We’re in waiting mode. We might as well use this time for some pondering.
The next big date certain is January 6th—well,
actually, we’re also looking at January 5th, which is the runoff
election date for Georgia, where two senate races could determine the Senate
majority. But on January 6th, the Electoral College votes are
opened, read, and counted. We’re used to thinking about that as a formality
with an automatic outcome. But that has only been true for 75% of US presidential
elections; the other 25% have been—otherwise. This one is going to be
otherwise.
Seven states have sent two dueling slates of electors. How
that is handled is, well, too complicated to predict. In a bit we’ll talk about
the possibilities. But first I want to talk about a particular question—about what
it is to be conservative.
Vice President Mike Pence
image found here
Conservatism
Outside and Inside the Political Sphere
There’s an excellent article from Ted Noel at American Thinker,
in which he’s going through some of the possibilities, and making a striking
recommendation that we’ll talk about. After he has laid out the situation, and just before offering a script for the
Vice President to follow on January 6th, he says this:
This leaves V.P. Pence with a dilemma. He is a gentleman who
regards our governmental traditions with a degree of reverence, so he will be
reluctant to take any bold action. But as an honorable man, faced with massive
illegality, he must act to protect the law.
When we talk about conservatism, outside of politics, it might
be summarized as “a degree of reverence for traditions.” Conservatives are slow
to make changes for the sake of change; they must know that the change will indeed
be an improvement over the tried and true or even marginally successful but
comfortable. Conservatives don’t throw babies out with bathwater. Again,
speaking outside of politics, this may get conservatives the reputation of
being stodgy, standing in the way of progress, or just being no fun. But also,
they’re reliable, organized, logical, and deep thinking. A society may need new
fresh ideas, but it also absolutely needs these reliable, careful deep thinkers.
When we talk about conservatism in the political sphere, and
we’re in America, we are talking about conserving the Constitution. That is our
basic law. It’s not, as Barbossa says of the code in Pirates of the Caribbean,
“more what you’d call ‘guidelines’ than actual rules.” The Constitution isn’t a
“living” document; it doesn’t change meaning based on who’s reading it or
applying it on a given day. It doesn’t morph to meet societal whims. It isn’t
intended to be “gray” or malleable. It is meant to stand firm as the law of the
land.
That’s actually important. It might be going too far to say
that voting was invented in America. But I think you can say that every country
in the world that now chooses its leaders by vote rather than birthright does
so because America set up a way for people to rule themselves. That means that even
most of the tyrants of the world today hold fraudulent elections over which
they control the outcome, so that they have a veneer of giving their people a
choice.
What VP
Pence Should Do
So what will VP Mike Pence do? Will his personal
conservatism outweigh his political conservatism?
Earlier in his piece, Ted Noel phrases his January 6th
duties this way:
His task will be to fulfill his oath of office to protect and
defend the Constitution of the United States and to ensure that the laws be
faithfully executed. This is a high standard of performance, and V.P.
Pence will have two choices. He can roll over on
"certified" electors, or he can uphold the law.
Noel is definitive on which Pence should do. I am also in
favor of VP Pence protecting and defending the Constitution. I like Noel’s
script for him. I’m not sure that is how things will play out. And, actually,
no one is. Before we get into the complications, I’ll quote Noel one more time,
on what is legally an election:
An election is a process of counting votes for candidates.
Only valid, lawful votes may be counted. A valid lawful vote is:
• Cast
by an eligible, properly registered elector [voter] as prescribed by laws
enacted by the state Legislature.
• Cast
in a timely manner, as prescribed by laws enacted by the state Legislature.
• Cast
in a proper form as prescribed by laws enacted by the state Legislature.
Any process that does not follow these rules is not an
election. Anything that proceeds from it
cannot be regarded as having any lawful import.
Most commentators suggest that a process of collecting pieces
of paper with marks on them is an election regardless of errors, omissions, and
even deliberate malfeasance. This is a mistake. Imagine a golf tournament where
every bad shot by one player gets a do-over, but the competing player has to
follow USGA rules in detail. One player gets to drop freely out of hazards, but
the other has to tackle every embedded ball as it lies. The result is a
travesty.
