So I wrote a letter to the electoral college....

I realize that writing a letter to the electoral college asking people to consider acting as unfaithful electors is unlikely to make any impact, and I also realize that such action may be very misguided. But as I thrash about endlessly trying to take action against what I perceive will be a calamitous four to eight years,  I caved and wrote to the electors because not-my-president elect's choice of climate change denier Scott Pruitt to head the EPA put me over the edge, into another full-blown state of panic (these have been coming in waves since November 9), and I felt, once again, that I needed to do any and everything possible to deter what seems more and more inevitable: the end of days. 

Anyway, there's a handy web cite called #AskTheElectors, which provides a tool for contacting everyone in the electoral college, so I used it and sent what I thought was a very thoughtful, polite, and informed entreaty for the electors to please consider being unfaithful.  I'll post it below, and it's also posted on the #AskTheElectors page.  

I didn't really expect anyone to respond, but a few electors have -- either via a form letter or directly to me -- and those responses are fairly appalling.  I'll post the responses below, and I'll update them if and when I receive more.

My letter:

Dear Electors;

Thank you for your participation in our democratic process and for the care and thoughtfulness that I feel certain must be a part of your decision making process.  I am a college professor at a university in rural North Carolina; a state where my family has lived since the 1700s. Over the course of Governor Pat McCrory's time in office; I have watched as funding for our public schools and universities has been cut; environmental protections have been gutted; fair access to the right to vote and access to women's health care have been limited. McCrory finally conceded to Roy Cooper just this week; and I am hugely relieved; even as I know that Cooper will have a difficult (if not impossible) time enacting significant change; given the republican supermajority in our legislature.  Nonetheless; I now have some hope for the future.

The future after the 2016 presidential election; on the other hand; terrifies me. Given the things that he said and did prior to the election; I was already worried about what a Trump presidency would mean for the rights of the citizens of this country and for the health of the planet.  I worried about the overt and explicit racism that has now; as expected; lead to an increase in hate crimes and harassment.  I worried about the misogyny that I watched be made acceptable by a candidate who has a vile record of using the most reprehensible rhetoric about women -- not to mention assaulting them with impunity -- and as a woman; I watched the campaign play out in ways that challenged my own sense of self; my self worth; my value as a human being.  And I watched as a qualified woman lost the election to an incompetent man; a person with no experience in politics.

Now I am watching as our president elect appoints cabinet members with no experience; people who I fear will do irreparable harm to the most vulnerable members of our society.  The president elect has chosen white nationalist Steve Bannon as his chief strategist.  He has chosen school voucher advocate Betsy DeVos as his secretary of education.  But the choice of Scott Pruitt; an avowed climate change denialist to head the Environmental Protection Agency; is the choice that terrifies me the most -- and it is the reason for which i am writing to you today. 

This choice is clearly about the influence of the fossil fuel industry; it has nothing to do with protections of any kind; except for the protection of that industry.  This is about dismantling; not leading; the EPA.  It's about denying our responsibility to care for our natural resources not only for the citizens of this country but also for the rest of the world.  The pick of Pruitt signals the unmaking of our country and our planet.  Four or; heaven forbid; eight years of what happens next will take us to places from which it will be impossible to return.  It will lead to damage impossible to repair.

I write to ask that you please vote for Hillary Clinton on December 19.  I realize that you're unlikely to do this; but I also feel that I have a moral and ethical obligation to ask you; to try to convince you of the gravity of your choice; and the reality of what it means to do otherwise.  Thank you for your service to our country; and thanks as well for taking the time to read my letter.

Thank you for your time and consideration, I appreciate and respect the role you serve in our electoral process.

Sincerely,

Laura Wright

And the responses (verbatim):

1. From L. Scott Mann

Texas Elector, Congressional District 19

Good Citizen,

I am sorry that, because I have received more than 60,000 emails, I can no longer personally respond to you. I gave up after about 1200. Given that the content is fairly universal, I am comfortable offering this universal response.

