On Mon, 11 Oct 2004 01:16:31 -0400, John D. Giorgis <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I'm sure that other people here are following the election very closely, so > I wanted to post some thoughts about where things stand, 3 weeks and 1 > debate before the election. >
Interesting analysis, John. Thanks. But it highlights what really frustrates me about the electoral college system: > Bush States Never in Doubt: > AK, UT, ID, MT, ND, SD, NE, KS, OK, MS, AL, GA, SC, KY, IN > Kerry States Never in Doubt: > HI, CA, IL, DC, MD, NY, VT, MA, CT, RI Translation: states where your vote doesn't mean squat, especially if you're in the minority party there. Both parties know who will win so neither will expend much effort (if any) in these places. Even though I'm planning to vote for the guy who will win my state, I resent the fact that my vote won't matter at all *regardless* of who I voted for. > This leaves the remaining solid battlegrouds of: > NV - 5, NM - 5, IA - 7, WI - 10, OH - 20, PA - 21, FL - 27, and NH - 4 Translation: states where your vote has disproportional voting power. Both parties will expend great efforts (and $$$) to win votes in these places. Is this really a desirable system for a democracy (or, ok, a republic)? Any good justifications for it? Why should we want the voters in a handful of states have so much influence over the final results? Why isn't there more call for change? I can only posit cynical behavior on behalf of BOTH parties to maintain their own strongholds at the expense of fairness. I had thought that after winning the popular vote but losing the election, that at least the dems would push for some changes, but they seem content with the status quo, and that puzzles me a bit. Personally, I'd love to see the whole electoral college system flushed and have the popular vote decide things. But I do understand the concerns that residents of the small pop states have that they'd be entirely ignored if that was the case (although it bugs me that this system makes, say, an Alaskan voter's vote worth a fair bit more than, say, a California voter's vote). But it seems to me that the biggest problem isn't so much the EC itself, so much as the "winner takes all" setup that awards all the electoral votes to the state pop vote winner so that that the winner gets all the electoral votes whether he wins by a 99% margin or a 50 vote margin. That just seems unnecessary and wrong to me. It would be very easy to allocate the electoral votes directly proportional to the pop vote, or give each district one electoral vote, with the 2 other EC votes going to the overall pop vote winner. > ... Lastly, while there is an initiative > on the ballot to split Colorado's EV's, it is nearly inconceivable that > Colorado would choose to commit electoral suicide in this way - and that's > probably more said about that than it is worth. You say "electoral suicide", I say "democracy". :-) That measure could conceivably give up to 50% of the CO voters some impact on the election that would otherwise be written off. Why can't (or shouldn't) every state do this? -bryon _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
