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Notes -
Q: Why doesn't Trump swap out Vance for one of his sons?
It seems like endowing anyone outside the family with VP levels of power is going to screw Trump in the long term. Pence continues to say Trump's unfit for democratic office as do many of his previous associates. Vance has previous form of the same hate reaction that many Dems find themselves having in response to Trump, and may revert to that once it's no longer advantageous to support Trump. So he adds distrust to the ticket.
Plus, Vance currently is an obvious drag on Trump because he doesn't have the ability to constantly shift and twirl that Trump does. People said upon Vance's pick that he would provide a kind of ideological scaffolding for Trumpism but that concept is absurd, because it implies creating a system that makes explicit and clear Trump's commitments – what he'll stick to and what he'll abandon when necessary. That making-explicit will by its nature damage Trump because it restricts his freedom of movement and ability to retroactively choose which things that come out of his mouth are literal, which are serious but not literal, and which are simply jokes. Without that freedom to dodge, the gymnastic elephant that is Trump would eventually be brought down for good.
Choosing one of the sons would communicate clearly to people that there is a VP on the ticket who owes his very existence not just his power to Trump and cannot, will not differ from him. It would help bolster the idea that voters are choosing Trump, a man they feel they have an emotional, animal connection with, rather than a party or set of policies, and that the number two on the ticket is as in thrall to Donald Trump Senior as they are themselves.
True, it would create doubt over the succession plan if something happens to Trump while in office, but tbh with Trump on the ticket that is always the case because he is just not readily replaceable.
Presuming that Trump's children are also residents of Florida, choosing them would forfeit Florida's electoral college votes under the 12th amendment.
This is a weird rule formulation. Why not just plainly state that the President and Vice President shall not be residents of the same state?
Concerns about one state lording it over the others, such as Holland did during the era of the Dutch Republic, were very prominent in designing the Electoral College (and other parts of the Constitution) and concerns about party tickets were very not prominent.
Pretty much everything to do with choosing the President is one of those things the Framers got extremely wrong and their mechanism broken pretty much right away.
I think an election that worked the way the founders intended would be extremely fascinating. They appear to have essentially wanted the voters to elect a single-issue legislature to be elected on their own merits then thoroughly vet the actual candidates for president, and then vote for the actual president. It's hopelessly naive once the votes that mattered expanded beyond one room in Independence Hall, but I wonder if swapping electors to citizens drawn by lot might actually work.
Sounds like they were visualizing some papal ass shit where they all meet in a closed room and then when smoke comes out the top we know we have a new President.
Would be kinda cool tbh
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