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C) Slate/Dear Prudence: Spare the Rod, Spoil the Romance? [Conseils sur la vie sentimentale et la vie tout court. Cette semaine : Mon petit ami perse est trop attentionné. / Alors que je suis fiancée, j'ai commencé un dialogue perso avec un partenaire de jeux de rôle en ligne. / Je viens de rompre avec mon partenaire mais nous n'avons pas les moyens de trouver rapidement de nouveaux logements pour vivre à part. / Je fréquente un homme plus âgé et plus aisé, mais qui ne sait pas la fermer.]
http://slate.msn.com/id/2107026/

Spare the Rod, Spoil the Romance?
How to take a hard line against smothering.
Posted Thursday, Oct. 7, 2004, at 4:32 AM PT

Dear Prudence,
I'm dating a delightful man who goes overboard with hospitality and wanting to do things for me. I'm looking for a gentle way to express my gratitude but also establish some ground rules: I don't need my pillow constantly fluffed, my feet propped up, coffee made and offered with every trimming under the sun (when I continue to say "Just black, please"). I am being told to lie down and relax when I'm not tired and am just incessantly fussed over. He seems to delight in this treatment and ignores my responses that "I'm fine sitting this way," or "No thank you, I don't want a glass of water," or "Thanks, I can help myself." He is a Persian man, and I realize that perhaps this is a cultural thing, but I'm finding it hard to be with this person when we can't merely sit and enjoy each other's company. Please help!

—Overpampered

Dear Ove,
While your letter will strike many as an advertisement for this man and Prudie will get countless inquiries asking for his address, she takes your question seriously. Although your friend is erring on the side of too much pampering—a loving thing, to be sure—it could certainly feel over the top … if not annoying. In terms of cultural norms (ours), he is overdoing things and not appearing to listen to what you're saying. Because the "delightful" man seems to have everything else in order, you need to go beyond repeating "No, thank you" and "I take my coffee black." Have a serious discussion explaining how you greatly appreciate the emotion underlying his concern for your comfort, then go on to enlighten him about what makes you comfortable. And humor can go a long way toward lightening up the situation as he learns to moderate his attentiveness. If this issue between you can be more like a private joke than a bone of contention, the romance has a good chance of surviving.

—Prudie, comfortably

-*-*-*-
Dear Prudie,
I am engaged to a wonderful, loving man with whom I share many interests. One of our shared interests is a massive multimedia online role-playing game. Recently while playing one of my characters, I met a man. (We'll call him Sam.) We have been speaking, both in-game and out, for several weeks now, and we have even swapped real-life pictures of one another. One of the things I know about him is that he lives in England. Just last night, as Sam and I were chatting in character, he brought up the subject of marriage. He has not proposed to my character yet, but he is going to. Now to my question: Should I tell him I am engaged in real life? I have done a lot of theatre and played many role-playing games (online, live-action, and tabletop), and I've learned to separate the feelings of my characters from my own. But I don't know about Sam. I have told my fiance about Sam, and he doesn't mind the relationship; he feels that the best policy in this matter is, "Don't ask; don't tell." So, I turn to you, Prudie: Should I tell him or not?

—Pixilated Paramour

Dear Pix,
Prudie is guessing your game is along the lines of Dungeons and Dragons—that is, something that's all about pretending. Because your fiance recommends not revealing real-life information and because it's a game, perhaps you should just stay in character. Just assume that Sam can hold his own … and remember that he is, after all, in England. As for sending your picture and speaking "out of game," that seems a little like crossing wires, if you get Prudie's drift.

—Prudie, theatrically

-*-*-*-
Dear Prudence,
My live-in boyfriend (for four years) and I recently broke up—not by my choice—and I am heartbroken. However, neither of us can afford to move out of our apartment just yet. We live in a fairly expensive area, and neither of us has family in the area that we could stay with. We have jobs and lives here, so moving out of the area is not possible. He has offered to stay at a friend's house and keep paying me his share of the rent so that I can afford to live on my own, but I'd hate to take his money if he's not living in the apartment. Meanwhile, however, he's sleeping on the couch, and he's in the apartment all the time. His constant presence is difficult to deal with, as I am still not over the pain of the breakup, which occurred about a month ago. Should I take him up on his offer to move out and pay rent so that I can move on with my life, or should I leave things as they are and live together indefinitely as roommates despite the fact that it's breaking my heart more every day?

