Month: November 2020

Sunday Mornings

If you read Trump World often, it’s probably a surprise that I am a steady Fox News Sunday viewer.  It’s on my “Sunday List”.  I start with Ali Velshi on MSNBC, move onto George Stephanopoulos on ABC, then Chris Wallace on Fox, and finish with Chuck Todd on Meet the Press. But I don’t just sit and watch four hours straight. I usually write a blog, balance the books, get a workout and have breakfast during that time too.

Fox News Sunday is well done, and reasonably dispassionate.  And you can tell why regular Fox viewers aren’t all that fond of Chris Wallace.  He lives up to the “fair and balanced” theme that Fox so frequently fails to achieve.  It helps to “balance” my viewing, and I know what to expect from the Fox commentators  (Brit Hume being the worst).  I need to hear what “the other side” is hearing.

This Week

On Fox this week, US Surgeon General Jerome Adams talked about the transition to the Biden Administration.  He used a track “pass the baton” analogy, talking about how we need to have a “clean” exchange, particularly when it comes to the COVID pandemic response.  

And on Meet the Press Hugh Hewitt was on the panel.  He is a conservative radio commentator on the Salem Network who was a “Never Trumper” until after the 2016 election. Then he swallowed the “Kool Aid” and has been a Trump apologist ever since.  

This week, he rattled off a Trump 2024 (that’s right – 2024) campaign spiel as justification for the President’s failure to offer the common courtesy of a concession.  Hewitt claimed that the future candidacy justified delegitimizing the incoming President.  It’s the first time in a while I’ve wanted to throw something at Meet the Press.

Track 

And it dawned on me:  I am an “expert” in both of those areas.

Let’s start with relay exchanges.  I was a track coach (still one in my head) for forty years.  One of our team’s specialties was in taking solid but not great sprinters and teaching them amazing exchanges to beat more talented teams.  I watched the alternative:  the spectacle of the US Olympic 4×100 Relay team, the most talented in the world, disqualified year after year because they couldn’t complete an exchange.  

As my assistant coach for sprints would say:  “They had one job – make the exchange”.  But they didn’t, and we got to watch the agony of the fastest men in the world sobbing on the field.

So the trick was to set up a simple system that allowed the incoming runner to maintain his speed of almost twenty miles an hour, while the outgoing runner got up to that speed and seamlessly accepted the baton.  The baton never slowed down as it moved from one to the other.  It took a group of talented kids to sixth place in the state meet.

Our National Exchange

And we know that the “exchange” between the outgoing and incoming President should be the same, because the United States cannot afford to “slow down” in the middle.  The rest of the world won’t wait for a “bump and run” or worse, a dropped baton.  Think about what’s happening now in Iran, or Afghanistan, or with the pandemic.

There is a system designed to keep America moving.  But it takes both the outgoing and incoming Presidents to agree to do it.  George W. Bush did for Barack Obama.  And Obama offered the same to Trump, though Trump decided it wasn’t “a thing” for his team.  They took over at a standstill, then managed to go backwards for the first few weeks.  Remember the inauguration count, and the Muslim Ban?

Titles

 I have experience with “titles” as well.  How important is it for the outgoing President to recognize the legitimacy of the incoming President?  It’s all about the 72 million Americans who voted for Mr. Trump.  If they follow his lead in denying the 2020 results, then Joe Biden will struggle to “unite” America – especially when it comes to ending the COVID pandemic.

I was hired as the “Dean of Students” at Watkins Memorial High School.  My job was to be the primary “discipline guy”, the first person a kid in trouble would see.  As that “guy”, I spent a lot of time on the phone with parents, who often weren’t particularly glad to hear from the school.

Two years into the job, the Principal called me in and told me the District wanted to change my job title from Dean of Students to “Teacher on Special Assignment”.  It was a contractual/legal thing he said.  I said no.

What’s in a title?  So let’s say I caught a kid smoking dope in the locker room.  I call the parent.  They’re angry with their kid, angry with the school, and angry to be interrupted at work.  And in all of that anger, I would have to explain what a “teacher on special assignment” was.  It wasn’t going to work. The conversation went to the Superintendent, and included the possibility of me going back to my former life as a Government teacher.  In the end we agreed that I would remain in my current assignment:  as the Dean of Students.

Disqualified

Like it or not, Joe Biden is the next President of the United States.  But it would be a whole lot easier for him to govern, and better for the country, if the current President simply acknowledged it.  It would give Biden a fair shot.  Barack Obama had Trump to the White House within days of the Clinton’s defeat.  And Secretary Clinton herself urged us to support the new President.  

The Presidential “exchange” looks like it’s going to be a disaster.  The future President is going to be hamstrung from the start.  It’s not good for Biden, but more importantly, it’s not good for America.  

Trump’s not just dropping the baton.  He’s throwing it off the track.

Here’s the next in the “Outside My Window” series, chronicling life during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Joni Mitchell – The River

Walking in the Dark

 My routine has changed a bit.  I’m usually an early riser, a habit of decades of teaching, but my recent mornings were coffee, dishes (from the night before) and then onto the keyboard.  But with our “rehab” dog addition, there’s now a thirty-minute or so walk added in.  It brings back memories of “dawn-thirty” workouts over the years, but I can’t get moving that fast anymore.  I’ll work out later, when my sixty-four year old muscles get a little warmer.

So “Louisiana” and I wander the quiet streets of Pataskala.  We start by starlight, but things brighten as we get through our journey, and it’s almost dawn when we return home.  “Lou” feels the early morning stiffness too. As he gets stronger we’re letting him do more.  He’s playing with Atticus and Keelie, two of our other dogs, and Lou’s sore and stiff in the mornings like me.

But we warm along the way.  Lou’s getting the hang of things, no matter which direction I take him, he recognizes when we’re back on our street.  He stops sniffing around, and the pace quickens to a light jog.  Lou knows the way home.

Decorations

The fall leaves are gone and there’s frost on the grass now.  Tomorrow we’re supposed to get our first snow.  I look forward to Lou encountering that; after all, he’s a Louisiana dog.  All the dogs get excited with the first real snowfall, but for him, it’ll be a whole new experience.  And the political season has changed as well:  it took Christmas decorations going up to get some of the Trump signs down. 

There are a lot more Christmas decorations up than usual in our little neighborhood.  It used to be just a couple of us decorated, but this year, most of the houses have lights or inflatable figures.  This was already a “short” Christmas season. Thanksgiving was late this year; it’s less than a month before Christmas Day.  And it’s the Christmas of COVID, the end of the Trump Administration:  there are lots of reasons to get decorations up.  We can’t “Gather Together” like the old Thanksgiving song, but we can demonstrate our togetherness by decorating.

But I am still working on the motivation to break out Christmas lights.  Usually I am a traditionalist:  Friday after Thanksgiving, rain or shine, I’ve got the boxes down from the rafters, plugging in to find out which strings of lights somehow were “healed” over the past eleven months.  It’s such a clockwork thing, that the next-door neighbor checked up on me yesterday, wondering where the lights were.

They’re still in the boxes. 

We won’t pull the “big tree” out of the rafters either this year.  It doesn’t feel like a “big tree” year, and with more dogs there’s more dog “crates” – not much room for a “big tree”.  So for this year we purchased a smaller one.  The “traditional” schedule says that will go up sometime after next week.

Sad Christmas Songs

It’s easy to get in the “sad Christmas song” mood.  After last week, when it seemed like our world “forgot” about COVID, I anticipate that our Thanksgiving “dessert” will be even greater spikes in the disease.  And I watch as Donald Trump seems to be doing everything he can to sabotage the Biden administration.  

Israel assassinated Iran’s premier nuclear scientist yesterday.  It’s not something they would do without clearance from the United States, and it certainly won’t help when Biden tries to reinstitute the Iranian Nuclear Accord.  Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu going to get everything he can before his friend Trump leaves.  And as for Trump:  he can check one more box for future Evangelical Christian support, and mess with Biden in the process.

A small Christmas, walking in the pre-dawn darkness – you’d think Donald Trump is the NEXT President of the United States.  He’s not – and Joe Biden will be the man to lead us through what may be our darkest hours – but just before the dawn  (yep – CSNY reference).  

So I’m going to finish this essay – and get the ladder out.  It’s a short Christmas season – and it’s going to snow tomorrow – so the lights have to go up today!!

Out My Front Window – Part One (4/21/20)

Outside My Window – Part Two (4/23/20)

Outside My Window – Part Three (4/26/20)

Outside My Window – Part Four (5/13/20)

Outside My Window – Part Five (6/3/20)

Outside My Window – Part Six (7/3/20)

Outside My Window – Part Seven (7/31/20)

Outside My Window – Inshallah (8/13/20)

Outside My Window – Part Eight (9/15/20)

Outside My Window – Part Nine (9/25/20)

Outside My Window – Part Ten (10/9/20)

Outside My Window – Part 11 (11/29/20)

Facebook

Here’s one I found on Facebook the other day.  An acquaintance (Facebook does not define my friendships) has been an advocate of Donald Trump since the 2016 election.  His posts are “acerbic”: he not only advocates for Donald Trump, but he constantly questions the intelligence of anyone who is in opposition.

So yesterday’s post fit right in.  He tried to explain why Trump refuses to acknowledge the Biden victory.

Does anybody understand why Trump protested the election results for as long as possible?  

Answer:  To keep the rural Republicans from burning this Country to the ground.

If you doubt this hypothesis, it is because Trump is a whole-ton smarter then you are.  You should be able to fully understand everything that Biden does.

His logic is the “inscrutable mind of God” argument.  Since we are not gods, we cannot understand how God thinks.  We “mere mortals” are unable to comprehend the Trumpian strategy.  But since we voted for Biden, who, like us, is a mere mortal, we will have no problem following him.

For my “acquaintance” it is just another needle in the “progressive eye”.  But it brings up a larger point.  Maybe all the fear that Trump supporters will NEVER accept the legitimacy of the Biden Presidency is overblown.  Maybe they really do “get it”, and they are just looking to “alternative” reasoning to justify the inevitable result.

Through the Night

If the “inscrutable mind of Trump” is what his supporters need to get “through the night” of their election defeat, that’s fine.  As long as come January 20^th, they will step up to be Americans, willing to work with their fellow Americans to solve our most pressing concerns.  That is Joe Biden’s message.  

