1. An arbiter for arbiting among a plurality of items, comprising: a first register having a length N, said first register for storing a first bitmap vector corresponding to the eligibility of an item to participate in an arbitration process; a weight table having K rows and N columns, wherein each column represents a weight associated with one of the bits in said first bitmap vector; eligibility circuitry for applying the weights within said weight table to the bits within said first bitmap vector to yield a weighted eligibility table having K rows and N columns, said eligibility circuitry adapted to generate a plurality of indications wherein each indication is associated with a row in said weighted eligibility table and indicates whether said row is empty or non empty; arbitration circuitry for applying a first arbitration process among said plurality of indications to yield a selected bit, said arbitration circuitry for choosing a row within said weighted eligibility table with which to perform a second arbitration process; and wherein K and N are positive integers.