The same thing applies to elections. If there are a handful
of improper votes, we can suggest that there was in fact an election, perhaps
tainted, but the election wasn't materially harmed. But when the people charged
with managing the election decide to ignore the law, whatever process they
supervise is not the process defined by the law. Therefore, it is not an
election.
Noel says that the Vice President, as President of the
Senate, has both the duty and supreme authority to determine whether to accept
electors from a state. That is probably true. But it’s actually a difficult
question. He leads us to articles he has referenced, written by Alexander
Macris. Noel links to two. Macris himself links to an additional earlier one he
wrote, plus a longish section of the US code in question. So, if you want to do
enough reading to probably feel like an expert on the subject, here’s the list:
·
“It's for Mike Pence to Judge whether a
Presidential Election Was Held at All” by Ted Noel, for American Thinker,
Dec. 26, 2020.
·
“If Chaos is a Ladder, America's Election Laws
are an Elevator: Americans Don't Play by the Rules as Written and the Rules as
Written Don't Make Any Sense” by Alexander Macris, Dec. 13, 2020.
·
“Who Counts the Votes of the Presidential Electors?” by Alexander Macris, Dec. 7, 2020.
·
“Can State Legislatures Appoint Presidential Electors?
Yes they can, and don't let Lawrence Tribe persuade you otherwise” by Alexander
Macris, Dec. 5, 2020.
·
“State Legislatures Can’t Ignore the Popular Vote in Appointing Electors” by Lawrence Lessig and Jason Harrow for Lawfare,
Nov. 6, 2020.
·
3 USC 15: Counting Electoral Votes in Congress
What the
House and Senate Should Do
Another relatively likely scenario for January 6th
is that House and Senate members will object to particular electors, and then
the bodies need to convene to discuss. The Ted Noel version says that won’t
even be necessary with the VP plan. But, if the VP doesn’t toss out electors
from states that shouldn’t have certified their electors, based on fraudulent elections,
then the next step is for the protests of electors to happen.
Rep. Mo Brooks has announced his intention, and several
dozen House members have announced their plans to join him. There must be at
least one Senator to join in the protest. I suggested a letter to send them, in
my December 22nd post.
LifeSite has a link where you have an easy way to contact
your US Rep and both Senators with a message asking them to join in the protest
of fraudulent electors. You can use LifeSite’s brief message or exchange it
with one of your own.
Other
News
Sidney
Powell’s Report
Table of Contents page of Sidney Powell's Report
provided by Zenger News
Sidney Powell put out a 270-page document detailing election
fraud, including evidence of overseas interference. The table of contents can
give you an idea of what is contained. You can read the entire document here.
The MSM narrative has been that there is no voter fraud, and
there is rarely voter fraud, and there may have been some voter fraud but not
enough to affect the outcome, and Sidney Powell has provided no evidence, and
all the cases are being tossed out. And so forth. But the evidence is getting
out there. What I began talking about in the days immediately after the
election was, at that time, considered conspiracy theory; now it’s a collection
of thousands of affidavits, videos, testimonies, and collected documents such
as the Navarro Report, which is also included in this Sidney Powell report.
There is so much evidence of voter fraud that changed the
outcomes in at least six states that anyone who says otherwise is a partisan liar
or purposely ignorant. The real question now is what will be done about it. One
thing is for certain: the American people cannot let this much fraud be
shrugged off with a “We’ll just work harder to get out the vote next time.”
The opposition is now talking about the confusing procedures
on January 6th as an attempted coup by President Trump. Note that,
whenever they accuse, it is because that is what they are doing. But there is
some truth in the fact that a large segment of the American people will be
upset either way. That’s why it’s important to show the fraud, so those who
have been depending on MSM sources will come to realize that Biden was never
elected, and to show support as people who actually voted for President Trump—which
is a clear majority.
