I learned yesterday that Colorado voters will be asked whether they should amend their state constitution this Tuesday. The proposed amendment would affect the way Colorado's electoral votes are counted in presidential elections, and if it passes, it will become effective immediately--that is, it will affect this year's election.

This amendment, of course, has been pushed for by people who don't like the fact that the electoral college doesn't always reflect the popular vote for President. They think that presidential elections should be one big national popular vote, instead of 51 separate elections. Since they don't have much of a chance of amending the federal Constitution, they might as well amend Colorado's.

I'm going to side on this issue with the political group with the best name ever: Coloradans Against a Really Stupid Idea. It's just stupid for a lone state to divide up its electoral votes according to the popular vote when no other state does so (it appears that Maine and Nebraska assign some (not all) electoral votes not according to a statewide election, but according to smaller congressional district elections; still, that's a different fish than assigning all state electoral votes in proportion to the statewide popular vote). Especially when Colorado is a swing state, that means that its nine electoral votes are going to be split up 5-4. If there's only one net electoral vote to be gained by winning Colorado, it's the most insignificant state in the nation.

If every state did this, then the anti-Electoral College people would have their way. But only one state is doing it, so it's stupid. I kind of like the Electoral College anyway. Even though we're a big modern heterogeneous society with advanced communication technology that, unlike in the olden days, could make a national popular election possible, we still shouldn't do it. What would possess a candidate to cater to the interests of a smallish state like New Hampshire or Iowa or Maine, when they can get far more bang for their buck in the more densely populated states like New York, California, and Massachusetts? Of course, in the current system, a state with a solid ideology (like Republican Utah or Democrat Massachusetts) is ignored, but hey, what can you do?