The presidential race is in full swing. Democrat Barack Obama has just declared Joe Biden to be America’s future president, ehm, vice-president. Hillary Clinton supports both Obama and his wife Michelle, and Republican candidate John McCain has competition from French fries of the same name…

All this is very exciting. But do you know exactly how the US president is elected? Aha, I thought so. Me neither. (I had to memorize that once for a course called “The Political System of the United States of America,” which was just as comprehensive as its sounds, but the details didn’t stick.) So, here’s how it works: