One reader is sure that the inauguration of Present Trump for a second term will be used as point of contention forever. There is no reason to doubt that prediction. We still hear about the Florida recount in 2000, which took 37 days to solve, including numerous appeals to the Florida state supreme court and two trips to the Supremes themselves. The matter was simple - their state constitution required a recount of the entire state, not the just the two heavily controlled counties. Game over.
The House of Representatives receive the electors' names in January, and that is also where a solution can be found, with state delegations voting - one for each state. The Electoral College is balanced, with population and territory each counting toward the final outcome. The House has more Democrats in the total, but more state delegations which are majority GOP. In both cases, population alone does not determine the outcome. If it did, a few metropolitan areas would dominate control of the presidency. That is why the "popular vote" does not exist, except for the TV Wheel of Fortune lit boards on Election Night.
I kept explaining loudly to the TV on Election Night, "Your numbers are irrelevant!"
The big case (18 states) is going to the US Supreme Court. They should be deciding, based on the Supreme Law of the Land (the US Constitution) that the electors must be chosen according to that state's legislature. Nothing declared by state governors, secretaries of state, state judges, or local supreme courts can over-ride the state's own lawmakers. If state law says balloting stops at midnight, then that holds.
This is ultimately a case about the rights of each state to determine how voting can be accomplished legally. Although the fraudulent voting issue is obvious, that seems to be secondary - good for a lengthy study to prove everything. But - in order for the ballot box stuffing to work, a lot of illegal (lacking the state legislature) rules had to be instituted.
No one has ever won or lost the "popular vote," so the media simply show their own ignorance in perpetuating this folly. That is why people say, "But we already voted, and our candidate won. We don't need an Elector College." Wrong - everyone voted for their state's electors. There is no election so far and no "President Elect," let alone an "Office of the President Elect."
Lutherans should have no problem with this. The key factor keeping Luther out of the hands of the Pope was the fact of Frederick being an elector. The Spanish Emperor, Holy Roman Empire, was elected by five men, and Frederick's vote would un-elect him.
Of course this was by God's design. The next time you hear the strange title - Frederick the Wise, also known as Frederick the Wise - remember that they too had electors during the Reformation and beyond.
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| Some of us give a hoot. |
