Splitting Parties

Thomas Friedman is hoping the Republican party will split. They now get a little less than half the votes, but that was enough to elect Trump in 2016. St Hillary got more votes: she had huge majorities in the states that always vote Democrat, while Trump won 30 states with narrow pluralities, so St Hillary did have a plurality of the total vote; however, in the US system, it's not the votes, but the number of Electors. What happened when the 13 colonies agreed to join into a United States was that the smaller of the 13 colonies were afraid the large, industrial states would treat them as mercantile colonies, so they wanted a veto over legislation and the presidency, and they insisted that every state gets 2 Senators, regardless of population, and every  state gets 1 elector for everyone they have in the Congress, so at least 3, even if they have a tiny population. Thus, the agricultural states were able to prevent the industrial states from passing mercantile laws that the small states could only buy from the US industrial states at above world market prices and could only sell to the US industrial states at below world market prices. And this system gave Trump 304 out of 538 Electors and the presidency.

So the current Republican Party is capable of winning elections, and Friedman wants it split. The Trump voters in 2016 consisted of those who liked Trump and those who hated St Hillary, two very different groups, and if the party split on those lines, it would form two parties of about 24% of the vote who would put up 2 different candidates for president in every election. This would ensure Democrat victories in every single national election, since the Democrats would always have a plurality in every state, even if they only had 40% of the total vote.

Actually, the Democrats are also kind-of, sort-of split. There are the DNC Democrats who figure Ss Hillary and Biden are two of the very best candidates for president the US of A has ever had, and then there are those who voted for Trump or third parties or didn't bother to vote because they detested St Hillary. 

The DNC are certain both that Russia stole the election, and also that 52% of the voters actually voted against St Hillary (how could they). Something must be done to make sure this never, ever happens again.

The DNC know for a fact that every single American who failed to vote early and often for St Hillary in 2016 is utterly Deplorable. Enough learned their lesson in 2016 to give St Joe a massive victory in 2020. But it was still far too close. Every single voter who failed to vote early and often for both Ss Hillary and Joe must be disenfranchised, since their votes go against everything the US stands for. But how?

Thomas Friedman stands firmly with the DNC, and he fervently hopes that splitting the Republican party into two small parties would fix that once and for all, so that was his Christmas wish to Santa.

(There are, of course, those who figure in 2016, the Democrats were so sure St Hillary would win those 41 states, maybe all 50, they got lazy and didn't bother to rig the election, a mistake they did not make in 2020, and will not make in 2024.)