Thank you for your communication and for your passion for the Republic. I prefer writers to rioters.

Several things merit mentioning. First, you have every right to lobby an elector. I welcome the contact from a fellow American.

Second, this is not a pure democracy, it is a republic. The corollary to that fact is that even if the majority did rule, and it does not, there was no absolute majority winner in this election.

Third, the Electoral College does not exist in order to give you a "do over" because you don't like the results; it exists to preserve the nature of the the republic.

Finally, your feelings notwithstanding, it is not my duty to care one whit what the plurality or majority of Americans want. My job is to represent the decision of the winning party in the Texas Presidential election.

It's not that your feelings don't matter at all, they just don't matter here. The law and U.S. Constitution do.

For those who believe I should change my vote to HRC because of your intense feelings about Donald Trump, surely you must know that for every person who feels you have elected the worst person to ever hold the office, there is another who would have felt exactly the same that had we elected HRC: that she is unfit for office and her husband has committed multiple sexual assaults.

Nevertheless, I think it safe to say, my good citizen, you would not have agreed with electoral nullification of a Clinton victory. Nor would I.

This is why we have elections.

If you disagree with the electoral college concept, and some do, you have the opportunity amend the constitution. But elector nullification is not the answer.

I will vote my conscience. You need have no fear. I have never intended to do anything more or less.

Please allow me to illustrate my point from America's favorite pastime, baseball. In the 1960 World Series the Pirates beat the Yankees 4 games to three. But, the Yankees scored a total of 55 runs while the Pirates could only muster 27 total runs.

Unfair? No, those are the rules of baseball. We choose the winner of the World Series by number of games won, regardless of the disparity of the total runs. If the rules were different, teams would strategize differently and the result would likely be different. That the Yankees outscored the Pirates in 1960, or that the Cubs tied the Indians in runs scored this year, is nothing more than an interesting statistic.

In a Presidential campaign, if the rules were different, candidates would strategize differently and the result would likely be different. Donald Trump won according to the rules. Everything else, including the popular vote, is merely an interesting statistic.

Indirect election of the chief executive is the rule under parliamentary forms of government. No one in Canada or the United Kingdom votes for Prime Minister. The election is indirect.

In closing, I am delighted that many are reading the Federalist Papers. I've been reading them for twenty years. They are a fascinating insight into the minds of the framers of the Constitution, aren't they? The Anti-Federalist papers are equally educational. I recommend them for your reading also.

Yes, I agree with Hamilton in Federalist 68. No, I do not believe that the election of Donald Trump rises to that level.

If you have read this far you deserve my thanks, and to know that I do browse for responses. I read them and sometimes respond personally as time allows.

May God bless America and may God bless the great state of Texas.

Best regards,

L. Scott Mann

Texas Elector, Congressional District 19

OK, fine.  He also includes a bunch of links that might be "of interest," including this one about how most letter writers are women who are scared because Hillary scared them.

2. Alex Kim

Elector, Texas Congressional District 24

Thank you for writing.

I am receiving about 4,000 emails a day so I have set this to an auto-response.

You should know that I have no interest in Hillary Clinton becoming our next President.  I reject the Democratic Party principles and I reject Hillary Clinton.

I will not do anything that will open a path for HRC to become our next President.

There is no such thing as a national popular vote.  The only vote that matters to me as a Texas Elector is the Texas vote.

We are not a democracy, we are a republic, for good cause.

We all have differing opinions and I respect your part in the political process, but frankly, the political opinions of non-Texas voters means nothing to me.  I do not vote or get involved in your state, I am not sure why you are trying to interfere in mine.

I encourage you to be more active in the political process where your vote matters.

Best Regards,

Alex Kim

Elector, Texas Congressional District 24

3. John Haggard, Michigan (and by far my favorite for so many reasons)

Laura see you are a Professor and I assume you are sending these email on School time and being paid for this when your job is to teach the students what is in the English book and not what you think.   Problem with education today is the instructors like you teach the kids what you think and not what is in the books.   Again you are on the College time card.   Thanks John

Yeah, just me over here, being a dangerous professor....  Cheers.

