Here's my stats.

Age: 21
Sex: Male, semi-regular
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Location from age 0-20: Los Angeles
Why?: Because I go to La Trobe University for the next 3 years
Major: Politics
Dislikes: George Bush and Vegitables
Likes: The beach and Victoria Bitter

There we go.

You can tell the difference?

The night before the election about 2 years ago I got exceedingly hammered and missed my civic duty being busy trying to recover from a hangover of doom. No big loss, my district went Gore by a landslide; not like Mr. Potatohead was a better choice, but hey that's the choices these days. I thought at the time it had something to do with being broken up about a girl. Now I know I was really just preparing myself for 4 years of suck.

Oh, and I've mentioned this before... is it just me or are most of Linux users in Australia running Slackware?

Cheers,

Finegan

he he he, political debates always confuse me. I really don't understand a lot of things about the election system in the US. I get the feeling sometimes that your vote does count, but only once. You vote 1 person into office, and then he votes "for you" for people above him, and so on up to voting for the president. I am sure that is very wrong and a political science major is now going to hack me for all I am worth But it really seems that way, especially during the Presidential election. States vote, and depending on the amount of representatives, some states count more than others? I thought everyone had a vote, and that was the beauty of things? No need to straighten me out on here, unless you can do it in very short, easy to understand terms. Speak to me as if I used winbloze If not, I probably won't understand a word you are saying.

Anyway, yeah, so my pinto on bush:

I think he's decent. He's got balls. Other than that, I don't wanna mention much on my views about him, as he is my boss after all

Cool

Your right, lets avoid the politics of people and complain about how twisted the electoral college really is.

First off, there are 538 electoral votes, I think, give or take a few: 435 seats in the house, 100 senators and some oddball shadow senators or reps for those weird places like DC and Guam. One of the most powerful votes is North Dakota, for instance, because with 1 Rep and 2 Senators, 3 electorals spread out over a tiny 550,000 people-ish makes it so their percentage is higher than say California with their near 50 electorals and something like 45 million people.

Then again, no one ever campaigns in North Dakota, its a lot easier to get a 500,000 person crowd in downtown LA than it is to get 10,000 people in Fargo. Also makes for better news coverage as the CNN van has to put on the snow chains to make it to the stumping in ND.

States always go in blocks, there's never been a state that split their electoral vote, although its constitutionally possible. Some states just historically go one way or the other, New York for instance is a buttload (45?) and has gone Democrat in nearly every election year but Reagan's going back a while... to Nixon I think? I wish I knew the history as well as the math. Regardless, things tend to hinge on states like Florida, that go either way... go figure.

Jerrymandering is rampant, re-arranging the congressional districts, and therefore the state's overall outcome, around party lines by neighborhoods. If you cordon off the suburbs (republican), so they're consolidated as a loss, and then water down 50/50 neighborhoods with working class families (democrat), you'll squish out a democratic victory. Heck, all it would take would be a voter registration database and a lot of perl. For example, Illinois was pretty ridiculous through the Daley years in the 50's and 60's.

Okay, that's enough of my ridiculous;y inacurate exposition on the US electoral system.

Yeah, I'm a big fan of a popular vote too.

Cheers,

Finegan

Hey that wasn't half bad, and wasn't too far over my head. Thanks for the seriously down played version for me Fin.

Cool

Uh oh, I hope I didnt turn this into a rant session on politics with that dislikes comment. Truely that wassnt my intention.

geeeez look at my thread now.....shocked...can't say any more....

You should always expect a thread like this to take a twisted turn in topic.

Too old to say,Caucasion,all man,hopelessly American
lynch

Well here's me too then.
www.geocities.com/nskl86/dork.jpg

-NSKL

I'm thinking if it's a good idea to post mine... No, it isn't.

Why would someone not post?

Perhaps they're hiding something.
Perhaps they're actually a group of people who can't decide what to post.
Perhaps they're Bill Gates.
Perhaps they're Linus Torvalds.
Perhaps they think we're making ours up anyway.

Nice

Maybe they're just hideous looking...

20, male, Santa Cruz California. Hey aussie... I had a girlfriend from N.Z., I went there too, but They all have this big rivalry with aah... aussies... I must ask: Why the hell do you go against your people and call yourself an aussie? :-)