The Electoral College is comprised of 638 elected representatives who individually vote their choice for President of the United States.  It is these representatives who actually determine the who will become President.  Each State is apportioned a certain number based on population.  The original intent for the Electoral College was to act as a “sanity check” on the popular votes cast by the largely uneducated citizenry in the early days of the founding of this Country.  In other words, these elected representatives were not bound to cast their vote based solely on the outcome of the popular vote.  An elected representative had the obligation to evaluate the candidates, using their judgment, their understanding of policy issues and their wisdom to assess if it was for the good of the Country to accept the outcome of the popular vote of the citizens of their State.  If after reviewing the candidates, the elected represenative determined that outcome of the election of President was not in the best interest of the Country, they could ignore the results of the popular vote and choose their own candidate.  This provision prevented the election of a President that truly was unqualified.  To date, the electoral college representatives have almost always voted in lock-step with the popular vote.

However, in my opinion we are fast approaching a day where those representatives elected to the Electoral College should seriously consider whether they should vote the will of the people.  The citizenry of the United States have become so diverse, so apathetic, and so uninformed, that for the first time in my nearly 50 years, I would strongly encourage those elected officials to ignore the popular vote.  Our citizens are simply not capable of being informed voters, and instead they cast their vote based on propaganda in the news or worse yet they vote straight party line.

An alternative to the electoral college that I could strongly support is having voters take a test demonstrating a proficiency in the issues facing this country.  This may sound extreme, but we are on the precipice of electing a President who could not even get security clearance to be in any high level appointed position in Government, and yet the popular vote supports electing this largely inexperienced well-spoken charismatic constitutional lawyer.  All we need is another attorney parsing words as simple as the word “is”.  It’s time for closer scrutiny of the candidates by people who know WHY they are voting!!!