Founding Father's presidency

As we are 13 months away from our next presidential election, I look back at the history of the presidency and wonder about how it all started.  In 1776, the articles of confederation stated that there is an election, whoever had the most votes is the president and the second most is the Vice President.  Even back in those times, there were two major parties and it really ended up being a two person race, one representing each party.  This lasted for 27 years until they decided that the system was ridiculous and presidents got to choose their running mate/vice president.  Was it that ridiculous though? 

The whole point of what the founding fathers were trying to accomplish was balance of powers.  They wanted to make sure that there would be no King George III in America, so when you look at it at under that goal, the system makes complete sense.  The Vice President is of the opposing party so it keeps the president in check from promoting far right or far left legislation.  If you look at today's government, this is exactly what happens anyway.  Two years after almost any election, the party opposing the president's party wins the house.  It seems that the voters make this the case anyway when they do this.  What hasn't changed since the inception of America is that the vast majority doesn't want complete party power.  That's why it's always so hard to get anything done, because the house has to approve and then the Senate and even then the President can veto 

This is really the greatness of our system though.  For if bad presidents could get their way, than we may have another George III.  So, why did they get rid of second place being the Vice President?  Clearly the top two people should get the top two positions in government and what's the difference if it's two people fighting or 428 vs. 100 vs. 1?  The balance is the same, if not, much less confusing.

~Larry Couchmanos
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