Black Lives Matter at Western Carolina University

Dear black students (and various non-black supporters) who were staging a protest at the fountain at WCU today:

Thank you. I walked by on my way from one class to another, just as you were setting up. You were all wearing black, you had yellow tape across your mouths, and you were holding signs that said, "please respect our silence. We are mourning." And you sat in silence, in the middle of campus, surrounded by chalkings announcing that "blue lives matter," "all lives matter," and "Trump for president." You sat as white students walked past you and laughed, as they yelled that they were "white and proud." 

I know that you must be deeply tired of trying to explain how completely offensive all of these sentiments are. 

I stayed with you until my class started, and then I came back afterwards to find that you were engaging in dialogue -- you were trying to explain why you were sitting in silence -- to students who didn't understand or who might even have been trying to provoke you. I heard one of you say, "we will start the next discussion in a few minutes." And there were students of all races standing in that circle and talking. Having a discussion. It worked, maybe not for everyone on campus, but it worked. People were talking. And, more importantly, people were listening.

Discussion. You were working towards civil discussion, and that's a brave and unusual thing right now. You were working to educate (although it's utterly absurd to think that you should have to do that) your fellow students who simply seem not to understand, who feel unnecessarily threatened, who are confused and frightened. And these days are confusing and frightening, and because we are confused and frightened, when we disagree with one another we tend to just stop talking to each other. Instead, we start yelling. Or hurling nonsense that we've heard but not evaluated, not fact-checked, from the media or from our politicians and would be politicians, at what we presume to be "the other side."

But here's what I think these WCU students understood: there is no other side. There is only us: WCU. There is only us: North Carolina. There is only us: the USA. There is only us, all of us, having to live together in this world that would like nothing more than to drive us apart. There is only us, and we are all beholden to each other.

You wanted to engage your fellow students in order to be a part of a collective community trying to understand what is happening in our country right now. You were trying to help, to staunch the hatred, and to move us forward together. You were trying to raise awareness of the very real circumstances that perpetuate indiscriminate police killings of black people, whether armed or not (the 2nd Amendment doesn't just apply to white folks), at the hands of those who are supposed to protect and serve us. 

I am proud to know that you are our students.

With deepest respect,

Laura Wright
Professor of English
Western Carolina University

Hillary's Health and my Heart Attack

When a friend called and told me that Hillary Clinton nearly collapsed after having to leave a September 11 memorial service early, I braced myself for the wave of misogyny that would follow.  And then it came crashing down, just as expected.  The media pounced; Hillary's health was now a major issue.  Tom Brokaw announced that she should see a neurologist.  My first thought?  She got overheated.  And: leave her alone.

When she revealed that she had been diagnosed with pneumonia a few days prior, the narrative shifted again, this time to how her refusal to reveal that diagnosis was further evidence of the fact that she's not honest.  There was immediate speculation that maybe she has pneumonia, or maybe she's hiding something worse since, you know, she lies about everything.

You know the reason why Hillary didn't tell the world that she had pneumonia?  She says that she really didn't think that pneumonia was that big of a deal.  And you know why?  Because women are really good at convincing themselves and everyone around them that they are totally fine when they totally aren't.  And you know why that's the case?  Strap in and I'll tell you.

Exactly.

Women work when they are sick because they have to.  They have to take care of their families, they have to provide for their children, and if they value their jobs, they can never -- under any circumstances -- appear weak.  Illness in a woman who works is an indication that she can't handle her job, that she's too frail, too constitutionally incapable.  The speculation and scrutiny to which working women are subjected when they are sick, when they do actually have to miss work, is disproportionate to what men have to endure when they succumb to illness.  And women know this.  