—Breaking Up Is Hard To Do

Dear Break,
Prudie will assume that your ex-beau's offer to stay with a friend was genuine—and possible—and therefore she would urge you to accept the offer. In the spirit of letting him off the hook, you might look around for a temporary roommate who would be willing to share expenses until you're free to leave that apartment. Your ex's offer is well–meant, and the financial burden should not be significant, seeing as how he'll be bunking with a friend. Prudie can think of no good reason to suffer, daily, when there are options.

—Prudie, optimally

-*-*-*-
Dear Prudence,
I recently was blessed to start dating a nice man who lives nearby. He is older, more mature than the men I'm used to dating. He is a successful businessman who is retired now and wants a companion to accompany him when traveling, help him entertain in his beautiful new home, and generally enjoy life with him. We have some important things in common. He is a very generous person, not only to me, but also to his family and friends. We recently went to a party, and many people stopped by to visit with us at our table. I was relieved to see he had so many friends. The problem is he talks constantly; the sad thing is he knows he has this annoying habit. He's joked about it, even, but I don't find it a laughing matter. Sometimes he bores me to tears, and I honestly find it hard to stay awake and listen to his long-winded stories that include every minute detail, blah, blah, blah! It's hard to get in a word, and it's almost like he can't wait for me to stop what I have to interject so he can start talking again. I feel like he doesn't care about my thoughts on any subject. What can I do or say to let him know how annoying and boorish I find this part of his personality without hurting his feelings? I'm afraid I can't tolerate this for the long term.

—Hard To Stay Awake

Dear Hard,
There is no way to tell someone he is annoying and boorish without hurting his feelings. Plus, it sounds as though he already knows … hence his "joking" about the nonstop talking. To be bored to tears, fighting sleep, regarding his conversation as blah, blah, blah, and feeling you cannot get a word in edgewise are pretty unambiguous signs of, let us say, incompatibility. Do yourself a favor, and call it a day. The trips, the beautiful new home, and his generosity will no doubt attract someone less discriminating and perhaps deaf.

—Prudie, directly

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2) The Economist: Je ne texte rien [Pourquoi les Français utilisent-ils moins les SMS que les autres Européens ?]
http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=S%27%298H%2CRQ%3B%27%200%210%0A
Texting

Je ne texte rien
Jul 8th 2004
From The Economist print edition

Why do the French send fewer text messages than other Europeans?

THOUGH they disagree about many things, there is one respect in which France and America stand shoulder to shoulder: neither country is terribly keen on mobile-phone text messages. In most parts of the world, zapping tiny messages from one handset to another is de rigueur. Over half a trillion such messages are sent every year, bringing in around $50 billion in revenues for mobile operators. Globally, the average number of messages sent per subscriber per month is around 35, though it is far higher in some countries. But in France and America, texting has proven much less popular (see chart). Why?

America's lack of enthusiasm is relatively easy to explain. Several different and incompatible wireless technologies are in use, and the necessary plumbing to enable texting has only recently been put in place. Furthermore, voice calls on mobile phones are cheaper than in other countries, which gives cost-conscious users less incentive to send texts instead. And texting is often an additional service that must be paid for and switched on, so customers cannot be sure that a message to a friend will get through. This is not the case in France, however, which uses the same mobile-phone technology (called GSM) as all other western European countries, where texting is hugely popular. So why is it not in France?

