The election has started since some states have started mail in voting. It is still going to be two months before all the votes will be cast. Most Americans tell the pollsters they have already decided who they support.
Polls have lost credibility after 2016 although even then they were reasonably accurate about the national vote. It's all but certain that Joe Biden will win the popular vote but that is not enough in this country. You also have to win in the right states.
A system designed to protect slavery now serves much the same purpose. What it sort of protects now is the ability of Republicans to be viable. There are large areas of this country that have been largely isolated from modern dynamics.
Its not like they don't have access to media or that they aren't educated, they just live a traditional way of life that seems right to them, go to a traditional sort of church that teaches or accepts values much of America has rejected and have a tenuous relationship with Government.
That is an oversimplification but there is clearly a rural vs urban divide and as an electoral map clearly demonstrates, the states that are primarily rural vote one way and urban states vote another.
This is what it is but because rural states tend to get disproportionate electoral votes because of the formula it allows a candidate to lose an election with a majority of the votes.
This is not likely to change because the most undemocratic part of our Government, the Senate, is proportioned much the same way.
So yu have to win the right votes to win, not just the most votes.
This year it looks like we might have a democratic result if the polls are reasonably accurate. Still the electoral divide also represents a cultural divide as so many support values that are rejected by the other side.
Bringing America together is the hardest task facing our country. It clearly is not happening now.
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