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Make The Electoral College Real

Article II of the Constitution

  • Clause 2 Electors
  • Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector.

    • Clause 3 Electoral College Count
    • The Electors shall meet in their respective States, and vote by Ballot for two Persons, of whom one at least shall not be an Inhabitant of the same State with themselves. And they shall make a List of all the Persons voted for, and of the Number of Votes for each; which List they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the Seat of the Government of the United States, directed to the President of the Senate. The President of the Senate shall, in the Presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the Certificates, and the Votes shall then be counted. The Person having the greatest Number of Votes shall be the President, if such Number be a Majority of the whole Number of Electors appointed; and if there be more than one who have such Majority, and have an equal Number of Votes, then the House of Representatives shall immediately chuse by Ballot one of them for President; and if no Person have a Majority, then from the five highest on the List the said House shall in like Manner chuse the President. But in chusing the President, the Votes shall be taken by States, the Representation from each State having one Vote; A quorum for this Purpose shall consist of a Member or Members from two thirds of the States, and a Majority of all the States shall be necessary to a Choice. In every Case, after the Choice of the President, the Person having the greatest Number of Votes of the Electors shall be the Vice President. But if there should remain two or more who have equal Votes, the Senate shall chuse from them by Ballot the Vice President.

From John Adams to John Taylor, 17 December 1814

In your fifth page You Say “Mr. Adams calls our Attention to hundreds of wise and virtuous Patricians, mangled and bleeding Victims of popular Fury.” and gravely counts up several Victims of democratic Rage as proofs that Democracy is more pernicious than Monarchy or Aristocracy.” Is this fair, sir? Do you deny any one of my Facts? I do not say that Democracy has been more pernicious, on the whole, and in the long run, than Monarchy or Aristocracy. Democracy has never been and never can be so durable as Aristocracy or Monarchy. But while it lasts it is more bloody than either. I beseech you, Sir to recollect, the time when my three Volumes of “Defence” were written and printed, in 1786, 1787 and 1788. The History of the University, had not then furnis[, Start insertion,h, End,]ed me with a document I have Since Seen; an Alphabetical Dictionary of the Names and Qualities of Persons “mangled and bleeding Victims of democratic rage and popular fury” in France during the Despotism of Democracy in that Country, which Napoleon ought to be immortalised for calling “Ideology.”

—————————-

The reason our USA Founding Fathers establish the electoral college was because they feared mob rule and they understood the dangers of direct elections. Then you had Alexander Hamilton who set the seeds to turn America into an Aristocracy/Oligarchy. The fight back against the Oligarchy has historically lent itself to political populism and the people having more of a say in our government, and while the Oligarchy has generally waved the white flag to surrender to some of the mobs ideas when they become too raucous, generally the Oligarchy has managed to control the mob without most of the mob knowing it.   This has often been to the detriment of the United States. That white flag has more times than not been disingenuous and just a ploy to achieve its actual goals to maintain the power of the oligarchy, keep its crony clubs unfettered by making class mobility more difficult and limited, and to destroy any new powers in the economy that might be or might become their competition.

We saw this with the destruction of the Southern Textile families who supported politicians the richer, and often Northern, Oligarchy didn’t like. In more recent times we saw the Oligarchy at work when the goto search engine was destroyed, then the old yahoo was destroyed, and all search power was given to google and to a lesser degree Microsoft. We saw it when the old myspace was destroyed and the power was given to Facebook. With that transfer of wealth and power, that gave the oligarchy more power to spy on opponents and to pick winners and losers in the larger economy and perhaps even to some degree in the micro economy. Does google refuse to put your business on the map where people can find you or do they have you a block over? When you search for a given business is their competition more likely to pop up than the business for which you were in search?

The bankruptcy of J.C. Penney may at least partly be blamed on google and google pretending J.C. Penney were demoted in search because they had broken some seo rule. I am not a huge fan of COX Inc. but how often do you see any of their news organization on the google news page? Now, I guess it is possible that COX Inc. is retarded in leadership and does not want their news listed on the google news page but I kind of doubt that.

So anyway, the Oligarchy is thriving under our current system of electing their idiots to power so they have no desire to change the system. Some even want to make the electoral college even more irrelevant.  But, the American people need to demand that the electoral college be relevant.

How can it be made relevant?  Well, one thing is to look at how it was originally designed.

