IT'S BIDEN AGAINST TRUMP IN AMERICA'S STRANGE FORM OF DEMOCRACY

Two geriatric candidates are vying for the White House in an undemocratic system.

- JOHN DOBSON

Democracy in America? “Bah! Humbug!” Ebenezer Scrooge would say. This iconic fictional protagonist, created by Charles Dickens, would have a characteristically sarcastic view of American democracy today. He would have a point. After all, how can a country claim to be democratic when in a crucial election a winner can lose and a loser can win? In the year 2000, Al Gore received 48.4% of the national vote but lost the presidential election to George W Bush who received 47.9%. In 2016, Hilary Clinton received 48.2% of the votes cast, but lost to Donald Trump’s 46.1%. Clinton won nearly 3 million more votes than Trump, but still came second. How can this happen?

To understand you have to go all the way back to the 1787 Constitutional Convention held in the US State of Philadelphia, which decided how the president should be elected. The delegates debated the issue for months, with some arguing that Congress should pick the president and others insistent on a democratic popular vote. In the end they compromised on a process called the Electoral College, in which nowadays 538 electors are divided up among the states. Small states receive a minimum of 3 electors, and the large states many more. Dig deep, however, and you’ll find a strong element of racism in their final decision. The creation of the Electoral College was a workaround for the persistence of slavery in the United States.