2024.08.23
holy cats "the simpsons" really added a lot to the vernacular..
These are two very different theories of the election. Trump is running to get to 47 percent. Harris is running to get to 52 percent.This is also why Republicans have gone "weird". Like, things normies find "weird" about the Democrats often comes from reaching out to be a bigger tent more people can be under. But the Republican "weird" comes from getting a bit inbred and echo-chambery. (And it's so charming to see how so much of the Republican meme space is dominated by "Nuh-uh! WE'RE not weird... YOU ARE")
But there's something deeper going on here.
The reason Trump is aiming for 47 percent is because the Electoral College makes minority rule possible for the rural party. Which incentivizes the rural party to be insular and to focus on energizing--not expanding--its coalition.
By disadvantaging the urban party, the Electoral College incentivizes it to broaden its coalition. Which means that the Democratic party of this moment must be constantly seeking to expand its reach and bring in new constituencies if it is to have a chance at holding executive power.
In other words: The Electoral College distorts the character of our parties, nudging one of them to be a majority-seeking organism and the other to be a base-pleasing organism. The character of our two parties today flows from the system architecture used to allocate power.
This is a high, abstract concept. But it explains--perfectly--what we have seen at the two conventions.
