Another week, and more breaking news in the faithless elector astroturf campaign. To keep this one short, we won’t repeat the background thus far, you can catch up here, here, here, here and here. The latest: Clinton campaign backs intelligence briefing for Electoral College electors (CNN), an attempt to paint the election as having been tainted by those damned Rooskies. This is yet another step in the plan to sway enough electors (or to provide cover to electors compromised by extortion and bribes); this time the justification is patriotism.

This unfolding saga, while once a remote intellectual exercise, is now gaining traction with each passing week, even gaining the attention of some fairly staid and conservative types, although many of them are still falling for the Hillary head-fake. Remember, this isn’t about putting Hillary into the White House, that ship has sunk; it is about throwing the election into chaos and putting in a dark-horse ringer. We’ve seen this effort make an appeal to conscience, and now the puppet masters are pulling out all the stops with this latest smokescreen.

So, who is the ringer? Kasich has now clearly pulled ahead of Cruz here in the war-room. It appears that Kasich is being presented a classic loyalty test by the Marxists: Ohio passes 2nd bill restricting abortions; both await Kasich’s signature (CNN). Will Kasich show he is a company man by acting appropriately, and thus get the nod as the ringer? Time will tell.

It isn’t over yet, though. Mitch “The Turtle” McConnell is making a bid, stabbing Trump in the back for fingering his wife, Elaine Chao, for the Secretary of Transportation slot. The Turtle is backing both a Congressional investigation into alleged Russian hacking, as well as characterizing Trump’s proposed tax cut and infrastructure plans as dangerous. Neither of these moves are particularly surprising for any opportunistic Republican, but the timing and how these fit into the faithless elector campaign is very convenient.

The sad thing about all this is that with all this chaos, the idea of a meaningful election is a thing of the past. An anonymous WRSA reader put it best:

The last eight years (and arguably the last 100+ years) have been marked by people THINKING the ballot box was a legitimate means to have grievances addressed and resolved. Now many of us have watched that fail and have many examples.

If Donald Trump (love him or hate him) is not inaugurated on Jan 20 2017, the ballot box is dead. No debate, no excuses, no wishful thinking, no more Constitutional Republic.

Yep. That is the real loss in all of this.

Update to this update: Multiple readers have sent me links to this article describing Texas elector Suprun’s compromised background, only a week after he issued a long, rambling list of justifications for breaking his electoral promises, including “because 911” and “Trump staffers as Darth Vader admirers”. There is a lot in that article beyond just the salacious title. It is worth reading deeply to understand the deeply flawed characters of people who are in place to tip our entire culture into the waste bin. Bribery and extortion, the age-old carrot and stick approach to corruption.

And this is just this one guy that you know about. Imagine how much in-place rot is out there we haven’t heard about.