Real Voter Fraud: How Dems, GOP Conspire to Make Most Votes Meaningless

The American electoral system is designed to give the impression of equality. It's meant to suggest that every citizen wields precisely the same power when it comes to peacefully overthrowing (or supporting) the poweres that be.

The idea of "one person, one vote" is ingrained in us from a very young age.

But it's a lie.

Sure, each person who chooses to vote Tuesday does have one vote in each race. But the idea that everyone's votes have equal importance is simply a lie.

Take New Jersey, for instance. The state has supported the Democratic candidate every year since 1992, including supporting Al Gore in 2000 and John Kerry in 2004. The likelihood of Jersey voters supporting Barack Obama again in 2012 is so high that, for all intents and purposes, every vote cast in New Jersey is meaningless.

The same goes for some of the most heavily populated states in the nation, including California (for Obama) and Texas (for GOP challenger Mitt Romney). 

Sure, there could be surprises. But Obama and Romney think it's so unlikely that, for the most part, they haven't bothered campaigning or advertising in those states.

The same can't be said for the states where votes do matter -- specifically Ohio, Wisconsin and Florida (and, to a lesser degree, Virginia, North Carolina, Nevada and Colorado).

In those states, the candidates have spent a combined $100 million. And that doesn't count the "soft money" that other organizations are pumping in. 

Put simply: The fraction of the nation that votes in those battleground states are the only votes that will really matter on Election Day. And the Democrats and Republicans want it that way.

Why would they want it that way? Because it's a whole lot easier to campaign and spend money in a few states than it would be to try to earn votes around the nation.

But the result is that the majority of votes cast are almost meaningless. 

We live in a time when the precise number of votes can be counted almost as soon as the polls close. Yes, there have been some problems, but those issues have been partially addressed in the past decade.

It's time the United States cast away the archaic Electoral College that categorizes votes by state and reduces the value of so many ballots. 

Americans can be trusted to vote directly for the president. And we deserve to have each of our votes count equally.