Re: OT: Electoral College Op Ed

In article
<c072b89c-e11d-42ee-8343-3a7a7e283867@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
salmoneous@xxxxxxx wrote:

       I would submit that 2000 is the best reason to keep the Electoral
College. Gore won the popluar as counted by less than five tenths of one
percent or just a little over 500,000 votes out of over 101 million
votes cast. A razor thin margin like that could very easily be
overturned (or not for that matter) by a recount.

If the "best reason" to keep the Electoral College is that it would be
messy to count all the votes, so let's give the office to the guy who
got fewer voters, then we *really* need to ditch it.

It has always been too messy to count the votes. Never in any
election I am familiar with (including for that matter a couple of class
president and union elections) has every vote been remotely counted.
Most toss ballots for a number of reasons. It is not all that unusual to
find mistakes in individual precincts.
Evidence submitted trying to postpone the California recall found
a pretty steady 3% margin of error across most of the different methods
then available. YOU have to have a back-up method when it is too close
and is within the error margin.
I also take comfort in knowing that in the week or so prior to
the election when it looked like the roles might be reversed, Mr. Gore
was more than happy to tell reporters that we had to play it out
according to the rules.
Also remember that in all the elections for President under the
Constitution, this is only the second time that this has occurred.
.

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