To that end, President Trump has invited supporters to come
to the capitol on January 6th for a peaceful protest. I think he
needs to see that the people are behind him. Also, the legislators need to see that
support, and there needs to be some visual display that even the MSM can’t hide
or minimize.
I don’t know how big that gathering is going to be, but I
have been seeing discussion on our Tea Party email list about people getting
together to travel there for it. That’s about 1430 miles, 21 hours in a car.
But there are people willing and excited to do that. (I’m not able to make the trip,
but those who do, I hope you share a lot of photos of the historic day.)
Nashville
Explosion
On Christmas day there was an RV that exploded in front of an
AT&T facility in Nashville. There was an announcement ahead of time telling
people to evacuate the area. So far it appears the only life lost was to the
owner of the RV, a man named Anthony Quinn Warner. Motive is still unknown,
although the man may have had issues with 5G. But the explosion did little damage
to the building, and certainly not much to the 5G industry. It did temporarily
take out communications in the surrounding area.
There are speculations. First was this one, on Facebook,
saying it had to do with the audit of the Dominion voting machines. I’ve come across it from a couple of
friends. One linked to a John Murphy, in Florida, a common enough name that I
couldn’t identify him, so I’m not sure if it was initiated by him or simply passed
along. Anyway, maybe. But there’s no corroborating info that any such machines were in the building
and damaged. I’ll need to see more.
Last night Joshua Philipp went through the various possible
motivations in his Crossroads Q&A. He said at
this point, early on, we don’t know enough, and we probably ought to be
skeptical about any narratives coming out of the media. He offers pure
analysis, just thinking through what is known, and suggests it is likely one of
the following:
·
A crazy person who had something against
AT&T, but wasn’t crazy enough to actually want to hurt anybody—which is
kind of odd for an actual crazy person.
·
Somebody meant to destroy something at that
facility, although it doesn’t look like it destroyed enough of the building to
do that.
·
It was meant as a probe, to try to see what the
protocols of reaction would be to an incident like that, shutting off communications,
or destroying a communications facility—possibly ahead of a planned future
incident.
So many things these days start out looking like conspiracy
theories but turn out to be true that, who knows? It’s difficult to get to the
truth. Nevertheless, we keep looking for truth, and trying to be wise and
discerning in that search.
As for whatever is about to happen next week, I’m continuing
to pray for our President to be guided, supported, and protected to do God’s
will for our nation. And I’m praying for Vice President Pence, that he will
have both wisdom and courage in the task before him. And I’m praying for
members of Congress to have the fortitude to step forward and protect our
nation against tyranny.
Additional
Sources
Besides the above, you might want to watch/listen to the
following additional sources:
·
X22Report.com
This website contains the originals, in audio and video versions. Some
of these, particularly Ep. 2350, I’ve referenced before, in its YouTube form.
It was the channel PinkAudioX, but this week it is GreenAudioX. Depending on
format, or versions, the titles change. But there have been several the last couple
of days, in each of which he goes over the Ted Noel piece in American
Thinker, among other news:
o “Jan 6th Comes into Focus, Patriots Prepare To Make Their Move” Ep. 2364, Dec. 28,
2020.
o “Patriots at the Ready” GREENAudioX Ep#2363B, Dec. 28, 2020. He quotes the Ted Noel piece. He predicts
that the Durham report with be actual indictments.
o “Countermeasures in Place” GREENAudioX Ep#2363F, Dec. 28, 2020 (original Dec. 27). He quotes
Ted Noel piece, mentions Sidney Powell’s 270-page document.
o “States Panic, Impossible to Clean” GREENAudioX Ep#2350F, Dec. 26, 2020. This is an older
one, reposted as new.
·
“Ep. 41: Election Lawsuits; Lockdown Lawsuits;
Coomer Defamation; Pardon Power & MORE!” Viva & Barnes, Dec. 27,
2020.
·
“The FULL Snowden Interview” John Stossel,
Dec. 21, 2020.
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