The First Design
In the first design of the Electoral College (described in Article II,
Section 1 of the Constitution):


Each State was allocated a number of Electors equal to the number of its
U.S. Senators (always 2) plus the number of its U.S. Representatives (which
may change each decade according to the size of each State’s population as
determined in the decennial census). This arrangement built upon an
earlier compromise in the design of the Congress itself and thus satisfied
both large and small States.


The manner of choosing the Electors was left to the individual State
legislatures, thereby pacifying States suspicious of a central national
government.

Members of Congress and employees of the federal government were
specifically prohibited from serving as an Elector in order to maintain
the balance between the legislative and executive branches of the federal
government.


Each State’s Electors were required to meet in their respective States
rather than all together in one great meeting. This arrangement, it was
thought, would prevent bribery, corruption, secret dealing, and foreign
influence.

In order to prevent Electors from voting only for a “favorite son” of their
own State, each Elector was required to cast two votes for president, at
least one of which had to be for someone outside their home State. The
idea, presumably, was that the winner would likely be everyone’s second favorite choice.

And the casting of two votes is important.

The electoral votes were to be sealed and transmitted from each of the
States to the President of the Senate who would then open them before
both houses of the Congress and read the results.

The person with the most electoral votes, provided that it was an absolute
majority (at least one over half of the total), became president. Whoever
obtained the next greatest number of electoral votes became vice
president — an office which they seem to have invented for the occasion
since it had not been mentioned previously in the Constitutional
Convention.

In the event that no one obtained an absolute majority in the Electoral
College or in the event of a tie vote, the U.S. House of Representatives, as
the chamber closest to the people, would choose the president from
among the top five contenders. They would do this (as a further
concession to the small States) by allowing each State to cast only one vote with an absolute majority of the States being required to elect a
president. The vice presidency would go to whatever remaining
contender had the greatest number of electoral votes. If that, too, was
tied, the U.S. Senate would break the tie by deciding between the two.

That system might not have been perfect but it is better than what we have now where we are not even sure whether our elections are honest or not.  But the bottom line is that some major change is needed in how we choose a President because we can’t afford to keep allowing the Oligarchy (some of whom are not even American) to make the Presidency of the US a bought office mostly run by them.

So, to get our Republic back what changes are needed.

1. The size of the House of Representatives needs to be increased from 435 to 43,500.

2. The electors should again cast 2 votes for President.  One vote should be based on the people’s vote as is pretty much done now.  The 2nd vote should be for who they think will best serve the interest of the American people.  The 2nd vote should be different from the first vote.

3. The electors and not the President should decide who the VP should be and who the AG should be.

I realize what I am suggesting will never happen but it is just a thought. LOL

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In The News 4-4-2023

Jamie Dimon says the banking crisis is not over and will cause ‘repercussions for years to come’

The recent banking issues in the U.S. began with the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank, which was closed by regulators on March 10 as depositors pulled tens of billions of dollars from the bank. The smaller Signature Bank was closed two days later. And in Europe, Swiss regulators brokered a purchase of Credit Suisse by UBS.

JPMorgan and other large banks stepped in to make $30 billion of deposits at First Republic, another regional bank that investors feared could become the next SVB.

Richard Branson’s Virgin Orbit files for bankruptcy

 

Hart said he believed that the company’s “cutting-edge launch technology” would have “wide appeal to buyers as we continue in the process to sell the company.”

Virgin Investments, one of Virgin Orbit’s sister companies, will inject $31.6 million into the satellite launcher to help it stay afloat while the business searches for a new owner.

The announcement comes just days after Virgin Orbit said it would lay off about 85% of its workforce to reduce expenses since it could not secure additional funding.

Google is so broke after becoming a bitch for the government that they have stopped buying laptops and stapler guns and are telling their employees to use paper clips.

 

Google to cut down on employee laptops, services and staplers for ‘multi-year’ savings

The latest cost-cutting measures come as Alphabet-owned Google continues its most severe era of cost cuts in its almost two decades as a public company. The company said in January that it was eliminating 12,000 jobs, representing about 6% of its workforce, to reckon with slowing sales growth following record head count growth.

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by Edgar Rice Burroughs (Author)

Suddenly projected to Mars, John Carter found himself captive of the savage green men of Thark. With him was Dejah Thoris, lovely Princess of Helium. And between them and rescue lay a thousand miles of deadly enemies and unknown dangers.

