Dennis Robert Redmond wrote:
>On Fri, 11 Jan 2002, Nathan Newman wrote:
>
>> Why should Dems be bipartisan- they actually do like winning elections,
>
>Except Presidential ones, especially the ones where they won the popular
>vote by 500,000 ballots.
>
>I still haven't seen one single Dem say anything about the godawful
>18th-century shambles masquerading as the US electoral system.
Lots of Dems have said things about the electoral system, proposing a slew of reforms and money to clean up elections. As for the electoral college, Jimmy Carter publicly tried to reform the system after the close 1976 election but that experience made it clear that the electoral college is unchangeable under our Constitution.
The electoral college, due to its voting formula, gives disproportionate voting power to small states. On the other hand, it take only 26% of states to block any constitutional amendment-- therefore, small states will inevitably block any amendment both in the Senate and in the states where it has to be ratified.
I know lefties like to fight over issues that are completely unwinnable, but this issue is the silliest one to condemn the Dems that I can imagine. Gore and other folks can be trashed for giving in too easily over last year's specific election, but fightng the overall Electoral College is unfortunately a non-starter.
-- Nathan Newman