What Is Your Vote Worth?

There was an article in the Washington Post this morning by Charles Lane titled "Deciding the president by popular vote is a flawed idea". He's against it. Yep, Mr Lane thinks that the electoral college is the best thing since sliced bread. And he particularly likes the two party system. He thinks it's just right for us. Any more parties would just cause trouble and maybe even get us a president that didn't even win a majority of the votes. That's why he doesn't like the popular (one person, one vote) vote idea. It might mean that small states wouldn't get much say while big states would. In other words, it's more important that states with small populations should never-the-less get to have a prominent say in just who gets elected. What I don't understand is why, in a country that pays so much homage to majorities, why small minorities get to have more say than they have population? I mean, I understand that while the majority rules, it must protect the rights of the minority. So it's not like the big states with the large majorities will decide to place inhumane restrictions on the small states. Although I've been in most thinly populated states and they could do with some restrictions. Just not inhumane. The thing is, I don't think that our two party system is working very well. I think our two party system would work much better if it had two less parties. And the electoral college doesn't work well either. Mr Lane points out that while Al Gore got about 500,000 more votes than George W Bush in the 2000 campaign and yet lost, he was "pretty much unmoved". The thing is, whether you liked Gore or Bush, doesn't change the fact that a man with fewer votes still won. And I'm fairly certain that this wasn't the first time it happened. And I'll bet it won't be the last. Now if you liked Bush, you may be happy. But what about the time that's coming when someone you don't like will win that way? What will your opinion be then? Actually, Mr Lane isn't completely against the idea. He does point out that in California every 677,000 people get one electoral vote, but Wyoming's 563,000 citizens get three. His point is that no system is completely fair. He also points out that small states could stop a constitutional convention from changing the system. That doesn't mean it shouldn't be tried.