The green warrior decided to close in and end the battle; just as he rushed me, a blinding light struck full in my eyes, so that I could not see Zad’s approach and could only leap blindly to one side to avoid his mighty blade.

It caught me in the left shoulder; but as my vision cleared a sight met my astonished gaze that almost made me forget the fight. Standing on her chariot with Sola and Sarkoja, my beloved Dejah Thoris turned on Sarkoja with the fury of a tigress and struck something that flashed in the sunlight from her upraised hand. Then I knew what had blinded me at that crucial moment, and how Sarkoja had found a way to kill me without herself delivering the final thrust!

Sarkoja, her face livid with baffled rage, whipped out her dagger and aimed a terrific blow at Dejah Thoris—and Zad was once more advancing on me with reddened blade. I felt the steel tear into my chest and all went black before me. . . .

I didn’t know that Avatar was based, somewhat, on the Edgar Rice Burroughs book Princess of Mars. Now I do.

News Cont…

 

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GOP Leader & Polio Survivor remains in hospital after concussion

Mitch McConnell and Joe Biden

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell was being treated Thursday for a concussion and is expected to remain in the hospital for “a few days” after he tripped and fell at a hotel dinner the night before, his spokesman said.

The Kentucky senator, 81, was at a Wednesday evening dinner after a reception for the Senate Leadership Fund, a campaign committee aligned with him, when he tripped and fell. The events were at the Waldorf Astoria Washington DC, formerly the Trump International Hotel.

Read More At the AP

Notes:

I am not sure which hospital he is at.

From Article:

None of the senators had talked to McConnell, though several said they had reached out to wish him well. Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley said he had sent a note but that it was his understanding that McConnell was not taking calls.

Most of the article implies he is doing well and is conscious but that he is not taking calls is kind of curious.  Also, he didn’t fall at the function he was attending but later, somewhere, in the hotel.  It is not clear, who, if anyone was present when he fell.  It is not the first time he has fallen since his having polio as a child has made stairs difficult for him as an adult.   The articles do not make it clear if police were called when his medical emergency was being handled.  Whether they were or weren’t doesn’t imply anything.  It is just a question to which I don’t know the answer.

I am not criticizing the linked or other articles but it is something of a puff piece that distracts from unanswered questions and seems to fall back to the “on file” information.

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Book

The Noise of Typewriters: Remembering Journalism Hardcover by Lance Morrow

Editorial Reviews
Review

“Terrific!”

—Gay Talese, author of The Kingdom and the Power

“With his preternatural memory, powerful prose, and puckish wit, Lance Morrow brilliantly evokes the highs and lows of twentieth century journalism. He revisits the big stories and creates unforgettable portraits of influential characters, chief among them TIME’s founder Henry Luce, ‘a preeminent American mythmaker’ with ‘a warlord’s air.’ Luce, Morrow writes, ‘had a way of being vindicated by the passage of years.’ This engrossing and highly original book asks hard questions, doesn’t flinch from discomfiting answers, and offers insights for our times. As he writes, ‘Be tolerant of chaos. Be patient. Wait for stillness.’”

—Sally Bedell Smith, author of George VI and Elizabeth: The Marriage That Saved the Monarchy

“This sort of writing is the reason that Morrow is in that exceedingly small club of journalists worth rereading. One looks in vain online these days for anything even close to this kind of prose. This is not the language of the ephemera of the internet.”

—Gregory J. Sullivan, America Magazine

Book

The Best Year of Their Lives: Kennedy, Nixon, and Johnson in 1948: Learning the Secrets of Power

