>> ^Hastur:

>> ^Asmo:

Umm, isn't that the very definition of democracy? Getting the most votes, one person one vote.
So is the UK not a democracy? Canada? Australia? Germany? France? All have a head of government who is not elected by one person, one vote. In any of those cases, it's quite possible to choose a prime minister not favored by a majority. There are different flavors of democracy, some of them pre-dating the US, many of which do not directly elect their executives by one-person, one-vote.
The philosophical point of democracy is to best represent the will of the majority. In the US, we have the additional task of doing so while protecting the rights of the minority. The best way to do that is not always one-person, one-vote.
And like I said: even if you abolish the electoral college you still don't get the will of the majority, since there are many people who cannot legally vote and many others who choose not to.


Yes, they are democratic systems built on the principle of democracy. However, "equality and freedom have both been identified as important characteristics of democracy since ancient times" (from the Wiki). Most modern democratic systems are not equal.

Btw, a person who chooses not to vote does in fact cast a vote, a vote to abstain. Because they choose to exclude themselves from the process does not mean they weren't given their democratic right to have their say.

As an Australian, I'd prefer a Prime Minister voted in by popular vote. During the last term, the sitting PM Kevin Rudd was deposed and replaced by Julia Gillard in an internal coup due to his poor polling results (ie. it was looking like Rudd was riding the Labor party in to the ground). They replaced him as party leader which also meant he was no longer PM. That was not democratic in the slightest. At the following election, Julia Gillard won government by securing the votes of independents/crossbenchers, but achieved less of the popular vote than Tony Abbott from the Liberal party. Incidentally, voting in Australia is compulsory and you're fined if you don't show up (so much for that 'freedom' principle)

Our system is built on democratic principles, and is a form of democracy, but it's far removed from the method used by the Greeks who coined the term (Demos = "people", kratos "people"). The US electoral college is in the same boat. Someone said it earlier, the founding fathers didn't trust the average moron to get it right and put in a system to leave the true voting to 'wiser' minds.

When you can achieve 50+% of the EC votes for less than 20% of the popular vote, the system is broken, end of story. Keeping the EC seems more a matter of convenience (eg. "there will be too much rorting", it'll be too hard, waaah etc) than a matter of fairness.

Update: Australian PM Kevin Rudd says he'll consider a parliamentary inquiry.

Australia has just pulled all of its troops out of Iraq, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said that the "war was based on a lie". Not that it was a war in the first place, it was a blatant invasion and illegal occupation.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/war-based-on-a-lie-says-rudd/2008/06/02/1212258741705.html

This makes Kevin Rudd's apology to the indigenous Aborigines look thoroughly meaningless.

Thanks, much appreciated! Tags and channels are spot on I think.

It´s good to see some important historic documents between all the LOLcats and faceplants from time to time...

In reply to this comment by Thylan:
sifted. please do edit tags/channels.

sifted. please do edit tags/channels.