Why is there a 3 month delay between the Presidential elections and the Inauguration?

In the UK - the PM is chosen by the members of parliament - not the complicated electoral system that the U.S. has - (parliamentary system is quite different) - the executive branch in the UK uses the members of parliament to run the entire government - bureaucracy - (cabinet) - therefor the system for transition of Executive power is much more simplified in the UK.

In the U.S. the two branches - Exec (President) and Legislative (Congress) are completely separated - thus when the elections occur - Congress comes in (2/3 of the senate remains in power to continue policies) however the executive / cabinet and bureacracy leadership completely changes - the amount of time to select new cabinet / federal agency leadership does take quite some time.

Historically - the original transitions of power were much smaller and could have taken place in just a few days or weeks - however there is a delay because of the process - it was originally expected that the House of Representatives would be used to choose many Presidents - as a majority of the electoral votes is constitutionally necessary - and if a multiple party system (not a 2 party) had taken hold in the U.S. then delays of power transition can be expected - that has shown not to be the case thus far however - the process for counting the electoral votes and selecting the President originally was expected to possibly take as long as a month and a buffer has been placed to help with the complicated U.S. system of transitional power.

Hope that helps a little.

great question

Many will cop with "transition" to which I reply "transition shmanzition".

In this instance it was with the HOPE that information would surface (the liberal media in the USA is suppressing any FACT that portrays Obama in the corrupt light that he embodies) that would cause him to have to decline inauguration.

All the media is doing is delaying the inevitable. Obama WILL resign before his first term ends, as this corrupt far-Left Liberal had no business being elected. If Americans hadn't become so dumbed down by the public education system and we suspended voting privileges for welfare recipients, this man NEVER would have been elected.

This is a very important fact for other nations to understand. While America may be in a PERCEIVED position of weakness now, don't be fooled by such a perception.

It's the hard working CONSERVATIVES who still run this nation, least of all the crowds of people you'll see in person at the "inauguration", who think that Obama's elections means that they STILL won't have to get jobs.

We may be a bottom-heavy society population wise, but the Pareto Principle holds true. 20% of the U.S. population at the TOP social status, are those responsible for 80% of control over the day to day of this nation. We do NOT reflect the Liberals in either the Executive or Legislative branch RESPONSIBLE for our failing economy (in a present and future context, of course).

In order to allow for an orderly transition. It takes a while for the incoming president and his staff to learn how things are done and they need to be brought up to speed on security issues...

There could be a long drawn out recount like there has been for the senate jobs this year. You can't put them both in the white house till they mull it out.

The incoming president has to choose his cabinet, get as many approved before hand as possible and be given briefings on things such as national security.

there is a delay between the time of the election results and the time that the president elect actually enters office because the old president needs to finish any business that he has.

and the president elect needs time to get ready.

It's to give Bush and his cronies time to shred all the emails and other stuff that could be embarrassing

There's not. It's only 2 months.

To give them time to hit the shredder

Bush needs time to clear out his stuff!