Remember when Regan had colon cancer? How about when Bush the first threw up on Japanese Prime Minister Miyazawa Kiichi?  

Here you go.

Presidential hopefuls Bob Dole, John Kerry, and John McCain all had cancer prior to their bids for office. And let's not ever forget that Dick Cheney had a letter of resignation ready to give to W. because he thought his heart was a goner and that he could die at pretty much any moment.  Bill Clinton?  Good lord, already.  The man was effectively trying to eat himself to death while he was in office. Donald Trump has produced an absurd supposed doctor's letter attesting to his fitness for office. 

And Hillary has pneumonia, a ailment that can be treated with antibiotics, and it's a national crisis, a clear testament to why a woman can't serve as commander and chief.  And it hits way too close to home for me.

In October of 2013, when I was 43-years-old, I had a massive heart attack that nearly killed me.  Before I go further with the details, let me tell you a few things about myself.  I have been a vegan for 15 years and a vegetarian for 20 years prior; I don't smoke, and I am a long distance runner.  My cholesterol is great, and I have no risk factors.  I am an English professor, and at the time of the heart attack, I was working in a administrative capacity as the Department Head of the largest academic department at the university where I work.  It was a stressful gig to say the least, and it was a job that I had wanted to do for a single three-year term.  I was in my second semester of that term at the time of the attack.

I was at work when I had the symptoms, the classic ones, the crushing chest pain, pain in my arms and jaw, nausea, sweating.  Of course I tried to talk myself out of what was happening because I was totally convinced that there was no way that I was having a heart attack.  I. Tried. To. Walk. It. Off.  No biggie.  Probably just a pulled muscle or something.

And then I ended up on a helicopter ride to the nearest cardiac hospital, which was 50 miles away.

Here's MAMA, the Mountain Area Medical Airlift.

The next day, my cardiologist told me just how bad it had been, how very close I came to dying, how difficult the surgery had been. How touch and go.  And he also told me that the only reason that I survived that widow maker -- so named because it lays men to waste -- was because I was so strong  and so healthy.  He told me not to return to work that semester.  

I was back in my office a week later.  I didn't even have to cancel a single class because I was only teaching a graduate course that met once per week.

No big deal.  Just par for the course.  It's what women do -- and I was super conscious of that.  I was back because not to go back would have meant the end of my ability to do any further administrative work at my university.  I would have been deemed too weak, too frail, and too unfit for such work.  Should I have gone back? Absolutely not.  But I went back anyway, and I finished out my term, and, as I had always planned, I returned to being faculty. 

But despite the sheer fortitude that should have been made evident by that action, I was still told by a no doubt well-meaning male colleague that I shouldn't plan to pursue further administrative positions because another term in the one I'd just completed would probably kill me. Woah, I thought, and then I explained that (as he already knew) that my heart attack turned out to be the result of a genetic predisposition that lead to a spontaneous coronary artery dissection (SCAD), a condition that affects otherwise super healthy women, that causes a SPONTANEOUS -- as in not-related-to-my-job -- tear in the lining of an artery, which leads to blood not being able to pass through, which leads to a clot, which leads, very often, to death. Not for me, though, I reminded him: I was back to work in a week. 

Bow down to the badass that is me, already.

Men's health issues are battle scars, evidence of developed character, of strength and survival.  Women's are evidence of frailty, even when we survive them.  Even when most men wouldn't be able to survive them.

I should be clear and note -- and I'm stealing this from a friend on Facebook -- that if Hillary's aids Weekend at Bernie-ed her body around for the rest of the election cycle, I'd happily vote for her corpse over the vileness that is Donald Trump.  But my bet is that she'll be fine, actually better than fine (did you notice that she had pneumonia and was still out there working 16 hour days?  That's not weak; that actually superhuman), no matter what the press might have us believe.

Oh my god...this actually exists.

