Pictured here is one of many maps made at the University of Michigan to reflect US voting in ways that give us a better understanding of election results. This particular map is a US county map scaled for population, although I think it looks a little like a mutating cat that's about to yak up New York like a hairball. Brian at the Farm makes an excellent point:
As best I understand it, the point of the electoral college is to make the election depend not so much on population, but on geographical regions' collective wills, regardless of how populous those regions are. Just as the Senate overstates the importance of sparsely populated states by giving each one two Senators, the House—whose representation is wholly population-based—overstates the impact of populous regions with respect to rural areas. Advocates of a pure popular-vote system would seem to have the interest of fundamental democracy at heart, but there's more to representation than the number of votes a state can cast: there's also the desire to give a farming town of 1,000 a voice that can be heard amid the clamor of cities of millions. So rural areas' importance has to be overstated beyond their raw population numbers. (Brian's emphasis)
Well said sir.
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