I understand the frustration, obviously I've felt it myself since I made the comment above, but politicians today making changes to the fundamental structure of the US electoral system that has existed for over 200 years is a very unsettling thought to me. I think it's more likely that we would end up worse off if we abolished the electoral college system, but that's just my opinion because I agree with the arguments of some of our founding fathers regarding it. Namely it acting as another "balance" in the system of checks and balances that helps to prevent what John Adam's refered to as the "tyranny of the majority". Oddly enough, the result of my above complaint could be interpreted as one of the direct intents of our founding fathers in creating the electoral college, and their reasoning doesn't seem to me to be any less relevant today than it was then. It's natural to want things to be simpler and to say that a simple majority vote should decide elections, and there are good arguments for that, but there are also good arguments against it. It's been almost a decade since I read them, but the Federalist Papers and the Anti-Federalist Papers are really good (albeit dry and more difficult to follow without annotations for historical context) at explaining both sides of the arguments that went on at the time regarding the US constitution, and straight from the source of some of the most prominent founding fathers. All of whom, even though they are often debating opposite sides, were obviously extremely smart people who didn't decide any of their opinions without a lot of critical thinking and constant revaluation of them.

I don't disagree that there are problems in the US electoral system, but I think it's more of a, "the devil is in the details" sort of thing. Again, it's just my opinion, but things such as state district gerrymandering, lack of legitimate 3rd party prospects for office, the near inability of a candidate of one of the major parties to stray from their party platform on any issue, etc., are mostly caused by the political party leadership themselves cleverly (albeit distastefully) exploiting the system for their own benefit. In a weird way I can't even blame them, they are just pursuing their own self interests as best they can within the system that exists. While I'm all for making changes that can eliminate a lot of the unsavory things that go on, I think those changes should come in the form of closing loopholes that exist in the current system, not largely throwing away the current system and replacing it. I say this because again, I think that the politicians of today being able to "do it better" than the politicians then is an unlikely prospect in the extreme. Reading and trying to follow their arguments, it's obvious none of them were following whims or failed to very thoroughly think through each and every sentence that was written and (albeit not without dissent) agreed upon.

Look, part of the problem is that you are treating a bunch of slave holders from the 18th century as saints, who should not be corrected.

But nowadays electors don't need 41 days any more to travel to the capital.

You guys have different systems in different states to elect the head of the federal government.

(And many states have changed their regulations long after the founding fathers died)

Maybe just try to impose a federal law that each state has to send electors in proportion to the election result - some states already do this - and you'll get rid of the swing state phenomenon.

OTOH who am I to mangle in internals of another country ... ;-)

Cheers Rolf
_{(addicted to the Perl Programming Language and ☆☆☆☆ :)
Je suis Charlie!}

Look, part of the problem is that you are treating a bunch of slave holders from the 18th century as saints...

I don't think they were saints. I do think they were a group of very smart, educated people who went to a lot of effort to design a system of government, and that system was designed well enough to work well for over two centuries as the United States grew from meager beginnings (where it very well may have taken some of them 41 days to travel to the capital) to what it is today, despite all the challenges along the way. The fact that different states have different systems, and that they have changed over time, is because the federal system they designed specifically intended and allowed for this. That's another one of the "balances" they intended by allowing states that power.

..., who should not be corrected.

Not at all, if the same group of people who designed the system then had designed it today I have no doubt it would have many differences, but I doubt the core constructs, such as the electoral college, wouldn't be included. I'm not against making changes when they make sense. Here again, they wrote the constitution with the need to make future changes in mind. I'm just more cautious in that I think changes should be made organically as need arises, and the degree of change should fit the need. In the case of the major political parties manipulating the system in ways that the majority of Americans (who largely consist of members of those parties) agree shouldn't be allowed, by all means lets find ways to write or rewrite legislation that prevents the behavior, or repeal existing legislation that allows it.

OTOH who am I to mangle in internals of another country

Well, I think I'm safe saying you are a human being capable of rational thought, and having an opinion on another countries system of government isn't mangling in the internals of another country. I like opinions and open discussion, it's an excellent tool available in countries that are fortunate enough to have it without fear of repercussion (beyond the occasional personal insult from those with too little self control anyway). Considering other peoples opinions, arguments, and why they have them is a good thing. Sometimes it even leads to people changing (or initially forming) their own opinion, which should be the point of a good debate. Even if I disagree wholeheartedly with someones opinion, I'd rather have them state it and argue their opinion rather than not. It's always likely that the two oppositions on any issue both have points that the other hasn't considered, not to mention any observers who can benefit from the exercise.

That being said, this is PerlMonks, and I don't think that's a very good venue for a political debate. Now, in a bar over beers (or in a pub over a pint if you prefer), that's a great venue. :-)

Just another Perl hooker - will code for food