And that isn’t really about Trump.  It’s much more about McConnell, and Jim Jordan, and all of those Republicans who have determined that it is more important to defeat Democrats than it is to govern.  It’s been going on since Newt Gingrich and Bill Clinton.  The division has been going on so long, that when it started Trump was a Democrat (hate to admit that).  So Trump, “inscrutable mind” or not, may be the ultimate and inevitable result of the political trend that started with the “Gingrich Revolution of ‘94”.  

While the spoils of victory may have been worth it in terms of Supreme Court seats and State Legislatures controlled, it has left our nation unable to solve our most pressing issues:  COVID, immigration and healthcare, climate change and racial justice.  Instead of the “inscrutable mind” we need to choose another religious analogy, “the middle path”. 

Our Bitter Pill

And for my fellow Democrats, that will be a bitter pill.  We don’t want the “middle” anything.  Democrats want our spoils, and we want them now.  We don’t want to compromise, in fact we can’t see HOW to compromise on COVID, climate change or racial justice.  There either IS a plan to combat COVID and climate change, or there’s not.  There is either going to be racial justice so long neglected in this nation, or there’s not. 

And we want payback, to be honest.   Payback for what we see as the atrocities of the Trump Administration.  We want a “Truth and Reconciliation Commission” to examine everything from Russia to Ukraine, child separation to emoluments.  But to get those paybacks, we may have to give up opportunities to move forward.  That is a choice every “Resistor” may need to make.

I want the “progressive agenda” as much as anyone.  But I also realize that, at best, there will be a Senate evenly divided, with any one Senator, Democrat or Republican, able to swing the outcome.  And we Democrats chose the “middle path” when we selected Joe Biden.  Bernie had his chance, but was unable to deliver “the expanded majority” he so promised us all.  So instead of demanding “it all”, we need to take a breath, let out the mysterious “OM”, and try to make things incrementally better. 

Separate or Together

I took an early morning walk in my neighborhood this morning.  The Trump signs are dwindling, as if the sure knowledge of his defeat is slowly being accepted by his supporters.  They are gradually be replaced by blow-up Santa Clauses and Christmas gnomes.  Maybe time is the answer, and our nation will grudgingly move to work together on something.  If a COVID Thanksgiving apart didn’t teach us what we have to lose by being separate, a COVID Christmas certainly will.

.  

Thanksgiving

It’s Thanksgiving, perhaps the most American of holidays.  It is a time of family and food – a favorite of mine.  How can you go wrong – no presents to buy, just eat, and eat, and eat some more.  The turkey and the beef tenderloin are poised for the fixing!!

But this is COVID Thanksgiving – when gathering is a danger to us all.  So what do we have to be thankful for?  

COVID is awful.  Look back at historic plagues; it could have lasted for years.  Yet today we look forward to vaccines that are literally “ready to go”.  The “light at the end of the tunnel” may only be months away, not the years we thought might be ahead when COVID began.  Stay healthy, stay safe, and look forward to next Thanksgiving and maybe even next Fourth of July when we can all gather together again.  Raise a glass!!

Presidential Pardon

As we enter the final-final phase of the Trump Administration, it is only fitting that he will leave office under scandal, the same one he entered with.  Today, the 45^th President of the United States pardoned his convicted former National Security Advisor.  Retired US Army Major General Michael Flynn was one of Donald Trump’s earliest supporters.  His “stars” gave an imprimatur of respectability to the Trump campaign when there were few others besides former Senator Jeff Sessions standing beside him. 

But he was also a harbinger of events to come.  After the shock of the 2016 Trump victory, almost everyone from Chris Christie to Barack Obama told Trump not to hire Flynn as National Security Advisor.  But Donald Trump, known best for taking his own counsel over others, proceeded to do so anyway.

Flynn lasted two weeks. Publicly what we knew then was that he lied to the Vice President and the American people about “ex parte” conversations he had with Russian officials almost a month before the Trump inauguration. Flynn suggested that the Russians should ignore then-President Obama’s sanctions for Russia’s interference in the 2016 elections. He said that the new Trump Administration would “fix” them. We knew all of this, because the NSA listens in on Russian diplomatic phone conversations. And Flynn, the former Director of Defense Intelligence should have known that too.

Flynn’s resignation was one of the first “scandals” of the Trump Administration.  It was so dramatic that it was the subject of one of the early essays I wrote for Trump World, – What Happened to Flynn?

Flynn’s Deal

What we now know is that Flynn didn’t just lie to the Vice President, placing himself in a “compromised” position with the Russians.   He also lied to two FBI agents who had a transcript of the phone conversation in hand, and who gave him multiple chances to “get straight” with the story.  Flynn didn’t. The Mueller team indicted him for lying to Federal agents.

Flynn made a cooperation-deal with Mueller.  He pled guilty to lying to Federal investigators.  He then reneged on the deal, and was up for sentencing when the Attorney General, Bill Barr, directly intervened in the process and tried to withdraw the Government’s charges.  Federal Judge Emmet Sullivan took the highly unusual step of refusing the Government’s move. The case was still being determined.  Of course, that’s now all done.  A Presidential Pardon absolves the recipient from all charges and penalties.

The Constitution of the United States gives the President the sovereign right to issues pardons.  The only limitations are:  it’s only for federal crimes, and there is no “pardon” for impeachment conviction.  It is one of the few times that the Founding Fathers looked to the sovereign power of monarchy for Presidential powers.

Who to Pardon?

President Trump has a limited amount of time to get things done – until 11:59 am on January 20^th.  He already is trying to restrict the incoming Biden Administration on several fronts.  Trump withdrew the United States from the Open Skies Treaty, and is in the process of destroying the aircraft that enforced it.  His Treasury Secretary is moving more than $400 million in COVID relief funds into accounts that could require Congressional approval to spend.  

And the President continues to try to “up-stage” the Biden Presidency by “stepping” on each Biden announcement. Today, Biden gave a pre-Thanksgiving speech, trying to steel the nation for impending COVID losses and rally us together. Trump waited until the speech was done, then released the “tweet” pardoning Flynn. Regardless that the election is over and Biden is the winner, Trump continues to try to focus attention back to Trump.

Don’t expect that this will be the last Presidential Pardon.  Paul Manafort is home, but still convicted of crimes.  He has been a “good soldier” and maintained his silence about the Trump 2016 campaign.  In Trump’s gangster-style life, he deserves a Pardon.  Bet on it.

And somewhere in the next few weeks, Donald Trump will raise the “specter of retribution”.  He will claim that the “radical Democrats” are going to attack his family.  Don’t be too shocked when he issues pardons “for any act they may have happened” to Jared and Ivanka, and Don Junior, Eric and their significant others. (Sorry Tiffany). 

But, of course, he’ll then explain that the main target is Donald Trump himself. 

The President 

There are two ways that the sitting President can “indemnify” himself from future Federal prosecution.  The first would be to follow the Nixon example.  Nixon resigned from office, and his replacement, Gerald Ford, soon issued a blanket pardon for any offense he might have committed.   I am not implying a “deal” was cut in 1974 – I don’t doubt Nixon wanted one, but Jerry Ford wasn’t that kind of politician.  Ford legitimately felt that it was in the nation’s best interest to end the Nixon era.

Donald Trump could resign from office – maybe right after New Year’s. Vice President Mike Pence would then take over for the brief interregnum before the Biden inauguration. Pence could then pardon Trump. And while there can’t be a direct “quid pro quo”, perhaps Trump might guarantee backing for a Pence Presidential run in 2024. And in the converse, if Pence didn’t pardon him, then Trump could use the deadly “tweet” to destroy Pence’s chances.

Or President Joe Biden could pardon Donald Trump, harkening back to Ford’s “…long national nightmare is over”.  I don’t think (or hope) Biden would do that, but anything is possible.  But Trump won’t count on that.

Or, as a last act of defiance, President Donald Trump could pardon himself.  It’s never been done, but there is no Constitutional prohibition against it.  Should Donald Trump do this, he is ultimately throwing himself on the “mercy” of the Supreme Court, made up in part by three of his appointees.  There are legal arguments on both sides.  If he can’t get a Pence pardon – what does Trump have to lose? 

But the most secure way for Trump to avoid prosecution would be a Pence Presidential pardon.

It’s THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION – Don’t be surprised!!

President-Elect Joe Biden is choosing his cabinet, and anyone who knows Joe Biden, isn’t surprised at his picks.  There are some simple principles that are driving Biden’s selections and are likely to continue. 

Something New – Competence 

First, Biden is looking for competence.  The folks he picked for his “National Security” team aren’t necessarily ideological.  They are proven, competent, professionals in their fields.  Tony Blinken, Biden’s pick for Secretary of State, worked for Biden on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.  He also served on the National Security Council, was the Deputy National Security Advisor, the National Security Advisor to the Vice President (Biden), and was the Deputy Secretary of State.  Sure he’s mostly worked for Democrats, but more importantly, he knows foreign policy, knows the workings of the State Department, and knows Joe Biden.

Many of his other selections are the same.  Avril Haines will be the next Director of National Intelligence – the top administrator of the United States “spy” agencies.  That job became controversial with the Trump appointment of John Ratcliffe, a Texas Congressman with little National Intelligence experience.  Ratcliffe’s prime qualification for the job seemed to be defending President Trump during the impeachment hearings.

Haines, on the other hand, is the former Deputy Director of the CIA. Prior to that she was a legal counsel to the White House, the State Department, and to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.  And she’s not necessarily popular with more progressive Democrats.  Haines was a key player in the development of the Obama “drone strike” policy.

But she is competent, experienced, and knows Joe Biden.

Heavy Weights

And what about John Kerry?  Kerry, Secretary of State, Democratic candidate for President, US Senator from Massachusetts, is the new “Environmental Czar”.  Biden created that crucial appointment to show his own commitment to improving the environment, a critical issue to the progressive Democrats.  He appointed a “principal” level candidate, and elevated the job to cabinet and National Security Council status.  John Kerry is not going to be “shuffled aside” by anyone, not in the White House, and not in the world.  And he knows Joe Biden.

And Janet Yellen, the first woman to be the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, will be the first woman to be Secretary of the Treasury.  She is a career economist, having held several positions with Federal Reserve banks alternating with professorships at major universities.  And she is considered a “progressive” in the economic world, more concerned about unemployment than inflation. 

