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Time for Hillary to stop whining

To the Editor,

Hillary Clinton has been whining since election night two years ago that she was cheated when she lost to Donald Trump. She thrusts her arms in the air, and with her weeping supporters, still tries to convince the public to sympathize with her as she screeches “foul.”

Let’s just think about this for one moment. She and her supporters claim they won the popular vote and should therefore have won the election. But wait a second, if you will, to see if she has solid ground to stand upon.

The Founders of this country set the rules when they drafted the Constitution. Since then, for more than 200 years, candidates accepted victory or defeat accordingly. Now, she and her supporters make public appearances crying “Russia, Wikileaks, unfair, cheated, Hillary should have won,” ad infinitum and ad nauseum. Surely the smartest woman in the world who parlayed $1,000 in cash into $100,000 by betting on cattle futures–with zero expertise in commodities futures–must be able to understand that she lost. (Don’t speculate in cattle or pork belly futures if you value your money.)

Actually, you have no constitutional right to vote for president. Instead, by indicating a choice for POTUS, one, in fact, votes for electors in each state who then choose him/her as that state’s winner. The Founders wisely saw the United States as a union of sovereign states, which means that even a lesser populated state such as West Virginia would have a voice in the outcome of an election. It guards against a candidate simply running up massive vote totals in larger states, which can dramatically skew the will of the country at large. Cowboys in Wyoming are thus assured their vote has meaning.

The popular vote is not the deciding factor. We are not a democracy, but a republic. Asked by a lady about the nature of our government, Benjamin Franklin replied, “A republic, if you can keep it.” When George Bush won in 2000, everyone focused intensely on Florida’s close returns. But in the ensuing brouhaha, scant attention was paid to West Virginia — take away its five electoral votes and Bush loses.

Think of it as the World Series. The team which wins four games is the world champion. The Pirates defeated the Yankees in 1960 when Bill Mazerowski homered in the bottom of the ninth in game seven. It didn’t matter that the Yanks scored altogether twice as many runs as the Pirates. Every game counted for something: Lose 16 to 3 and then win 3 to 2 and the series is tied; seven game totals of 55 New York runs to Pittsburgh’s 27 doesn’t make the cut.

Therefore, Hillary, stop whining and act like a big girl. You lost based on our election rules. When a candidate doesn’t understand that, it’s a good thing you were defeated. If you thought New York and California were going to crown you, you fell asleep in civics class.

Linda Wickstrom

Newell

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