The Democrats said they wanted to eliminate the Electoral College.
The Republicans said they wanted to eliminate the Electoral College.
Yet, the Electoral College still exists.
Why?
- Five times in history, presidential candidates have won the popular vote but lost the Electoral College.
History.com continues,
- Among the many thorny questions debated by the delegates to the 1787 Constitutional Convention, one of the hardest to resolve was how to elect the president. The Founding Fathers debated for months, with some arguing that Congress should pick the president and others insistent on a democratic popular vote.
Their compromise is known as the Electoral College.
As with most compromises, rather than everyone winning, everyone — in particular five politicians — lost.
The fear
Still citing History.com,
- First, they thought 18th-century voters lacked the resources to be fully informed about the candidates, especially in rural outposts. Second, they feared a headstrong “democratic mob” steering the country astray. And third, a populist president appealing directly to the people could command dangerous amounts of power.
While that could happen in 2020, given the presence of extremists on all sides and the number of unsolicited absentee ballots — blame it on Covid-19 — that may, or may not, be cast by unregistered persons or persons who are registered but not citizens — being able to register on-line without having to prove citizenship actually is no worse than registering in person and not having to prove citizenship.
- Actually, in some states more proof of citizenship is required to get a driver’s license!
Knowledge of issues
Newspaper, tv, radio — all carry advertisements promoting candidates and issues.
That is not to claim that the advertisements are truthful or that either the candidates or those supporting them or specific issues are honest. Even “fact checkers” can be biased and check facts that best support their position.
- Yes, I believe the media is biased; some more blatantly than others.
There is a plethora of information available. There is no excuse for a voter to claim ignorance of a candidate. Have email? The candidates’ supporters will find you. Have text messaging? Ditto. It doesn’t matter if you are a registered Republican; the Democrats still will try to get your vote. I’m sure the Republicans are no better.
Perhaps there should be a test before a voter is handed a ballot to see if he or she actually KNOWS who and what is on the ballot.
- Yes, I know that would immediately be declared unconstitutional.
Technology
Today, October 2020, most voting at precinct places is electronic.
Voters show up at the polling place and prove they are registered to vote by providing some evidence; often a driver’s license. The poll worker compares the evidence to a list; if they match, the voter gets a ballot.
Voters mark their ballots and carry them to a scanner that records their votes.
The scanners are “dumped” into a computer at the Supervisor of Elections (SOE) or similar office and added to the output of other scanners at other polling places.
Mail-in and drop off ballots are scanned at “Election Central,” the Supervisor of Elections’ office.
As with polling places, there are supposed to be “poll watchers” to assure everything is on the up-and-up; kosher.
The biggest weakness in the mail-in ballots is the U.S. Post Office (USPS).
There is no guarantee that a ballot stuck in a voter’s letter box will be collected by the carrier; there is no guarantee that a ballot dropped in a USPS drop box or a Post Office branch will be delivered to the SOE, especially if the ballot is handled by a mail sorting facility between the time it is collected at the drop box or Post Office branch and the time is it supposed to be delivered to the SOE.
- This scrivener has particularly bad mail service; despite complaints, Civil Service and the union protect the carrier.
Voters with mail-in ballots have the option of dropping them off at a local polling place once early voting commences, or taking the ballots to an SOE secure drop box. Both ways avoid putting the ballots into USPS hands.
Vote early and often
Incumbents generally are more concerned with cheating by their opponents’ followers.
With lax — sometimes non-existent — requirements to prove citizenship, the suspicion is that illegals will be casting ballots.
The Heritage Foundation Election Fraud Database (https://tinyurl.com/ycyn6t2z) presents a sampling of recent proven instances of election fraud from across the country. This database is not an exhaustive or comprehensive list. It does not capture all cases and certainly does not capture reported instances that are not investigated or prosecuted.
The database lists 1,298 “proven cases of voter fraud,” but fails to specify WHEN the fraud was discovered making is less useful.
History, unfortunately, has some (in)famous voter fraud.
The City Journal site (https://tinyurl.com/y3y45euf), records that
- Nowhere did voter fraud have a more notorious record than in Tammany-era New York. Tammany Hall's ruthless efficiency in manufacturing votes—especially during the zenith of its power in the second half of the nineteenth century—is legendary. At the time, America didn't yet have privacy-protecting voting machines or official government ballots, so Tammany fixers could ensure that voters would cast ballots as promised. Vote riggers would simply give people pre-marked ballots and watch as they deposited them into the voting box.
The people of Chicago might dispute that.
The Block Club Chicago site (https://tinyurl.com/y654l7m7) offers
- Chicago is famous for its history of people voting from the grave and for helping President John F. Kennedy “steal” the 1960 election. (JFK beat Richard Nixon by 9,000 votes in Illinois by capturing what some considered a suspiciously high 450,000 advantage in Cook County.)
Mayor Anton Cermak, the first in an unbroken stream of Democratic mayors since 1931, created what would became known as the infamous “Democratic Machine,” said Bob Crawford, a now-retired journalist who covered city politics for decades. The Machine ensured voters picked the right candidates, and the people who worked in it weren’t shy about using money, bribes or fake identities to get votes for Democrats.
Tactics may have changed, but the prospect of voter fraud is once again a significant consideration. Instead of registering names from tombstones, illegal aliens may be voting thanks both to unsolicited ballots and voter registrars who don’t demand proof of citizenship.
Both WUSA9 (https://tinyurl.com/y4mh8hbp) and WTOP (https://tinyurl.com/y59nympj) report that A half-million unsolicited absentee applications cause confusion in Virginia. That’s just one state. Similar situations have been reported elsewhere.
House decides
If neither presidential candidate receives the required 270 votes, the House of Representatives elects the president.
For the 2020 election, given the House’s Democrat majority, Harris-Emhoff will become the first female president of the United States.
- I predict that Joe Biden will not complete a full term in office. His age and health are an issue and if that doesn’t force his capitulation, his party will drum up a way to get him declared unfit for office. I could be wrong.
The question is: WHEN will the House get the job, if ever?
There is so much speculation that voter fraud will be rampant that who ever looses the election likely will challenge many votes. At this point, it seems likely that the winner will be named sometime in December.
PLAGIARISM is the act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or the ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.
Truth is an absolute defense to defamation. Defamation is a false statement of fact. If the statement was accurate, then by definition it wasn’t defamatory.
Web sites (URLs) beginning https://tinyurl.com/ are generated by the free Tiny URL utility and reduce lengthy URLs to manageable size.
No comments:
Post a Comment