Senate Seats

So what happened to using the other Senators who ran for the Democratic candidacy for President?  What about Sanders and Warren, Klobuchar and Booker?  The first factor to consider is the makeup of the Senate itself.  Right now, there are 50 Republicans and 46 Democrats and two Independents who organize with the Democrats.  Two Senate seats are up for grabs still, the runoff seats in Georgia.  That January 5^th election will determine which political party controls the Senate.  Should the Democrats win both it will create a 50-50 Senate, with the new Vice President, Kamala Harris, breaking the tie for the Democrats.  

Joe Biden isn’t going to pull anyone out of the Senate that could alter that possible balance.  Sanders is from Vermont and the governor there is a Republican.  Warren is from Massachusetts, and believe it or not, the governor there is a Republican as well.  Normally, the Governor of the state can appoint an interim Senator until a special election is held.  Republican governors will appoint Republicans:  Sanders and Warren aren’t going anywhere.

The same is true about Sherrod Brown.  Ohio’s Senator is an obvious candidate for Secretary of Labor.  As Ohio’s only statewide elected Democrat, Brown is unlikely to accept any Biden appointment.  Republican Governor Mike DeWine would love to appoint a Republican to that Senate seat.

Progressive Demands

Does that mean that the progressive wing of the Democratic Party won’t get any Cabinet level appointments? 

There are still “domestic” Cabinet level jobs to be filled:  Labor, Commerce, Interior, Energy and others.  And, of course, there is the Attorney General’s position.  There will be other opportunities for more “progressive” Democrats to make their mark.  

But several things are clear at least from these first appointments.  Biden is living up to his campaign pledge of a Cabinet that “looks” like America:  men and women, Black, White and Hispanic.  But there are two even more critical factors in Biden’s first appointments.  Joe Biden knows and trusts them.  And they are experienced and competent.

It was “No Drama Obama”.  Joe Biden wants that too:  an Administration with quiet, competent leadership.  That’ll be a change.

Results

Democrat Joe Biden leads the popular vote by over six million, and has over fifty percent.  When all of the votes are “certified” by the various states, Biden will have 306 Electoral Votes to Donald Trump’s 232. That’s the exact total that Trump claimed was a “landslide” in his victory in 2016.  And, in the three “Blue Wall” states that gave Trump his 2016 victory by the narrow margin of 77,744 votes, Biden flipped them by 255,754.

For a few moments (more like a couple of weeks) it seemed that Donald Trump would try to somehow ignore the popular vote, and politically maneuver himself into a second term in office.  And while last night we saw a Trump tweet “allowing” (ordering?) the Administrator of the GSA to “ascertain” that Joe Biden was the President-Elect and begin the transition process, even in that message Trump still claims to be “fighting the good fight”.  

Donald Trump’s supporters tweeted back to their leader.  Just a few:

“Greatest President Ever!”

“You have to wake up, this is no longer a conspiracy theory.” 

“BIDEN IS NOT MY PRESIDENT”.

Delegitimize

President Trump has led a yearlong campaign to discredit this election.  He has questioned the results every step of the way, including filing “nuisance” lawsuits.  He has created among many of the almost 74 million who voted for him, a “more than reasonable doubt” about the whether the election was “stolen”.

But what if the “shoe was on the other foot”?  What if the very real strategy to political “flip” the results and take the Presidency for Trump had actually worked?  I believe, when history reveals the whole story that we will find that it was a much nearer thing.  It wouldn’t have taken much; a couple more state legislators susceptible to Presidential level pressure, a judge or two that could be influenced, and the Trump plan might have worked.

And what would we Democrats do?  Would we accept that the election was “stolen”; that over a six million vote majority ignored, and the “rules” manipulated to maintain a Trump Presidency? 

Our History

We were “led” by an honorable candidate in 2016.  Secretary Clinton conceded on Wednesday morning, even though the election margin was razor thin.  She said all of the right words:  support the new administration, the will of the people, we must unite and move on.  And even though many of us didn’t follow that advice, with the term “Resistance” in play even before Trump took the oath of office, few questioned the legitimacy of the Trump victory. (Though there remain statistical questions about what happened in balloting in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, and with large precincts in – surprise – Detroit.)

But if the Trump “team” had managed to reverse the election decision, Democrats this time would have been unwilling to accept the results.  What that means – I’m not sure.  It’s not likely that Democrats would take to the streets with guns:  that’s not our style.  But take to the streets – absolutely.  What kind of civil unrest might result from that, I don’t know.

Expect This

So there are many millions of Americans, including some of my closest neighbors; that have been told by their “leader” that the election has been stolen from him, and them.  Many of them are “true believers” in Donald Trump, and in the aura of victimhood he engenders.  

What are they going to do when Joe Biden is sworn in on January 20^th at noon?  It’s hard to imagine that those who would “storm” the State Houses with semi-automatic weapons at the ready because of face masks and stay-at-home orders, would do less if they felt the Presidency was stolen.  Are they going to have a national “truck parade” to block traffic throughout the nation?  That seems pretty futile.  

President Trump has achieved a personal goal.  He has established a “base” that will follow him – anywhere.  And while last night’s tweet (a Hell of a way to run a railroad) acknowledges a Biden victory, Donald Trump is never going to say it.  And so his “base” will never believe it.  Many of those supporters fly the “Don’t Tread on Me” flag of the American Revolution.  Do we really expect they are going to “swallow” an election they believe was “stolen”?  I don’t.

This isn’t over.

Re-Evaluation

We have re-evaluated the “story” of the American Civil War in recent years.  While Americans still recognize the “pathos” of a struggle that set brother against brother, the “new revisionist” history of the War creates a clear moral position.  One side was fighting for the “right” to enslave others: the other side was fighting against it.  

That was clear to those in the 1850’s before the War, and it was clear during the effusion of blood that was the War.  It was only in the 1890’s, after the Union Reconstruction troops were withdrawn from the South and the now older Confederate leaders began to write their stories that the first “revision” of the history began.  “It wasn’t about slavery,” they claimed, “It was about the right of states to determine their own course.”  And they added that the North benefited mightily from slavery, perhaps even more than the South, so there was no moral “high ground”.

Like all good excuses, the “Lost Cause” Confederates had just enough truth on their side to sound convincing.  The North certainly benefited from slavery.  The textile mills of Massachusetts needed the raw material of slavery, cotton, to feed into their giant looms.  Even during the War itself, Southern cotton still found it ways across the tenuous border into the North.  But if it weren’t for slavery, there would have been no war.  And if the South had won, slavery would have remained.  All the “Lost Causes” in the world couldn’t change those facts.

Lost Cause

I too have walked the line from Seminary Ridge to “the Copse of Trees” at Gettysburg, the line of Pickett’s disastrous Charge and the “High Water Mark” of the Confederacy. Southern author William Faulkner (a wonderful writer and a “Lost Causer”) described the “dream” of every fourteen year old Southern (white) boy: to stand at the ready on Seminary Ridge, the flags unfurled, before the order, and change the awful results of that charge. It’s romantic, it’s compelling, but what Faulkner never describes is that the “dream” is one of enslaving his fellow fourteen-year old boys who were black.

So when we think about Robert E. Lee, the leading Confederate General, we need to revise our “eighth grade history class” view.  We were taught that Lee, a career military officer and the rising “star” of the pre-war Army, struggled to determine whether to stand with the Nation he spent his career defending.  And we eighth graders somehow justified the fact that Lee turned on his Nation to defend “Virginia”.  Had Lee taken the commission offered as the leading Union General, perhaps the four years of Civil War and the 600,000 dead might have been only a fraction.  But he didn’t.  He stood for slavery.

Appomattox

But there still is one moment when we can look at Lee and find honor.  After four long years of struggle, when Lee saw he could find no legitimate path to continue the fight, he surrendered.  At Appomattox Courthouse, Lee chose to give up, rather than continue the slaughter.

He did have other options.  He could have led his Army of Northern Virginia to “fight to the death”.  His depleted and starving troops would have followed Lee into the rifles and the canister shot once again, until they were all just bodies lying in the April Virginia sun.  Lee had plenty of officers who wanted it to end that way.

Or Lee could have taken the advice of his younger staff.  They laid out a plan of guerilla warfare.  He could have “dissolved” his Army, sending them up into the Blue Ridge and the Appalachians to hide, regroup, and continue the war as small groups of “terrorists”.  The “cause” would have continued for years, perhaps decades or even longer.  America could have become a land of perpetual fighting, like the Middle East, or the centuries in Ireland.

Legitimacy

But Lee knew the fight for a “legal” Confederate nation was over.  The “peculiar institution”, slavery, which served as the foundation of the Confederacy, was done.  To become a “guerilla force” would not change that irrevocable result of loss on the battlefields.  So he surrendered, and ultimately ended the bloodshed.  He went to Lexington, Virginia, to Washington College, and lived the remaining five years of his life as its President.  His last act as a General was to allow for an actual peace.

Donald Trump has arrived at such a moment.  

In all the “legitimate” ways he has lost the 2020 Presidential election.  Even the states like Georgia, where the Republican Party controls all of the levers of electoral power, acknowledge that Joe Biden won the election.  And in the Courts, Trump’s attorneys are being more than laughed out of room.  Judges are disparaging their arguments, and seeing their “evidence” for what it is:  propaganda.

Trump can find a way to accept the loss, and allow the institution of the American government to continue.  Unlike Lee, Trump won’t be going to some university retirement:  perhaps he will even look to run again in 2024.  But he can maintain the legitimacy of the election, and keep it as a means for his own regaining power.

Ruin

Or he can follow the strategy the he has set upon now.  He can delegitimize the election.  Today, tens of millions of Americans really believe that the election was somehow “stolen” and the results are tainted beyond acceptability.  Those millions could be like those Confederates who would go into the hills, to fight on as guerilla forces.  But instead of acts of terror and attacks in the middle of the night, the Trump “guerillas” would simply deny the validity of anything a Biden government might do.

In the end, Democracy is a cooperative effort.  The winners govern and the losers plot to become winners once again.  But all participate in the process of governing, legitimizing the system.  But Donald Trump is flirting with a path where there is no acceptance, no moving on.  Republicans who depend on Trump’s support cannot be allowed any cooperation to govern.  That cooperation becomes “traitorous”, and to do so means political suicide.

The Choice

We see it happening today.  Even the “moderate” Republicans cannot utter the words “President-elect Biden” without risking political exile.  

