That attributes a lot of naivete to elected officials. I think they knew exactly what they were doing and exactly what the peoples' reactions would be. They knew they'd get booted out of office and they... just... didn't... care.

Americans need to wake up to the facade of the two-party system. It is a one party system, with two fronts, so we are given the illusion of choice in elections... but neither side ever truly opposes the other side, they just give a good show for the "masses" to make it look like they're opponents.

Explain, then, how it was that 60% (more in some polls) of the American people opposed Obamacare, yet it got passed anyway? Why would politicians choose to vote for it, knowing that doing so would cost them their jobs? Worse, why would Democrat leadership push so hard for it, knowing that doing so would hurt their party severely, potentially costing them both the House and Senate? (They lucked out and only lost the House, but still lost major ground in the Senate).

One answer: They threw themselves on their swords for the greater good of the party... the single party. They knew they'd get booted, but didn't care because Repubs and Dems are the same thing, just a thin veneer differentiates the two.

That's not necessarily true... Right now, if you've got ten cashiers lanes, that means you have ten sets of magazine/candy/soda racks. Take those out and you'll free up quite a bit of space.

Also, there are a number of stores that do the single queue setup (others have mentioned banks and USPS, but they do it at my local Best Buy and during busy times my local Costco has a guy feeding each line in a quasi-single line method.)

As someone else mentioned, this is not just some arm-chair calculation... there is a whole science to how queues work and the single-queue has been proven time and time again to be the fastest method.

The real blockade is that no one wants to stand in a long line, no matter how fast that line is going. They would rather wait a long time in a short line than wait a short time in a long line.

Once again: PEBKAC... Problem Exists Between Kart And Cashier. (I know, I know... it's "Cart"... but I had to make it work with the old acronym.)

Or the word you were actually thinking of "spurred"... comes from riding spurs, which you would use to encourage a horse to go (or go faster).

I'll just address a few issues.

First, there is a difference between being educated and being informed. The people at the time of the Constitution may not have been formally educated, but most made it their responsibility to be better informed about their world. The electoral college had nothing to do with dealing with an "uneducated" populous (for one, only land owners could vote and the vast majority of them were educated or at least literate)... it had more to do with the Founding Father's vehement opposition to pure democracy, which they viewed as one of the worst forms of government. The electoral college was intended to soften the volatility of pure democracy.

Second, you request a "Citation" in reference to my assertion that a person with lots of "4"s would end up being president. Allow me to illustrate.

Population: 100

Each person gets 5 "votes" (i.e. ranking 5 people from 5 to 1 in order of preference) 51 people give candidate A a "5"... the other 49 people give him a 1. Giving him a total of 304 "points" (255 from the "5"s and 49 from the "1"s).

Candidate B only needs to get 64 "4" votes and he'd win.

Now, don't get me wrong, I don't think our current two-party system is very good, but I wouldn't rush to solve the problems by throwing our entire system. First, I'd try to prune off those things that were hastily added to begin with, then once we've pared it down to that, let it work for a few cycles and revisit any problems that crop up, but in a more measured and careful manner.

Mod parent "+1, The Only Gorram Sensible Comment in This Thread"

I appreciate your out-of-the-box thinking, but your specific suggestion for changing the way the president and vice-president are elected is problematic at best. This would lead to horrendously confusing presidential elections. For crying out loud... we have problems choosing ONE president... now you want us to rank among numerous candidates? You'll have situations where one candidate will get the majority of "5"s, but another will get more "4"s and when all the numbers are tabulated, the guy with more 4s wins. That's just confusing as hell. And don't even get me started with your idea of negative numbers. Yowzah!

I say we keep the electoral college, but eliminate the process by which a candidate can win the whole state, even if he/she only gets 51% of the vote. That is how we end up with screwy elections results. If a state with 10 electoral votes is split 60-40 between the two candidates, you'd have 6 votes for one and 4 for the other. That is only fair.

The way it is now, if you live in a state that votes predominantly toward one party or another, the people from the other party are essentially silenced in the presidential elections. For instance, in Washington State, the vote usually goes towards Democrat, so all the people in the state that vote Republican essentially don't really get a vote because their vote just ends up getting tossed out by the overwhelming majority. Or take Texas which predominantly votes Republican... all the Democrats are silenced. It gives the illusion that there are "Red" and "Blue" states, when each state is a dynamic conglomeration of people of varying political sympathies. The Electoral College should reflect that.

I think the only fair answer is to return the electoral college to proportional representation.

In other news... Not to be outdone by some mere galaxy, Dolly Parton has contacted her cosmetic surgeon to see if implants come in "Gamma-Ray Bubble" size.

Actually, the Constitution does not give a monopoly to the Supreme Court for interpreting the Constitution. The Supreme Court gave itself that power in Marbury v. Madison and everyone just accepted it, but numerous Founding Fathers specifically said that no one branch had that monopoly and that either of the other two branches could declare something constitutional or unconstitutional.

So, no, I don't accept the idea that the Supreme Court is the final word on what is or is not Constitutional. The second we do, we can forget being a free people.

Yes. Of course, the theory is that only people of above average intelligence go to law school (hence, the grueling test known as the LSAT) and that after working as an attorney for many years, you have the wisdom and knowledge necessary to accurately and fairly apply the law as a judge.

But sadly that isn't the case. And we wonder why the country is going down the crapper.

Oh, and I am working to "fix it".

Who said I don't like the Constitution?

It isn't the Constitution that I don't like, but activist judges and conniving legislators who have "interpreted" all governmental restriction out of the Constitution.

Thomas Jefferson referred to the "chains of [the] Constitution" and that these chains would "bind [government] down from mischief".

What I was referring to was the fact that the Supreme Court has supported Congress in ignoring these chains, teasing out of the Constitution powers that were not there to begin with. Many SCOTUS decisions have flown directly in the face of the explicit meaning of Constitutional provisions.

So, what I meant was that the current interpretation of the Commerce Clause and the Necessary and Proper Clause gives the middle finger to the rest of the Constitution.

IAAL and I would say that many (not just "some") judges are f***ing morons.

Example:

Client gets a restraining order put against him several years ago, moves on with his life. 3 years later he wants to move in with GF who lives with the protected person (with me so far?). He remembers that there was once a restraining order, but can't remember how long it was in effect for. So, being the reasonable person he is, calls the court and asks if there is a restraining order. Clerk tells him "I can't find it in the system. That means it has either expired or was never entered in correctly."

He thinks, "Great!" and moves in thinking restraining order is a non-issue. Lives there for 1.5 years and all of a sudden gets charged with violating the restraining order. Turns out clerk was wrong.

So, we want to present his testimony that he'd made this call. Judge says that the evidence is "not relevant". Needless to say we lose. Just got done with the appeal and the second judge has also said the evidence is not relevant.

Judges suck balls.

I literally (and I do mean literally) fell off my chair laughing.

Commerce Clause = Middle Finger to the rest of the Constitution.

Also, Necessary and Proper clause = "... and we're gonna do whatever the f*** we want anyway, so screw you."

Let's also keep in mind that the only reason oil is approaching "peak" is that we aren't continuing to drill. "Peak" oil has nothing to do with the amount of oil available, just how fast we're able/willing to access that oil.

Now, if the government allowed drilling in certain verboten areas, we'd be further away from "peak". But do we really care about "peak"? So what? What we really need in order to bring gasoline prices down is more refineries (which have been getting closed all over).