Ok, so Vintage is currently in Boston in the midst of election fever (and University Halloween madness), but a couple of things have struck me whilst out and about.

The term electoral college has been batted around quite a bit while here - in short this is the way the US election system works, in that Americans will not cast votes directly for president in Tuesday's election. An electoral college is a set of many electors who are empowered to elect a candidate to a particular office. This is separate from the popular vote (which anyone voting on Tuesday will be a part of), which in affect counts for absolutely nothing in electing the next president.  The state of Massachusetts, of which Boston is a part of, for instance has a combined total of 12 votes in choosing the next president, while Alaska has a grand total of 3.

The candidate who obtains 270 electoral votes wins and it is indeed possible for a candidate to lose the popular vote and win the election. This happened most recently in 2000 with Al Gore.

This antiquated selection of the presidency has lead several young educated people (some Harvard, some street corner homeless dudes) to comment to me that, 'Yeah I may vote, but if I had a hair appointment or a doctor’s appointment, I wouldn't re-schedule this for voting, because basically my vote doesn't count, so why bother'.

This begs the question: Is this form of indirect election not a controlled form of democracy, and in effect non-democratic in its nature?

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