The calm before the storm?

We’re in a the summer lull of the US Presidential election and despite speeches in Berlin, Vice-Presidential speculation and basically the American equivalent of the British “silly season” the campaigns are preparing themselves for the nominating conventions and hard campaigning in the autumn.

But how does the election actually work? Well luckily the fine folk over at the Common Craft Show have turned their attention away from their usual fare of technology issues – to produce this excellent guide to Electing a US President in Plain English.

So while the various poll of polls data from sites such as, Gallop and show the race is pretty tight, but with Obama maintaining a small but consistent lead over McCain, when this is translated via state by state polls, into a projected Electoral College result, it does not look like being the sort of close election we’ve had in 2000 and 2004.

However, there is plenty of time for this to change and in the meantime, why not sample of some of the best of the web on the US elections – just scroll past the Editor’s Choice selections to get to the latest additions to Intute: Social Sciences.