The Math

For some reason I felt like writing about numbers this afternoon. Donald J. Trump likes to brag that he got more votes during the Republican primary than any of his opponents, and in fact, he's been known to say he got more primary votes than any Republican ever. Maybe. It is true that he got the most primary votes this time around, but remember, he had, at one point, 16 opponents. If you add up all of their votes, more Republican primary voters voted against The Donald than for him:

Donald's votes: 14,095,993
The other candidates' votes: 17,023,694

The total number of votes cast is 31,119,687, of which Trump got approximately 45%. The other number to keep in mind is 60,933,500. That's the number of votes Mitt Romney got in the 2012 general election, and he still lost.

By-the-way, do you remember all of the distinguished statesmen/women who ran in the Republican primary? It was all kind of fuzzy in my head, e.g., did Gingrich run this time around or was that in 2012? (Gingrich ran in 2012.) Was it Ron Paul or Rand Paul? (Ron in 2012, Rand in 2016.) Santorum and Perry? (Both in both.)

Anyway, here's my blast-from-the-not-so-distant-past list of the 2016 GOP primary candidates:

Declared (and still in the race) GOP Candidates

1. Donald Trump (June 16)

Officially Not Running
Rob Portman (Dec 2, 2014)
Paul Ryan (Jan 12, 2015)
Mitt Romney (Jan 30, 2015)
Rick Snyder (May 7, 2015)
John Bolton (May 14, 2015) 

Mike Pence (May 20, 2015) 

Bob Ehrlich (August 4, 2015)

You're Fired!: Candidates Who Have Dropped Out
Rick Perry (June 4 - Sept. 11)
Scott Walker (July 13 - Sept. 21)
Bobby Jindal (June 24 - November 17)
Lindsey Graham (June 1 - December 21)
George Pataki (May 28 - December 29)
Mike Huckabee (May 5 - Feb 2)
Rand Paul (April 17 - Feb 3)
Rick Santorum (May 27 - Feb 3)
Carly Fiorina (May 4 - Feb 10)
Chris Christie (June 20 - Feb 10)
Jim Gilmore (July 30 - Feb 14) 
Jeb Bush (June 15 - Feb 20)
Dr. Ben Carson (May 3 - March 4)
Marco Rubio (April 14 - March 15)
Ted Cruz (March 23 2015 - May 3 2016)
John Kasich (July 21 2015 - May 4, 2016)

Days until Election Day: 36