For a mixture of reasons, says Stéphanie Pittet, an analyst at Gartner, a research firm. For a start, the French mobile-telecoms market is the least developed in western Europe: only around 65% of the population has a mobile phone, compared with around 90% in Britain, Spain and Italy. The usual explanation for this is a desire to protect Orange, the dominant mobile operator, from too much competition. Orange is part of France Telecom, which is partly state-owned, has huge debts and relies on Orange's revenues to prop it up. Less competition means higher prices and fewer of the cost-conscious, late-adopting subscribers who tend to like texting.

Another factor, says Jessica Sandin of Baskerville, a firm of telecoms analysts, is that French operators were late to introduce texting and slow to interconnect their networks to allow subscribers to text each other and those in other countries. Prices have now been cut to make texting more attractive. But it does not seem to be helping. “At this point they should be catching up, but they aren't,” says Ms Sandin.

So it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that cultural factors also play a role: perhaps mobile phones simply do not fit in with the relaxed French lifestyle, with its short working week and unusual respect for traditional ways of doing things. But perhaps even that is being too kind. “I think they are just technophobes,” says Ms Pittet, somewhat ruefully, of her compatriots.

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3) Business Week: Where our energy will come from [L'avenir de la production d'énergie.]
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/04_41/b3903425.htm

THE INNOVATION ECONOMY -- WHAT'S AHEAD

Where Our Energy Will Come From
From seabed gas to pebble-bed nukes, a scouting report on tomorrow's sources.

The way we produce and consume energy hasn't changed much in decades. Sure, you might spot the occasional hybrid gas-electric car or a high-tech windmill. But research in the field hasn't been energetic. No surprise there: Except during the crises of the '70s, fossil fuels have usually been cheap and abundant. The next few decades promise to be vastly different. Driven by escalating prices, geopolitical instability, global warming, and pollution, governments and companies around the globe are stepping up the hunt for new ways to power the economy. The ambitious goal: plentiful, clean, and secure forms of energy and less wasteful ways to employ them.
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The effort spans everything from hydrogen-powered cars to safer nuclear reactors to solar power, efficient lighting, and methane from the ocean floor. Of course, some of the efforts may never pay off. The nearly $10 billion spent by the U.S. Energy Dept. on nuclear fusion research, for example, has borne little fruit. And private companies might unplug their energy research if prices drop again. Still, the pressure for breakthroughs is stronger than it has ever been. "We must find alternatives," says Amos M. Nur, a geophysics professor at Stanford University, who calculates that world oil output is near its peak. "If we don't, we'll soon be in big trouble."

Here are some of the technologies that could make a difference in the next couple of decades:

HYDROGEN REDUX
As far back as the late 1700s, city streets, public buildings, and homes in Europe were lit with a hydrogen-rich gas derived from baking coal. Town gas, as it was often called, remained widely used in much of the world until the early 1900s, when the marketplace moved to natural gas or electricity. Now, governments of many industrialized countries are trying to bring hydrogen back -- this time as the motor fuel of the 21st century.

The move to hydrogen has already begun -- slowly. Major carmakers have developed engines that can run on the lighter-than-air element instead of gasoline. They also know how to manufacture fuel cells that combine hydrogen and oxygen to generate electricity, with double the energy efficiency of the internal combustion engine. Iceland, which has abundant geothermal energy for separating hydrogen, already has hydrogen-powered buses and filling stations. The government there has vowed to switch the entire economy over to hydrogen within 50 years.

Even hydrogen proselytizers acknowledge, however, that immense obstacles remain. What's still lacking -- and essential -- is a cheap, nonpolluting way to generate the energy to derive pure hydrogen, which comes from either water or hydrocarbon fuels such as methane. Also, on a horsepower basis, fuel cells cost five times as much to make as internal combustion engines. And the fuel tank in today's prototypes takes up the whole trunk.

In the U.S., the Energy Dept. is spending $1.7 billion over five years to chip away at these problems. Researchers have already cut fuel-cell manufacturing costs by 95% since 1990. If they can reduce those costs further, the payoff could be big. If just one in 100 cars and light trucks in the U.S. were fueled by hydrogen, 4 million gallons of gasoline would be saved every day.

