?
THE WHITE HOUSE
PRE
DENT
he Un of t
SI
The Hawkeye d States ite
ELECTION EDITION 2016
MEET THE STANCES
EXPERIENCE
Pro-gay marriage
Secretary of State
Pro-choice
New York Senator
Anti-gun rights
First Lady of U.S.
Pro-clean energy
First Lady of Arkansas
Pro-Obamacare
Lawyer
Pro-tax raises
Should Trump be President? Explained by the Hawkeye in the style of Hillary Clinton Jack Silberman and Shibi Sanjeev Co-Editors-in-Chief
T
his election is about more than the right versus the left. It’s about the legacy we want to leave for our children, and our grandchildren. It’s about defining who we are as a nation, and what we want to be. Do we want our legacy to be electing a man who mocks the disabled, and who demeans women? Or, do we want our legacy to be that we stood up to a bully and fought for our human rights? When you go to the polls, I want you to remember something. I want you to remember that this is about you. This election is about the issues you care about. It’s about voting for the person who will fight for you. Donald Trump won’t fight for you. Anyone who finds joy in saying “you’re fired” is not someone we want to have running our great nation. And let me be clear, America is already great. We do not need to make it great again. We need to make
BAGGAGE Email Scandal: Clinton’s
RUNNING MATE
email probe was recently reopened by the FBI.
Benghazi: U.S. Ambassador to Libya and three other Americans were killed on her watch as Sec. of State. Clinton Foundation:
Allegations of pay-for-play between Clinton Foundation donors and Clinton as Sec. of State are being investigated.
Tim Kaine
Virginia Senator, former governor of Virginia
HILLARY CLINTON it whole again. We need to remember should not have the nuclear launch that love trumps hate. We need to recodes. He has shown that he cannot be member that human rights are women’s mature when given mature substance. rights, and women’s rights are human Donald Trump is the man who once rights. Donald Trump does not value suggested that the United States milithat statement at all. He says he retary kill the families of terrorists, which spects women more than anyone. But is a war crime. Donald Trump said we know this is not he knows more than “And let me be clear, the generals. “Believe true. As Secretary of America is already great. me”, he says. Well, State, I dealt with I worked with those complex issues We do not need to make generals during my that required calm, it great again. We need time as Secretary of steady decisionState. And “believe making. One snap to make it whole again.” me”, they have a fanjudgement could tastic understanding result in disaster. I understand the of their field and know much more importance of being cautious rather about it than Donald Trump does. than impulsive. Donald Trump, on Donald Trump wants to break up immigrant families, and send them back the other hand, has proved time and time again that he is temperamentally over his wall. What kind of a person unfit to make these types of decisions. would do that? He mocked the Khans, Anyone who can be baited with a tweet, a gold star family who is coping with
the loss of their son, a United States military captain who sacrificed his life to save his fellow soldiers. He mocked John McCain, an American hero. He says he likes soldiers who weren’t captured. He has lost the support not only of McCain, but of Paul Ryan, John Kasich, Mitt Romney and the entire Bush Family. If he can’t even unite his own party, how does he plan on uniting America? I have spent my entire life fighting for women and children around the world. I want to go to work for you, and I would be honored to be our first woman President. We do not need to make America great again. It already is great. America is great because America is good, and I hope every one of you remembers the core values that our nation is based on when you head to the polls on November 8th.
CANDIDATES RUNNING MATE
BAGGAGE Tax returns: Donald Trump has refused to publish his tax returns.
Rape allegations:
Trump has been accused eleven times of rape, and has a child rape trial in December.
Discrimination: Mike Pence
Indiana Governor, former Indiana Congressman
Claims that Trump discriminates against Muslims, women, Hispanics, and the disabled are prevalent.