Amazon.com Review

The Best Year of Their Lives is not a typical presidential biography in that it forgoes the comprehensive approach to history. Instead, Lance Morrow shows why 1948 was a watershed year not just for John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, and Richard Nixon personally, but for the nation as well. That is the year that Johnson, in his bid for the Senate, used huge sums of corporate money to bombard the media with lies about his opponent, finally stealing the election by 87 votes by having a ballot box stuffed (thus earning the nickname “Landslide Lyndon”). Had he lost, he would have arguably been out of politics forever and the course of history would have been changed. At the same time, Nixon, as a freshman congressman, launched his political career by using his seat on the House Un-American Activities Committee to relentlessly pursue Alger Hiss, making himself a prominent national figure in the process. (Four years later he became Eisenhower’s running mate.) Meanwhile, Kennedy was working hard to suppress the fact that he had Addison’s disease. He continued to lie about his health for the rest of his life just as he later hid his reckless personal behavior. Through anecdotes and analysis (including personal contact; all three were presences in Morrow’s childhood), Morrow shows how secrets and lies were to shape the behavior of all of them. This “convergence of personal ambition with secrecy, amorality, and a ruthless manipulation of the truth” would have tremendous implications for the country. The events of 1948 also foreshadow the tragedies and scandals that would end all three of their administrations.Externally, the three presidents were radically different. Internally, argues Morrow, they were identical in many ways in that they “shared a tendency toward elaborately deliberated amorality; all three behaved as if rules were for others, not for them.” Along with a rapidly changing American society, the start of the Cold War, and looming atomic destruction, 1948 ushered in modern politics and these men were the embodiment of it. Absorbing and unconventional, The Best Year of Their Lives adds to the considerable bodies of work already available on all three presidents. —Shawn Carkonen

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Star of TV Show Baretta and One of the Little Rascals dies at the age of 89

Robert Blake Dead At Age 89

Robert Blake died from heart disease at the age of 89.

As a child actor, he starred as Mickey Gubitosi in the “Our Gang” comedies and acted in a movie classic, “The Treasure of the Sierra Madre.” As an adult, he was praised for his portrayal of real-life murderer Perry Smith in the movie of Truman Capote’s true crime best seller “In Cold Blood.”

His career continued with the 1975-78 TV cop series, “Baretta.” He starred as a detective who carried a pet cockatoo on his shoulder and was fond of disguises. It was typical of his specialty, portraying tough guys with soft hearts, and its signature line: “Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time,” was often quoted.

In 1993, Blake won another Emmy as the title character in, “Judgment Day: the John List Story,” portraying a churchgoing man who murdered his mother, wife and three children.

In April of 2002, Blake, himself was accused of killing his wife Bakley. He was acquitted of the murder charge but the expense of the trial and then the following civil trial by our corrupt Civil Court System destroyed him financially.

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$34 Billion Later Georgia Nuclear Plant Begins Splitting Atoms In New Reactor

ATLANTA (AP) — A nuclear power plant in Georgia has begun splitting atoms in one of its two new reactors, Georgia Power said Monday, a key step toward reaching commercial operation at the first new nuclear reactors built from scratch in decades in the United States.

The unit of Atlanta-based Southern Co. said operators reached self-sustaining nuclear fission inside the reactor at Plant Vogtle, southeast of Augusta. That makes the intense heat that will be used to produce steam and spin turbines to generate electricity.

Read More of Story At Yahoo

More Information:

“The average LCOEs for existing coal ($41/megawatt-hour), CC [combined-cycle] gas ($36/MWh), nuclear ($33/MWh) and hydro ($38/MWh) resources are less than half the cost of new wind resources ($90/MWh) or new PV solar resources ($88.7/MWh) with imposed costs included,” the report states. Imposed costs include the need to keep baseload energy like coal or natural gas idling in case the wind or solar are not producing enough energy to meet demand; such costs are often ignored by advocates of wind and solar.

Source: https://www.mackinac.org/blog/2022/nuclear-wasted-why-the-cost-of-nuclear-energy-is-misunderstood

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Books on Nuclear Power

Meltdown: Earthquake, Tsunami, and Nuclear Disaster in Fukushima Hardcover – February 23, 2021

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Moldovan prime minister announces government resignation

Moldovan Prime Minister Natalia Gavrilita, a former Soviet Block Nation before the breakup of the Soviet Union, announced on Friday that her government was resigning.

“I believe in the Moldovan people. I believe in Moldova,” she told a news briefing. “I believe that we will be able to make it through all the difficulties and challenges.”

But what does that mean?  Does she mean that Maldova will eventually become part of the criminal, totalitarian EU that is as big of blight on the world as the USSR was.  European Union leaders accepted Moldova as a membership candidate last year in a diplomatic “triumph” for President Maia Sandu, who was “elected” in 2020.

The former Soviet republic country of 2.5 million has suffered from soaring inflation and was strained last year by an influx of Ukrainian refugees.  So does she mean that economy will suddenly upright itself and the people, who are desperately struggling, will see some light at the end of the tunnel and it will not be an on coming train?