PEACEFUL NUKES
A new nuclear race is under way, and this one is peaceful. As early as next year, rival quasi-governmental teams in China and South Africa aim to begin building commercial-scale atomic reactors that would depart radically from current designs. A similar plant in the U.S. could be close behind: Introducing the PBMR, or pebble-bed modular reactor.

Today's nukes are behemoths that use rods of uranium undergoing fission to make superheated steam, which in turn drives turbines to generate electricity. PBMRs, for their part, are compact units fueled by thousands of ceramic-encased orbs of uranium, each about the size of a billiard ball, which heat a chamber of helium to spin the generators. By using helium instead of steam, the plants should be at least 35% more efficient. Pilot projects have shown the design to be inherently safer: The ceramic shell locks in radioactive by-products, and the nuclear reaction slows as the chamber gas gets hotter, a safeguard against a meltdown.

Pebble-bed modular reactors aren't perfect. They still produce nuclear waste that would remain dangerously radioactive for ages. But industry and government are starting to rethink nuclear power as other fuels lose favor. Without new technology, coal is on the outs because it's dirty and emits greenhouse gases, while cleaner-burning natural gas has become pricey. Uranium is inexpensive and doesn't dirty the air.

Authorities in China and South Africa expect to have demonstration plants online around 2011. China, in fact, is talking about building over the next 20 years 30 such reactors to meet surging demand for electricity. In the U.S., the Energy Dept. is planning to sponsor a PBMR in Idaho, with a 2012 startup target.

METHANE MOTHER LODE
The U.S. is producing about the same amount of natural gas as it did 30 years ago in spite of soaring demand. Improved technology can't overcome the depletion of fields. As a result, natural-gas prices in the U.S. have more than doubled since 1999. The solution could come from a surprising place: the sea bottom.

Buried just below the ocean floor along the continental slopes as well as in the Arctic permafrost are vast deposits of crystallized natural gas suspended in ice, known as methane hydrate. The U.S. Geological Survey reckons global reserves of methane hydrate contain twice as much energy as the world's proven deposits of oil, natural gas, and coal combined.

But no one has yet figured out how to exploit this energy source economically. Methane hydrate is too dispersed among the sediment to be pumped to the surface like gas or oil. Dredging doesn't work well, either, because it would mean scooping up tons of muck and hoisting it to the ocean surface for separation.

Working with the Energy Dept., ChevronTexaco Corp. (CVX ) is heading an international consortium that has identified sites in the Gulf of Mexico that appear to contain storehouses of methane hydrate. The oil giant plans to sink wells next spring to bring up core samples and get a better idea of how to recover the gas. Energy-short Japan and India are also digging into methane hydrate. Researchers hope to hit pay dirt by 2025.

INTERIM SUPPLY STRETCHERS
Incremental innovations in other arenas could tide the world over until these longer-term solutions are realized.

Imports of natural gas could ease the supply squeeze within a few years. Following the example of Japan, South Korea, and Western Europe, American energy companies have filed plans for some 40 ship terminals that would allow for a vast increase in imports of super-cooled, liquefied natural gas on specially made ships. Sempra Energy (SRE ) is furthest along. The San Diego company plans to begin building an LNG receiving terminal in Louisiana and another in Baja California later this year. By 2007, the company says, at least three terminals will be completed.

Other companies are working on lighting technologies that extend power supplies. Many municipalities are installing signs with clusters of light-emitting diodes instead of incandescent lights. They consume one-tenth the electricity and last up to 100 times as long. General Electric (GE ), Royal Philips Electronics (PHG ), and other companies are racing to come up with affordable diodes that will work in regular room settings.

Solar power is advancing, too. Photovoltaic panels -- thin sheets of semiconductors that turn the sun's photons into electricity -- are becoming more common in Japan and Germany, where governments are funding research, and in developing areas such as rural India and Nigeria, which often lack an electrical grid. As costs sink and efficiency rises, solar power could be "a huge opportunity," says Stephanie A. Burns, CEO of Dow Corning Corp., the leading producer of silicon for solar panels. "We're right on the cusp between what's an engineering project and what's a real product," adds Daniel P. McGahn, executive vice-president at Konarka Technologies Inc., a Lowell (Mass.) company that is trying to build solar power capacity into a wide variety of products. "We want to cut that final wire."

