Tag Archives: Jeb

#NeverTrump7 = BREAK GLASS in CASE of “A Republic, if you can keep it” EMERGENCY

by Annie | Leave a comment

I’ve had this tweet pinned since before Memorial Day:

A week or so later, I was thrilled beyond description to see this paragraph in The Hill:

And then June 4th I see this, “Dear GOP Convention Delegates: Declare Your Independence”  by Steave Deace at Conservative Review, which I have excerpted below the line.

I sure hope this is the beginning of something…

If you’ve ever asked yourself “Why do we have conventions anyway? Who are these delegates? These crazy people on the floor with the straw hats and the pins and the red/white/blue shirts?” Steve offers an answer* but I would like to offer my own.

What if the primary winner dies? (God forbid! And I mean that sincerely. As catastrophic as I believe a Trump – or Hillary – Presidency would be, we don’t want anyone harmed. Ever.) Think about it. What if it’s right now, the beginning of June, 5 weeks from the convention, 5 months from the November election. We’ve just had a year of campaigning. Seventeen candidates, save one, dispensed with. What if something happens?

We couldn’t POSSIBLY get a 50 state mulligan (57 states & territories, actually, but let’s not be persnickety). There’s NO WAY we could have a do-over. For the OBVIOUS logistical reasons, but also the Constitutional question. The people had their say. They cast their votes, chose their delegates. It’s done. You can’t disenfranchise those millions of people. You just can’t.

Thus, the delegates system. THAT’S WHY THEY’RE THERE. “Break Glass in Case of Emergency.” Now, typically, they vote the way their states voted and it’s desperately anti-climactic, the nominee having achieved 50%+1 of his party’s popular vote and 50%+1 (=1237) of his party’s delegates.

But we don’t have that this time. Trump’s achieved roughly 40% of the popular vote of his party. 2 of every 5 Republicans. 3 of every 5 Republicans voted NOT Trump. Perhaps not affirmatively negative (!) but OTHER than, to be sure.

And the delegates “win”? Hardly resounding. Trump will be sent limping to Cleveland. The stupid frickin’ corrupt RNC purposely crowded the field with a dozen candidates knowing Jeb was worse than beige-Volvo-vanilla and needed the field fractured to emerge with the most votes/delegates.

Then Trump happened. And it backfired spectacularly. S-P-E-C-T-A-C-U-L-A-R-L-Y.

I won’t go through the whole history of 2nd ballot Presidents (or 2+ ballots) but it’s happened before. Several times. We got Lincoln that way.

Anyway… Trump should be any sane, sentient, moral person’s own personal red line. I can’t vote for him. I can’t. With Hillary or Donny it’s like being forced to choose which I wanted amputated: Hands? Or feet?

I choose neither.

I choose BREAK GLASS IN CASE OF EMERGENCY.

*I did not include that portion of his article below, but you can see it in his original text.

DEAR GOP CONVENTION DELEGATES: DECLARE YOUR INDEPENDENCE

…(The new book, “Unbound: The Conscience of a Republican Delegate” is) co-authored by Curly Haugland, a 17-year veteran member of the RNC, who also currently sits on the powerful rules committee for the convention[.] The book uses the RNC’s own actual rules to make its case all GOP delegates are not bound to vote for Donald Trump (or anyone else as the nominee) who violates their conscience. …

If Haugland is right, and he is on the rules committee after all, then not a single GOP delegate is bound to vote for Trump as the Republican nominee. Especially given that Trump’s politics and character make him a far better standard bearer for the Democrats.

And lest anyone think this sounds like Obama picking and choosing which laws he’ll uphold, these RNC rules are in place to protect the system from just such a leader. See, this is how a republican form of government works. The popular vote puts a check-and-balance on the political class, but elected representatives (in this case delegates) put a check-and-balance on the unbridled passions of a wayward electorate. It’s why the Founding Fathers gave us mechanisms such as juries and the Electoral College in the first place.

This is now your role in preserving our constitutional republic if you are a GOP delegate.

This is why our representatives take an oath “so help me God” and not “so help me will of the people.”  …Never fear, delegates. You have the green light. Now all you need is the same sense of duty and courage that drove our Founding Fathers to dedicate their lives, fortunes and sacred honors to a cause that would keep generations of Americans free from the various and relentless yokes of tyranny.

Oh, and that doesn’t mean “let’s compromise and move passive-aggressively on the floor to make Ted Cruz the running mate because, unity.” If you admire Cruz’s courage of conviction, and see him as a future standard bearer for our ideals, you will dare not paint him into such a corner. … Cruz has taken more flack on our behalf than pretty much any Republican in recent memory, so he deserves a much better fate than that no-win scenario. Instead, focus your ire where it belongs. …

Don’t let the media that hates you pick your nominee (again). Insist this July that we will be led by a leader who respects the laws of nature and nature’s God, instead of a crude populist whose tantrums seduce us from both the left and the right. The country deserves much better, as does the party of Lincoln and Reagan which you now steward. It’s either that, or we may sadly look back years from now as the moment you helped accelerate American Exceptionalism’s collective fade to black.

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