electoral

    Call me crazy but, I have a degree in mathematics, and I do not understand the new electoral math. I do not believe that a vote for Nadar is a vote for Bush. I do not believe that vote for Pat Buchanan is a vote for Al Gore. I believe that a vote for Harry Brown is a vote for Harry Brown. A vote for Nadar is a vote for Nadar. A vote for Bush is a vote for Bush, and on through the list.
     I find it absolutely appalling to consider voting for any candidate who does not represent what I want from my government simply because my candiate of choice is unlikely to win.   It is a matter of principle, it is a matter of conscience, and it is a matter of civic duty. My goverment representatives are there to do what I want them to do. My representatives need me to tell them what I want. When I vote for a candidate, that says to him, "I approve of your ideology. I approve of your goals. I approve of your plans for the country that I love dearly." If I vote for him simply because the other guy might not win, that defeats the entire purpose of the electoral system.
    In 1776, the British army was the single most powerful army on earth. Ask yourself: What would the world be like today if that group of underdogs known as the American colonies had simply said, "We cannot possibly win, therefore, we will not try." I refuse to be a defeatist. I refuse to waste my vote. My candidate may not win in this election, but that, my fellow Americans, is not the point. It is about having the courage of my convictions. It is about accepting the responsibility that comes with the freedom of the electoral process.
    In most states in the United States there are at least five candidates on the ballot for President of the United States: the two main party candidates, Libertarian Harry Brown, Green Party candidate Ralph Nadar, and Reform Party candidate Pat Buchanan. These men represent a great array from the American polital spectrum. I urge you to vote for the man who most closely represents your beliefs. On November 7th, I will do just that. I will cast a vote for Libertarian Harry Brown, and my vote will not be wasted.
                       ~ October 2000

American public education has long done an injustice to the study of the writing of the Constitution. The basic story we have all been told is essentially: The Articles of Confederation did not work. The United States needed a better system. A Constitutional Convention was called. A group of men descended on Philadelphia in the summer of 1787. Voila: a fabulous document that we still use today. This my dear friends is a gross over simplification. Indeed, there was no commonality of thought at all at the beginning of the Convention. Many feared that the United States were simply too large and too diverse to be governed as a single nation. They worried that in a country as large and diverse as the United States that there could never be a concensous of opinion, and that factions would become numerous. They worried about the inherent distructiveness that would surely follow from factions vying for power, seeking to be more powerful than another faction rather than tending the country's business. They worried that if any one faction should gain a majority that it would oppress the minority. They worried that factionalism would bring about the ruin of a Republican form of government. There was, however, at least one man who thought otherwise. That man was a delegate from Virginia - James Madison.
James Madison throught that factionalism was precisely the mechanism by which a Republican form of goverment could be made to work. Madison believed that the United States was so large and so diverse that there would be too many factions for any one faction or group of factions to dominate. I am sorry that Madison's vision has not been realized. For Madison's entire argument please read Federalist No. 10.