Matriculating At The Electoral College

Most US citizens nowadays have not read the Constitution of the united States of America [sic], much less the Federalist and Anti-Federalist Papers.  For this reason, the Electoral College seems like an elitist and anachronistic vestige of a by-gone era.  Actually, the problem is that the System has been so monkeyed with, and the federal institutions completely re-tasked, since the founding of the country that the original intent of many of the country's institutions seem rather mysterious.

Thank you, American "education" system for dropping Civics classes in favor of LGBT studies.

In fact, if anyone bothered to read the US Constitution, the Senate, President and Vice President were never intended to be elected by the masses.  Only the House of Representatives was considered the People's forum, while the Senate was intended to be a deliberative body, the President's job was just to execute the laws passed by Congress, and the Supreme Court was an "untouchable" group of FIVE people who weighed laws against the Constitutional powers.

Since the original intent of the Federal government has been completely turned upside down, many of the national institutions seem bizarre by current standards, not the least of which is the Electoral College.

The Federal government was never intended to issue laws that affected the People of the States.  It was simply a body created to regulate relations between the States, issue and regulate a single currency, and unify trade regulations and foreign policy.  For this reason, most of the Federal government was NOT elected by the People, but rather by the States, which were the only entities affected by Federal law.

Originally, Senators were elected, not by general statewide elections, but by the Legislatures in each State.  The Legislatures were also tasked with selecting the Electors for each State, who in turn voted for the President.  The top vote in the Electoral College became the President, and second place became the Vice President.

Each State had a minimum of three Electors, one for each Senator (total two), and one for each Congressional seat.  The total number was based on population, determined by a decadal Census, which was only intended to count heads, not race, gender or number of toilets and flooring material in each house.

Over time, the Federal government began to insinuate more and more power over individual citizens, a function it was never intended to have.  After the Civil War, this usurpation of power was more or less cemented in place.

Let's take a minute to examine how the Electoral College was supposed to function.  The 12th Amendment, ratified in 1804, states that the Electors meet on the first Monday following the second Wednesday of December every four years.  The Electors vote separately for President and Vice President, with at least one of them being from a different State.  The Electors send a Certificate of their vote to the US Senate, where the current Vice President (President of the Senate) opens them in front of the full House and Senate and reads them aloud.  If no one gets a 2/3rds majority, then the House immediately votes for President, with a simple majority winning.  If a majority is not reached by the following March, then the current Vice President assumes the office.

No where in the Constitution does it mandate that the President and Vice President be elected by the citizenry.  That is actually a function of the party system, where popular vote selects the nominees.  Therefore, the popular vote for President is meaningless, except as allowed by law in the individual States, where all of them have locked the percentage of pledged Electors to the popular vote in some form or another.  In other words, the American public has never elected a President, either now or in the past.  They simply bind Electors to vote one way or another, with varying degrees of force (or none at all).

Basically, all the time and money spent on presidential elections in the US is really pointless.

The power (thought the Right is a contentious argument) of the Federal government to bypass the States and invade the lives of private citizens came with the creation of the Federal Reserve (Federal Reserve Act of 1913) and the Income Tax (16th Amendment).  Together, these laws removed the "power of the purse" from the people and tore down the barrier between them and the Federal government.

The next jiggering with the US System came right after the Income Tax amendment in 1913 (appropriately enough), when the 17th Amendment took the power to elect Senators away from the Legislatures and gave it to the rabble.  This further eroded the function of the Federal government as just a regulatory body among the States, and gave it more power over the individual citizens.

The Judiciary Act of 1869, combined with President Franklin Roosevelt's court stacking to ram his New Deal through Constitutional prohibitions were the final nail in the coffin of the Republic.  At this point, the Socialist agenda of the FDR administration solidified the democratic wave that had slowly overpowered the founding intent of the Federal government.  It now had the power to directly affect the lives of individual citizens, which was precisely the worry that the Founders had when they set up the system.

As it stands, the Electoral College seems like an anachronistic vestige of a bygone era because its intent has been destroyed over the past two centuries through the usurpation of States' Rights and the unbridled expansion of Federal powers.  The last remaining barriers against an all-powerful Federal beast are the 9th and 10th Amendments (Rights of the People, and the States), and the jury system, all of which have been under steady attack for decades now, in great part by the purposeful maleducation (to coin a term) instituted by the Federal government trying to centralize control over information through the school systems, in other words, the Common Core.

