McGrath says: First past the post is a lousy and anti-democratic system in any country. But you seem to be even more wedded to it in the States than back here in England.

Kevin, you've pointed out the fundamental flaw in the American system: whoever gets 51%, calls all the shots - and the 49% are mostly forgotten until the next election.

But there's another, even more insidious flaw in our system: each party nominates one candidate, and that candidate is often selected by a plurality vote. In this way, a guy like Trump who never had good support from more than 20% of the electorate, beats out others and suddenly becomes his party's candidate and automatically gets close to 50% of the votes.

There's close to a 50-50 split between Republicans and Democrats in the U.S., and it's well-nigh impossible to get most Republicans to vote for a Democrat (especially a lackluster candidate like Hillary). So, Trump has a good chance of being elected.

I'm scared.

-Joe-