Re: CHAT: browsers

Tristan scripsit:

> If the people vote for it, it'd go out of reach of the majority...
> (think America).
If the U.S. President were directly elected by the people, Bush II
wouldn't be sitting in the White House today.

To become President, one runs in 51 separate contests (one for each
state, one for the capital district), each of which is worth a number
of points; points are distributed roughly on the basis of population.
Whoever gets an absolute majority of the points wins.

The points are called "electoral votes" for historical reasons, and
indeed electors are chosen and go through the motions of voting, but
the effective system is as I have described.

Only three times in our history has the elected President also failed to get
a plurality of total votes cast.  But legally the total votes cast are
totally irrelevant: indeed, there are no records of popular votes from
1789 (the adoption of the current Constitution) to 1820.

--
John Cowan           http://www.ccil.org/~cowan              cowan@ccil.org
To say that Bilbo's breath was taken away is no description at all.  There
are no words left to express his staggerment, since Men changed the language
that they learned of elves in the days when all the world was wonderful.
        --_The Hobbit_

Reply