At the moment (and it’s been this way for quite a while), CNN has Amy Klobuchar 84 votes behind Pete Buttigieg, and 2.1% of the vote behind Pete Buttigieg. Which should mean that the total number of votes counted is about 4000. But Klobuchar and Buttigieg have about 11,000 each, and Bernie Sanders has more than that. None of the anchors seems even slightly perturbed by this.
I’ve seen too many cases of weird percentage calculations (oh, he got 10% in this little county, and 5% in THIS big county, so on the average he got 7.5%….) to have much trust in intermediate percentage reports.
I’m grateful if they at least get the raw numbers right.
I take it there is no electoral college that would explain the discrepancy in these elections? I do not understand the US system, with its caucuses and primaries and what have you.
Harold, yes, usually they are talking about Democrat delegate-equivalents and not actual votes in the caucuses or primaries. That’s why the totals don’t match. It is delegate “votes” not primary/caucus votes.
Thank you Tom. It is odd how democracies cling to their particular brands of elections that ensure the Government does not reflect the majority. Here in the UK we have the parliamentary representative system that means, for example, the number of votes (in thousands) needed to elect each MP from different parties in 2019 was:
Tories -38
Labour – 51
Lib Dems – 336
SNP – 26
Greens – 866
This is the price paid for maintaining the local MP system.
In the USA, the electoral college system ensures over representation for small States – the price you pay for maintaining a somewhat level political playing field among States.
Given that small States are massively over-represented in the Senate, it does not seem too onerous on them to have a simple majority for President, but I guess it does not look like that from the inside.
Another recent entry in the eternal war between math and journalism:
https://twitter.com/DavidEpstein/status/1228001544920010752?s=19
2/11 CNN: We can’t do math
3/5 MSNBC: Hold my beer