Decades from now, the world's commuters may still be driving gasoline-powered cars. And power plants, retrofitted to further reduce emissions, may still be burning coal. But who knows? Given the potential of the energy projects under way, they may be as rare as hybrid vehicles and windmills are today.

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4) Europolitix: Prodi flags up new EU symbole clash [Lors des JO, Prodi a provoqué des remous en GB en évoquant la présence du drapeau européen chez les équipes européennes lors de futurs jeux.]

http://www.eupolitix.com/EN/News/200408/e1df458f-0c81-4d27-8796-d7ec5a6f8731.htm
Prodi flags up new EU symbol clash

A call for European Olympic medal winners to fly the EU flag alongside national banners has sparked a Brussels “meddles” row. Romano Prodi, while congratulating Greece for its organisation of the 2004 games, set out his idea for a more euro-Olympic vision.

The Brussels chief, who steps down in October, on Monday highlighted his “dream to see the EU member states perform… in an even more united fashion at the next Olympic Games”. “In 2008 I hope to see the EU member state teams in Beijing carry the flag of the European Union alongside their own national flag as a symbol of our unity,” he said.

But his call has fanned the eternal flame of UK euroscepticism and generated raging headlines in the British tabloid press. “They just don’t get it in Brussels, do they?,” asked the Sun newspaper. “They can’t understand the importance of national identity. When it comes to sport — and so many other things — we’re not all on the same side and never will be.”

UK Labour MEP Richard Corbett has attacked the latest “untrue” euro-myth. “The idea of carrying a European flag alongside a national flag is just that, an idea not a decision and not even a formal proposal,” he said on Tuesday. Corbett argues that Prodi’s proposal is “not nearly as radical as it sounds”. “We already compete in international events at a number of levels. In football and rugby we compete as England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, but as Great Britain in the Olympics, just as our British golfers compete for Europe in the Ryder Cup,” he said. “Using different flags for different levels of identity should be no real drama.”

Under a new constitution the EU flag is to be given European treaty status as a symbol for the European Union. The flag's 12 gold stars – in heraldic terms “twelve mullets in annulo Or” - symbolise completeness - as in 12 hours of a clock, 12 months in the year, 12 tables of Roman law.

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5) The Economist: British Fashion [George, la marque maison de la chaîne de supermarchés britannique Asda, détenue par Wal-Mart, fait un tabac.]
http://www.economist.com/World/europe/displayStory.cfm?story_id=3220624
British fashion: By George
Sep 23rd 2004 | LEEDS
Britain has produced the first global clothing brand from a supermarket

TO THE envy of Paris, New York and Milan, a British brand has become one of the fastest-growing lines of clothing in America. It is also causing something of a stir in Canada, Germany, Japan and South Korea. The origin of this global assault is glamorous Lutterworth, the Leicestershire base of George.

If you don't know George, then you don't shop at Asda or its American parent, Wal-Mart—the world's biggest retailer. George was named after George Davies, founder of the Next clothing chain. Mr Davies first produced a George collection for Asda back in 1990. The brand was then absorbed by the Leeds-based supermarket chain, which was acquired by Wal-Mart in 1999 for more than $10 billion. The folks back at Wal-Mart's base in Bentonville, Arkansas, took such a shine to George that earlier this year they decided to make it a global product.

A complete George outfit can be bought for £25. The bargain pricing will continue: George's clothes are to be produced through Wal-Mart's legendary global-procurement system, and Wal-Mart, with sales of $256 billion last year, gets to negotiate very good deals with its suppliers. But Lutterworth is also having to cater to local tastes. Best-selling sizes, obviously, vary a lot between America and Japan. And South Korean girls favour paler colours.

