"Then some combination of the party structure, and the media telling complicit voters who voters are likely to vote for, is exerting on the order of 14-15 bits of power over the Presidency; while the voters only exert 3-4 bits."

I don't buy this. The vast majority of random people would lose an election race against Hillary/Giuliani/etc even if the party structure and media supported them. So I would say many of those 14-15 bits are actually forced moves caused by good estimates of voter preference. Am I missing something? I'm having trouble thinking of a standard of nincompoophood according to which the average presidential candidate is a nincompoop but the average voter is not.

"I'm glad I didn't do the "sensible" thing. Less blood on my hands."

I tend to think that what matters is whether or not the blood is still in the body of the person it belongs to and not so much whose hands it's on when it's out.