"We have actually had governments elected with a minority of the popular vote. Churchill was one, in 1951. Thatcher was the other (though not every election)."

Well strictly speaking most governments in Britain get a minority of the vote, just as whoever gets to be President will have received a minority of the vote (and a tiny proportion of the actual electorate since so few people voted, though I gather it was just over one in two this time, a bit more than the last time).

The word for getting more votes than anyone else is "plurality" - majority means that most of those who voted voted for you, wich doesn't often happen when there are more than two parties involved. Thatcher never got anywhere near a majority, ansd most people loathed her.. She only got the high majorities in Parliament because the parties against her were scratching each other's eyes out. Once people got their act together to vote tactically in 1997 the Tories were absolutely slaughtered. As would probably happen every time if people were allowed to rank candidates in order of preference.

What happened in 1951 (and I think in 74) was that the party that won got fewer votes than the largest opposition party, but got more people elected, because of the way the voters were distributed in differenmt constiutuencies. Not unlike the Electoral College situation really.

I imagine it happens in Congress as well, but noone ever seems to add up the figures there, or if they do noone makes a fuss about it. (Though I imagine in real,life who own Congress is probably more important in shaping the lives of ordinary people - most monarchs, elected or not, are largely show business after all.)