I survived a heart attack because I am strong and, probably, because I'm a woman.  Hillary continues to survive hit after hit after hit for the same reasons.  I hope she gets better soon, and that at some point, we might see fit to let women actually be sick without also deciding that they aren't fit to lead. 

Dear Appeals People at Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina

Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina

Appeals Department

Level 1

P.O. Box 30055

Durham, NC 27702

RE: Denial of benefits (reference #: ZE-140429)

13 August 2016

Dear Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina:

On October 25, 2013, at the age of 43, I had a massive myocardial infarction that nearly killed me, did irreversible damage to my heart, and caused me acute psychological distress, which manifested itself as PTSD, depression, and anxiety.  After receiving conflicting medical diagnoses from two cardiologists in North Carolina (neither of which was a women’s heart expert), I sought at third opinion from women’s heart specialist Dr. Sharonne Hayes at the Mayo Clinic, where I was definitively diagnosed with Spontaneous Coronary Artery Dissection (SCAD), a genetic disorder that causes often fatal and spontaneous shredding of the lining of the arteries.

SCAD predominantly affects healthy women with no risk factors whatsoever – I am a long distance runner, non-smoker, long-time vegetarian, for example – and has only recently been studied, in large part because of discriminatory preexisting assumptions and attitudes about women and heart disease/attack.  For my heart, I take a low dose ace inhibitor, which takes some of the stress off of my damaged heart and allows the healthy part of my heart not to work as hard, and a daily low-dose aspirin.  For my anxiety, depression, and PTSD, along with seeking psychological therapy, I have tried Zoloft, Prozac, and Lexapro, with varying degrees of success.

At my annual physical in July of this year, I discussed with my doctor, Laurie LeMauviel, my continued struggles with the physical and psychological aspects of my heart attack; I don’t believe that the mind and body can be disaggregated and disengaged from one another, and I remain troubled that Western medicine (and Western insurance – even after the Affordable Care Act did significant work to address that issue) consistently refuse to recognize that treatment of one necessarily impacts the other.  My blood work indicated the my B12 levels were very low, and, given my battles with depression and anxiety and my seeming inability to find the correct medication to help me with those, Dr. LeMauviel suggested genetic testing for variants in my MTHFR.  Two abnormalities were diagnosed after this testing, and my knowledge of those abnormalities and their implications is absolutely medically necessary.  Here’s why:

The variations noted (677T and 1298C) are responsible for several factors that impact both my physical and mental health.  First, these variants are responsible for my body’s inability to properly absorb certain B vitamins, primarily B6 and B12, and this lack of absorption is probably the cause of some of my struggle with depression and anxiety.  Second, low levels of B vitamins contribute to elevated levels of homocysteine in the blood, which have been directly linked to increased risk for heart attack – including SCAD related heart attack.  This test may very well save my life.

I am concerned that this denial of benefits for this testing as “not medically necessary” is based on a failure to understand or appreciate the value of mental health in the service of physical health and vice versa.  Further, since being diagnosed with SCAD, I have been as vocal an advocate as possible for increased understanding and study of the ways that women have heart attacks, why women have heart attacks, and how the medical and insurance communities can more appropriately and responsibly respond to women’s heart attacks.  It is my sincere hope that this letter will do some positive work in the service of the discrimination that women have long faced, from medical providers and from insurers, with regard to heart and mental health.

Sincerely,

Laura Wright

Cc: Wayne Goodwin, NC Commissioner of Insurance

Thank you

I cannot thank everyone enough for the outpouring of support that I have received since I published on 2/21 my email that was requested by the Pope Center.  I have received emails and phone calls from faculty across the UNC system and beyond who are outraged and appalled at the idea of the challenge to academic freedom that my case (and the case of my colleagues) represents to those of us who disagree with the influence that corporate money has to shape student ideology in higher education.

I honestly did not expect so much attention to my blog (it's never seen the like) or outspokenness against the actions of the Pope Center and the Koch Foundation.

So this is just a simple thank you.  And this is an assertion as well that this is what vegan activism looks like.