I only say that in Finland the person who gets most votes wins. We have a very different system. Yet now Biden got nearly 100 more election people for president so it was not even close.
The Electoral College was meant to keep the great unwashed from electing someone unsuitable. It may need some fine tuning now.
Actually it was crafted to keep the smaller heavily populated regions from continually electing presidents while leaving the not as much populated regions out of the process. Never read about keeping the great unwashed from electing anyone. Five times in US presidential elections did the electoral college produce the winner over the candidate winning the popular vote. At least half of the US population lives in the yellow colored counties. It works fine as intended.
Sorry, but no. Those who could vote was left up to the States to decide. Many of the States had a property requirement of 50 or 100 acres of land and be of the white race, some also required a certain amount of personal wealth, and others continued the old tradition of a religious test. The Federal government did not begin to say who could vote until 1870.
It is a problem. We have places where 20% of the country wants their candidate as president. Yet we have 80% of population who wants their candidate as president. Who is right? It is 80 vs 20%. Also we have all the before elective day given votes counted on the voting day counted so the data for postal votes is counted when the counting sites are closed so we have the pre-election votes alredy counted when the final day starts as the voting day election starts. Who is right? Less or more people? We have decided more is better.
Before this descends into a political fight...this outsider sees the real problem is the choosing of candidates...I’ve said before that mathematically it is impossible to have family members of previous Presidents be appropriate candidates...and now they are saying maybe Trump jnr or his daughter may run for president in the future...or Obama’s wife or daughter...Kennedys, Bushs, Clinton’s...the most powerful seat in the world is chosen as nepotism! What an irony that this is a suedo monarchy! Birthright to the presidency! WTF? Here’s an idea...how about putting some of the amazing minds you Americans have up for election...?
There are many qualified people who could run for various political offices out there, but I figure that many are scared off by the massive scrutiny of their personal lives, businesses, their families, friends, etc. Paparazzi types and other ghouls running around digging up whatever they can find or pay "informers" to tell their story from 20, 30, 40 or more years ago regardless of certainty on whatever candidate they are trying to destroy. Who in their right mind would want to subject themselves and their family to that? So we're largely stuck with career politicians who have no shame, scruples, character or a general sense of good being to run for office. But what are our alternatives, an absolute monarchy, military dictatorship, mob rule? Things are not looking good for awhile.
You make a good point and something that I have warned against in the past for a number of jobs...Police for example, if you vilify them too much you will see that little quality people will want to become one and you have a lowering of standards to allow for recruitment quotas to be filled... The presidency looks too much like a popularity contest based on the "cult of personality" rather than intelligence and experience. In Australia, the party in power puts its greatest mind into the treasurer position, the guy in charge of fiscal policy...(the reason why we did so well during the GFC and despite Corona, why Australia still holds it's AAA rating) it's usual that that person then runs for Prime Minister when his boss loses the next election. Australia doesn't vote for a person, we vote for a political party, and it's that party who chooses it's leader...that leader can be replaced literally overnight (you can wake up to a new Prime Minister).
Interesting how different it is almost everywhere. For example in Finland we have some ten candidates for their parties of which two could get to the second round where they battle each other for being president. Socialdemocrats, leftists, middle party, the rightist wing, christians, Finnish Swedes,and the Green party who has some 12% of votes now. Those are the main parties as there are several others who have 1-2% of votes.
In 1945 the incoming Atlee administration continued the policy of the wartime coalition of maximising domestic food production and minimising imports although for different reasons. Agricultural policy was based on the premise that there was a worldwide shortage of food.[1] The war had left Britain with huge debts in foreign currencies so that even ’cherished’ projects (like the National Health Service and nationalisation) took second place to limiting imports.[2] Hostilities had ended but British agricultural policy had not changed and was essentially still wartime. However the labour supply had dried up as little thought had been given as to how this was to be achieved. The First World War song ‘How you going to keep them down on the farm after they’ve seen Paree?’ spoke of the difficulties of retaining a rural work force once exposed to wider horizons. In 1945 the sentiment might have been better expressed as ‘How you going to get them back to the farm?’ The end of the war in Europe and the beginning of demobilisation did not create a flood of workers, released from the war industries and the forces, returning to the land wanting their old jobs back. Conscientious objectors could no longer be pressed into service and mismanagement of the Women's Land Army's expectations had led to a rapid decline in its numbers and a loss of morale. The only source was POW labour and the number of German POWs working in Britain increased after the end of hostilities, by June 1946 there were 163,000 German POWs so employed. However there was a limit to how long they could be retained - the need to rebuild the Western occupied parts of the German economy as a buffer to an increasing threat from the Soviet bloc created an increasing demand for men. There was increasing pressure, for their repatriation, in the House of Commons, led by Labour MPs Tom Driberg and Richard Rapier Stokes. Stokes repeatedly accused the government of profiting from slave labour and of breaking the Geneva Convention. The campaign was soon picked up by the Spectator and then the Economist. The Ministries of Labour and Agriculture fought a vigorous rearguard action. This probably lengthened some POWs' captivity by up to a year. However by 1948 it was clear that public opinion had turned, moreover some mechanisation in the form of self propelled combine harvesters, hop and fruit pickers etc was beginning to appear and a repatriation programme began in earnest. [1] Cabinet Paper C.P.(45) 273 8th November 1945, Agricultural Policy. Page 3 Para 16 [2] Andrew Chester, Planning, The Labour Governments and British Economic Policy 1943 – 1951, PhD Thesis, University of Bristol. 1983. Page 209