Today’s Politically INCORRECT Cartoons from TOWNHALL.COM
FROUND ON FACEBOOK
To see more Legal Insurrection Branco cartoons, click here.
As Republicans continue to fight back against trained activists disrupting their town halls, some of the nation’s most vulnerable Senate Democrats are refusing to hold meetings with their constituents ahead of the 2018 elections. While Congress is on recess, lawmakers across the country have been holding town halls to discuss issues ranging from repealing and replacing Obamacare, border security, and the president’s executive order limiting immigration from seven terror-ridden nations.
While disruptions to Republican town halls have received much of the media’s attention, notable Democrats are skipping out on the chance to speak to the voters about important issues. Democrats avoiding in-person town halls altogether have instead resorted to communication through the telephone, e-mail surveys, and social media. Some are only meeting with voters in controlled environments with limited opportunities to ask questions, according to ABC News.
“Seems to me that all these members of Congress are afraid to face their constituents,” said Hillary Shields, a volunteer organizer with the Kansas City Indivisible, said after Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) declined the group’s invitation to attend a town hall.
Democrats will be defending 25 seats in 2018, 10 of which are in states carried by President Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election.
/* */
McCaskill declined an invitation from Indivisible, the liberal activist group leading many of the protests against Republican lawmakers at town halls, and instead sent one of her staffers to speak on her behalf, according to ABC News.
Trump won McCaskill’s state by 19 percentage points over Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential election, making Missouri a high-priority target for Republicans to try to unseat McCaskill in 2018. McCaskill does not have any scheduled town halls, but she is slated to speak with her constituents this upcoming week on Facebook Live.
The political pressure has kept other endangered Democrats in hiding from their constituents. Neither Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.) and Joe Manchin (D-W.V.) held in-person town halls during the recent recess. Trump won both of their states by more than 30 points in November. Heitkamp’s office indicated that she participated in a discussion about flood issues with voters in northeastern North Dakota and attended a subsequent ribbon-cutting event. Likewise, Manchin’s office reported an equally busy schedule, while his constituents argued he has been “hard to find” this past week, according to the Associated Press.
In Montana, where Trump beat Clinton by 20 percentage points, Sen. Jon Tester made a few small public appearances, but none in the form of a town hall where voters could ask him questions.
Sen. Bob Casey (D-Penn.) claimed he would be hosting a town hall in early March, but details of the event are not yet available on his official website. Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) delivered remarks to students Thursday, while Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) spoke with his constituents through a tele-town hall.
Other Senate Democrats not up for re-election in 2018 are ducking town halls, too. Washington Democratic Sens. Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell are not scheduled to speak in their states at all, The Seattle Times reported.
Last Wednesday, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) faced a raucous crowd that repeatedly heckled the former infantryman as he attempted to answer audience questions. Cotton kept his cool and answered many of the questions that were asked of him, even as he was being booed.
The importance of speaking to your constituents is crucial, Gov. Chris Christie (R-N.J.) said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.”
“It’s now on us to produce results. And one of the things that we need to do is engage with the public,” Christie said.
Wanted, Dead or Alive
Rob Morse is a high tech geek who left California for Louisiana. He writes and podcasts about technology and society.
A 
What Did You Say? 
Clinton appears to have won the national popular vote in 2016, primarily fueled by massive landslides in populous Democratic states like California and New York. This has sparked efforts to do away with the state-based and not entirely democratic Electoral College.
Though a huge part of the anti-Electoral College push is sour grapes in the wake of a surprise electoral defeat, it serves the broader interest of the progressive movement’s goal to both delegitimize the incoming administration and subvert the idea of federalism as enshrined in the Constitution.
Electoral College Worked in 2016
The Electoral College was carefully designed by the Founders after lengthy deliberation at the 1787 Constitutional Convention. The design is this: Americans don’t cast their vote for president, but instead for electors pledged to their preferred candidate. Each state has a set number of electors based on the total number of representatives and senators. You can read about why the Founders created this seemingly complex system here.
Founding Father Alexander Hamilton, who was fairly popular with progressives just a week ago, supported the Electoral College process in Federalist 68. He said that “if the manner of it be not perfect, it is at least excellent.”
But a number of prominent Democrats have ignored Hamilton and called for an end to the Electoral College post-election.
Opponents of the Electoral College claim that the institution is fundamentally flawed. The fact that the winner of the most recent presidential contest didn’t have the highest total vote further demonstrates why it needs to be scrapped, according to their logic.
This narrative couldn’t be farther from the truth, as the issues surrounding the election prove exactly why the Electoral College is such an excellent system for the United States.
For instance, Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein is leading a movement to recount votes in three key states that Trump won: Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. This was in part justified by the idea that Russia had tampered with the election.
The recount process will likely be messy, but it would be vastly more complicated if America had to undergo a national as opposed to state-level recount. Votes have trickled in for the last month, and it is possible that without the state-based system it might still be unclear who the next president would be.
As ugly as the 2016 election was, it would have been far uglier without the moderating, stable process afforded by the Electoral College.
Having states conduct their own elections is a strength of our system, not a weakness. For instance, without the Electoral College and respect for state powers, it would be difficult for America to experiment with solutions to prevent voter fraud. This should be a priority for those suddenly concerned about voting integrity.
Assault on Federalism
What is lost in the Electoral College debate is the underlying attack on America’s cherished and inherited idea of federalism.
The Founders in their wisdom designed this republic with the intent of checking ambition with ambition, and delegating specific powers to both the national as well as state governments. They created a nation in which states could operate independently, experimenting with different policies and laws to fit their people.
The elimination of the Electoral College would be just another blow to the role of the states in the American system of government. No longer would presidential candidates have to appeal to the farmers of rural Iowa alongside the bankers of urban New York. They would be incentivized to campaign directly to the interests of the largest population centers alone.
The reasoning used to abolish the Electoral College could easily be applied to some of the most important aspects of America’s constitutional republic.
If the Electoral College is simply an ancient, undemocratic, and defunct relic of the Founding, then why isn’t the Senate? After all, treating the states equally and allowing them only two senators regardless of population is silly if one thinks the states hold no special place in our system. One writer was open about this in a Washington Post op-ed calling for abolishing the states entirely.
Samuel concluded:
This is the essential issue at the heart of the Electoral College that extends far beyond the results of a single election.
The left wants to fundamentally change the system of federalism so venerated and protected by the founding generation. But those who believe that the United States was built on timeless ideas about man’s relation to man should look to preserve the system that allowed America to rise to the status of a superpower while preserving individual liberty.