Electoral votes should become electoral ‘points’

This letter is in response to the articles concerning the Electoral College.

The framers of the U.S. Constitution created the Electoral College as a result of a compromise for the presidential election process. During the debate, some delegates felt that a direct popular election would lead to the election of each state’s favorite son and none would emerge with sufficient popular majority to govern the country. Other delegates felt that giving Congress the power to select the president would deny the people their right to choose. After all, the people voted for their representatives to the federal legislature. The compromise was to set up an Electoral College system that allowed voters to vote for electors, who would then cast their votes for candidates, a system described in Article II, section 1 of the Constitution.

Each State is allocated a number of Electors equal to the number of its U.S. Senators (always 2) plus the number of its U.S. Representatives (which may change each decade according to the size of each State’s population as determined in the Census).

Whichever party slate wins the most popular votes in the State becomes that State’s Electors – so that, in effect, whichever presidential ticket gets the most popular votes in a State wins all the Electors of that State.

The debate has started again as to whether the U.S. Constitution should be amended in order to change the presidential election process. Some promote eliminating the Electoral College in favor of a direct popular vote for president while others believe the Electoral College should remain unchanged. Just as compromise solved the initial problems of the framers so it is that compromise can solve this problem.

The solution is to change the electoral votes to electoral points and reward each candidate a percentage of points based on the percentage of popular votes received in each state. This would eliminate the “”winner take all”” system thus allowing for all the votes to count. A voter is more apt to believe their vote counted when a percentage of popular votes are taken into account rather than the “”all or nothing”” system currently in existence. Further, this new system would integrate the desire for a popular vote for president with the need for the individual states to determine who actually gets elected.

Joe Bialek
Cleveland, Ohio

Obama’s energy policy ‘untenable’

Senator Obama’s energy policy consists of trying to reign in speculation of oil in the markets, promoting alternative energy sources and increasing the mileage standards of automobiles.

First, the automobile manufacturers have been increasing mileage standards for years, and they are currently producing smaller, fuel efficient cars which get 35 to 45 miles per gallon.

Second, alternative energy sources, e.g. wind, solar, thermal, hydro, tides can only provide a very small portion, maybe 10% to 15%, of our energy requirements.

Third, the supposed speculation of oil in the markets has its root cause in classic economic conditions. Since the demand for oil is approximately equal to the available supply, prices are high, and any perturbations in the supply of oil puts upward pressure on prices. Supply is controlled by OPEC, domestic production, and U.S. refineries. To increase supply we have to increase domestic oil production and build refineries. On the demand side, gasoline consumption has been steadily decreasing in the U.S. due to less travel, a switch to smaller cars, car pooling and the increased use of mass transit systems.

Unfortunately Senator Obama came up with an untenable program, because he does not have the experience and good judgement to make sound decisions.

John McCain will increase domestic oil production, build nuclear power plants, promote alternative energy sources and encourage reduced gasoline consumption

Donald A. Moskowitz
Londonderry, N.H.

Advice for ‘starving students’

Like everyone else, I am a starving student. (Race Track Industry ’10).

Last year I got a scholarship for a notebook computer, so I picked a Gateway C-120x (convertible touch screen). This was the biggest mistake I ever made! It has spent more time at service departments than it has with me. It is ultra slow, and just does not work! I highly recommend that you don’t buy one!

Shannon Reynolds
Animal Sciences Sophomore