Our view of Robert E. Lee is less “mythical” than it was forty years ago.  We see him more clearly as a man who stood for an unacceptable institution, a man who could have made a morally right choice, but didn’t.  But there is still the one “honorable” act of Lee:  the act of allowing the nation to move on.  We have a lot lower expectations of Donald Trump.  But Trump only exists because those in power around him allow him to continue by their silence.

Their legacy and our Democracy are at stake.  Should those Republicans standing silent remain so, the “revision” of their actions by history will be brutal.

John Mellencamp – Pink Houses (Ain’t that America)

Louisiana

So if you’ve read many of my recent essays, you know that my wife Jenn has taken in a “rehab” dog, Louisiana.  Lou was rescued from Baton Rouge with two broken legs and a dislocated hip. A team from Lost Pet Recovery, the group that Jenn and I volunteer with, went down to pick him up.  OSU veterinary care patched him up, with a plate in one leg and hip relocation surgery, and now he’s doing his second “rehab” stint here at our house.

Lou’s up early, and needs his “big” walk of the day as part of the rehab.  Then he takes a bunch of drugs to keep him quiet so he can heal. It takes a while for him to settle down again and he needs company.  We’ve turned Jenn’s office into his rehab facility, and we take turns “hangin’ with Lou on the daily shifts.  He wants us there, you can tell from the Cajun accented howls if we leave too soon.

But it’s a good time to get some writing done.  I’m sitting here in Jenn’s office at 5:30 in the morning, staring at her map of the United States on the wall.  There are pushpins in all of the places she’s gone. Most of them we’ve visited together. There are pins up the coast of California, from LA to San Francisco from when Jenn, our son Joe and I drove the Pacific Coast Highway through Big Sur.  We made it to Yosemite National Park on the trip as well.

Packed with Stars

The first night near Yosemite we stayed at a hotel just outside of the Park.  Yosemite National Park is huge; maybe thirty miles from the Park entrance to Yosemite Valley and the amazing waterfalls and cliffs.  The hotel was “rustic”; it kind of had that old summer camp look.  It was somewhere my Dad would have taken us on a road trip back in the early 1960’s with rough pine log beds and wood paneled walls.  

We arrived there with a couple of steaks we picked up in a little town called Manteca on the way over from San Francisco.  That was our stop to do some laundry and shopping. We also brought some bottles of wine from the Hearst Castle winery in San Simeon just south of Big Sur.

After grilling steaks, potatoes and green beans, and knocking back a couple of bottles of Chardonnay, Jenn, Joey and I decided to climb “the mountain” behind the hotel.  It was really a hill; we were already in the mountains.  But our adventure led us to the stars of Yosemite, far away from the city lights.  It was amazing, from the Milky Way to the constellations to the planets:  stars packed the sky from horizon to horizon.

We woke up slow the next morning, sore from the stumbling journey back down, and from the chardonnay as well. We would see Half Dome, Bridal Veil Falls, El Capitan and Glacier Peak, that next day, and they were amazing.  But nothing was quite as striking as all those stars, up on the hill above the camp just outside the Park.

Solitary Drive

There’s another pushpin in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Jenn and I, and Dash and Buddy, our two dogs at the time, drove out to Telluride, Colorado, to visit my sister and brother-in-law.  We travelled out through Missouri, Kansas and Colorado, but decided to return on the “Southern Route” through New Mexico, Texas and Oklahoma.  

So we drove out of Western Colorado, past ancient Mesa Verde and into the high desert Navajo Country in New Mexico.  We made the long empty drive down US 550 diagonally through the plateau country, from Farmington to Albuquerque.  It was empty land on an empty road, dry red high country.  It was remarkable for it’s quiet solitude, as if no one had walked those hills before.  

We stopped at a gas station in the middle of the journey, the only stop for a hundred miles.  The blaring heavy metal rock coming through speakers in the store contrasted with the ultimate quiet of the squared off mountains all around.  The kids working the store seemed surprised by the interruption – a customer they didn’t know.  But they were polite, and directed us to the Port-a-Potty in the back.

Twelve Hours 

And there’s a pushpin in one of our “go to” places, Pensacola, just twelve hours from gray Pataskala winter to the white beach and sun.  It’s a fun town, part beach, part Navy, part Southern charm and part New Orleans. 

There’s a park nearby, just across the state line, the Alabama Gulf State Park. The Lodge there is isolated on the beach, half a mile from the next nearest structure.  The hotel is wonderful, the Gulf of Mexico just outside the room windows.  You can sit on the balcony and watch the waves come in.  And while the restaurant is a little “too” gourmet for our taste, there are plenty of other places to eat not too far away.

That was the last trip we took, just a couple weeks before the world changed with COVID. 

Just Folks 

In all of those places, from Big Sur to Yosemite, Telluride to Albuquerque, Pensacola to Gulf Shores:  no one ever asked if we were Democrat or Republican.  We were all just “folks”, enjoying the scenery, the food, the life and the people of those very different places.  

So when I get too wrapped up in the politics of the moment, on what damage might be left to do before this President leaves office, and how my family, friends and neighbors will react to our shockingly fragile government and life, I think back on that map, and Jenn’s pushpins.  It’s still an amazing country, with lots to see.  When COVID is over, and maybe our politics get back to “normal”(whatever that might be now); there’s Boston and Seattle, back to New York, and maybe Big Bend National Park way down in Texas.  There’s a lot of America to see, and Americans to meet.  And maybe we can all be just “folks” again.  

I’m looking forward to that. 

Farm Town

When I moved here to Pataskala, Ohio in 1978, it was still considered a “farm town”.  The directions to the high school were: “Turn left off State Route 16 onto Watkins Road, go south three miles, and it’s in the west cornfield just before you reach the National Road”.   In October, soon after the fields were cleared, the high school had “Tractor Day” when the seniors drove their Green or Red (it’s a thing) tractor to school and paraded in the parking lot.  

The landscape, now covered with sub-divisions, was dotted with older farmhouses, barns, sheds and silos.  Silos were the tall circular structures where grain was stored, piped into the top and filled at the end of the harvest.  Some silos would get corn some would get soybeans.  In the spring, when the structures were empty they were fun to “play” in. 

The school “tradition” was to kidnap the senior government teacher on the last day of seniors’ regular school.  No one told me about that tradition when I took the job, but for the first three years of my career, I found myself bound (one year handcuffed) and held by the graduating class.  Silos were a great “prison”, though one year I figured out I could jump out of a window about twenty feet up.  

I managed to escape, hide from the searching (and not quite sober) seniors in a field, and walked the few miles back home.  That year they weren’t able to parade me as the trophy into the morning senior assembly.  They were eighteen, I was twenty-four.  It was a great game.

Danger

But silos could be dangerous places as well.  Every year in some small farm school in Ohio, there’s the tragic story of a kid lost to the grain in a silo.  They fall in as the grain is being loaded, the dust chokes them to unconsciousness, and the grain smothers them to death.

While there are still a few old farmers left at the local diner, Pataskala is not really a farm town anymore. Forty years have turned it into a suburb of Columbus, with housing developments and industrial parks filling the places were corn and soybeans grew. Most of the kids at school couldn’t identify what “green and red” means when it comes to farm equipment, and struggle to tell the difference between soybeans or corn growing in the few remaining spring fields. John Deere makes lawn tractors as far as they are concerned.

And the few remaining silos are now homes for rodents and bats.  The danger there isn’t the grain, it’s the structure collapsing on the few adventurous kids who put down their video controllers long enough to venture outside.

The News

But there is a different kind of silo that impacts our growing suburban community.  It’s a silo of information, a “mental” structure rather than a physical one.  But those mental silos are just as real as the old silo that still looms by the railroad tracks in “downtown” Pataskala.  And they are just as dangerous.

While forty years has changed the landscape, it’s really only been in the last ten that we’ve seen this mental containment.  Up through the first decade of the twenty-first century, we all got our information, “the news,” from similar sources.  We read the Columbus Dispatch or the Newark Advocate, and we watched Channels 4, 6, and 10.  Sure there was cable news, with Fox, CNN and MSNBC, but we still all went to the same “well” for most of our general information.

Maybe we should blame it on the IPhone.  When did “getting” the news become a matter of watching a two-inch by three-inch screen?  And when did our news sources stop being Dan Rather and Peter Jennings and Tom Brokaw?  Now we have our “inside sources”, the Twitter feed that tells us exactly what’s going on.  And the only time we catch the “local” news on 4, 6, or 10 is to see the high school football highlights or catch a late weather alert.  

Facts

Our information is so “silo’ed” that what’s a “fact” is no longer a certainty.  We are in the middle of a global pandemic.  Over a quarter of a million Americans are dead just in the last nine months.  Our schools here in Pataskala just went “virtual”, because too many of the staff are getting sick.  And yet, we can’t even agree to wear masks, social distance, or stay home for Thanksgiving.  My silo of information says yes – my neighbor’s silo says it’s all a hoax.

Over the next six months, how we decide to deal with COVID will determine how many more will die.   And which information “silo” we live in will decide what we think about that.

And now there’s an even bigger question.  Another neighbor down the street flies his American Flag at half-staff today.  Below the Stars and Stripes – a Trump for President banner. He believes that Trump won the 2020 Presidential election, and that Joe Biden truly stole the Presidency from him.   There’s no discussing it.  His silo of information tells him over and over and over that the election has been rigged.

And my silo says the opposite: that Donald Trump is intentionally trying to destroy confidence in the election process, for his own personal and financial benefit.  And that the Republican Party, sold lock, stock and soul to Trump, is willing to disenfranchise as many minority voters as it takes to maintain their power.

Collapse

The old silos out in the fields are collapsing from disuse and age.  They are a hazard: old bricks falling from the top, and vermin living in the base.  But the information silos built mainly on the screens in our pockets are structurally impregnable.  We cannot peer out; we can only look up at our one source of information, pouring like grain on top of us.  And who’s to say that we are right?   If all we see is corn, how do we know what the soybeans look like?

There are two Americas right now, one looking at “corn” and saying there are no “soybeans”, and one doing the other.  And no matter whether corn or soybeans are “right”, as Lincoln said:

“…a house divided against itself cannot stand.”

Holding a prior President criminally accountable after their Administration is not “the American Way”.  It is far outside the “norms” of American History.  It’s “banana republic” behavior; what the rotating dictators of some unnamed Latin American country might do.  

