RE: Democracy or Republic

[Bob Hoffmann <escape@alt-escape.com>]

At 11:33 AM 12/21/2000 -0800, Shahab Mesbah wrote:
>As for your assertion that Republicans carry most small states, if you look
>at "normal" elections you will see that most of the presidents end up wining
>with the popular and the Electoral College votes.

Actually, this is not necessarily true.  Clinton won against Bush with the 
Electoral College, and he won with the plurality of votes (more than any 
other single candidate), but certainly not a majority of the popular 
vote.  Perot took about 20% of the vote, so Clinton only needed about 41% 
of the popular vote to beat all other candidates in the popular vote 
(although I suspect he got more).  He was by no means a majority president 
in his first term.

I'm not going to do a historical survey on this, but it is easy to see that 
any "close" presidential election could result in a president who won a 
minority of all the votes cast.  Had Gore won (with the current vote 
count), he also would have been a minority president, as he was only a few 
hundred thousand votes ahead of Bush, and 3rd party candidates garnered a 
couple (or few) MILLION votes.

We can see that we can't just say "Eliminate the electoral collage, and 
whoever wins, wins."  Wins what?  Wins a plurality?  I don't think the 
majority of Americans would want that.  So we would either need run-off 
elections (which I couldn't bear), a parliamentary system (where you vote 
for a party with a leading candidate, and the majority party, or a majority 
coalition of parties, takes the presidency), or (an interesting concept 
that I first heard in this forum), you are allowed to vote for several 
presidential candidates, and rank your votes (e.g. My first vote goes to 
Buchanan; if no one wins a majority and Buchanan isn't in the top 2, then 
my second vote goes to Bush, etc., until some candidate has a majority of 
votes cast).

While we're at it, what about the legally disenfranchised?  Washington, DC 
residents can't vote for members of Congress or the President (in any way 
that counts).  The argument is that the Capital should be a Federal 
territory (under control of the Federal govt.), and therefore should not be 
a state.  But a Constitutional amendment can correct this:  Giving DC 
residents Congressional representation and a legitimate vote in 
presidential elections, while maintaining their status and a Federal district.

Correcting the Electoral College opens a can of worms, but a can of worms 
is still a can of worms, whether it is opened, or not.  Worms are great for 
fishing and gardens, but not for governments.