminals and murderers are not on the street. They just go where the patrol chief sends them

An opportunist at the very least and or best

Comey himself seems to believe his letter was an error and Hillary cites it as a key reason for her loss. That doesn't mean Comey acted maliciously, but the more principled the actor, the more chance something goes awry in the real complicated world.

I voted for Hillary in both the general election and even the primary when all my liberal friends voted for Bernie. I think she was a great Secretary of State and a quiet but powerful advocate for women's rights throughout the world. I still don't like her. It bugs me when she takes credit for #metoo or takes money to talk to Wall Street execs.

I don't look at Hillary and see single payer health care, or cleaning up Wall Street, or investing in a moderate middle class to stabilize unstable parts of the world, or challenging Scott Walker on labor unions, or solving the high cost of housing (my #1 issue). Even though these were all policies during her husband's administration she didn't campaign on them. Bill Clinton openly advocated higher taxes and gays in the military during his 1992 campaign. He also made an outspoken environmentalist his VP candidate. Hillary was very moderate , took few chances, and focused on negative campaigning against Trump.

I live in California and feel pretty good about most of the people I vote for. We have lots of policies I am proud to support. The truth, however, is we all feel the economy is pulling away from us. Many people throughout the country fell the same way, but here Democrats are in a position to do something about it. The average voters have political will to implement progressive policies, Democrats have all the power they need to implement such policies, all the technological, financial, and educational resources are available to facilitate better cost of living policies. Yet, the whole world sees it costs too much to live here and our leaders are not in front of this issue.

If working class Americans looked at liberal policies and saw we had a real handle on individual economic empowerment and social mobility we would win every election. Yes, there are extremists who support bad leaders like Trump. Most of the people I know personally who voted for him are average people who are looking to build a better life for themselves and their families. That's why most people voted for Trump, Putin, Brexit, and even Hitler (he won the popular vote before he made himself a dictator). We have to change our party's image on this issue and we can only do this by producing results working class Americans can connect with. Until we do, mainstream voters will continue to be vulnerable to all the dirty campaigning conservatives throw at us.

And her speeches? Really? Please note where you objected to speeches that any make politician gave.

I don't look at Hillary and see single payer health care, or cleaning up Wall Street, or investing in a moderate middle class to stabilize unstable parts of the world, or challenging Scott Walker on labor unions, or solving the high cost of housing (my #1 issue). Even though these were all policies during her husband's administration she didn't campaign on them. Bill Clinton openly advocated higher taxes and gays in the military during his 1992 campaign. He also made an outspoken environmentalist his VP candidate. Hillary was very moderate , took few chances, and focused on negative campaigning against Trump.

You do realize she's not running for anything now, right? Also, did you ever happen to take a look at the Democratic party platform, or attend any of her rallies, view her campaign website or listen to any other speeches?

I believe you have been misinformed.

...they lead off with Russia, ratfckng, and GOP dirty tricks.

I'm talkin' to you, Donna Brazile.

Thanks for the list, shraby. It is short and to the point -- easy to memorize.

They pulled out all of the stops to ensure Hillary would lose and Trump would win.

Hillary actually would have won the election had it not been (as dumpster himself said) stolen. I keep saying, she is MY president. Unfortunately, she isn't able to exercise the powers of the presidency because of the criminal enterprise that stole the WH AND CONGRESS!

would cost her the election, even at the time...once we saw that her numbers didn't nosedive.

The night of the election, after the shocker of Spanky winning, the first thing I thought was....did RUSSIA interference have something to do with this? This makes no sense. At no time did I EVER think the Comey October surprise cost her the election. There is no evidence of that.

which allowed for all the issues that you referenced to be swept under the rug. BTW, I've seen countless twitter posts from people who say that Comey's actions turned them away from Hillary. Not only did he drop a bombshell 11 days out, but the FBI brought it up AGAIN 2 days before election (by then, most low informed voters would have tuned out and only saw the words HILLARY FBI EMAILS).

