On
Monday, December 19th, I went down to the State Capital today to watch
the nine electors for the State of Colorado cast their votes for for the
US President. Before it was over nine votes were cast for Hillary
Clinton, but it was not without some drama. You see, before the
proceedings even took place, Colorado Secretary of State Wayne Williams
had stated that if any of the electors broke rank and decided to vote
for a candidate other than HRC, they would be dismissed and replaced
with someone who would. He even went so far as to draft a new oath for
the proceedings to highlight the fact that if they did not vote for the
person who won the popular vote that the person would be committing
perjury.
Let that information sink in for a moment: Williams, a Republican, interceded on behalf of Hillary Clinton.
Hillary Clinton, who has not contested her loss, would have opposed the
actions of SOS Williams even though it meant she would have received
one less electoral vote.
And
then, up stepped a true American patriot. One brave, twenty-four year
old, former Marine Micheal Baca, stood his ground to defend his right
to vote his conscience and proceeded to vote for Governor John Kasich.
This was the first time that had happened in Colorado history. Baca
became the first electoral college voter to cast his ballot for someone
other than for the winner of Colorado’s U.S. Presidential contest.
Despite
his stand, Mr. Baca was admonished by Secretary of State Williams who
then dismissed him as an elector and called for a replacement. Almost
as if it were planned (It was, by the way.), a volunteer, Celeste
Landry, stepped up and was sworn in by Colorado Supreme Court Justice
Nancy Rice. Williams did this as the huge crowd of citizen witnesses,
(almost all of whom were Democrats who voted for Clinton), loudly demanded that he (Williams) either resign or face recall.
Unless
you understand the insider politics of the Electoral College, this all
probably seems a bit odd. What Mr. Baca was trying to do was to
reinstate the notion that electors could remain unbound and vote for
whomever they chose. That was the way the Founding Fathers believed
that the American people could keep a despot from stealing the office of
the President. When Colorado, or any state, binds its Electoral
College delegates to vote in lock step with the popular vote of the
state, it reduces the meaningfulness of the Electoral College vote to a
useless charade. Why even have the vote at all if voters can only
choose what has been chosen already? This makes no sense whatsoever.
And, if that is the case, why not scrap the thing all together?
We
have just witnessed an election where the loser won the popular vote by
nearly a 3% margin. I get it. Hillary did not garner the electoral
tally of 270 votes, and so she lost. I am not saying give it to her,
nor were the hundreds of people in attendance at the Capitol yesterday.
We all knew about the electoral threshold going in and HRC did not
clear the mark.
But
what purpose does the Electoral College serve if we continue to strip
electors of their choice to pick whomever they wish to become President
of the United Stated? The Electoral College has become a tool for
political strategists to undermine the popular vote…period. The will of
the majority be damned. Just find the right path to electoral votes and
you do not even have to win the popular vote. Lock the electors into
having to vote "winner takes all" and it makes this a sure thing that
cannot be challenged.
I
leave you with this final thought: If we are going to continue to use
this adulterated system of electing our United States President that has
long strayed from its origins, can we at least make it entertaining?
What about dressing the electors in lavish costumes and have them sing
outlandish show tunes during the ceremony. At least we would be
entertained once every four years.
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