CL, you are absolutely correct that the citizens who reside in the big states are cheated in the U.S. Senate. For example, the 490,000 mostly conservative folks in Wyoming have the same two votes as California's 33.9 million. Add in two more senators EACH for the loyal patriots of Utah, Idaho, Kansas, and a dozen other red states in the West whose TOTAL combined population is LESS than California's, and you clearly see the inequity.

Well, the electoral college is based on the very same calculus. The folks of Wyoming gave 3 electoral votes to Bush-Cheney. That's one vote for every 165,000 people. California was able to give 54 electoral votes to Gore/Kerry, which sounds like a lot, but only equals one vote for every 627,000 people. As there are a lot of little Wyomings, but only a handful of big Californias, the cumulative inequity so skillfully exploited by Rove & Co. is HUGE.

I've heard right-wingers insist that this grossly unfair system was the original intent of the Founders, who chose to rest America's fate upon the common sense of rural, small-state farmers (read: WASPs). What I know for certain is that homelander values have given the world 9/11, Iraq, one-party rule, warrantless surveillance of citizens, the right to torture in secret prisons, neo-fascism, and the repeal of the American Republic; praise Jesusland.

It really is; thanks.

A Guy sounds suspiciously like the "Proud Well-Traveled American" from recent threads who claimed to embody proof that not all conservatives are know-nothings who have never ventured beyond Tijuana, yet then proceeded to trash the rest of the world with tired cliches about how Western Europe is going to hell under socialism, etc. Whatever.

So, A Guy, when abortion is recriminalized in the red states, and a sufficient number of physicians are imprisoned and women dead from back-alley butchery, will you THEN be satisfied? Can we THEN go back to free and fair elections in which WE THE PEOPLE choose serious and qualified persons to lead us into the 21st century? Or is this just the beginning of a Christofascist Bridge to the 17th century, with more witch hunts to follow?

Bill Clinton won the popular vote -- twice -- just as Al Gore won the popular vote in 2000. Meaning they received more votes than any other candidate, and no other candidate received more votes than they did. In the U.S., unlike many if not most other countries, there is no run-off election between the two top vote-getters to ensure that the victor ultimately receives the approval of more than 50% of the voters.

You are, of course, merely repeating right-wing disinformation, designed (as always) to undermine Bill Clinton and shore up the questionable legitimacy of the Bush-Cheney presidency. Alas, the forum you are in is not the Limbaugh Letter or the O'Riley Factor.

I can recall a history class in which the professor was writing some terms on the board, and a student interrupted him, saying something like the correct spelling is Guangzhou not Gwangjyou, or whatever; and the professor responding that no, the actual spelling is like this: [he then rather impressively drew the characters from memory].

-- Language is above all else a tool, and should be respected as such, rather than degraded as a political statement. While I sympathize with France's efforts to resist Americanisms (futile though those efforts might be), I just don't understand Taiwan's refusal to accept simplification -- despite the beauty of the old characters. Christian Europe didn't reject the so-called Arabic numerals because they arrived via Islam.

-- I just saw the movie "Three Times" (I think the true title is more like "The Best Times"), which is set entirely in Taiwan; and I realized I had never seen anyone type or text in an Asian language. But if the film's depiction of the ease and speed with which characters can be text'd is accurate, then I have no doubt Chinese writing will survive and flourish.

It is correct that President Clinton, in receiving the most votes in 1992 and 1996, was elected with less than 50% of the total popular vote; but what is your point, Mike K.?

-- Democrats should work harder to attract more votes? Well, OK; except that the point of this discussion has been that it is not even necessary to get the most votes, much less an outright majority, as long as they are the right kind of votes -- namely, those in small, rural, mostly conservative states, which in the electoral college weigh up to four times more than votes in big states. In a word, the "homelander" vote.

-- Coming in first in a field of several candidates isn't "winning"? Ross Perot, the strongest third-party candidate in recent memory, received nearly 20% of the vote in '92 and nearly 10% in '96. If you have information that Perot's votes would have gone to Bush Sr. or Dole, then that would be significant. Otherwise, the lack of a run-off election under the American system renders your point irrelevant.

The Democratic candidate(s) "won" the popular vote in 1992, 1996, and 2000. We chose wisely, as the 90's will be remembered as a Golden Age; whereas, the last six years have resembled the Christian Fundamentalist hell a little bit more each day. Oh and by the way, that giant sucking sound you hear is the American Republic being flushed down the drain by the two men who placed 2nd in the 2000 popular vote.