text: What have Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, Bob Dole, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and the AFL-CIO all, in their time, agreed on? Answer: Abolishing the electoral college! They're not alone; according to a Gallup poll in 2000, taken shortly after Al Gore- thanks to the quirks of the electoral college- won the popular vote but lost the presidency, over 60 percent of voters would prefer a direct election to the kind we have now. Under the electoral college system, voters vote not for the President, but for a slate of electors, who in turn elect the President. Sometimes state conventions, sometimes the state party's central commitee, sometimes the Presidential candidates themselves. The single best argument against the electoral college is what they might call the disaster factor. Perhaps most worrying is the prospct of a tie in the electoral vote. At the most basic level, the electoral college is unfair to voters.