# Hillary Clinton did not run a terrible campaign **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [July 28, 2017, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305 "2017-07-28T03:55:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/161 "2017-08-01T16:14:22Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > When we’re 3 pages into this thread and someone is still getting it wrong, I’d say nothing is blindingly obvious. Especially when the claim is that it’s “the central factor of the election”. The voters did not choose Hillary, and as long as someone keeps saying that, I’ll keep correcting them. You should stop. The voters chose Hillary Clinton. Donald Trump won the election. These are facts. The voters chose Hillary Clinton: 65,853,516 voted for Hillary Clinton. 62,984,825 voted for Donald Trump. Donald Trump won the election: Donald Trump won 304 electoral votes. Hillary Clinton won 227 electoral votes. The people chose Hillary Clinton and the Electoral College chose Donald Trump. And it’s the Electoral College and not the people who elect the President. So when somebody looks at those results and argues that the lesson of the election is the Democrats and/or Hillary Clinton did a worse job with connecting to the public than the Republicans and/or Donald Trump did, they are making an argument that defies the facts. Notice that I am not saying the Democrats won the election or that the Democratic Party is perfect and doesn’t need to change a thing. What I am saying is that the Democrats don’t need to change their “message”. Their message works fine and the voters support their message. What the Democrats need to do is figure out how to translate the support of the voters into a majority in the Electoral College. Or figure out how to have the support of the voters be what decides elections. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/162 "2017-08-01T16:17:47Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > All the Democratic candidates endorsed Hillary. The same cannot be said of Trumps’ Republican adversaries. Sanders only did so after his Bros and Sandernistas did maximum damage to Hillary by spreading the GOPs and the Kremlins lies. And they kept doing so even after he endorsed Hillary. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/163 "2017-08-01T16:19:32Z")
> [@BlankSlate](#): > > All these things are true, and yet, America voted for Clinton and got Trump. Only 55% of Americans voted (a 20 year low in voter participation: 27% for Trump and 28% for Hillary and 45% voted for no one; by contrast in 2008 Obama got 34% and 36% voted for noone). The difference between Hillary votes and Trump votes nationwide is smaller than the spread in favor of Hillary in California. Hillary got more votes in California on an absolute basis and as a percentage of the vote than any other candidate ever. And she deserved those votes because she campaigned her ass off in California. They might have been more useful elsewhere. I don’t know if you can really say “America voted for Hillary” It seems too broad. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/164 "2017-08-01T16:22:57Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > Given their built-in electoral advantage, the isolated ignorant are not really required to work together with the city slickers, who do have experience living together with people of radically different experiences. **Do please note who has majorities in Congress right now, and how well they represent America.** That’s a product of misinformation on the part of conservatives and voter apathy and also some ignorance among those who vote progressive as well. There’s nothing inherently wrong with the design of the electoral college and it actually responds to a well-documented flaw in the design of simple, pure democracy, which is the power of the mob to control political minorities. It’s possible in our system for political minorities to control the masses in reverse, but that’s not a flaw that can’t be overcome with more motivated voters. Even with the electoral college handicap, a strong majority of similarly minded people have the advantage - they just have to have solidarity and the motivation to vote. For whatever reasons, in 2000 and 2016, they did not. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/165 "2017-08-01T16:43:33Z")
> [@asahi](#): > > There’s nothing inherently wrong with the design of the electoral college and it actually responds to a well-documented flaw in the design of simple, pure democracy, which is the power of the mob to control political minorities. Bestowing permanent unequal power on one group because of its own parochial interests is inherently antidemocratic. > [@](#): > > Even with the electoral college handicap, a strong majority of similarly minded people have the advantage - they just have to have solidarity and the motivation to vote. We certainly do need a better electorate than we have. > [@asahi](#): > > The fact that there are fewer people living in flyover country doesn’t give the democratic majority that lives in cities and suburbs the right to run roughshod over them – I mean they do produce our food supply, right? And we produce all of their everything else. How do we not get at least an equal voice? ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/166 "2017-08-01T16:47:03Z")
Why does it matter that Hillary won the popular vote? That’s not the game that was played. If a football team loses 21-17, do we hear them complaining that they won, or should have won, because they had 403 total yards to the winning opponent’s 258? I mean, that would be a starting point to analyze why their superior offense did not convert into points, but at the end of the day, fair or not, the winner is decided by points. And in a Presidential election, it is the electoral votes that matter. This rule is well known by everyone prior to the campaign. It is also known that 48 states allocate these voters on a winner take all basis. Frankly, I believe it is a good system. Without the EC, candidates would never leave the coasts. Candidates would only be responsive to the urban centers. No candidate would ever care about workers in Michigan and Ohio, or coal miners in West Virginia. Ours is a federal system where states matter. Under a direct popular vote system, they would not. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/167 "2017-08-01T16:48:38Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > The voters chose Hillary Clinton: > 65,853,516 voted for Hillary Clinton. > 62,984,825 voted for Donald Trump… 68,931,262 voted for “someone other than Hillary Clinton”. The voters, if they chose anything, chose “someone other than Hillary Clinton”. They cannot have chosen her and someone other than her. