This presidential primary has witnessed droves of voters from both parties flocking to voting booths or caucuses to express their anger with the direction of this country. Many have called this a movement while others have seen this as the result of decades of neglect of the true interests of this country by entrenched Washington politicians bloated with payment from special interests.
In keeping with the law of unintended consequences, much more has been revealed to the average American this election cycle. Americans have seen the ridiculous dress and behavior of delegates at recent Presidential conventions. They erroneously thought the delegates were casting votes that reflected the will of the populace.
The publics’ desire for outside candidates, Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders, has forced the “establishment” of both parties to reach into their bag of heretofore more hidden dirty tricks to assure the will of the people would be denied in favor of the desire of the “establishment.” More shockingly, the establishment of both parties extends well beyond Washington into cities, counties and Congressional districts of each and every state.
Few establishment officials have ever earned a single vote for public office but hold the absolute power to select the delegates to “represent” the people at conventions. To insure the peoples’ choice will not prevail, each party has created a block of delegates called super delegates by the Democrats or at-large delegates by the Republicans. There are more of these delegates than represent actual voters. One of the at-large delegates, Howard County Republican Chairman Craig Dunn, appeared on C-Span on Monday.
One might remember Dunn from his infamous declaration to Politico: “If the race came down to Satan and Donald Trump, and I was the last vote, I might consider voting for Donald Trump.” One saw no such bravado in his C-Span appearance. While telling more untruths than “lyin’ Ted Cruz,” he tried to appear knowledgeable and fair.
He now says his is for Kasich whom he described as reasonable, fair and adult; and expressed a hope he could get to cast his vote for him. For all the virtues he believes Kasich has, Dunn failed to mention Kasich has fallen far short of votes already cast for other candidates who have subsequently honored the vote of the people and dropped out. Dunn also failed to mention Kasich left Congress after the Clinton impeachment debacle and went straight to work in a special office created for him by the infamous Lehman brothers. Lehman started the financial disaster that nearly took this country down in a single weekend.
According to Kasich’s tax records for that year, he took home a cool 1.4 million dollars while the rest of us lost our life savings. Oh, well, it was on to bigger and better things for him. He decided to join the Tea Party and become governor of Ohio. Ohio flourished under Kasich from the now questionable use of fracking. Oil prices have since collapsed and with it so has the Ohio economy.
Dunn shows the same poor judgment in being a Kasich supporter as his flippant comment to Politico reflected. For all of his half-truths and slippery answers, one thing was glaringly absent in Dunn’s presentation and defense of his vote as a Delegate At Large—the will of the many residents of Indiana who cast those pesky little things called votes.
[written by Marcia and Kent Blacklidge]