The current way of electing the President of the United States is limiting and unfair.
It is limiting in that our choices are self-selected candidates from two tired old parties. This further limits our choices in that they must appeal to the "base" of either party, even if the rest of the country sees different problems and solutions than either "base".
It is unfair in that people who have no affiliation with either party get to vote to select a party's candidates. It is also unfair that people who have leanings toward one party or are even affiliated with that party get to vote for a candidate in the other party. It is also unfair that party members are now supposed to rally behind a candidate that was not of their choosing.
If we're going to have such "grass roots" selection, let's really make the start of the process "grass roots". In the spring before the presidential election, all voters can submit the names of an eligible pair to run for a president. How wide open this part should be is open to discussion. It could be by online voting, by petition with a certain number of signatures, or by a mail-in ballot.
Order the candidates by nominations and select the candidates whose nomination totals add up to some threshold. Or take the top so many candidates. Now the entire voting population can select one candidate.
If no candidate gets more than 50% of the vote, we repeat the process until one candidate gets more than 50% of the vote. Depending on how many candidates we start with, it could take four to six cycles.
Will Americans turn out so many times to vote? Maybe, maybe not. But all the candidates, and all civic-minded citizens should stress the importance of voting. Supporters of this system should also stress the alternative of absentee voting.
This idea will meet much resistance, but if we keep doing things as we have, we are going to be stuck with more of the same old, same old.