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/168 "2017-08-01T16:53:27Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > Bestowing permanent unequal power on one group because of its own parochial interests is inherently antidemocratic. Dogmatically adhering to a “pure democracy” makes no sense unless you can show that it is desirable and superior to other alternatives. The FFs contemplated this and decided there needs to be a means to check the tyranny of the majority. > [@](#): > > In a society under the forms of which the stronger faction can readily unite and oppress the weaker, anarchy may as truly be said to reign as in a state of nature, where the weaker individual is not secured against the violence of the stronger; and as, in the latter state, even the stronger individuals are prompted, by the uncertainty of their condition, to submit to a government which may protect the weak as well as themselves; so, in the former state, will the more powerful factions or parties be gradnally induced, by a like motive, to wish for a government which will protect all parties, the weaker as well as the more powerful. > > SOURCE: [The Federalist No. 51](http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa51.htm) ~James Madison ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/169 "2017-08-01T16:56:10Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Dogmatically adhering to a “pure democracy” makes no sense unless you can show that it is desirable and superior to other alternatives. Whaddaya got? > [@](#): > > The FFs contemplated this and decided there needs to be a means to check the tyranny of the majority. Thereby keeping the slave states in the union. Already discussed. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/170 "2017-08-01T16:56:10Z")
The USA is not a democracy; it is a republic. Hence the Senate and the EC. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/171 "2017-08-01T17:01:54Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > Whaddaya got? > > Thereby keeping the slave states in the union. Already discussed. Nope. Thus making the \*small states \*happy. The 3/5s compromise kept the slave states in. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/172 "2017-08-01T17:05:06Z")
The isolated small states like Rhode Island, surrounded by larger ones, weren’t going to be independent. The slave states, most of which \*were \*small, had the opportunity to form a contiguous Confederacy. And eventually they did. Slaveowners like Madison and Jefferson had a lot of hypocritical euphemisms and circumlocutions for it, but that’s what it was essentially about. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/173 "2017-08-01T17:06:33Z")
> [@doorhinge](#): > > Hillary ran a great Presidential campaign. Two of the best ever. Unfortunately, and according to the existing rules, Hillary lost. Twice. > > The Democrats do not need to change anything. Not one thing. With the existing leadership team they currently have in place, the Democrats will clean up in 2018 and 2020. Other than raising a LOT of money, I am not sure what metric you are using to say that she ran two of the best campaigns ever. Or are you being sarcastic? ISTM that the Democrats DID change things when they kicked out Debbie Wasserman Schultz and cleaned house. It may be enough. It may not. I don’t think Democrats can afford to take shit for granted anymore. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/174 "2017-08-01T17:08:05Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > Thereby keeping the slave states in the union. Already discussed. Yes and you did not make your case. How is a “pure democracy” the most desirable way things should work compared to other alternatives? ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/175 "2017-08-01T17:09:23Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > 68,931,262 voted for “someone other than Hillary Clinton”. The voters, if they chose anything, chose “someone other than Hillary Clinton”. They cannot have chosen her and someone other than her. And more importantly, voters were not voting “for” Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, Gary Johnson, etc. They were voting for the slate of electors in their home state pledged to these candidates. There are 51 separate elections. They cannot be aggregated together to achieve a certain result. The match play in golf analogy upthread is the best one. I can’t lose by one hole in match play and then complain that I should have won because my opponent took an octuple bogey on a hole he lost. It simply does not matter in the game that we are playing. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/176 "2017-08-01T17:09:25Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > The isolated small states like Rhode Island, surrounded by larger ones, weren’t going to be independent. The slave states, most of which \*were \*small, had the opportunity to form a contiguous Confederacy. And eventually they did. > > Slaveowners like Madison and Jefferson had a lot of hypocritical euphemisms and circumlocutions for it, but that’s what it was essentially about. Nope. Virginia was the most populous state in the union. And New England was thinking about succeeding once. The Senate/Electoral was set up to make the small states happy and appease those who were afraid of mob rule. Nothing to do with slavery. The 3/5th compromise was about slavery. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/177 "2017-08-01T17:10:13Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > How is a “pure democracy” the most desirable way things should work compared to other alternatives? I have neither the time or inclination to teach you a World History major. If you have something you think is superior to offer and wish to discuss it, please do so. If you just want to needle, g’bye. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/178 "2017-08-01T17:11:16Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Nope. Virginia was the most populous state in the union. Perhaps you ought to read the post you’re replying to again, but more slowly. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/179 "2017-08-01T17:12:58Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > I have neither the time or inclination to teach you a World History major. > > If you have something you think is superior to offer and wish to discuss it, please do so. If you just want to needle, g’bye. The dodge of someone who can’t back up their rhetoric. In short, you’ve got nothing. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305/180 "2017-08-01T17:15:01Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > The dodge of someone who can’t back up their rhetoric. Nope. Can’t be arsed, for you. > [@](#): > > In short, you’ve got nothing. I do have some idea of what the best form of government is. You, despite challenges, offer “nothing”. When come back, bring argument. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-did-not-run-a-terrible-campaign/792305.md?page=10)