There was a discussion over on Usenet in which people were whining about how unfair it was that Gore didn't win the presidency, even though he got a majority of the vote (he didn't really--there's no way to know that within the margin of error of vote counts, so close was the election), because of that anachronistic electoral college thingie. I pointed out that there's nothing at all anachronistic about it, and that in fact it's arguable that it's needed more than ever, with modern media. If the president were directly elected, all a candidate would have to do is ad buys in the major media markets, and voters in places like Wyoming and Alaska would be effectively disenfranchised, since the candidates would have no need to pay any attention to them.

It occurs to me that, in fact, a lot of California's mess could be alleviated by instituting an electoral college. As it is now, while there are legislators representing rural counties, they're overwhelmed by those from the cities, and the entire state (most of which is in fact quite rural) is run by Sacramento.

I'm not sure exactly what the mechanism to restore some balance might be, but it would probably involve having electors proportional to state senator and representatives from some kind of new district analogous to states within the state, to at least insure that the governor was more broadly representative of all the state's constituencies, rather than just LA, San Diego and the Bay Area. Of course, given the current political structure, implementing such a reform is probably a fantasy.

[Early afternoon update]

Just by coincidence, here's an article by Henry Lamb defending the electoral college.

You need to be very careful about things like that. One of Japan's problem is a heavy over-representation of rural areas.

California used to have more rural representation when the State Senate had a member from each county. However the federal courts ruled that the Senate had to be apportioned by population rather than county.

By what authority would a federal court tell a state how to organize its legislature? Particularly in such a perverse way, making the state senate simply another house?

Dealing with Arizona rather then Californa, but here is a document that describes the reasoning on the part of the courts.

http://www.library.arizona.edu/exhibits/udall/congrept/88th/641014.html

I'm not a lawyer, but I can't help thinking that the logical conclusion to this is to make the Fedearal Senate directly proportianal to population as well. Which to be clear, I think would be a horrible idea.

Reform the Electoral College here in California
is our effort to cut out the national political machines. We have an initiative on May 10,2007 to change the based on Maine and Nebreska.

THE PLAN

Our initiative is that the presidential candidate who wins the popular vote in each Congressional District gets the Elector. The two Electors that reflect the two Senate
seats would be selected by the statewide popular vote. It is called the Mundt-Cordier Plan and is now installed in Maine and Nebraska.
The current system is that the winner of the popular vote in California takes all 55
Electors. The Los Angeles and San Francisco areas determine the Electors for the
entire State. This is not democratic, eliminates third parties, and is unfair.
Under the new system we would increase competition for Electors in California. We
will give a voice to less populated and rural counties to participate in the presidential
election. It would force the presidential candidates, who now ignore us, to campaign
in our State. Also, minor parties would have a chance to elect an Elector.
California in 2004, had 20% of the Electors but was not involved in the process of
selecting our president.
We need more 3rd party and independants to be involved in the presidential election!!!