Have I ever mentioned that I hate the electoral college? Yes, I have, like here, here, here, here . . . .
And I have skirmished in the public press with the college's benighted defenders, such as D.J. Tice, of the Star Tribune newspaper's editorial page. Him. Me.
Today I want to call attention to a hardy perennial of Tice's argument, one he highlighted in "The Electoral College Still Gets My Vote":
The Electoral College, by giving states, as distinct polities, a role in choosing presidents, forces politicians to concern themselves with appealing to a broad coalition of concerns across America.
Under a pure popular vote system, running up one's vote totals in small but loyal regions and narrow demographic groups would be a smart politician's single-minded objective. There would be little strategic sense in broadening one's message to pursue a wider appeal.
But when a candidate has to win separate contests inside the borders of numerous states to prevail, he or she is forced to break out of the partisan stronghold and seek support in the opposition's backyard.
At the time, I wrote, in response:
I wonder whether Tice thinks that what he describes here is what Donald Trump did. If not, his analysis is divorced from reality, right?
It seems obvious to me that Trump did not seek broad support and that his campaign was targeted narrowly at white working class voters who, happily for him, are pretty heavily concentrated across a swatch of "swing states" running along the Great Lakes, from Pennsylvania to Wisconsin. These "distinct polities," as Tice calls them, are not really distinct. Trump was able to eke out narrow victories in several of them with a single demographic strategy, because the boundaries between them are artificial.
Suppose California were divided in two by an east-west line drawn somewhere between Los Angeles and San Francisco Bay. Clinton would then have won an additional two electoral votes, and, in the word according to Tice, she would have earned them, because she would have appealed to another "distinct polity." Is it necessary to explain patiently why this is stupid?
Thinking about it now, the described division of California would create "distinct polities" that actually are distinct, since the state is the country's leading agricultural producer as well as home to two great but quite different urban centers--the interests of the people who live in Compton are quite distinct from those of the residents of Nob Hill. The notion that the state line between Ohio and Michigan more meaningfully delineates "distinct polities" is implausible--as Trump showed by winning both those states while making no attempt to "seek support" outside of his base.
But the point I want to make today is that, while the debate about the electoral college is generally reserved for election time, its distorting effects may be seen clearly in day-to-day governance. Trump's approval rating, in the low 40s according to polls, may seem incompatible with his supporters' confidence that he will be re-elected. But he very well could be. He won election with only 46 percent of the vote (to his opponent's 48), so he hasn't fallen off much. Among the substantially more than half who disapprove, how many live in New York, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Illinois, Washington, or California? It's a vital question, because, on Election Day, thousands and thousands of them don't have a vote--they are meaningless "extras," ciphers, third-string touchdown scorers in the fourth quarter of a game that was over before half time. The only game that counts is being played on another field, which also explains, in case you are wondering, why in a "democracy" the Trump administration feels free to "double down" on wildly unpopular policies, such as separating migrant children from their parents and holding them in cages.
Trump is not responsive to the views of "the American people." He is responsive to his base, which is the heart of both his electoral strategy and his governing strategy. So D.J. Tice is off by 180 degrees. The electoral college did not force Trump to "seek support in the opposition's backyard." It permitted him to say Fuck You to everyone hanging out in that yard--during the election campaign and every day that he's president.
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