Mr Davies is no longer involved with George. He defected to Marks & Spencer (M&S) to produce Per Una, now a successful range of women's clothing for Britain's best-known but deeply troubled retailer. In a shake-up following its successful defence against a takeover bid by Philip Green, who owns BHS and Top Shop, M&S bought Per Una from Mr Davies for £125m, although he will remain as boss of the range for another two years.

But here, given Mr Davies's success with George, is the interesting bit: according to the supposedly secret sales surveys carried out by Taylor Nelson Sofres, a retail research-agency, Asda recently nipped ahead of M&S in volume terms to become Britain's biggest clothes retailer. By value, M&S apparently kept the lead. Many in the rag trade said it was an aberration. Mr Green said the figures were “rubbish”. Nevertheless, most of Asda's clothing sales are George, and there is no getting away from the fact that it does very well. Moreover, George's success points to broader retailing trends.

The first of these is that fashion is no longer all about pricey designer-brands. Gap, H&M and Zara prove that. Fashion has gone upmarket and downmarket at the same time. The transformation of Selfridges by Vittorio Radice—who also defected to M&S, with less success—illustrates how £5 tops can be sold alongside £500 Gucci bags: women happily wear them together.

The second trend is the supermarkets' move into general merchandise, from £30 DVD players to £4 denim jeans. It has led to a transformation of British shopping habits. Five years ago only about 8% of Asda's customers bought clothes; now one in three do. And like all trends, things keep evolving. Asda is now opening its fifth stand-alone George store, in Liverpool. It has already opened George stores in Leeds, Croydon, Preston and Northampton. This is part of an experiment to see if the brand can also work as a chain in its own right. If it can, the wheel will have turned full circle.

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6) Herald Palladium: Woman who sold rocks at Benton Harbor riots pleads no contest [Une femme qui a vendu des pierres aux émeutiers d'une ville noire du Michigan est condamnée pour incitation. (A noter qu'elle a arrêté ses ventes lorsqu'elle a été elle même frappée par une pierre, et que les bénéfices de l'opération ont servi à régler sa facture de télé par câble.)]
http://www.heraldpalladium.com/articles/2004/10/05/news/news1.txt
Woman who sold rocks at Benton Harbor riots pleads no contest

By SCOTT AIKEN / H-P Staff Writer

ST. JOSEPH -- A woman who admitted she sold stones to rioters in Benton Harbor last year has pleaded no contest to a felony charge that carries a prison sentence of up to 10 years.

Yuolanda Taylor, 32, toted rocks through a riot-wracked neighborhood on the night of June 16, 2003, according to police, and sold small rocks for $1 each and bigger ones for $5. The rocks were thrown at police, prosecutors said, though Taylor claimed she did not participate directly in the violence that tore through the area around Empire Avenue and Broadway. Taylor told police she collected about $70 selling rocks, but quit when she got hit by one herself. She later used the money to pay her cable TV bill.

In Berrien County Trial Court Monday, Taylor pleaded no contest to inciting a riot, which carries a sentence of up to 10 years in prison upon conviction. Judge Casper Grathwohl accepted the plea one day before Taylor was to have faced trial. She is free on bond pending sentencing Nov. 15. A no contest plea is the same as a guilty plea for sentencing purposes but cannot be used as an admission of wrongdoing in a civil lawsuit.

Berrien Assistant Prosecutor Gerald Vigansky said Taylor was arrested after police investigated an informant tip. She was one of several people charged about one year after mobs burned houses, and assaulted police and firefighters in two nights of violence. Taylor was one of six people named in warrants in June. Ten people were arrested initially at the time of the riots, most of them for driving up to or through police lines.

Investigators continued working through the area's FBI Violence Crime Task Force, using videotape footage and witness accounts to identify and charge suspects. The task force is made up of detectives from the Berrien County Sheriff's Department, state police and Benton Township Police Department, with assistance from the FBI, and the police departments in Benton Harbor, St. Joseph and St. Joseph Township. The task force also gets help from the federal Drug Enforcement Administration and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

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Americans vote on everything. Everything. On the first Tuesday of November each year, they vote on dozens of matters, from the members of the local animal control board, to the sewer commission, to the sheriff, to the school board, to… well you get the picture. They vote for local offices, state offices, and federal offices. They may vote on millage (school tax), on any number of local or state initiatives or proposals, and about anything else you can imagine. Each ballot may be made up of dozens of lines, each calling for a decision.