EXPERIENCE
STANCES
Chairman and President of Trump Organization
Pro-gun rights
Host of The Apprentince
Pro-Wall
Majority owner of Miss Universe, Miss USA, beauty pageants
Pro-life
Anti-NAFTA Pro-school of choice Pro-tax cuts
DONALD TRUMP Should Hillary be President? Explained by the Hawkeye in the style of Donald Trump Jack Wroldsen Managing Editor
I
f Crooked Hillary was President, she would be horrible, folks, horrible. Believe me. I get so many calls, you know, from people asking me, they’re asking “Donald, what’s the problem?” “Why is it like this?” You can’t, you know, you can’t solve a problem until you find the root cause, okay? And that nasty woman, believe me, that nasty woman, she is the root -- she is the problem. She is a nasty woman, and she is -- believe me -- she is the root of the problem. You look at the people in -look at Washington -- we have a lot of people -- look at what’s happening in
Washington -- they are causing tremendous harm. Tremendous harm. We see corruption, we see -- I mean, okay, there’s Paul Ryan, there’s people like Paul Ryan, and they’re so corrupt, you know. These people, there are people in Washington, they are so corrupt. They take bribes. They don’t do anything. Crime is up big league. We have people com-
ing from, well they’re not coming from Sweden, okay? We have people coming from Syria causing tremendous death. You look at three -- look at what happened in Paris. Look what happened in Florida. In California. We have 14 dead one day, hundreds -- they’re killing, and people are so badly injured.
“It has to stop. We’re going to build a wall, a beautiful wall, believe me folks, and Mexico will pay for it.”
It’s so sad. They’re coming in from Syria, from Mexico, the rapists, the murderers, they’re coming from Mexico. Some are good, I’m sure, but most, you know, most are just bad hombres -- they’re killing, people are dead. It has to stop. We’re going to build a wall, a beautiful wall, believe me folks, and Mexico will pay for it. *gets interrupted by interviewer for not answering the question*
works cited: http://freepngimages.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/hillary-clinton-transparent-background.png, https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2016-trump-lawsuits/img/Trump_silo.png, http://politicks.org/IMAGES/CANDIDATES/2016/PRESIDENT/Mike-Pence.gif, http://public.media.smithsonianmag.com/legacy_blog/donkey-and-elephant.jpg
the
ELECTORA
the
the
electoral college
electoral college
EST. 1787
EST. 1787
538
electors choose the President - one for each member of Congress 0
elections were decided by faithless electors: votes against the popular vote
Works Cited: http://www.politico.com/story/2012/12/keep-electoral-college-for-fair-presidential-votes-084651 http://history.house.gov/Institution/Electoral-College/Electoral-College/
PRO: I
Electoral College stands test of time The system is still valid and is the best way to determine a President Jack Wroldsen Managing Editor
t seems like people really hate the Electoral College. All the time, in the months before and after an election, there are calls to destroy our system of deciding the President. “It’s undemocratic,” some say. “I’m not voting for President, some random guy is.” “It was made in a time when nobody was informed. We don’t need it anymore,” others claim. To the haters, I channel my inner Donald Trump. “Wrong.” The Electoral College is not some malicious anachronism. It’s not the evil twin of democracy. It’s a system designed to pick a President that best represents all viewpoints of Americans, and to create cohesion across one of the largest countries in the world.
The popular vote deciding the President wouldn’t be democratic. It would be a disaster, in which metropolitan areas would be the focus of the campaign. After all, if the most votes wins you the election, wouldn’t you focus on places that has the most people? Cities like Los Angeles, New York City, Chicago, and Houston would become the “battleground states.” How does that represent the country best, if everyone that decides the President is from the same place? Candidates have to win not just a majority, but a super-majority. They can’t just win the majority of individual votes; they have to win a majority of votes in a majority of states. It forces them to campaign across the country and appeal to all sorts of Americans: rural farmers, urban lawyers, etc.
270
electoral votes needed to win the presidency
48
states are winnertake-all
They have to represent the ideas that are represented in all, or almost all Americans, not just those that live in the cities. Because of this, the Electoral College has given us our political system, where we have two parties that strive for mass appeal. That two-party system. Whether you like it or not, has given the United States a lot more governmental stability than countries with popular elections and twelve parties that focus only on certain issues, according to the Asia-Pacific Economic Blog. If we get rid of the Electoral College, our stability will go away. And just imagine what would happen in a close race like the 2000 election, without the Electoral College. National departments devoted to elections
wasting taxpayer dollars, precinct by precinct recounts; it would be a “tremendous disaster,” as Donald would say. Our best way of picking the President is through the Electoral College. It requires our candidates to appeal to the entire country, not just densely populated regions. It has given us our stability, and it has given us our expediency in declaring a winner. The Electoral College has been around for almost three hundred years. It should stay for even longer.
