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OpEdNews Op Eds    H3'ed 12/8/16

To Members of the Electoral College

By       (Page 1 of 1 pages)   14 comments
Follow Me on Twitter     Message Mary Bell Lockhart

Please protect our democracy by casting your presidential electoral vote for the winner of the national popular vote, Hillary Clinton.

The United States is the only democracy that elects the leader of all the people, the President, through a mechanism such as the Electoral College. While the Electoral College itself is in the US Constitution, how states allocate electoral votes and how individual electors vote is not. This places great responsibility on electors like you to fulfill the purposes of this election process.

The main purpose of our presidential-election process is to select a person of high qualifications and to prevent the selection of a person lacking in knowledge or personal and professional integrity. The President also should not have foreign entanglements and foreign governments should not influence our political discourse. And it's not just about the person - in selecting their President the people express their will regarding the actions they want that person to take.

Votes are still being counted, but we know that Hillary Clinton received at least 2.7 million more votes nationwide than Donald Trump. However, since our population is not evenly distributed, Donald Trump was able to win victories by tiny margins in 3 states (Wisconsin by .9%, Michigan by .2%, Pennsylvania by .8%, subject to recounts). In those states, Donald Trump had at most 87,504 more votes than Hillary Clinton and, under a winner-take-all allocation, would receive 46 electoral votes. Nationwide, Hillary Clinton only needs 38 electoral votes to reach 270 and win.

This is an electoral process based on geography, not the political will of the people. It can, however, be modified to reflect the political will of the people and you can do that in this election. Thirty-eight true patriots who are now designated as Trump electors can do it by voting for Clinton instead.

Donald Trump exhibits a lack of knowledge about the complexities of modern domestic and foreign policy and has never held any elective office. His personal behavior and demeanor is offensive to millions at home and abroad. His business history is one of repeated law violations, lawsuits, civil settlements and bankruptcies. He refuses to release his federal income-tax returns so we must assume he has something to hide. He does business in many countries from which complete disinvestment is virtually impossible. Many of those businesses would present targets for terrorist attacks or opportunities for political pressure to be applied. He bragged of his ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, has received millions from his businesses in Russia and our national-security professionals believe Russia illegally invaded U.S. private email and database files for the purpose of influencing this election.

Finally, at least 65 million Americans do not want him to carry out his stated intended actions as President. Donald Trump is, therefore, everything our election process is supposed to protect us from as President of the United States. We cannot subvert our democracy by allowing 87,504 votes in 3 states to "trump" 2.7 million votes across 50 states and the District of Columbia. Please let the will of the people be done. The world is watching.

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Mary Bell Lockhart Social Media Pages: Facebook page url on login Profile not filled in       Twitter page url on login Profile not filled in       Linkedin page url on login Profile not filled in       Instagram page url on login Profile not filled in

I'm a retired public health worker focused these days on supporting a variety of progressive issues, such as criminal justice reform, energy efficiency, environmental protection, universal health care, civil rights, and worldwide peace and (more...)
 

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