Did I just hear correctly?  In his remarks in India tonight, did Bush refer to "nuculer" power as a "renewable energy source?"  What, does this guy think plutonium grows on trees?  Are the Department of Energy and the United States Forest Service teaming up for a Healthy Plutonium Forests Initiative?

In a recent assignment for a class on foreign policy, I was tasked to analyze the US decision to invade and occupy Iraq from two theoretical perspectives in international relations: realism and progressivism.  Since this was an academic exercise, the views expressed do not necessarily represent those of the author.  Then again....

NEWS RELEASE
OPS-Alaska
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
28 January 2006
Contact: Dr. Marilyn Dudley-Flores, OPS-Alaska, CEO

California Democratic Party Recommends Presidential Primary Reform Plan for 2012

MANHATTAN BEACH, CA ­ In a unanimous vote in its January 28, 2006 Executive Board meeting in Manhattan Beach, CA, the California Democratic Party recommended that the Democratic Party seriously consider the American Plan for implementation in 2012.

People really shouldn't waste a lot of time and energy on Pat Robertson.  The man is a joke.  But he is a good Christian, so when he talks about "taking out" Hugo Chavez, I'm sure he means taking him out to dinner or something like that, possibly a movie as well, and walking him home after the movie, then later.... Well, we all know that Jesus said, "Love thy neighbor."

After almost every presidential election the idea of reforming the Electoral College--or outright abolishing it--gets kicked around.  These ideas go nowhere fast for the simple reason that there are more small states that are advantaged by the current system than there are large states that are disadvantaged by it.  Thus, a constitutional amendment will never pass the US Senate by a two-thirds majority, and even if it did, it would never be ratified by three-fourths of the state legislatures (see my op-ed in the Dec. 29, 2004 Santa Rosa Press Democrat at <http://www1.pressdemocrat.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041229/NEWS/412290339/1050/OPINION03>).  Another avenue of reform that is often discussed is changing the allocation of individual states' electors by state legislation, but this presents a massive collection problem that is equally hopeless, and it still doesn't address the problem of the small states having disproportional electoral power.

The path of least resistance would be enacting reform by federal statute, which only requires a simple majority in the House and the Senate.  But would such a statute be constitutional?  Either I have found a loophole in the Constitution that would permit a reformulation of the Electoral College in order to bring it much closer to the principle of "one person, one vote" (see <http://www.ops-alaska.com/ps2/Electoral_College_Math_201.htm>) or my argument is based on a specious word game.

By definition, all of us on this blog are political junkies. (My name is Tom, and I'm a political junkie!)  However, are there any other political scientists or some constitutional lawyers in the audience who could give this issue an authoritative critique?