AL COLLEGE 4
elections have resulted in the President winning the electoral vote but not the popular vote
8
states have electors to vote for winner of national popular vote, not their state’s.
2
states use “district system” (2 electors vote for popular winner, 1 votes for winner of each district)
CON: N Citizens are left out by Electoral College The system is antiquated and discards a large portion of votes Jason Moonka Business Manager
the
the
electoral college
electoral college
EST. 1787
EST. 1787
118
million votes in the 2012 Election
ot all men are created equal, or at least their votes aren’t. Truth is, if you live in California or Texas, your vote means absolutely nothing; don’t bother going to the voting booth, your vote won’t make a difference. Now, if you live in Florida or Ohio, your vote might determine who could be the next president of the United States. Why? This is all because of an antiquated and inherently unequal system: the Electoral College. For those of you who haven’t taken AP Government, the Electoral College is the system where instead of voting directly to elect the president, people chose electors to in turn vote for the presidency. Each state is allotted a number of electors, based both on the population of the state with three
automatically given to each state. Our Founding Fathers created this system believing that the average American was not smart enough to be able to intelligently vote on presidential candidates (given our current candidates, I’m not sure they were wrong). Because our nation’s early leaders didn’t think the common man knew enough about politics to vote, they created this concept of electors - individuals who theoretically were more educated than the average individual. While originally the Electoral College may have been necessary, nowadays anyone with internet connection can develop an opinion on anything, rendering this system worthless. The modern day elector isn’t necessarily more informed that the average voter. Looking through a list of Michigan’s past electors most of
them are picked solely based on party loyalty. Even if electors were all geniuses, in most states they are legally bound to vote for a candidate, meaning they essentially just act as placeholders. Why even bother having them? Then there is the fact that almost all states have winner take all systems; a candidate who wins an election by one vote gains all of a state’s electoral votes. This can result in instances like the election of 2000, where the candidate with the majority of total votes lost the election as he had fewer electoral votes. This has already happened four times in this nation’s history. Shouldn’t the candidate with the most votes win? Isn’t that the fundamental principle of democracy? More so, each state is auto-
matically awarded three electoral votes regardless of population, leading the votes of people from smaller states to be more worth more proportionally. It’s supposed to be one person, one vote. That’s clearly not the case. Taking the ratio of electors to a state’s population, the vote of a Michigander is worth only 31 percent of a voter from Wyoming. So, do you believe that one person’s vote should be worth more than others, let alone that person being from Wyoming? While once upon a time, this system might have made sense. Today it is useless. This system should be abolished to affirm the American principle, that all of us are created equally, and our votes should be too.
TWEETS
TOP TWEETS Throughout the election, Twitter has emerged as the dominant medium of social media communication for the presidential candidates. Here are some of their most memorable tweets of the campaign.
