Shocker: Democrats embrace electoral college

After all the noise bashing the electoral college in 2000, the irony here is so thick you need a jackhammer to cut it.

A Republican push to change America's historic voting system is faltering after a fightback by Democrats fearful that it could cost them the 2008 presidential election.

Republican activists in California, the most populous state in the country, have set in motion a proposal to change the law to end the winner-takes-all electoral college system.

The change, if it went through, would effectively hand the next election to the Republicans...

...Two Democratic senators from California, Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein, in a joint statement, said: "This power grab orchestrated by the Republicans is another cynical move to keep the presidency in Republican control."...

...The Democrats attempted to introduce a similar reform in North Carolina earlier this year in the hope of picking up seven electoral college votes. But they quickly abandoned this when they realised they would be establishing a precedent.

They did the arithmetic and realised the gain in North Carolina would be swamped by the losses in California...

posted by Purp at 12:48 PM

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