To you all;
Please excuse my bad manners and this blunder {weren't so revolting}in the
message, I copied part of it from a vent that I wrote to an American friend
(who'se still a really good friend), but it's still no excuse for bad
manners.
Humbly,
Pat
Daniel, my most humble apologies, from one subject of Her Majesty Queen
Elizabeth to another.
>From your e-mail address, and that of Ian, I gather that you are a direct
subject of Her Britannic Majesty; I can now understand why you don't like
being referred to as a citizen of her North American Southern colony. Why
in the world the colonists got so choked over a Tea Tax is beyond me; after
all, the majority of them now drink coffee in addition to other liquids.
And they're responsible for the creation of some of the most disgusting
coffee houses in the world; no names, no lawsuit.
Now, if they weren't so revolting, and hadn't revolted, think what an
interesting place the world would be today. Problems with the Afghans, send
in a representative of the Foreign Office, a platoon of Gurkhas, and the
whole thing would be cleared up in a day. The Iraqis are revolting, send in
a Political Officer to set them straight. The natives of North America are
rioting, send in a section of soldiers with a good sergeant in charge, end
of problem.
-----Original Message-----
From: Daniel Carrera [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: 2008/06/06 02:09
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [social] Hillary finally quits
Rod Engelsman wrote:
>> I think winner take all systems are hugely unfair and undemocratic.
>
> It depends on how much "all" there is to take. If the prize is a single
seat
> (a representative, for example) then winner-take-all is inevitable.
Well, yes. But you know that I'm talking about the Electoral College.
Having a single guy take all the points from Florida because he got
50.001% of the popular vote is not fair.
> On a larger scale, our overall system of governance always was a
> compromise to hammer out a union among a number of inherently unequal
> states.
And that's all fine and good, but the Electoral College does nothing to
further this goal. For example, maybe you want to give extra weight to
small states so they don't get overrun by the big states. A winner take
all system does nothing for that. The only reason why the current system
gives more weight to small states is because small states get more
delegates per-capita. But you can get that without a winner take all
system (e.g. like the Democrat primaries).
> IIRC, Europe
> had every bit as much trouble putting together a confederate system for
the
> EU, with similar results.
But notice that Europe does not have a winner-take-all system. Except
for when there is only one delegate to choose (e.g. country presidents).
> Our real undemocratic institutions are the Senate (2 seats per state,
> regardless of size or population) and by extension, the Electoral College.
The European Council of Ministers is one minister per country. So it has
the same problem as the US Senate. This wouldn't be bad if the EU
Parliament had more power. You could argue there are benefits to having
two bodies, one that follows population and one that gives equal weight
to everyone, who have to get along with each other and compromise.
> But as originally designed our Federal government was envisioned to be
about
> as relevant to your daily life as the U.N. is to your life today -- i.e.,
> hardly at all. So absolute, per-person, democracy wasn't as important a
> consideration as just getting the thing done.
Indeed. If the Federal government was also as small as the founders
intended, then the system wouldn't be a problem.
Daniel.
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