One reason for this is America's federal system of government, the product of the failure of the first attempt at national government, the Articles of Confederation (established in 1777, soon after the US Declaration of Independence, but only ratified in 1781). Under the Articles of Confederation, the thirteen original States retained most of their sovereignty, with a very weak central government. Given the failure of this form of government to deal with relations between the US and other countries, and more importantly among the various States, it was decided in 1787 to reform the Articles of Confederation. As is often the case, instead of modifying the Articles of Confederation, the Constitutional Congress decided to start from scratch, inventing a new form of government embodied in the Constitution that has continued to be the law of the land since its ratification in 1788.

The Constitution is the result of these historical tensions between the various States and the central government, between the North and the South, between the interests of the commercial and industrial cities and the agricultural countryside, between small States and large States. Each of these tensions led to various compromises without which the Constitution would never have been written and ratified, and without which the United States would probably not exist today. For example, the issue of the balance of power between small and large States was settled by the division of the legislature into two houses: the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Senate protects the interests of small States, as each State is represented by two Senators, giving each State equal weight. The House of Representatives, on the other hand, reflects the balance of population, with each State entitled to a number of Representatives proportionate to its population. The approval of both houses is required to make a law, and each house has specific powers (taxation bills must be initiated by the House of Representatives, the Senate must approve the President's nominations for federal and Supreme Court judges, for members of the Cabinet, and for other offices).

The issue of slavery was a source of contestation from the very beginning of the country. In terms of representation, the southern States wanted their slaves to be counted as part of the population. The North refused to grant representation on the basis of slaves who had no status as citizens. With slaves counting, the population of the South would have been greater than that of the North. Without slaves counting, the opposite would have been true. The compromise, known as the "3/5 Compromise" was to count each slave as 3/5 of a free citizen for purposes of representation. The result appeared and appears shocking, but gave a balance in electoral weight between North and South without which the Constitution could not have existed.

The Americans had just fought a long war for freedom from tyranny, and were very concerned with safeguarding their sovereignty and rights, both the rights of individuals to be protected from government, and from the States to be protected from the central government. The Constitution established a balance of powers between the legislature (itself divided between Senate and House of Representatives), the executive branch (President) and to a lesser degree, the judiciary (the Supreme Court and the federal court system). The Constitution gives only certain powers to the federal government, with all remaining powers retained by the sovereign States (the historical trend has been to find justification within the Constitution for a progressive increase in the power of the federal government that the writers of the Constitution would probably not approve of).

The Constitution deals mostly with the relations between the States and the federal government, and we can see this in the elections for national office. Each State is the master of these elections, and it can be said that there are in fact no national elections in the US. The most extreme example of this is the Presidential election, in which the popular vote across the country has absolutely no importance for the designation of the President. In the beginning, the legislature of each State, and not the people of the State, would vote on the presidential candidates. Although the vote is now in the hands of the people, the tradition remains that the vote in each State determines the vote for the entire State. This is translated to the presidential election through the Electoral College, in which each State has a number of Electors equal to the number of Senators and Representatives of the State. Each State thus designates all of its electors for only one candidate, meaning that even a small majority for a particular candidate results in that candidate winning all of the Electors of the State (there are only two exceptions to this, Maine and Nebraska, which divide their Electors on a geographical basis).