Watergate

Gerald Ford became President upon the resignation of Richard Nixon after two years of the Watergate scandal . The Republican leadership of the Congress, told Nixon he would be impeached and removed from office.  While removal from office isn’t a criminal offense, it would prevent Nixon from getting his much-needed Government pension.  And he still would be open to criminal prosecution. So he resigned.

 There was ample evidence that Nixon committed multiple criminal offenses as President. He was even an “unindicted co-conspirator” in a Federal criminal obstruction of justice indictment that resulted in multiple convictions.

But Ford determined that a criminal trial of Richard Nixon would drag the “Watergate Era” on for years.  His goal was to move the nation on, to end “…our long national nightmare”.  So he pardoned Nixon for any crimes he might have committed as President of the United States.  There would be no “perp-walk”, no mug shot, and no “show trial” with Richard Nixon in handcuffs.

Ford took a tremendous amount of “heat” for the pardon, even testifying at a Congressional hearing to explain his reasoning.  It was one of the major reasons he lost to Democrat Jimmy Carter two years later.  But Ford was a Republican like Nixon, and the Vice President appointed by Nixon to replace the resigned Spiro Agnew.  There couldn’t have been a friendlier “venue” for Nixon’s pardon.

Political revenge in America occurs at the polling place.  We don’t “do” vendettas, and we don’t put our former leaders on trial. We vote them out. Or at least, that’s what we’ve done in the past.

Unprecedented

The Trump Administration can be characterized by one word:  unprecedented.  From his very first day in office, as Press Secretary Sean Spicer unabashedly lied about the size of the inauguration crowd, the Trump Administration broke the “norms” of American Government.   

There is an actual list of over 20,000 lies that President Trump told in the first three and a half years in office (WAPO). But lying isn’t illegal.  And there are the hundreds of outrageous policy decisions from selling off mineral rights in National Monuments to building oil pipelines through sacred Native American lands to using Federal forces to battle protestors in the streets.  But those policy decisions, as much as they were disliked, aren’t illegal either.

The President politicized the Department of Justice, suggesting prosecutions and demanding personal loyalties from chief law enforcement officers.  These actions might have bordered on obstruction, and were distasteful and against long established norms of America. But they weren’t illegal.

So if Donald Trump, forty-fifth President of the United States committed crimes, what were they?

Already Determined

There are two areas that are “done deals”.  The first is the Russia investigation, conducted by Special Prosecutor Robert Mueller’s team.  The exhaustive report issued by Mueller and long debated in Congress turned out to be an exercise in “fence sitting”.  Mueller refused to take a side. 

 From the start of the investigation he determined that a serving President couldn’t be charged. So he never suggested what those charges might be.  While there seems like plenty of evidence for charges, those questions are already “asked and answered” in the eyes of the American people, regardless of the unsatisfying results.

The only possible charge Trump could face from the Russia investigation now is as part of the Michael Cohen indictment, where he was the unnamed “Individual One” who orchestrated the violation of campaign finance laws.  And while that is a pre-cooked charge, ready for re-heating, it also is exactly the kind of charge that would be seen as the Biden Administration “getting vengeance”.

The second area that’s a “done deal” is the Ukraine scandal that led to Trump’s impeachment.  The evidence was actually pretty clear, and is even clearer today than it was during Trump’s impeachment trial in front of the Senate.  The President tried to use the power of the US government to leverage a foreign leader for “dirt” against a political opponent. Criminal actions, including obstruction of justice and abuse of power, clearly occurred.  

But the people of the United States feel that this is “adjudicated”.  The Impeachment Trial felt like a trial. And even though it has nothing to do with criminal law or the double jeopardy clause of the Fifth Amendment, in the public eye, the President is “not guilty”.

What’s Left?

There are two areas where the upcoming Biden Administration could look for criminal charges against the forty-fifth President.  The first area is in Trump and his family’s use of the office of the President to enrich themselves.  From getting special deals for golf courses in Scotland, to hotel fees in the Old Post Office in Washington, the Trump business has consistently “monetized” the Presidency.  Some of these may well violate the emoluments clause of the Constitution, and other actions look lie a straight “shakedown” of the American people.  

And though some of Trump’s personal and business behavior may be beyond the scope of the Department of Justice, they may be right in the ballpark of the Manhattan District Attorney’s office.  That investigation is already underway, and will soon pick up the pace, unencumbered by the burden of Trump being the serving President.

And finally there is the singular outrageous act of the Trump Administration, separating children at the border from their parents.  At least 666 children cannot be returned:  the government lost contact with the parents.  This intentional and morally reprehensible act may be criminal as well, a crime against humanity.

Biden’s Choice

Joe Biden is a traditionalist.  He will almost automatically look to history, and Gerald Ford’s precedent.  I don’t expect Biden to pardon Donald Trump for anything. But I do expect that he will avoid the morass and division a Trump prosecution might cause.

However, Joe Biden is also an institutionalist.  He believes that the President should keep the Department of Justice at arms length.  So if his Attorney General, or a new US Attorney, wants to pursue charges against Donald Trump or his family, Joe Biden may feel obligated to stay away from the decision.  That would fit his and America’s norms for what the President should do.

COVID

It feels like life is starting to close down again, and it is not just Governor Mike DeWine of Ohio doing the closing.  We can read the COVID statistics.  Ohio in the past three days:  total cases increased by 14,000.  Hospitalizations are up 600.  And fifty more have died of COVID (Ohio).  Our local schools are switching to full online learning Thursday.  A statewide “mandatory unenforced” curfew goes into effect Thursday as well, from 10 pm to 5 am.  The circle of COVID is closing in.

We are lying low as well, taking care of the dogs, and staying close to home.  We seemed to have slipped into a shrunken world of our own.  So, to break things up at least a little bit last night we threw all of our rules out the window.  I went to pickup a fast-food dinner at Wendy’s!

Nullification

So I was in the Jeep, waiting in the drive-thru line when I heard the news.  There is an obscure government committee in Michigan, the Wayne County Board of Canvassers.  After an election, this four-member group has the task of “balancing the books”.  They make sure the precinct totals reported match the actual precinct counts.  After an election, they literally cross check the lists by hand. 

Like election boards all across the nation, the Wayne County Board is split between representatives of the two major political parties, Republican and Democrat.  These are “professional” board of election personnel; it’s their job.  But they are divided by Party, because here in America, that’s how we try to guarantee fairness.  There’s no pretense of some “apolitical” group of neutral workers.  We just assume both Parties have an interest, and will watch each other.  And they do.

So it was a routine meeting.  The four completed their task; the books were crosschecked and agreed to.  The vote was a formality, announcing to the world that one more step in the common election process was concluded.  They Wayne County Board of Canvassers would certify the election results to the Michigan State Canvassing Board.

But they didn’t.  The two Republican representatives voted against certification.  This was despite the books being “balanced”.  Their task was completed.  They simply refused to acknowledge it.  But by voting against “certifying” the votes, it was a two to two tie, and the certification process was stopped.

Disenfranchisement

Wayne County, by the way, contains the single biggest municipality in Michigan: Detroit.  Joe Biden won Wayne County by almost 300,000 votes.  He won Michigan by 149,000 votes, so if somehow the votes in Wayne County could be “vanished”, that would leave Donald Trump as the winner of Michigan.

The Wayne County vote is 15% of the total votes in the state of Michigan.  The thought was breathtaking.  These two folks on the Board of Canvassers, could disenfranchise over 800,000 people, and change the results of the election.  And they could do it, without legitimacy.  As the saying goes, “…they had one job to do”.  And they did it, to completion, and agreed on the results.  It was only then that they decided to vote against their own conclusions.

And that’s where I felt the rise of just a little bit of panic.  If two obscure folks in a dingy office in Detroit could change the course of the election in Michigan, couldn’t that happen in Philadelphia, and Milwaukee, and Atlanta?  Is the pressure generated by the Trump-led disinformation campaign so great, that everyday government workers will determine to ignore their own findings, and knuckle-under to illicit pressure?

For just a moment, I saw an America where the votes of millions could be completely ignored.  It already happens, legally, with the Electoral College system.  Out of the last five Presidential elections, twice the winner of the popular vote has lost the Presidency.  But this “vision” was on a whole different scale.  This wasn’t some Constitutional peculiarity; this was out and out disenfranchisement on a scale the United States hadn’t seen since the passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

Win At All Cost

And who would be disenfranchised?  The Republican Party knows full well that people of color vote overwhelmingly for – not Republicans.  So disenfranchising them would allow Republicans to win.  The idea that an American political Party, the Party of Abraham Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt and Earl Warren, would fully embrace the concept that they cannot fully represent the nation is astounding.  That the Grand Old Party would then simply say:  “don’t count their votes” – well, that’s not my America.

 I felt my foundational “Boy Scout” belief in American values tremble.  

A couple of hours later, the two Republicans on the Wayne County Board of Canvassers changed their mind.  Whatever threats they received that made them vote against their own conclusions the first time, paled when threatened by the real possibility that a Michigan Judge might find them in contempt for ignoring their own findings.  And the Republican leaders of the Michigan legislature made it clear that “they” weren’t going to overthrow the legitimate decision of the voters of Wayne County.  

So the two Republicans on the Wayne County Board of Canvassers changed their mind again, and the vote was certified by a four to zero agreement.  Sure, they got a “sop”, an agreement that the Michigan Secretary of State (a Democrat) would conduct an “audit” of the Wayne County results.  But the process continues in Michigan.

Fail Safe

The entire event shows how close to the knife-edge our Democracy seems to be.  There’s a 1964 black and white movie about nuclear war starring Henry Fonda called “Fail Safe”.  The story goes that a computer glitch sends bombers to attack Russia, and there’s no way to call them back.  It’s a dark, depressing film, as Fonda (the President) tries to convince the Soviet leader that he should not respond by using his nuclear weapons.  The rest of humanity went on about their everyday lives, not knowing that the mushroom clouds were just minutes away.

Life is on that edge right now.  COVID is closing in.  And this little vignette in Detroit should demonstrate how fragile our Democracy really is.  There won’t be tanks in the streets, or even Proud Boys with AR-15’s to change our government.  It will be obscure officials, making fateful decisions in backrooms.  

And then it will be gone.

