Elections Overview - U.S.

Between dictatorship and democracy, there is the two-party monopoly.

Elections are the basis of any democracy.
In the U.S., we have a system of government that was created to be the perfect democracy because of the separation of powers between Executive, Legislative and Judiciary. It was established this way to create checks and balances so no branch of government could abuse its power.
The biggest danger to democracy has always been corruption, which in turn allows for abuse of power and disregard for basic human rights.

History has shown that some degree of corruption is almost impossible to stop. The goal in working for democracy is to minimize it so it doesn’t affect the final outcome.
Laws are passed to make sure that the integrity of the process is respected.
But what happens when the same people that are candidates for election are also the ones creating the laws that govern the election process? Or when they are the ones who appoint the commissioners in charge of overseeing the process?
In democracies, the media are often viewed as the watchdogs in charge of launching an outcry when laws are trampled.
But again, what happens when the same people who support the media through advertising are also the ones financing the candidates’ election campaigns?

In the U.S., we don’t have a dictatorship. We do have political parties. Two of them.
Other industrialized countries usually have several parties representing a wide range of political views. Two parties is not much, but it’s better than just one.
Now, what’s interesting is the relationship between those two parties.
They get most of their financing from the same sources. Of course, a few donors give only to the Democrats, and a few only to the Republicans. But the majority of the large donors with an interest in influencing lawmakers to favor them give to both parties.
There is, of course, a commission that was created in a bipartisan way to oversee election campaign finance laws. It’s called the Federal Election Commission (FEC). What’s interesting is the use of the term “bipartisan” when describing that commission. Bipartisan means set-up in a common agreement between the two parties. And that’s exactly what it is. That commission was set-up by the two parties, and the two parties alone (it is comprised of three democrats and three republicans appointed by the President), and one of its main goals is to make it as difficult as possible for “third” parties to participate in the election process.
The whole U.S. election system is first and above all organized in such a way that no one can easily interfere to spoil their fun and their fundraising.

Another important commission is the Commission on Presidential Debates.
It decides who can participate in the debates, the debate format, and all other details regarding the debates. In other words, it has the power to decide which candidates the public will see and hear, and what they will be able to say.
The interesting thing about this commission is that it is… (you guessed it) a private organization. Established and funded by corporations!!! Should we say “by corporations, for corporations”?
There are of course other parts of our voting process that are not typical of the democratic process.
Among others:
The Electoral College: in every state, both parties appoint a group of people from their party, and their party only, who decide which candidate their state will go to.
So it is possible for a presidential candidate to win the majority of the popular votes, and still lose the elections. It is not only possible, it has happened.

Electronic voting: electronic equipment has been creeping-up in U.S. elections for over thirty years, mostly unnoticed. Most voters didn’t pay much attention to it because a paper ballot was still the first step of the process. It was then processed electronically, but most people were not aware of it. The latest versions of electronic voting machines started raising flags, for good reasons: all electronic voting, without a verifiable record, on machines built and owned by corporations known to be politically partisan and with a history of hiring programmers previously indicted for fraud. And that’s only a brief summary.

So the least that can be said is that our voting process needs to be scrutinized and, if possible, overhauled. Not an easy task considering the fact that the parties now in power thanks to this system are the only ones legally allowed to make any change.