My eldest is one of those people with a gift for problem-solving. (Which, god knows, he gets from his mother.) This is not merely in the McGyver sense of getting things done, either, although he's good at that, too. He's the kind of person who can walk into a room, get an immediate sense of the actors and forces involved in a problem, and put together a solution that manages to keep all parties at least content that they made the best deal possible under the circumstances. So, when he proposed a plan to pry the Republic out of the mess into which it wandered a week ago Tuesday, I felt compelled to pass it along.

There is a lot of wishful thinking and candle-lighting being done in prayerful hope that the Electoral College will avert the pending catastrophe. So, what the hell. It's our turn now. Let us put all purely political considerations aside for the moment, although I admit they're considerable, and just propose that, in its deliberations, the EC vote to award the presidency to Hillary Rodham Clinton and the vice-presidency to Mike Pence.

I am assured by lawyers that I trust that there is no constitutional bar to this solution. Indeed, as one prominent constitutional lawyer pointed out, it's closer to what Alexander Hamilton had in mind when he argued for the EC in Federalist 68 as a roadblock to prevent the presidency from falling into the hands of the unqualified, the crooked, or the vulgar talking yams.

"Talents for low intrigue, and the little arts of popularity, may alone suffice to elevate a man to the first honors in a single State; but it will require other talents, and a different kind of merit, to establish him in the esteem and confidence of the whole Union, or of so considerable a portion of it as would be necessary to make him a successful candidate for the distinguished office of President of the United States"

The balance of power in Washington would change very little. The congressional majorities would remain the same. A Democratic president would have the veto, but a Republican vice-president would have the tie-breaking vote in the Senate. (I suspect Pence would have a more active role in that body than most Veeps would but, hey, at least it would distract him from thinking about what people might be doing with their naughty bits.) And, for those of you who care about such things, it would force the parties to govern together or perish. If Pence doesn't like the policies of the administration, he can leave in 2018 and run against the president in the 2020 election when, with any luck at all, the madness that produced our current situation will have passed and we can have normal politics again.

Now, as for those political considerations that we put aside for the moment, they would be explosive. The Trump loyalists would go absolutely out of their minds. The arrangement would depend vitally on some substantial political courage, particularly on the part of the Republicans, but you can't tell me that, secretly, in their heart of hearts, there aren't some who would celebrate any chance to let this cup pass from them. Out in the country, I hope, there would be some comfort in the fact that the presidency would pass to the person who got the most votes.

(Added bonus: the backlash might be so ferocious as to force an end to the Electoral College once and for all.)

This will not happen, of course. That much political courage doesn't exist anywhere in the system these days. The kick-em-in-the-nuts-and-run crowd is driving the train. Governing is hard. Governing when you have contempt for the process itself is a self-evident disaster.

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Charles P. Pierce Charles P Pierce is the author of four books, most recently Idiot America, and has been a working journalist since 1976.

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