Since the American people no longer have any clue why and how their government works, it is becoming increasingly easy to run roughshod over the law without even bothering to change it.  Who would argue when no one understands it?  And besides, decades of maleducation have left people thinking that Democracy is pretty nifty, not realizing that these strange institutions were put in place to provide a barrier against centralize power and control over people's daily lives, which is where the US is today.

One of my biggest worries about the recent election is that neither Trump, or the people, have any clue that they have demanded from the office of the President actions and results that the office is not empowered to have.

I would be greatly encouraged if Trump's only act in office were to appoint strict constructionist justices to the Supreme Court and together begin dismantling the central power grab of the Federales.  This one act would eliminate 99% of all the problems that got people to the point of electing Trump in the first place.  The rest of his job would be dismantling the Federal Reserve and the Income Tax system and returning the country to the original form of government it was meant to have.

Unimaginable?  Yup  That's why I have never supported ANY candidate for President.

Truth Be A Harsh Mistress

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If people not worshiping soldiers pisses you off, you may want to click away now.  I guarantee today's column will piss you off.

Today is Memorial Day in America.  It started in 1868, with an informal observation called Decoration Day to honor slain soldiers.  Of course, it was originally only for Union soldiers and pretty much spit on the graves of the Confederates who died in the same conflagration.

Every Memorial Day, my inbox(es) is stuffed with email reminding me to worship the fallen soldiers of the US, who died in the various wars that country has committed.  My father and uncles were all veterans of WW2, and I honor them.  My grandfathers were veterans of WW1, and I honor them.  But, when it comes to any war since WW2, I draw the line.  Why?

Article I, Section 8, Clause 11 of the United States Constitution, sometimes referred to as the War Powers Clause, vests in the Congress the power to declare war, in the following wording:

[The Congress shall have Power...] To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;

That's why.  There has not been one single war declared by the US Congress since WW2.  Under the terms of the US Constitution, the adventures in Korea in the 50s, Vietnam in the 60s, and every single military intervention in the doings of sovereign countries since then have been illegal.  I don't care if you call them "police actions" or "military advisors," the result was lots of soldiers and materiel were expended in events that looked a whole hell of a lot like wars to me.  We even call them the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Grenada and Panama invasions, the various Desert Storm Wars, etc.

What's more, every US soldier said these words at some point:

"I, _____, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed ...Jun 15, 2011

Therefore, every soldier who has fought on orders from the government of the US, has violated their oaths to "protect and defend the Constitution."

If all this isn't enough for you, then how about Article I, Section 8, Clause 12, of the US Constitution?

 The Congress shall have Power To ...raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years....

So, only Congress can declare war, and it hasn't done so since WW2 (you can argue all the subtleties you want-means nothing), the soldier's oath requires him or her to support and defend the Constitution, and right after the Constitution grants Congress war powers, it says that the US may not raise and support an army more than two years (no standing army).

Under the very terms of the Constitution soldiers are sworn to defend, every soldier that has been drafted or joined the US Armed Forces since WW2 has violated the Constitution and is a war criminal, as are all the presidents who have sent armed soldiers into sovereign countries to fight since Roosevelt and Truman.

It's not like any of those folks couldn't read the Constitution.  Most Americans read it at least once in school, and if you are swearing an oath to defend it, you should probably read it again at least once.  In any case, every representative, officer and government employee who supported the various military adventures since WW2 are complicit in war crimes and treason.

Sorry if that seems harsh to you and you don't think your grandfather, father, brother, or son who served in the US military since WW2 is a criminal, but the facts speak for themselves.

So, when it comes to Memorial Day, I don't get all teary eyed and go around laying wreaths on soldiers' graves.  I don't honor those men and women who violated the founding document of the US government and their oaths.  I don't honor the people who can't read rather simple text that is widely available and has been since the founding of the country.

You can pick nits and get all patriotic and jump up and down about the sacrifices of these fine men and women, but none of it changes the nature of their crime.

Memorial Day is just another state-worshiping holiday that glorifies death in the name of a flag.  It's time for folks to extract themselves from the deep conditioning that has led them into blind obedience to symbols and not ideals.

I do honor those men and women who served in WW1 and WW2.  You did your duty under terms of the Constitution and your oath.  Thank you.

For the rest of the fallen, sorry for your empty (and illegal) sacrifice for the glory of empire.  Too bad you didn't stand up for what's right, not what's expedient.