In 2020, Moldova was the number 138 economy in the world in terms of GDP (current US$), they number 129 in total exports, they number 124 in total imports, the number 118 economy in terms of GDP per capita (current US$) and they number 69 most complex economy according to the Economic Complexity Index (ECI).

The top exports of Moldova are Insulated Wire ($445M), Sunflower Seeds ($188M), Wine ($134M), Seats ($112M), and Hot-Rolled Iron Bars ($105M), exporting mostly to Romania ($791M), Russia ($278M), Germany ($263M), Italy ($241M), and Turkey ($181M).

The top imports of Moldova are Refined Petroleum ($328M), Packaged Medicaments ($226M), Cars ($224M), Broadcasting Equipment ($165M), and Insulated Wire ($140M), importing mostly from Romania ($1.03B), Ukraine ($667M), China ($544M), Russia ($495M), and Germany ($429M).

The college graduation rates of the people fluctuate widely but one number puts the college graduation rate at around 38% which is somewhat better than the USA at 33%.  But Maldova’s graduation rate has not helped it increase the size of its Middle Class. 90% of the people are considered part of the lower class.   Around 1% of the people are considered upper class.  And 3% to 9% of the people are considered Middle Class with the people struggling to not fall back into poverty.

Oligarch Vladimir Plahotniuc is “the owner of four of the country’s five national television stations—Prime TV, Publika TV, Canal 2, and Canal 3—in addition to three radio stations” controlling 60% of the shares on the information market.  So if he was not running for his life under assumed names, he would mostly be in charge of keeping the people of Maldova hypnotized, brainwashed, and good little slaves.  Vlad Plahotniuc,  fled his home country in 2019 amid a government shake-up engineered/brokered by government officials in Russia, the United States, and other European partners.   (Yeah, the war between Russia and the West in the neighboring Ukraine is real, don’t you know, and totally not a coverup for something else.)  To who now controls Plahotniuc‘s media brainwashing apparatus, I am not totally sure.

Vladimir Plahotniuc sought political asylum the United States, but his application was rejected, according to a lawsuit filed in U.S. federal court.  Still, he and at least a billion dollars of his money was hiding out in the United States for a time according to some and then again, maybe not.   There is some indication that Russia may be about to help him to return to Maldova to clean up the western mess there. Maldova needs economic cooperation with Russia to straighten out their economy and Plahotniuc might can accomplish that.  But the USA Treasury might be, behind the scenes, threatening the entire of Maldova to be put under sanctions if the current Western Puppet Government falls.  [Note, I have no proof of such threats and that might be a misguided assumption.]

To be honest, the court cases and intrigue is more complicated than I can figure out.  There may be some errors in this article.  This article does contain opinion.  The story of Maldova is a very interesting and complicated story.   I am not totally sure who the good guys and bad guys are or even if there are any good guys.  The only thing I can say with certainty is that I wish the people of Maldova well.

https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy1049 (Explains the actions taken by the USA Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC.)  In their words they, “took action to counter the Government of the Russian Federation’s (GoR) persistent malign influence campaigns and systemic corruption in Moldova by imposing sanctions on nine individuals and 12 entities.”)

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I think Satan Must Have Thought I Bought Intel

Intel stock tumbles after brutal results

I didn’t buy Intel stock back when ever, but I came really close.  I wonder if Satan thought I did buy it and that is the reason it is behaving like the stock I am holding.  NOT GOING UP!!!  Yeah, I blame Satan. LOL

This from CNBC

  • Intel shares closed down 6.4% on Friday, a day after the company reported dismal quarterly and full-year 2022 results.
  • One analyst said there were “no words” to describe the collapse of Intel, which has suffered as consumer demand for PCs has slackened overall.
  • The company posted a 32% year-over-year decline in revenue and a net loss of $644 million for the quarter.

Intel’s stock is down more than 46% from its 52-week high. And from where I was considering buying it.

Good computers are over priced and affordable computers are not much of an improvement over older computers. And then there is that God awful Microsoft that wants to hijack your life and boss you around and put you through update hell and even stop you from logging into your own gd computer because you can’t access your microsoft account. (Not me, but a neighbor I was trying to help.) Anyways, maybe Intel needs to tell computer makers and Microsoft to clean up their freaked up act.