Count Lugosi

Yes they do, and the electoral college allows states with low populations to be the recipient of some of that pandering rather than just big states, by (admittedly artificially) inflating the weight of their votes. That's the point. It also serves to keep large cities such as New York City listed above from constantly deciding who will run the country at the expense of those who do not live in big cities and have completely different needs and interests. Edit: Looks like Hilowe beat me to the punch and put it more eloquently than I have.

I know I'm going a long ways back in the posting to respond to this, but every president issues pardons. Some pardons are obviously more controversial than others. Some examples I can think of (and had to use Google to get the correct names and backgrounds) are Barrack Obama pardoning of Oscar Lopez Rivera (admitted terrorist, offered pardon by Clinton in the 90's if he would renounce violence, but Rivera wouldn't renounce it), Bill Clinton pardoning his brother (drug related offense), and George W Bush commuted Scooter Libby's prison sentence (perjury related to testimony about revealing an active CIA agents identity, still has guilty verdict, just removed the prison sentence). All of these are allowed, just for one reason or another (nepotism, favoritism, etc), the decisions were controversial. Wait... Was Breitbart created by Andrew Breitbart? Wasn't he the guy who made The Drudge Report the biggest news site on the planet? Wasn't he the voice and spirit of the Tea Party? and then mysteriously died of a heart attack at the age of 43? Yep... and I miss him every day. He was a Conservative Lion, and would have made a great President someday. This is utter nonsense. Of course they didn't think about California... but they did think about Virginia. It was by far the most populated state in our new nation, and the most important fact about Virginia... it was a slave state. There was no way the northern states would give that much power to the south. You are correct that our founders would never stand for a government ruled by a Monarch, nor would they stand for a Democracy... that is why we have a Republic. Draft up the amendment and go for it. Either succeed in changing the way we elect the President, or fail in the attempt. If you can manage to get the country to go along with it, I most certainly will congratulate you and abide by the new Constitution... but I don't think you will do it, succeed in doing it, or even get it off the ground... because the reason it was done in the first place, still exists to this very day. Also if you guys did try to do it, you know you will fail, and then you will lose your ability to keep complaining about it. You know I didn't like it when Bill Clinton became President after only receiving 43% of the vote... but he captured enough electoral votes to win. That's what chooses the President. By all means... I challenge you to change it... anything to get people to STFU.I will not STFU. Remember our beloved first amendment, I will say my opinion until you change the constitution and take that right from me. I can't imagine why my opinion about the electoral college upsets you to the point where you talk like that. Are you one of those special snowflakes I hear some people talk about? I'm obviously not a fan of popular vote. If this was ever going to pass, my entire state would have almost no say in presidential elections. The politicians would spend almost all of their time in probably the 12 most populous states (based on last population census I found, those 12 states account for ~192.5 million people in a nation of ~321.5 million people). My state, at 34th on that list, would never see a presidential candidate (not that that would be a bad thing by itself), and therefore, the candidates would not care what people in my state thought. My understanding was, that was the reason our founding fathers set on the electoral college, so a couple of large states couldn't make policy for the entire nation. I was not thinking of the votes being broken down by state. I was thinking of all votes being counted as a national vote. Like a true democracy. State by state would hardly be fair. We are also talking about a national popular vote. Candidates only have so much money and time to run their campaigns and can therefore only visit so many places. As hilowe stated, however, over 1/2 of the population of the US belongs to roughly 1/5th of the states. If you are a candidate and the election is based on popular vote you will campaign and pander pretty much exclusively to those states and effectively ignore all of the issues and needs of the other states because they just don't have enough people to be worth the time or effort. Why go to Wyoming at all for instance? There's only 600,000 people there and the same time and money could be spent in New York where New York City alone has 8.5 million. You'd get far more votes for your campaign dollar there, but what is good for New York is not going to necessarily be good for Montana or South Carolina and may in fact be detrimental to them. The electoral college boosts the influence of the smaller states so that they still have at least some influence in national politics and have their voices heard.

I ate your chicken dinner. Only winners can eat chicken.

What are you guys talking about? I can't quite hear you from all the way over here where I'm winning.

...and so it is!

We are gathered here today on this momentous occasion to celebrate the day I won the thread. I would like to thank my parents for giving me support when I needed it most. They were always behind me every step of the way. I would also like to thank the academy, but most of all I would like to thank iwin90, brewersalliance, and samudragupta for not winning.

Good you understand that I win.

http://www.troll.me/images/xzibit-yo-dawg/yo-dawg-i-heard-you-like-losing-so-i-added-some-points-to-my-points-so-you-could-lose-while-you-lose.jpg

Granted, but it's not your funday or your "I don't have to run" day. I wish the next person couldn't make a wish.

winnn

Granted. Your wish for an uncorrupted wish wasn't corrupted at all. Your balance is now 0. I wish I knew what game I wanted to play.

Granted. You go swimming in a sewer. I wish there was something good to watch.