While there were originally logistical reasons for the creation of the Electoral College, given the long distances and the difficulties of transportation and communication in early America, the primary reason for creating such a means of electing the President was to translate two of the historic Constitutional compromises from the legislative to the executive branch. Small States are over-represented, as they benefit automatically from two Electors (the number of Senators), along with a number of Electors proportionate to its population (number of Representatives). A small State like Wyoming, for example, has only one Representative, but has three times the number of Electors it population would warrant (1 Representative + 2 Senators = 3 Electors). Likewise, thanks to the attribution of Electors on the basis of the number of Representatives, the 3/5 Compromise can be found in the Presidential election. (Thomas Jefferson, the third President, was the first to benefit from this, as he was elected with a majority of Electors from slave States, despite losing the popular vote by a significant majority.) It must of course be noted that the 3/5 Compromise is no longer in effect (slavery was abolished thanks to the victory of the North in the Civil War in 1865), but the Electoral College can be seen as a sort of constitutional fossil remains of this measure.

Each State is in charge of its own elections, including the Presidential election by which each State designates its list of Electors to the Electoral College. In general, the officer in charge of elections in each State is the Secretary of State, who in some States is named by the Governor, and in others is directly elected. A great deal of authority and responsibility is given to lower levels of government. In some States, the counties are in charge of the organization of elections. As a result, there can be different methods of voting even within a given State. The great number of elections held on the same day (dozens in most places) means that some sort of automation is desirable. Various solutions have been adopted: mechanical machines, optical card readers, punch cards, and now, touch-screen electronic voting machines. As you may have seen in some of the articles I have sent over the last year, these machines are a source of great concern, due to their lack of security (easy to hack), their ability to be tampered with ("trafiquer"), and the refusal of manufacturers to include basic safeguards such as a paper copy of the vote.

With regard to the presidential election, each State totals its vote, and the candidate receiving the majority (absolute or simple) receives all the Electoral College votes for the State (except in Maine and Nebraska, where the votes can be divided; there is currently a referendum scheduled to do the same in Colorado). As a result, the presence of a strong third party candidate can mean that a presidential candidate receives all the State's Electoral College votes without winning an absolute majority of the popular vote. In practice, these Electoral College votes are people who are proposed by each candidate or party. If the candidate wins the popular vote in a State, his list in that State becomes the official list for the State. It is possible for an Elector not to vote as he has promised to vote, but this is rare, and in certain States such a betrayal can be punished by law. The Electors transmit their votes in January, and the President elected by the Electoral College takes office on January 25. The period between the election in early November and the inauguration of the new President serves as a transition period for the establishment of a new administration.

We usually hear only about the candidates of the Republican and Democratic parties, but in each presidential election there are many more who get little attention, and few votes. It is not easy to be present on ballots across the country, and each State has its own rules on who can be present as a candidate. Established parties have a great advantage as their past performance gives them automatic representation. Candidates running as individuals or for small parties can have much more difficulty being present in each State. There are currently battles throughout the US concerning the presence of Ralph Nader on ballots, with the Republicans providing financial and logistical help for Nader who is certain to take votes from Kerry, and with the Democrats opposing his presence in the Courts (this strategy doesn't always work, as in Florida, where Governor Jeb Bush, the brother of George W, has overrode a court decision barring Nader from the ballot due to irregularities in his petitions).

The country is divided almost 50-50 between Democrats and Republicans, but in most states the outcome is clear. The result is that the candidates concentrate their campaigns on a few "swing" states that could go either way. Because of this division, the outcome of the election is hard to determine, and the presence of a strong independent or third-party candidate like Nader can have a big impact.

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President: Elected every four years by the Electoral College. Presidents can serve two terms.

Vice-President: Elected with the President. Presides the Senate. Replaces the President in case of death or removal from office. If he serves more than two years of the President's term, he is limited to only one more term.

Senators: Two from each State. Elected for a six-year term by the entire population of each State. Each two years a third of the Senate comes up for election.

Representatives: Since 1911 the number of Representatives has been set at 435. These seats are apportioned according to the population of each State. Each State is divided into a number of districts equal to its number of Representatives (one for small States like Alaska or Wyoming, dozens for big States like New York or California). These districts have nothing to do with geographical considerations, and everything to do with ensuring that the party that controls the State legislature has the best chance of winning the greatest number of seats. All Representatives serve a two-year term, so they are perpetual candidates.

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