Friday, December 9, 2016

Persuasive Paper: Open Letter to US Electoral College

Farid Ghamsari
English 306
Dr. Brown
12/8/2016
An Open Letter to the US Electoral College
To The Members of the United States Electoral College,
            I am a 21-year-old student at the University of Arizona. I was born in Austria, but moved the United States shortly after. My parent’s and I obtained our citizenships as early as possible, and have been proud, patriotic citizens of the United States ever since. I have always been able to trust in our country and believe that its leadership was on the path towards’ helping its citizens, doing what it believed to be best for the people, even if it was against my own personal beliefs. It is with this in mind that I now write to all of you. On November 11, Donald Trump won the national election and is currently President-Elect, soon to become the President of the United States. This, as a citizen of the United States, is troubling to me for a number of reasons. Donald Trump, over the past several months, seems to have proven himself time and time again as unfit to be President. Since his victory, his transition has already repeatedly been putting US relations and security at risk through a number of ill-advised actions and inactions and has a number of conflicts of interest which should disqualify him from being the President. I will elaborate on all of these accusations, in order to present to you why Donald Trump cannot be allowed to be President.
First, Donald Trump and his presidency present a clear threat to US relations and National Security.  On November 23rd, The Washington Post published an article describing that since his victory 2-weeks prior, Donald Trump had only received 2 classified intelligence briefings (Miller). These briefings contain information from each of the US intelligence agencies and contain the most important, highly classified information regarding the nation’s security and military projects abroad. While it is not unprecedented for a President-Elect to forgo some of these briefings, the grand majority of President-Elects generally opt for daily briefings after receiving their first (Miller). Since Donald Trump has no foreign policy or relations experience, this is particularly disturbing. He is ignoring these briefings, claiming that he is receiving all of the information he needs through casual phone calls with other world leaders. This is absolutely ridiculous. There could be terrorist attacks or insurgencies that he would be wholly unaware of. His behavior cannot be condoned for someone who is going to be Commander in Chief and have his hands on the largest nuclear arsenal in the world. It is unclear whether he realizes the scope and importance of his position or simply doesn’t care.
In addition, Donald Trump has already made a number of claims which have strained relations with a number of other countries. During his candidacy, he made a number of memorable disparaging remarks towards other nations such as China and Mexico, saying that Mexico was sending us “Robbers and Rapists” and that climate Change was a hoax created by the Chinese to ruin the US economy.  Shortly after Donald Trump’s victory, China’s Vice Foreign Minister Zhenmin retorted to trump that it was US President’s Ronald Raegan and George H.W. Bush that started the global warming conversation in the late 80’s and that they would not tolerate such slander (Scherer). Donald Trump is damaging the US reputation minute by minute and painfully straining relations which have taken decades to build. He has further angered the Chinese by accepting a phone call from the President of Taiwan (Wong). This breaks decades of diplomatic protocol with the Chinese by not honoring the One-China agreement, in which the US does not recognize Taiwan as its own country, but simply a Chinese territory in revolt (Wong). This agreement is a centerpiece of US-Chinese relations and ignoring this has deeply concerned Chinese and World politicians alike. China is currently one of the largest and strongest countries in the world and Donald Trump is quickly turning them into an enemy. All of these things have occurred before Donald Trump has even taken office. I genuinely fear for our countries security when he becomes the commander in chief. He is unable to take the weight of his actions seriously and is putting the entire country’s security at stake. There is no place for Donald Trump’s form of ignorance of geopolitics in the global community.
If it wasn’t enough that Donald Trump is already threating US security and relations, he seems to have an alarmingly large number of ties to foreign governments and companies. While we all know that it was one of the hot topics of the debates, it is still monumentally important that Donald Trump has not released his tax returns. It is not only unprecedented, but it is wildly dangerous. Those tax returns would let the American people know whether or not he was financially tied to foreign governments and agencies. His refusal to release them is almost damning evidence on its own. He is almost definitely hiding something and if he does in fact have foreign connections, these would present huge conflicts of interest for the President. The President of the United States should have only one debt to pay, his service to the American people. A President with debts to pay to other countries or influential people would be wildly irresponsible and could not be trusted to keep the American People in the forefront of his decisions.
Additionally, Mr. Trump has not put his company in a blind trust, but instead, will give it to his children, who are also involved in his White House team, presenting yet another conflict of interest. How can we know that he won’t be using the US government to simply line his and his children’s own pockets once he becomes President? With his previous actions, there is no reason to believe that he will not be making decisions to champion his own interests.  Donald Trump’s connections clearly paint him to be unfit to be president, encumbered by his numerous interests abroad, and the idea that he could still become president, while still maintaining all of these connections is absolutely outrageous.
The National Election is over, but Donald Trump has not been sworn into office quite yet. The Electoral College still has to finalize the vote on December 19th. I am writing to you, the members of the Electoral College, to implore you to deliberate on your duty to the United States as a member of the Electoral College. While you are pledged to vote for your party, you also have a duty to select a president who you believe will do properly and successfully lead the nation forward. Donald Trump is clearly proving himself to be an unfit and dangerous president. One who will make a mockery of the institutions and achievements of the United States of America and could not be trusted to promote the American people’s interests. For these reasons, you as the members of the electoral college have a duty vote against him. I’m sure many of you have already deliberated voting against him, but are not sure if you should due to the precedent it would create, but remember that Donald Trump did not even win the popular vote. Hilary Clinton has now won it by over 2.5 million votes. He does not represent the voters of America and many feel that he has already produced intense divisions in the country, with hate crimes drastically on the rise. On December 19th, you will be the final obstacle between Donald Trump, and the White House. He strikes fear into the hearts of many American’s who fear war with other countries, discrimination here in the US, and more economic downfalls. Donald Trump’s presidency would exacerbate every problem faced the US today and needs to be stopped before it begins. Please, don’t vote for Donald Trump.  
Essay: 1290 Words.

Purpose of Conclusion: The purpose of my conclusion is to bring together finalize the goal of the letter. It is made to present the dangers of Donald Trump in a new way and to sway the Electoral college to vote against him by personalizing and making intimate the problems I discussed earlier. I felt that this would be the strongest way to persuade the electoral college to show them that it would be in everyone’s best interest to vote against Donald Trump.

Character Paragraph’s, First and Fourth Paragraphs
First: 
The Purpose of the Paragraph is to open to the Electoral College who I am, and why my word should be listened to at all as well as then opening my description and request from them.
Main Characters: My Parent’s and I, Donald Trump, Donald Trump’s Victory, Donald Trump’s Presidency.
This Paragraph moves from using focused topic strings to chained topic stings halfway through the paragraph, eventually becoming mixed near the end.
Fifth:
The Purpose: To elaborate on the conflict of interest of his company and his children, which crush the possibility that he could be a president without ulterior motives.
Main Characters: Donald Trump, his children, and his connections.
The Paragraph uses a chained topic string, using the stress of the previous sentence as the topic of the next sentence.




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