Thanks to Legolas' helpful direction it now seems the federal approach in Europe generally and Norway particularly is not that "foreign" to Americans (see what I did there? ) The mechanics are often differ, but the objective is nearly the same, and involves a certain degree of apportionment by region as well as population. My biggest concern, that national proportional representation denied non-urban citizens their own federal representatives, appears groundless.

After that we are just back to debating whether the head of government should be chosen by a direct popular vote or by popularly elected representatives, and it is rather ridiculous for people using the latter method to criticize America for not doing the former. Charity begins at home, and all that.