How the Electoral College should be done

Probably one of the most controversial aspects of a United States presidential election isn't the money spent campaigning, or the negative ads, but how we actually vote for the candidates itself.

The United States uses a system known as the Electoral College where instead of the population voting for who will be the President of the United States as a whole, individuals called Electors actually vote for who will become the President.

Now the only reason why a presidential election is is even held in the first place is because all 50 states have laws that state that the Electors must respect the wishes of the majority of the voters in the state they are in, and all the Electors usually choose who majority of the voters voted for (although this is not always the case).

Now while this may sound okay to some, this does have several flaws in it.

The first flaw in this is that the way the Electoral College is set up is that it can led to the person who did not win the popular vote to still win the election because they had enough electoral votes (this has happened three times before, four if you count the election of 1824).

The second flaw with this is that a couple of highly populated areas can literally give a candidate all the electoral votes in one state by only a few thousand votes, which in turn creates a huge amount of resentment from everyone else in the state.

There is of course a way to solve this problem.

As most of you may well be aware all states plus the District of Columbia are given a minimum of three electoral votes. This is of course to reflect the number of people that state has in congress (members of the House of Representatives and the Senate).

So here is what I feel should be done. Instead of a presidential candidate winning all of a state's electoral votes if they win the popular vote in that state, they should only be given the two electoral votes that is suppose to represent that state's senators if they win the popular vote, and that the candidate who wins the popular vote in a certain representative district should be given the electoral vote that represents that district, regardless of whether or not they actually won the popular vote in that state.

Doing this would not only more accurately represent the voting population of a state, it would also give a boost to "third party" candidates as more people might be more willing to vote for a candidate they actually want to for instead of voting against a candidate by voting for a candidate they don't necessarily like, but they can not stand the other candidate.

This could also eliminate Faithless Electors as well, as an elector might be more willing to vote for the candidate who won the distract that the elector is assigned to rather then actually becoming a faithless electors. Electors could even become no longer necessary at all and that the electoral votes be given out by the state.

Of course we could just do away with the electoral college completely and go to direct vote...

Get out and vote!

Today is the day that the majority of Americans choose whether we keep Barack Obama as President, or if Mitt Romney is to becomes our next President (along of course with other elections to choose to keep or replace governors, senators (state and national), representatives (state and national), delegates, judges, sheriffs, mayors, local councils, and new laws).

At least, this is what we tend to believe...

The reality is that it is not the majority of the American people who choose who will be President of the United States. In fact it is the majority of people who actually can legally vote who's choice really counts (which are United States citizens who are over the age of 18, and are not currently incarcerated, and have not been convicted of any felonies, or have been convicted of felonies but have yet to get their voting rights restored... and of course citizens who are residents of United States territories that are not actually states (with of course the exception of Washington D.C.) ) and not the people who are just to lazy to get up and go vote.

It is important that everyone who can legally go out and vote to actually go out and vote. It is the only way to know at least what the true opinion of what most Americans believe who should be in charge of this country, and thus how the country should be run.

Now there are some people that say, and believe, that their vote doesn't really count, but the reality is that your vote doesn't count if you don't actually go out and vote. No one is going to consider your vote to count if you don't actually vote in the first place.

Others might say that your vote really isn't going to make a difference. Again, this is only true if you actually don't go out and vote. Whether you believe it or not, your vote does make a difference.

Now of course there are others will try to make the "excuse" that there is no one is running that they actually like. Well there are more then two political parties, and in the presidential race there are more then two candidates. You can always check out what one of the other candidates want do and vote for one of them.

While we may have a choice whether we want to go out and vote or not, others will be basically be making your choices for you, unless you go out and make that choice yourself.

The reality is that your opinion about how the country is being run, and should be run, only means something if you want it to mean something, and the only way you can make that opinion mean something is if you actually go out and vote!