While I agree that the electoral college is not the best system, we can't really know what the results would have been if the popular vote determined the presidency. Campaigns are optimized based on the electoral college and each would have been run differently on a different system. Also, voter turnout may have been different because you no longer have partisan strongholds which may discourage voting.
A plurality did, not a majority.
But still more than went with any individual alternative.
> Trump won on a technicality of our (antiquated and frankly awful) system, not on a mandate.
It's not so much antiquated as evil; it's designed specifically to magnify the power of voters in states with people counted for assigning representation that don't vote (primarily to secure slavery, but its continued to reward other forms of disenfranchisement since.)
Thank you for providing me with the opportunity to look up the difference :)
Wikipedia [0] also recognizes this meaning.
It may have been built with slave/free state "fairness" in mind, but even today the mechanism serves to level out the tyranny of the majority, from the states' perspective.
I like to add there is still 4 million votes that are being counted. Projection even from CNN is that Trump wins the popular vote.
[0] https://mishgea.files.wordpress.com/2016/11/geographic-lands... [1] http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-11-10/trumps-geographic-l...
Actually, the majority of Americans agreed with Hillary Clinton. She won the popular vote by over a million votes. We just use an outdated system built to appease slaveholders that does not necessarily represent the bulk will of the people. Trump won on a technicality of our (antiquated and frankly awful) system, not on a mandate.
>If the liberal left was truly smart, why did they allow the president to run up more national debt than all presidents prior...combined?
The president doesn't make the budget or handle the accounting of the US. Congress does. Guess who controls Congress? Hint, not the liberal left.