It’s an easy question, or so one would think. But I am curious, unless you live in Illinois, New Jersey, Hawaii or Maryland, you may not know who you are actually voting for. Think I am kidding? I am not.

These four states have decided to change their electoral votes to the popular vote in what is called the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, but in every other state, you are not voting for John McCain or Barack Obama like you think you are. You are voting for your electoral college representative, who will decide who he thinks should be president for you.

Vote 101: The Electoral College
from the History Channel

More from Wikipedia

Some states don’t even put the electoral college representatives names on the ballot. Instead they just list the candidates for you to vote for, but that doesn’t mean they will pledge their vote to that candidate. Electoral college representatives have the right to change their mind or to vote against their party.

So how much power does your vote have?

That’s the question.

When you look around online, watch local news or otherwise try to find actual electoral college representatives, they are not easy to find, yet these are the people representing you. How much do you know about your representatives?

I can take an educated guess: not much.

How democratic is that?