Light in the Tunnel

I can’t leave this essay here.  The Attorney General of Michigan stepped in within minutes to defend the voters.  The threat of contempt of court was real, so the judicial system of Michigan was on hand to defend Democracy as well.  And the leaders of the Michigan legislature refused to “back” this subversion of the vote.

There is hope.  The “process” righted itself.  There is “light at the end of the tunnel”, and it’s not the headlight from the 4:35 freight to Chicago or a nuclear blast.  But somehow it does feel we need to watch our Democracy closer than ever before.  It’s not time to panic, but it is time to keep our eyes open.  

Democracy may need our help in the next sixty days.

Math

A “Facebook” friend of mine complained of COVID restrictions last night.  She posted: “Only .0001% deaths…and we are getting ready to shut down again.  This is more than ridiculous!!!”  Here in Ohio this has been a recurring theme since last March.  We had our fair share of protestors on the State House lawn, demanding their “freedom” not to wear masks.   And small business owners, reasonably afraid of losing their livelihoods, have fought against restrictions.

So let’s start with where we are in Ohio right now. First of all, the “.0001%” number is bogus.  How do you even get there?  Take the entire population of the state, and divide it into the number of deaths.  Mathematically, by the way – that’s “.01%”.  But besides eighth grade math mistakes, what’s wrong?  As a “snapshot”, most of the population hasn’t had COVID  – yet.  So since they haven’t been infected, they certainly aren’t dying from it.  But we know that COVID infection is spreading at an alarming rate.  Eventually most of the population may be exposed, and the “.01%” fatality rate will climb.  So here is a snapshot of Ohio numbers that make more sense.

Ohio Numbers

There are 11 million people in the state.  Almost 300,000 Ohioans have been diagnosed with COVID. That’s about 3%, and it’s growing quickly.  Also there are likely many more folks that had COVID, but were asymptomatic and never diagnosed.  Here’s the critical number though:  out of those diagnosed, 22,265 had to be hospitalized.  That’s 7%.  So if you are diagnosed with COVID, right now there’s a 7% chance of ending up in a hospital for treatment here in Ohio.

There have been 5722 deaths from COVID here in Ohio.  Most of those who died were hospitalized – which means that there’s a 25% chance that if you need to be hospitalized for COVID, you might not make it.  That’s one in four.

And here’s the final, scary numbers.  There were 40,000 new cases of COVID diagnosed in Ohio – last week!  We are averaging 199 new hospitalized patients each day.  The rate of infection, how many people are diagnosed a week, is increasing quickly.  Sure, part of that number is that from testing more people – and we ought to be testing a whole lot more people so we have a “real” percentage of the infection in our population (Ohio Coronavirus.org). 

Waiting List

But the number that should worry Ohioans is the number of folks in the hospital.  We can argue about “rates” of infection and testing, but there is no denying the fact that our hospitals are being crushed by COVID.  The Cleveland Clinic postponed elective surgeries for the foreseeable future.  Emergency departments in the Columbus metro area were so slammed last Friday, that one Level I Trauma Center (Level I is the most able to handle major cases) redirected ambulances away from their unit, and another Level II Center was unable to accept any new patients at all.  Think of that for a moment – ambulances are redirected to Emergency Departments farther away – and if you drive yourself to the hospital – they don’t let you in.

So let’s not fool ourselves with “bad” math.  We were warned back in March:  if we don’t control the rate of infection, we will lose control of our hospitals.  We will not be able to treat both COVID patients, and the folks with all of the other problems that put them in the hospital in the first place.  People will die, who didn’t have to die.

Who Lives

We dodged that bullet in March by shutting down, wearing masks, and social distancing.  But that was a long, long time ago.  Now shutting down, masks, and social distancing are “political” issues rather than medical ones.  We even had a Supreme Court Justice make “ex parte” statements  (outside of a court case) about the Constitutionality of restrictions.  He’s worried that folks can’t practice their religion by going to church.  

We should be worried about everyone in church getting COVID.  We should be worried about the elderly, often regular churchgoers, getting COVID and dying. Not because they “had” to die, and not because it was “their time”.  Dying because some church leaders willfully ignored science and brought them together.  Benjamin Franklin famously quoted, “God helps those who help themselves”.   Justice Alito and Ohioans need to help themselves and protect folks.

There is “light at the end of the tunnel”.  Vaccines are literally around the corner.  Sometime between now and June, it’s likely that most of the population could be vaccinated, and the COVID pandemic controlled (not over).  We can then return to many of the things that we call “regular life”.  

But in the meantime – we decide how many will die.  If we control the disease:  wearing masks, social distance, and, if necessary, shutdown for a few weeks to regain control, we can save many lives.  If we don’t, then we betray those who are vulnerable and kill them.  It’s not political – it’s simple math and science.

Teddy

The “gold standard” in modern United States election turnout was the election of 1908.  Teddy Roosevelt, the incumbent, chose not to run for a third term, citing Washington’s two-term precedent.  This was in spite of the fact that Roosevelt, still young at forty-eight, became President as a result of the assassination of William McKinley and only served three years of his first term in office.

But after seven years Roosevelt had enough of being President.  A yearlong world tour awaited, including a massive safari in Africa.  So his “chosen” replacement was Cincinnati’s own William Howard Taft, the serving Secretary of War.  And while Taft didn’t have the personable energy that the dynamic Roosevelt brought to the White House, he was the technocrat who could implement Roosevelt’s Progressive goals.

Progressive v Populist

Running against Republican Taft was the populist Democrat from Nebraska, Williams Jennings Bryan.  His soaring oratory in the name of the “people” galvanized the small farmers of Nebraska, and the coal miners from Pennsylvania.  It was his third (and last) run for the Presidency.

America was still a segregated nation, and women did not have the right to vote in many states.  But of those eligible to vote, almost 66% came out to help choose the President: 14,087,379.  That’s out of a total population of just less than 89 million Americans.

It wasn’t just the voting that was segregated.  The nation was only thirty-two years beyond the end of the Reconstruction Era.  While the issue of slavery was resolved, the former slaves states still voted as a solid Democratic block.  The “Union” states tended to still vote Republican, and though Bryan earned a few inroads in Colorado, Nevada and his home Nebraska; Taft swept the northern tier and won with 51.6% of the vote. Bryan earned 43%, with candidates from the Socialist Party and a smattering of other causes taking the remaining percentages.

Showing Up

It is projected that a modern record 67% of eligible Americans voted in this month’s election.  The current count is just under 152 million – but there are a few more million votes still to be counted, particularly in California. (No, the state of California isn’t “creating” votes, no matter what the Republican Party would like you to think.  Their “vote anyway you can” system just takes a lot longer to tally.  And besides, it’s almost 17 million votes – more than the entire national vote a century ago). The US population today is 331 million people.

So for those “glass half full” kind of folks – more people voted in 2020 than ever before.  For those “half emptiers”:  almost 100 million eligible to vote chose not to.  For many it was a conscious choice. Some military officers and other officials follow the “George Marshall” precedent and don’t vote at all.  And of course, there are different groups with religious reasons for not participating.  And there are those people who just don’t think it matters, or that their voice makes a difference. 

But as far as trends are concerned more Americans voted and at a higher rate in 2020 than ever before.  America “SHOWED UP”.

And here’s another notable fact from the 2020 election.  Donald John Trump, Republican candidate for President in 2020, received the second most votes of ANY candidate for President in American history.  More than 73 million Americans voted for him.  More than ever voted for Barack Obama.  So while Joe Biden may claim a “mandate” with over 78 million, the nation is still starkly divided into two visions of America.

Uniting

Biden sees himself as a “uniter” not a “divider”.  And that’s been the overall take on his forty-seven year history in government.  Biden is the one who reached “across the aisle”.  Not only did he deal with the opposition party, but some, like John McCain, were also his closest friends.  And in his earlier days in the Senate, Biden would work across the divides within the Democratic Party.  He could reach out to the old remaining Southern Democrats, the descendants of those post-Reconstruction era segregationists.  Biden could span a party that included John Stennis and James Eastland of Mississippi, as well as Ted Kennedy and John Kerry of Massachusetts.

The challenge of the 21^st Century for President-Elect Biden will be finding common purpose with his opposition.  The Republican Party of the past, with defined goals of personal freedom, unfettered capitalism and a strong world presence, is no longer.  Instead, the “Trumpian” Republican Party has drifted towards a more isolationist, more reactionary and racist view.  Where Biden and McCain could often find agreements, it’s hard to see the same possibilities anymore with McConnell or Graham.

It’s not because those particular Republicans don’t “think” the same way they used to.  But the Republican politics of today don’t allow them to act on those thoughts.  A “tweet” might destroy their political base.  They are “required” to fall in line with Trump’s brand of “white victimization” or lose office.  That won’t change with the 2020 results and Trump out of the White House.  It’s how the former President will stay relevant, and more importantly, pay his enormous bills.  And the battle for his “hardcore 40%” support base is only just beginning.

Division

Meanwhile the “Progressive” side of Biden’s own party will demand their agenda, the one that Biden already agreed to, at least in part.  So how does President Biden take a nation so radically divided and apply an increased national health care plan, or improved environment standards, or comprehensive immigration reform?  Who on the Republican side can he find with common purpose?  Frankly, in a Senate so evenly split, regardless of the outcomes in Georgia, can President Biden even find commonality with fellow Democrat Joe Manchin of West Virginia?

Abraham Lincoln prophesized that, “…a house divided against itself cannot stand”.  That was over the fundamental contradiction of the American experiment:  how a nation founded on the principle of  “…all men are created equal” could allow slavery.  Biden faces a similar racial crisis.  Within twenty-five years, white people in the United States will be the minority.  It’s the growing fear of that unavoidable truth that creates the strength of Donald Trump’s “populism”.  It’s the new incarnation of the “snake underneath the table” of American politics, the same “snake” that was there at the writing of the Declaration and the Constitution – racism.

So just over half of America has turned to a white man from the 20^th Century to deal with this “not so modern” problem.  He truly believes that we can be “E Pluribus Unum”, out of many, one.  It’s hard to see the way forward – but I hope Joe Biden does.

It’s Friday the Thirteenth in the remarkable year of 2020.  What could possibly go wrong?  

