God Bless the Electoral College

According to Politico, Barack Obama may pull an Al Gore this year by winning the popular vote and losing the electoral college. This would happen, for example, if Obama racked up huge margins on the coasts while Maverick McCain won narrow victories in the Republican heartland and the South.

This sounds plausible. It also sounds like an example of the Electoral College working as it was intended. When the Framers eschewed direct popular voting for the presidency and chose the Electoral College instead, one of their aims was to ensure that every president would be truly national figure. Indeed, not until the election of Abraham Lincoln did a US president come to power on the basis of support from only one region of the country.

Sure, the Framers are racist, sexist, classist dead-white-guys. But they were right on occasion. Imagine that.