> > > -Solidarity: The Electoral College eliminates votes for "silly" parties such as the Green party so that in most cases, the winner of an election will win by a larger margin. This is also the case with the Canadian system; "silly" votes tend to be disregarded because there are not enough to win any one riding. However, in the Canadian system, there /are/ occasional ridings that vote for independents or for third parties. This is a trade-off that we get for a system that comes closer to the popular vote than the American system; however, since there are very /few/ independent or third-party votes, and since the party that does win the election usually does by a very strong margin to form a majority government, we consider our system a success.
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> > I wasn't going to post on this topic because I'm just sick of politics at the moment, but this argument I reall have issues with. I support the Green party, a lot of people do.
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> Sorry about that. In Canada, the Green party is a little different from their American counterparts. I hear, for example, they want to use astrology to balance the budget. So when I was typing and needed an example of a silly party, the Green party came immediately to mind -- I forgot that the American Green party and the Canadian Green party aren't the same thing.
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> >Our votes arn't silly and the should count. With the electoral college there is only the illusion that the canidate that wins does so with a large margin.
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> I'm not going to get into this, but Sam would argue that that's a /good/ thing, because it makes it look as if America is uniting behind its leader. This is less true in Canada (smaller ridings mean that the margin by which the winner wins is less), but is still true under our system. Under a popular vote, there is no such illusion, and the result is often chaos and the ineffectiveness associated with coalition governments.
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> As I just finished saying, each country strikes a balance between personal representation and the illusion of solidarity...how far to carry that illusion is a decision made by each country.
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Well we don't hide the illusion very well, we annoucne the popular vote same time we annoucne the electorial vote, and you know the statisics will be out for what percentages of Americans of voteing age actually supported the canidate that wins. I know we did with Clinton, I think less than 40% of American Voters actually voted for him, if that many. There are just so many who don't vote that be it Gore or Bush neither of them are going to have the support of even half the country, and we arn't going to lie about it. So the ridiculus illusion of solidatiry is just that, ridiculus. It is flimsy at best an even a causal investigation will reveal the truth.

Speed'I need more sleep, I can't stop ranting'ball