RE: [Nettime-bold] Nader and US election processes

[gmidonnet@weightwatchers.com]

Title: RE: [Nettime-bold] Nader and US election processes

During the elections do not think of the United States as one country, put 50 States united under one government. Individuals in a state vote for the president. The winner takes all that state's electoral votes. The candidate that gets more than 1/2 the total electoral votes wins the election.

Why are there electoral votes you may ask? Imagine Australia, New Zealand, the Philippines and other countries decide to unite how would you apportion the relative votes of the various countries?  The joining of these countries is complicated. The framers of the United States Constitution solved this problem by keeping the states largely independent of the federal government ("the experiment of the states"). The federal government was given several very circumscribed powers (see the US Constitution). Electoral votes are (simplified version) based upon the state's population. The more people in the state, the more electoral votes. [see full answer below]

In the confederation then, Australia would give up its right to create currency, it could not set up tariffs between itself and the other united pacific states, and the federal government would decide issues regarding interstate traffic. When these united pacific states would elect a president Australians would vote among themselves. The person who they decided upon would get all of Australia's electoral votes.

[full answer]

To solve the thorny issue of representation. New York [Australia] is big and powerful, Delaware [Fiji] is small and weak the framers of the constitution divided up the legislative portion of government into two chambers: the senate and the congress.

In the senate -- which has particular responsibilities -- each state, regardless of its population density or relative wealth is represented by two senators.

In the House of Representatives -- which has other responsibilities -- each state has a number of electors based upon its population.

A state's electoral votes are equal to a combination of its senators and representatives. As each state, no matter how few its population has at least one representative. Therefore each state has at least 3 electoral votes [Alaska, Montana and others], and some such as California have 54.

phew

I got carried away there.

gilbert midonnet

I'm not American but I've been watching the Nader v the rest debate with
interest because here in Australia there is very little difference between
the major right and left parties (no offence to anyone who disagrees).
Nader seems to offer a real alternative and something to end the stalemate
of voting for the lesser of two evils.

What really amazes me about the whole thing though, is the vehement
disagreement among the left over whether it is worthwhile to vote Nader or
whether that will just ensure a conservative victory. I don't profess to
understand the US voting system, but don't you have preferences? Isn't it
possible to vote 1 Nader, 2 Gore, so that in the instance that Nader isn't
successful his preferences will still flow to Gore rather than Bush? I'd
really love someone to explain the system to me, because the debate so far
seems excessively divisive.

Thanks, Sky
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