And don't forget the Russian trolls working overtime to pit Hillary and Bernie supporters against each other.

nt

which has a history of beaming democrats and throwing softballs to the republicans, and frankly, barely covers any issues regarding voter purges, ID requirements, etc. which is what allows them to happen with impunity nt

across the country, those that are growing/young/diverse, the ones that power the country, that exist ALL across the country, not just on the coasts. Anywhere there are metro areas there is huge Dem turnout and possiblity to flip the state as a result.

The problem w/America is we have a system that is designed to favor rural/empty areas over populated ones... blue votes are worth far less than red ones... the electoral college, 2 senators per state, etc..

A vote in NY or CA is worth far less than some empty red state like ND or WY... taxation without representation, yo.

Red America is a drain on blue America, simply a fact that H didn't want to come out and say directly, but clearly what is going on.

* Trump's incessant lies and deceptions in the campaign and little or no media calling him out, and sensationalism on steroids. There was far more open fact-checking in European media than in the U.S.

* Billions of dollars of Trump support from the corporate and millionaire classes (support anyone with an "R" ) via PACs and free media coverage (MSM, Faux, Sinclair, etc.). In the U.S. money = power = the right to a louder voice.

IMO, most of the items listed in the OP had relatively minor effect compared to these. Good topic, thanks!

Because eligible democrats stayed home and didn't vote...

hacking, gerrymandering, etc. that the election was going to be stolen, long before Comey's announcement. . No surprise watching the red shift on election night, just like 2004. It wasn't Comey.

...and I say that as someone hi knew a lot of her staff (they stayed at our house). Bottom line is that the Russian Facebook posts and the Comey letter disn’t Take any Clinto voters and make them Trump voters; all it did was reinforce what some voters already didin’t like about her. Strategically, Clinto failed to ensure early on that she HAD the Obama voters, and spent her as money telling people how bad Trump was, not talking positively about what she’d do.

Had it not happened I think she would have won comfortably. Had the Russians not smeared her she would have won by a sizeable margin.

People hated her as a result of the damage that Comey did to her reputation. There was never supposed to be a public investigation to begin with.

HRC was extremely popular when she was Secretary of State. Then she got swift boated. She did her best to stop it, as we saw during the Benghazi hearings.

And I think she had the right advertising strategy, given how badly she was swift boated. Voters weren't deciding based on the issues, they were deciding based on who they thought had behaved more unethically. And Comey made sure she couldn't win that fight.

Besides, she won all three debates, where the issues were thoroughly hashed out. But people weren't focused on the issues. If they were Trump would not have won big in Iowa, where his protectionist rhetoric was unpopular.

over 24 years to work on her.

It's hard to overcome that kind of experience.

was badmouthed from every direction. That was meant to erode her numbers, which were quite solid until the assaults from every direction. Of course, we all expected it from the GOP, so Bernie......what a shame that Hillary really couldn’t attack back.

as seems to be common wisdom. She was a damn good candidate.

Obama steadily turned off the white working class and Hillary was going to have to deal with it. That was always the huge obstacle entering 2016, and it's the reason I didn't plan to pay any attention to that presidential race. All the logical numbers in key demographics pointed to a narrow Hillary defeat. It was only when Republicans seemed determined to actually nominate Donald Trump did I think Hillary might have a chance.

Here is one of the articles from immediately after the 2014 midterm. There were tons of them. I'm sure Rachel Maddow was paying no attention at all. But for anyone who has Republican friends and especially among that angry white working class male group, it could not have been more glaring what to expect from that block in 2016. The 2014 midterm was merely a warmup:

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/12/can-clinton-win-back-the-white-working-class/383280/

Comey definitely decided the race. Hillary had low upside and she never actually enjoyed the huge edge as indicated in the polls. Those simplistic angry males do not show up in representative proportion in pre election polling. Besides, independents wanted change and they always favored Trump. Hillary had no opportunity to win big.

But minus Comey and even with the Facebook atrocities Hillary would have squeaked out an electoral win and managed roughly 1.5 to 2 points greater margin in the popular vote.