works cited: https://twitter.com/HillaryClinton?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor, https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump?ref_src=twsrc%5Eg
OPINION You’re not wrong, just not right We should be respecting people’s opinions, not shaming them. Julia Eisenshtadt Managing Editor
Our Voice: the Hawkeye picks the
ELECTORAL MAP
Be involved, but be respectful This election has spurred a lot of interest in politics, but has also caused negative discourse Shibi Sanjeev Co-Editor-in-Chief
Our editoral board made predictions, and took the avergaes of them. These are the results:
“You’re wrong” This phrase, frequently stated during political debates by Donald Trump, is misunderstood. See, in order to tell someone that he or she is wrong when making a statement, that statement has to be a fact. A fact being a solid piece of information backed up with evidence to prove it, not to be confused with an opinion which is obviously someone’s beliefs. Now, I would think that I wouldn’t have to explain this difference in a high school newspaper column since we learned about facts and opinions back in elementary school. And, while some may understand the difference between the two, it seems that only a small number of us are able to respectfully acknowledge someone else’s opinion without making it seem like the world is coming to an end. Scrolling through Facebook, I can’t help but notice the long list of comments on a post about the election. These comments are not discussing real political issues or contributing to a productive conversation about political issues. Some of the comments just say the opinion stated is “wrong”. They are simply bashing the person who was brave enough to share his opinion with the world for having the beliefs that he does. Too often in the hallways, in class, or on social media, I see people shaming others about their personal beliefs on the election and political issues. Friends have been unfollowed on social media by friends based on something they posted about one of the candidates. How can we encourage our peers to voice their opinions if there is such a prevalent fear of being judged or shamed for their opinions? People are raised differently. They grow up with different parents who instill different beliefs onto them. They have different life experiences that form their values. So of course people have different opinions. So enough with the Twitter tantrums and Facebook fights. Enough with the unnecessary drama that has followed the presidential campaign to our community. In the end, there will be a new president. And when that happens, whether we like the outcome or not, fighting with each other about it won’t solve any problems that this country faces. Please, do everyone a favor and leave the pointless arguing to the candidates. And it’s okay to disagree. It’s okay to believe that some people’s opinions are absolutely ridiculous or disgusting. Believe me, I don’t agree with everything, but I do agree we all have the right to our own opinions. It’s not personal, it’s just politics. But I think that most would agree that it’s not okay to blatantly say that someone’s opinions are wrong or to not even acknowledge them. That behavior is anything but presidential.
CLINTON WINS 313-225
Poll of BHHS Students Students voted via Google form during the week of October 26th Hillary Clinton Donald Trump 2% 3.4%
Jill Stein Gary Johnson *439 students participated in the poll
works cited: https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/oZBBm58r-kh94c-fRBIX_nNsaCOKwbZgvJT7vb60dYghx43JOYYTsxo3zcKZmIuH730=w300
This election is special. We all know it. That’s probably the one thing the whole country can agree on. But what makes it special? Most people would say something like the Supreme Court, immigration, or Iran. And I agree, this election will shape almost every aspect of our legislative agenda. But there’s something else that makes this election important, something bigger, something that makes this election unique. No, it’s not the orange-faced reality TV star or the pantsuit lady who can’t send emails. It’s something simpler. People are finally paying attention. It’s more than that; it’s the fact that people have an opinion. People aren’t just watching the candidates, they are constantly forming and changing their opinions about them. That’s amazing. The fact that I can go up to anyone -- child, young adult, senior citizen, it doesn’t matter -- and they will all have some sort of a view on this election. It seems like we have finally solved the problem that’s plagued every previous election since Nixon; we are finally having an electorate that is actively engaged in our government in November. As a result, we have actually started to see another problem come up. All of a sudden, regardless of who or what I support, I’m being defined by the polarity of the candidates. People just assume that I mirror the personalities of whoever I support. If it’s Donald, I’m suddenly a immigrant hating, rape condoning psychopath. On the opposite end, if I like Hillary, I must be a twofaced, out-of-touch liar. This is the unique problem. I’m stuck whatever way I go, anything I do is going to make someone mad. This isn’t how it should be. I shouldn’t feel bad or guilty about who I support. I shouldn’t feel like I’m making enemies and losing friends. I shouldn’t feel like I’m portrayed as something I’m not. Instead, I should be able to talk freely about my own views without becoming them. I should be able to support candidates without being completely bound to them. For the first time ever we are being defined by the candidates, not our views. That’s why this election is special. But not in a good way.
Hawkeye Adviser Christina Hammitt Co-Editors-in-Chief Jack Silberman Shibi Sanjeev Editorial Board Jack Wroldsen Julia Eisenshtadt Jason Moonka Section Editor Evan Stern
THANK YOU FOR CHOOSING
Hawkeye the Bloomfield
works cited: http://i0.wp.com/www.towleroad.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/2_ baldwin_mckinnon.jpeg?resize=740%2C414