RE: RE: RE: withheld shares You're absolutely right about that - if you do nothing at all (which most people do), then the shares automatically do go to management. But if you fill out the proxy and actually mark the "Withhold" box, I think you are indicating to management that you are abstaining from voting and you end up taking those shares out of the mix.
I work for one of the big Five and when we vote in our board of directors, we have the option of voting for each director individually...usually, they give us three options on the proxy - Yes, No, or Withhold. Withholding votes sometimes sends management an important message without impacting the entire vote. We've had directors who were relatively decent but missed a lot of their committee meetings where the number of withheld or no votes were much higher for them than their peers. Usually, they end up improving their attendance, or move on. If a high percentage of the return votes for this meeting were "withheld", it lets AOS know that while shareholders did not necessarily support the Green side, they are sending the message along to get their act together.
At least that's my take on it...