Louisiana

So for me, Friday the Thirteenth started at three in the morning.  We are rehabilitating a dog named Lou (…me and you and a dog named Lou – not quite right).  Lou is short for Louisiana, where Lou came from.  My wife Jenn was part of a Lost Pet Recovery (LPR) rescue mission to save Lou, who was found in a parking lot at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge.  Lou had two broken legs, and a broken hip as well.  The LPR team brought him back to Columbus, where the folks at OSU repaired one leg and the hip.  The other leg is healing, but we’ll have to see whether it will ultimately require surgical repair.

Lou needs a lot of rehabilitation: time to recover from the surgeries, regain strength, get over heartworms, and learn how to be a “good dog”.  The hard part is that Lou is only a year and a half old, still a puppy.  But he can’t run and play.  There’s too much healing to go.  So Lou has to spend a lot of “quiet” time, not a puppy kind of thing.  The drugs he takes help, but it still is hard on him.  He sees our other dogs, who come to the door.  Our Lab Atticus will even bring toys.  But Lou can’t play yet, and he gets frustrated.  Can’t blame him.

The meds work for a while, but ultimately wear off.  And if that’s at three in the morning, then Lou’s rolling.  It’s time for a “rehab” walk (getting longer all the time), some food, and some hard persuasion to try to get Lou back into Jenn’s office, now Lou’s rehab facility.  Jenn has done most of the  “night duty”; but from time to time I’ll take that “way too early” shift.  

Dog Rules

We’ve had Lou for about a month.  He’s not a permanent addition – we are a three-dog family already.  Four would require too much space, inside and out; more then we’ve got.  But we can get Lou ready for his “final family”.  And we’ve probably got another month or so to go before Lou’s ready for adoption.  He will be around for the rest of the Trump Administration.

You knew there had to be a political “hook” to this story. Here on Friday the Thirteenth, we are teaching Lou to be a good dog.  He’s learning to behave, to play, and what’s allowed and not.  He can chew up his “rope”, and he can tear into his chew toys.  But he got in trouble for eating the rug, and the floor molding, and the orthopedic bed we picked up for him.  He’s learning – and now he can even hang out in his crate in the family room with the rest of us from time to time.  But all “good” dogs have to learn the norms, the rules.  It’s what we do with puppies, and with the kids we teach in school.

Life Rules

But I guess someone failed to teach the President of the United States how to be a “good” person.  The hardest part of running for office is losing.  It tests character.  As a high school coach for forty years, I knew it was part of my job to teach kids how to lose as well as how to win.  We put our best efforts, our hearts, and years of hard work into trying to achieve our goals.  And there were times when we did it all, and achieved what we set out to do.  But there were also times, probably more of them, that we fell short.  And as the coach, the role model, it was my job to demonstrate what the “norm” was for dealing with loss.

There is a time for deep disappointment, for frustration, and for emotion.  But that time is not in public, and it’s not towards your opponent.  After a loss, it’s time to congratulate the winner, and take responsibility for your own actions. Blaming others, opponents, officials, or other factors out of your control, doesn’t change the result.  So, as I told my teams every time it happened:  show class.  Demonstrate how to lose with grace.  Congratulate the winners; walk over and shake their hands.  Compliment them for a hard fought win.  My coaches and I did the same.  

I knew what my job was, win or lose:  to act with class, as a representative of the school, and as a role model for the athletes on my team.  The greatest lesson wasn’t in achieving the goal.  It was in learning how to live with failure or victory in life.

Missing Lesson

I listened to a reporter yesterday going to great lengths.  She was trying to explain how the “President’s men” were trying to convince the President that he had to leave office, but didn’t have to accept defeat in the polls. Donald Trump acts as if he “owns” the Presidency and the White House.  He doesn’t.  He serves at the pleasure of “We the People of the United States”.  But it seems that Donald Trump has decided his role as the “aggrieved victim” of the 2020 election will support his “post Presidency”:  politically and more important, financially.

Lou is learning what’s expected of a “good dog”.  Someday he’s going to be a great, lovable, energetic friend for some family.  He’ll always bear the scars of Baton Rouge, but he’ll be an even better dog for it.

The President could learn from Lou, or from our high school teams.  His greatest goal should be the “good” of the United States.  He can fight in court for votes if he wants, but denying Biden the information and resources to prepare for his Presidency is just selfish.  

Former President Obama described the situation yesterday. He said that Trump’s selfishness would ultimately not just hurt Joe Biden. 

It will hurt American Democracy.

Fake News

Joe Biden will be sworn in as the 46^th President of the United States on January 20^th, 2021.  To paraphrase Gerald Ford, “…our long national nightmare will be over”. 

But of course – it won’t be.  Donald Trump once told CBS reporter Lesley Stahl that he called the media “fake news” all the time, so that folks would stop believing them.  And now the media and the chief election official of every state in the nation declare the veracity of 2020 election results. But they are ignored. 

It’s just fake news.

A recent survey shows that only 3% of the nation really believes that Donald Trump won the election.  But somehow it doesn’t even matter that folks know Biden’s victory is true.  Many continue to “spout” the Trump line:  the election rigged, the mail-in vote fraudulent.  That moment on Tuesday night when Trump led in Wisconsin and Michigan and Pennsylvania is a reality frozen in time that all must accept.

It’s Kelly Ann’s “alternative facts”.  The truth must be  “fake truth”.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo further added to the false confirmation. He discussed a “transition” to the “second Trump administration”.  He’s a West Point graduate.  At eighteen years old he solemnly swore to, “…protect and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and bear true faith and allegiance to the same”.  He graduated from Harvard Law School.   He was a Congressman from Kansas and the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency.  And he knowingly and willfully participates in this disinformation, “fake truth” operation.

Disinformation

Vladimir Putin couldn’t have asked for anything more.  The President, the Senate, the Cabinet; all deny the Constitutional transition of power – the lynchpin of our Republic symbolized by the Election of 1800.  

In eighth grade American History class, we learned about the Federalists and the Democratic-Republicans, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. They were the fiercest of rivals.  In my era, we taught that Adams had a troubled Presidency with the “Alien and Sedition Act” that curtailed freedom of speech and the press. But he begrudgingly accepted the results of the election.   And Adams left before Jefferson’s inaugural and went back to Boston.  But without force of arms, the government transited from Federalist control to Jeffersonian power.  It was a first in world history.

But Donald Trump is signaling the exact opposite.  He fired the Defense Secretary who dared to question the use of active military troops against protestors, and replaced the entire top echelon of civilian leadership with those absolutely loyal – to him.  He ordered his administration not to cooperate with the Biden team, not even to share information or allow office space.

His White House even declares that any Trump political appointee who dares to look for future employment (after January) will be summarily dismissed for disloyalty.  

Biden’s Response

What will he do if Trump refuses to acknowledge the election?  Biden smiles, “…he will”.  Isn’t he stymied by not having access to the intelligence, the Presidential Daily Brief?  “Well, there’s only one President, and I won’t be until January.  I don’t need that intelligence yet”.  

He’s gathers the knowledgeable.  Not only does he have access to the eight years of Obama government officials, but he’s also tapped into those career civil servants who left or were fired in the Trump years.  On his COVID task force: Dr. Rick Bright, the Health and Human Services “whistleblower” who was leading the vaccine fight and forced out for questioning the quality of testing.  

Biden’s tapped career diplomats who are orchestrating his conversations with world leaders.  There are “Biden” translators, “Biden” secured communications, and “Biden” calls scheduled.  Is it a hassle, an inconvenience, a violation of the spirit and letter of the law, the Transition Act of 1963 that was modified after 9-11?  Of course it is.

But Joe Biden does exactly what we elected him to do.  Without drama, or tweets, or declaring victimhood:  Joe Biden prepares to lead.  And, unlike what the nation witnessed for the past four years, that’s not “fake news” or “fake truth”.  

It’s the real deal. 

Here’s the theme song from the show – It’s still available on MeTV – 4 times a day, 6 days a week.

NOTE

This is my own little vignette.  You can’t fact check this, even on quasi-factual Wikipedia.  I am making this entire conversation up.  Before anyone complains I say again:  this is a fictional tale.  I have no inside knowledge, no “bugs” in the Georgia Republican Party Headquarters or Doug “I Lost to a Woman” Collins’ home.  But here’s how the conversation might have gone – from the outside looking in.

The Scene

A high level Political meeting last weekend at the Republican Party Headquarters off Peachtree in Atlanta.  The Chairman of the Georgia Republican Party, Congressman Doug Collins, and Senator’s Kelli Loeffler and David Perdue are around a conference table.  They are not socially distanced, and there are no masks.  And they’re sharing boiled Georgia peanuts — all from the same bowl.

Act I

“What the Hell happened on Election Day?” cried out the Chairman of the Georgia Republican Party.  “Where were all the lines in Atlanta?  Who let all ‘those people’ vote so easily? We’ve spent generations stopping ‘them,’ who dropped the ball this time?”

Congressman Doug Collins responded:  “Yep, we let ‘them’ all vote, and we lost.  Who is going to tell the President — Georgia’s going Blue!!!!”

Appointed Senator Kelli Loeffler chimed in – “Well we can’t say the election was rigged.  We’ve got a Republican Governor, a Republican Legislature, even a Republican Secretary of State.   And besides, the rest of us Republicans did OK.  It was just the President who got beat.”

Senator David Perdue jumped in. “We sure can’t tell the President that.  We need him to get his ‘Trumpers’ back out to vote for us in January.  If we don’t back his claims of voting fraud then he’ll ‘Tweet’ all over us like Russian hookers in a fancy hotel – and we’ll lose to the Jewish guy and that Black fella.” 

Doug Collins continued:  “Well where the ‘heck’ (he’s a preacher, you know) is Governor Kemp?  He rigged the whole system for us two years ago – no one’s seen him since before election week.” 

 The Chairman replied, “Oh, Doug boy’s gone down to St. Simon’s Island, and seems to have lost his cell phone.  He doesn’t want to have anything to do with this cluster. He’s got enough worries about tangling with Stacy Abrams in two years.  If the Black vote turned out for Biden, what do you think they’ll do for Stacy? He doesn’t want to say anything that will make him a even bigger target than he already is.”

Act II

Perdue replied: “Well if we can’t blame Kemp, then somebody’s got to take the fall for this.  Someone screwed up and let the election be fair.  God (glancing at Collins) Darn-it, we’ve got to blame somebody.  What’s the Secretary of State’s name? Brad Hamburger Raffle?”

