The United States of America is a country of the people, for the people and by the people. Those are some of the country’s most heeded words in its history.

The Electoral College undermines this notion. With the Electoral College in place, the U.S. is more accurately a government of the privileged, by the privileged and for the privileged.

The Electoral College betrays the ideals on which the U.S. was founded upon. It perpetuates the very idea of oligarchy and aristocracy which were the causes of the American Revolution.

The Electoral College silences the many and serves the elite few. It perpetuates money in politics and lobbying, which are government’s biggest problems. It favors the two major parties without giving any other party a fair chance. The current system serves to maintain the status quo for the rich and powerful.

Perhaps the worst part of the Electoral College is the ‘winner takes all’ system. This system makes it so that if a candidate wins 51 percent of a state’s votes they are given 100 percent of the electoral vote. This makes it easier for gerrymandering to influence the election and also makes the votes of the other 49 percent essentially worthless.

In Kentucky, this has a negative impact on liberal voters because they know that their vote will not matter in the state in which they live. They know that no matter who they choose to vote for, Kentucky will ultimately vote republican and their votes will be completely nullified.

Proponents of the Electoral College would argue that if it were abolished that candidates would only visit places of high population density such as New York, Los Angeles, Boston and other major cities. This is most likely true, but as is, candidates already hardly visit safe states while all of their attention is given to the swing states in the form of ad campaigns and rallies.

Kentucky is a red state so it gets much less attention from campaigns because the Republican candidates already feel they have it in the bag, and Democratic candidates feel that it’s a lost cause.

It is mathematically proven that a candidate can win with approximately 21.8 percent of the votes in the current system. This is a blatant disregard of the people’s right to directly influence the outcome of the elections.

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