The Electoral College (part I)

Now, for those of you not put to sleep by the title, there is a new push by Sen. Nelson (D) of Florida to abolish the electoral college.

As the state now wrestles with the national Democratic Party to find a solution to seat its 210 delegates at this year’s presidential nominating convention, Nelson noted that “the solution is very elusive,” but that, “If nothing else, this election has provided further evidence that our system is broken.”

First of all, our system is not broken. This election has shown nothing of the sort. The primary elections are not part of the 'system.' They are internal party affairs, and any problems are entirely the fault of the political parties. Leave the electoral college out of it Senator!

Is the U.S. Senate 'evidence' that our system is broken? NO, of course not, it's evidence of federalism. The senate and the electoral college are the two main forums in which states play a role in federal decisions.

Senator Nelson on TV yesterday was urging the abolition of the electoral college in the interests of the principle of "one person, one vote." Each and every person already has one vote, at the state level.

What many people don't realize is the the U.S. has no national elections, NONE. We never have. Every election is a state election, including the one for president. our Federal government is formed not from the top down, but from the bottom up, by the states.

Representative are elected at the state level, then each state sends theirs to Washington, where together they form the House of Representatives. Similarly, Senators are elected at the state level (they used to be appointed by the state government) and sent to Washington to form the Senate.

The election of the President is no different. Electors are chosen at the state level (and they don't have to be elected at all, they can simply be appointed - Const. art. II sec. 1), and are then sent to Washington where they form the electoral college. That college exists for the sole purpose of choosing the president, and they can choose whomever they want. The Senate and House of Representatives count the electoral college votes together and the person with the most becomes the president. After the President is chosen, the electoral college is dissolved until the next presidential election. In the event no candidate gets a majority of the electoral vote, the House of Representatives chooses the president, and each state gets one vote.

The system is perfectly consistent as it is. The state plays an integral role in forming both the legislative and the executive branches of the Federal Government. The individual has a vote and a voice in every election, but it is at the state level. I don't see a good reason to disrupt this. . .

(to be continued . . .)

Hit With the Ugly Stick

Another news story with my comments interspersed. . .

The best marriages are those where women marry men who are less attractive than themselves, research has found.

Psychologists who studied newlyweds found men who were better-looking than their wives were more likely to be unhappy and have negative feelings about their marriage.

Whenever a story talks about measuring things like attractiveness, you know it's going to be worthless. Better looking? What units are those again? centilookers, or is it Wayne and Garth's scale, I forget. Must be the ISO beauty standard, revision 2 most likely.

In couples where the wife is more attractive, both partners tended to be very content.

That depends on who's doing the evaluation, both as to attractiveness and as to contentment.

Did the researchers tell the couples which one was more attractive? if not, doesn't that indicate a pre-existing bias in minds of the participating couples? If so, doesn't that bias the sample too? Either way, won't that affect the findings?

If they were evaluated by someone else, what does that tell us? Only that the finding are valid for those people evaluating the beauty of the subjects, nothing more. Change evaluators, and the results change. There is just no way to measure beauty.

The research, published in the Journal of Family Psychology, suggests that, in evolutionary terms, women are less choosy about their man's looks as long as he is able to help them reproduce.

Men, however, are programmed to choose a mate who is most likely to pass on their genes and look for youth, health and physical attractiveness.

Programmed? Doesn't that imply organization, hierarchy and order?

The tests involved 82 couples married within the previous six months.

Six months? They know enough to measure contentment after six months?

This whole article raises the question of why these couples get married in the first place. if the men really found their wives unattractive, why marry? Also, what kind of moron volunteers for a study and brags about being more attractive than his wife. The fact the participants are evaluating others based on physical appearance indicates a certain shallowness among the participants.

My guess is they are not content because they are stuck on themselves. It has nothing to do with their spouse.

Nothing about these articles makes any sense.