Last night, over Crazy Orange Chicken, Bayreuth Boy wanted to know the point of the Primaries.
A popular means of nominating the party candidate, I explained. Not that I was exactly sure who voted in these Primaries. Had I ever done so? Was I even allowed?
What, the Boy wanted to know, did the Primaries have to do with the Electoral College?
Nothing, I said. With great certainty.
But how exactly did the Electoral College work? he persisted.
Um, I said.
According to a news report he'd seen the night before, U.S. presidential elections were "an indirect voting process incomprehensible to the country's own populace."
Well, I said, there is a popular vote. And an electoral vote, too. At the same time. Only the second one counts.
The Boy raised his eyebrows.
I'm not defending it, I insisted, and stole some Crazy Orange Chicken sauce off his plate.
This morning I looked up Primaries on Wikipedia. (Ah. Seems I could vote.) Then Electoral College. I read select sentences aloud.
Currently each state uses the popular vote on Election Day to appoint electors.
Although ballots list the names of the presidential candidates, voters within the 50 states and the District of Columbia are actually choosing Electors from their state when they vote for President and Vice President
Oh.
That's what I thought, said the Boy.
He stood in the shower calculating how 51 percent of the popular vote might mean loss of the electoral vote. Let me explain it to you, he said.
Still, I did not get it. Too much math, I complained.
A month ago I wanted to know Bayreuth's position relative to Berlin. We were sitting on a sofa at the Schwarzwaldstuben. The Boy scrawled a map of Deutschland on a scrap of paper. "Oh," I said, surprised. "Bavaria runs along Germany's eastern border?" There was a clatter. Coulda been a waitress, fingers slipping. More likely the Boy's jaw. Falling.
To think his girlfriend, (supposed) member of the East Coast/West Coast intellectual elite, should need clarification on such matters from he, a Franconian of working-class origins.
I'm not that intellectual, I protested this morning. Not really political either.
Neither am I! he said.
Fine, I said. You are The Winner.
He left the house happy.
I was just saying that, though. You see, not so long ago, the name Judy Garland drew a blank stare.
No, really, I said, Liza Minelli's mother? Adored by gay masses? Star of Wizard of Oz?
The film at least he knew.
Also. Until the evening of December 31, 2007, Bayreuth Boy had never heard of Georgia O'Keefe. Her name cropped up due to the exceedingly phallic New Year's Eve party invitation he designed. "That's how bottle rockets are shaped!" he said of the exceedingly lengthened representation he and Gauloise-devouring Felix had spent hours perfecting. Its bulbous tip pierced the second zero of "2008."
For the first time in our relationship, I was speechless. Usually it's the other way around. "Infantile," I managed to sputter, then downloaded Georgia's blooming vaginas for him to study.
So. The Winner is me. I think that is clear. No?
For the record, the Electoral College was designed as a pre-media-age way for rural people to make an informed vote. They voted for electors, local people they knew, and then sent those electors to Washington to participate in the Electoral College: a gathering of electors to debate and barter votes until a President and Vice President could be chosen.
Today, some places districts still put the elector's names on the ballot; most put the candidates names on. Electors generally state for whom they are voting and generally stick to it, although they are not obligated to.
The College remains an effective way to help rural areas, although with a new function: Idaho, with a population of 1.5 million is significantly less important on the campaign circuit than Massachusetts -- with a population of 6.5 million. In terms of electoral votes, however, Idaho has four and Massachusetts has twelve, lessening the populatio differential from 6:1 to 3:1 -- or cutting it in half.
In this way, rural, less-populated areas are balanced a little against highly populated urban areas.
The popular vote is simply all the votes tallied.
Not that you asked.
But I have a question for you: what is the female equivalent of phallic?
Posted by: DaMomma | January 29, 2008 at 05:24 PM