Bill's Random Thoughts:: 5/1/16

WELCOME

You are reading the thoughts of one who has kept them mostly out of the public venue. By virtue of the concept, blogs seem narcissistic so you can expect a lot of personal pronouns to show up.

I don't like being pigeonholed, though many have called me a conservative. I agree with much of what is often considered conservative views, but I do tend to occasionally differ on this view point. I have also been termed opinionated. Well, please remember this is my view, and I consider my view valid until convinced otherwise. That doesn't necessarily make it right; it simply makes it my view.

Please feel free to leave a comment.

NOTE: The posts in this blog are duplicates of the column I write for the Perris City News and Sentinel Weekly.

All right, let's get started. You are about to read neither the rantings of a madman nor the reflections of a genius. Perhaps somewhere in between:

May 5, 2016

The Final Before The Final

The battle lines have been drawn for the 2016 Presidential election, and once again, California is irrelevant. Donald Trump won all of Indiana’s delegates and caused Ted Cruz and John Kasich to quit the race. On the Democratic side, well, Bernie Sanders did win Indiana, but with the Super Delegate jokers in the deck, the game is clearly rigged against him – maybe it always was.

It is ironic that California, with the most delegates at stake for both parties, is one of the last states to get to vote in the presidential primaries. Our June 4^th primary election will provide 341 Republican and 548 Democrat delegates to the respective conventions in our winner-take-all election. But does it make a difference?

A Democrat candidate needs 2,383 delegate votes to win the nomination outright on the first ballot at their convention. Hillary Clinton now has 2,205 delegates committed to her, while Sanders has only mustered 1,401. Looking at the numbers one could easily believe it’s lights out for the Sanders campaign. But wait! Take away those 498 Super Delegates mysteriously awarded to Clinton even before the first state held an election, and the score looks a little closer, 1,707 for Clinton to Sanders 1,401. Now throw in California’s 548 delegates and we have a horse race, folks – an honest election! Nah, that would not be Democrat-like.

On the Republican side, put a fork in it, it’s done. Donald trump is the nominee in all but the final coronation. To date, he has amassed 1,053 of the 1,237 delegates to win on the first ballot. California, had it gone for another candidate in the winner-take-all primary, might have been able to prevent Trump from hitting that top number and the convention would have been opened to deciding on another person for the nominee. Unfortunately, the only other two candidates left, Ted Cruz and John Kasich both dropped out. So, our block of 341 Republican delegates now become completely irrelevant.

So, what is wrong with this picture? Everything!

With the appointment of at least one Supreme Court justice, and possibly as many as five on the line, this may be the most important Presidential election in our lifetime. And here we wind up with two nominees that are deemed unfavorable by the majority of the country!

An average of polls, as reported by the Huffington Post shows Donald Trump is viewed unfavorably by 60.6% of the country, and Hillary Clinton’s unfavorable rating is at 52.4% (only 37% view her trustworthy and honorable).

So, why are we electing someone we don’t like or trust to the highest office in the land? Are we that suicidal? Or are we merely too apathetic for our own good?

If ever we needed a none-of-the-above choice on our ballot, it is now.