The "Red Wave" that was trumped up as a red tsunami never materialized... it barely lapped the shore (I am keeping with the wave analogy here). 

So what happened? Did we Americans essentially fear the instability that election deniers pose to our democratic systems? If so, we must have feared this so much that we voted for the very party that most of us seem to blame for high inflation, which has always been the death knell for political parties in power in the U.S. 

This is a story of geography, demography, money & minority rule.

My guest in this episode is Dr. David Schultz, a Distinguished Hamline University Professor of Political Science and Legal Studies. He is also a professor of law at Hamline as well as the University of Minnesota Schools of Law, where he teaches election law. In this conversation, he tells me about what he believes to be the most important election in U.S. history: the presidential election of 1800. Why is this election important? Because it set the precedent for the losing political party to relinquish power. At the end of the day, Adams conceded his loss (hint, Mr. Trump). 

Dr. Schultz explains how polarization has increased in America's politics over the last 50 years, and why polarization will decrease in the next decade (I know, I was surprised too). We also talk about a subject that has baffled and then angered me for years: Super PACs. Don't they threaten our democracy? 

We end our conversation with another intriguing realization - that America's election winners are receiving only a minority of the votes. This is a crazy idea in a democracy. Yet, it is happening in ours. 

To learn more about Dr. Schultz, you can visit his academic homepage.

In addition, below are links to other interesting episodes: 

S1E40: The Real Story of Thanksgiving, Dr. David Silverman

S2E27: America's Election Disputes & Violence, Prof. Edward Foley

S2E38: Chile's History of Polarized Politics, Dr. Claudio Fuentes

I hope you enjoy these episodes.

Adel

Host of the History Behind News podcast

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