2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: Bernie Sanders Explains How He Would Deal With An Obstructionist Congress [View all]dsc
(52,160 posts)In 2014, the GOP won 52% of the House vote and got 57% of the House seats. In 2012, we actually got more House votes than they did, and still didn't win the House or even come close to doing so. The margin that their 218th vote won by was 14 points in 2014, meaning we would have to win 55% of the vote (48% we got in 2014 plus half of their 14% margin.) Obama didn't win 55% of the vote running in 2008 against the party that had caused a second great depression, involved us in 2 foreign wars that they proceeded to botch, ran up trillions in debt, and let a major US city flood with no aid for the better part of a week and who nominated a 72 year old man running with a dimwit as VP. Obama still didn't get 55% of the vote. That means that if Bernie could, by some miracle run as well as Obama did in 2008, get every single solitary person who voted for him to vote for a Democratic candidate for the House, he still wouldn't have a House majority. He would still be short of a House majority even if he did all of that, which he is, frankly speaking, not going to be able to do.
http://www.thenation.com/article/republicans-only-got-52-percent-vote-house-races/
article from which I got the percentages.