[@Vilageidiotx]

I have yet to see how it does not work as intended, but more so my focus is on what is considered "the majority". In the strictest definition that additional 2% of the population does skew the numbers into a "majority" over the other percentage, but even that is not really much of a majority; there might be grounds to claim the system is broken and rigged if it were a difference of five percent or so. The actual difference between 46% and a 48% are negligible when factoring in that once again, a number of these people are concentrated in cities. The difference falls into the realm of margin of error - not that there was any - yet more that I mean its difference is statistically negligible to the outcome, which it was.

The election of 2000 was far, far closer in terms of numbers both in popular vote and electoral vote, yet the Bush administration was the one that found itself in office "against the popular vote". The disparity of 2000 was 271 to 266, a far cry from the massive difference of 2016 where the 304 to 227 occurred. Granted I know a number of people do not remember well the election in 2000, myself included, but that information is freely available. There is not much ground to argue that the popular vote is the deciding factor or that this was an upset victory created by a broken system; the win was not even close.

To answer the other component, do I think majority rule to be "evil"? [i]Yes to an extent[/i], because I know for a fact that the "Deep Blue States" do not speak for me or my beliefs. Just because you have a larger, more concentrated number of like minded people does not make you right; it just means you have a larger, more concentrated population of like minds - my state and lifestyle still want to be legally represented, especially as our own local "majority" that is a part of a union. Furthermore, this would have a better basis if, and only if, the numbers were [i]heavily[/i] skewed for the majority or for the minority. The electoral college, as dysfunctional as any other system built by man, more or less did what it was designed to do by and large; barring of course the faithless electors, who I view personally as traitors to their people, regardless of their party because of their motives and actions.

But I digress, the notion of "only swing states" is inaccurate within itself; a few of those heavy blue states that have not voted red in many years did vote this time around for them. Swing states are battlegrounds of course however, the argument that if it were a popular vote that you could come in and "Sweep up what the other side doesn't pander to." is not going to work well in a system that games towards a legitimate popularity contest versus the current metric. By the numbers and by location, the rural voters are going to be fewer and further between, it is not as easy to communicate with them, sway them, gather them, motivate them or compel them. No less, their goals and objectives in life are going to be naturally more diverse than major population centers.

Off the cuff but on topic, United States itself never was or is a true democracy, it is an electoral republic, those officials represent on behalf their peoples' districts, or at least should be. It is a democratic process certainly, although in a different forum. The popular vote is mostly irrelevant and only needs to aggregate enough in regions to push an electoral vote. I am not saying this as if you do not know, because that would be arrogant and foolish, but because I cannot see a basis of argument for "Popular vote wins."

About the electoral college ignoring the vote altogether, I am fairly certain they would not do so unless under a situation of extreme duress. If it comes to that, the United States is already beyond repair and likely in a flaming spiral downward that no amount of voting or politicking will save it from.

The disinterest of Americans voting is under their own lack of discipline and nothing but it. I live and work in a traditionally blue state and knew that even if my county was to be particularly red leaning, our electoral votes were going to the Democrats. I still voted out of principal and obligation. If people do not believe their vote matters, not only are they very wrong, they are doing a disservice to the people of the United States. Then again, I find that an unsettling number of American citizens are complacent, so this is not news either.

Even if a Republican won the popular vote, I know that accounts for nothing. It is a relatively meaningless number, not entirely true I will say as the electoral votes are more important, that should not really be used to gauge anything. I remember clearly the Obama administration sweeping the first election they won and a strong follow-up on the second. I would call that [i]more[/i] disheartening than having a difference of 1-2% popularity, but life still went on.