Collins responded, “His name’s Brad Raffensberger. He was a councilman from John’s Creek, up northeast of Atlanta.  And he went to school in Canada for Heaven’s sake – got an engineering degree up there.”

“NOT GEORGIA TECH?” boomed the Chairman.  “Well we can’t blame Kemp, he’ll rat us out for 2018. And we can’t admit the election was fair.  So lets demand that Raffle-ticket resign for screwing everything up!”

Loeffler and Perdue chimed in together, “We’ll tell Trump Raffle-Ticket did it!   Then he’ll blame him – not us – and get the Trumpers out for the January election!!”

Act III

Collins looked grim – he was still a loser.  But he knew that there was a way he could make Trump a winner – even though he lost.  “Here’s my idea.  We claim Raffensberger screwed up – by – maybe – Yes – the mail-in votes getting counted wrong.  So we demand that there be a recount.  Even better yet make it a HAND recount!!”

The Chairman smiled. “Why, that’ll take weeks.  So many weeks, that there won’t be a result when it comes time for the Electors be certified by the Governor to the Electoral College.”  

“Yep,” Collins replied.  “It fits right in with my favorite saying; ‘it takes a clock and a calendar’.  Time will run out, and the Georgia State Legislature will have to ‘pick’ the Electors.  And since we control the Legislature, and the Governor to sign off, we can ignore the actual popular vote, screw the Democrats and send the Electoral votes from Georgia to Congress in favor of Trump!!!”

Loeffler was a little slow on the uptake.  “But it won’t matter, Biden will still have enough votes to win the Presidency.”

But Perdue got it.  “Yep, but Trump will know we took care of him – and he’ll be down here in Georgia having rallies, spreading COVID and convincing all his folks to come on out and vote for you and me on January 5^th.  Will be Republican HEROS!!!!!”

Post Script

I’d like to say that the Democrats took the hand re-count to court, and won.  But it’s Georgia, and not every Georgia tale has a happy ending.  The story will continue…

Our Future

What am I looking forward to in the Biden Administration?  Well – big “corrections” of some of the past practices of the Trump Administration.  And Joe Biden is “on it”.  The first days promise a taskforce for COVID, a taskforce to reunite the 666 kids separated from their parents, and America’s return to both the Paris Accord and the World Health Organization.  

And regardless of who controls the Senate, we know that President Biden will go to work on healthcare.  Whether it’s improving the Affordable Care Act, or a Supreme Court decision forced redo of the whole process – Americans will find a way to have broad healthcare coverage for as many as possible.

Senate Elections

And there’s a long list of other issues, many hinging on the results of the Alaska and Georgia Senate elections.  Currently there are forty-eight Democratic Senators and forty-nine Republican seats.   Two seats are up in the Georgia runoff, and one still remains to be decided in Alaska. If Republicans win two of the three, then they have control of the Senate by one.  If the Senate is tied 50-50, the new Vice President, Kamala Harris, will break the tie for the Democrats.  

Alaska you ask?  Currently Alaska has only counted 61% of their votes.  It’s a big state with a small and far-flung population, voting by mail, airplane, and even dog sled.  The current Republican Senator, Dan Sullivan, is in the lead with 62% of the vote at the moment.  But his opponent, Independent Al Gross, who would align with the Democrats in the Senate, is less than 60,000 votes behind.  There are almost 176,000 votes left to count – so there is still a chance.

Georgia On My Mind

(Ray Charles – of course)

But the Georgia dual runoff will probably decide Senate control.  And it seems like a long shot for the two Democratic challengers, Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock.  They face two incumbents, David Perdue and appointee Kelly Loeffler.  On January 5^th (there goes Christmas) there will be the “final stand” of the 2020 election, the season, and the year, that doesn’t want to die.  

The first Senate meeting of the 2021 session is January 3^rd.  On that day, (assuming Sullivan wins in Alaska) there will be fifty Republicans and forty-eight Democrats, and Mitch McConnell will organize the Senate.  But he shouldn’t get too comfortable.  Who knows who might show up two weeks later (there’s another count) from the state of Georgia?

And we thought the $200 million plus campaign in South Carolina was expensive.  With two years of Senate control on the line, there will be fire hoses worth of money pouring into Georgia from all sides.  The newly empowered Democratic Party in the state is anxious to flex muscle at the polls.  And the winner will be – the local media markets that won’t be able to create enough television advertising time.  Sorry Santa, the Senators have bought it all up.

Back to Life

The other thing I’m looking forward to is “the obsession” to end.  Over the past four years, “mainlining” the “news” has become a habit.  It’s on every TV in every room of the house.  Even Lou, the broken dog we’re rehabbing back to health, gets MSNBC almost 24/7.  It’s on the radio in the cars, in headphones as I cut the grass, and the background “music” to our dinners and breakfasts.

Sunday, I put on real music as we worked around the house: music – (Aaron Burdett – Pennies on the Track).  Tomorrow night we may actually watch TV – like drama on TV besides the ongoing drama in Washington, Wilmington, and Mara Lago.  (Sure, we’ll record Rachel for later).

The intensity of the past months struck home yesterday afternoon – we got an anniversary card.  Jenn looked at me, and we both realized – it’s our eighth wedding anniversary today (November 10^th).  Eight years ago we gathered with our family and best friends at Salt Fork Lake to have a party that included a wedding.  It seems so long ago.  And the date was going right on by – neither of us remembered:  too much craziness going down.

So what do I look forward to most from President Joe Biden?  You do your job, I’ll do mine.  When it’s important, let me know.  Otherwise, just get things done.  No, I’m not giving up a lifelong involvement in politics and history.  But with the Biden inauguration, it will be nice to re-balance life.  

Resistance

I received a message from a former student yesterday.  He is on the opposite side of the political spectrum from me: a Trump supporter and a pro-life advocate. He’s a man who sees protestors as property destroyers.  He believes that folks like me never gave Donald Trump a “chance”.  We were the “Resistance” from the beginning, from Muslims bans to Russia, Charlottesville to Ukraine, and finally to COVID.  

My student carefully (and respectfully, I think) pointed out the hypocrisy he sees in Joe Biden asking for unity.  And he quietly mocked Sunday’s essay about “taking back” the flag,  Our Flag. We don’t agree, but I’m glad that after four years he’s still reading some of my essays.  I hope he reads this one.  And, he’s not wrong.

We did “Resist” from the beginning.  My first essay on “Trump World” was published on February 10^th, 2017, less than a month after the inauguration. We questioned the legitimacy of the 2016 election.  And we rejected the actions of the President from the very, very beginning.  I’ve got over nine hundred essays to prove it.

Legitimacy

This wasn’t the first time I saw a Presidency as illegitimate.  In the last couple of weeks there’s been a lot of talk about the election of 2000.  It was between Republican George W. Bush and Democrat Al Gore (with just enough of a smattering of the Green Party’s Ralph Nader to alter the outcome).  The results were so close, that it came down to an incredibly thin slice of voters in Florida.

In any mass of numbers, there is always some statistical “margin of error”. The Electoral College vote came down to Florida’s twenty-five.  Out of almost six million votes cast there, the difference between Bush and Gore was less than six hundred.  It was such a small margin, that it almost fell in that “margin of error”.  If you re-counted the votes, over and over again, you might get a different outcome each time:  a flip of a coin.

A Republican “riot” stopped the re-count in heavily Democratic Miami-Dade County.  The Governor of Florida, George Bush’s brother Jeb, refused to recuse himself from the process.  The entire Florida system seemed rigged for the Republicans, and when the Supreme Court ruled in favor of stopping the count at the moment when it was in Bush’s favor, that sealed the feeling. The Court voted five to four, the five Republican appointees against the four Democratic appointees.

Earning the Presidency

So many didn’t see George Bush’s Presidency as legitimate.  Folks have “spotty” memories:  few remember the “resistance” to Bush that lasted from January 20^th 2001, until September 11^th.   But we all remember what happened then.

George Bush earned his legitimacy as President in the days and weeks after 9-11.  He rose to the challenge from his first speech from Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana. In those first dark hours after the attack Bush made it clear:

“Freedom itself was attacked this morning by a faceless coward, and freedom will be defended.  The full resources of the federal government are working to assist local authorities, to save lives, and to help the victims of these attacks. Make no mistake: The United States will hunt down and punish those responsible for these cowardly acts.”

  He went on to Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska, the headquarters of the Strategic Air Command where he met with the National Security Council and then determined to return to the White House against their advice.  We literally watched as Air Force One and the fighter escorts flew home.  They were the only planes in the sky.

In the next weeks he spoke at Ground Zero:  “I can hear you! I can hear you! The rest of the world hears you! And the people — and the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon!”  But he also spoke at a mosque, making it clear that the United States was waging war against Al Qaeda, not all Muslims.

Legitimacy

After 9-11, America accepted George W. Bush as the legitimate President.  And while many continued to oppose his policies, particularly the CIA’s secret torture campaign and the war in Iraq, Bush won a second term in office.  He earned his Presidency.

Trump never won the opposition over, not even to the point of being a “loyal opposition”.  Even in a crisis more extreme than 9-11, the COVID crisis, the President never “rose to the moment” as George Bush did.  Instead, we now know, he whispered to a reporter that he knew “how bad” COVID was, but wouldn’t tell the American people.

So my old student is right.  Donald Trump was resisted from the very beginning, and until the “bitter” end.  But Donald Trump also never “rose to the moment” when he could win over the resistance, and bring the American people together.  

It’s up to Joe Biden now.  It’s clear he’s made it his priority to “reunite” America.  That’s a daunting task:  there’s pressure from the left to move their agenda.  They claim credit for winning Georgia and the “Blue Wall” states.  There’s pressure from the “right”, the Never-Trump Lincoln Republicans, who claim the same credit, seeing the Biden suburban support in part as their contribution.  And there’s pressure from the “Resistance”, who want nothing more than to see the Trump family in prison.

I don’t expect my friend to “fall in line” beneath the flag. And I certainly don’t expect all Americans to support all of Biden’s agenda.  But it’s not about giving Biden “a chance”.    It’s up to Biden to prove his legitimacy and win a “loyal opposition”.  

Biden must earn his place.

“The Star Spangled Banner, Oh long may it wave, o’er the land of the free, and the home of the brave”  – The US National Anthem

Battles

Sometimes it seems like a battle.  Not the battle for Fort McHenry in Baltimore harbor, but a battle for the symbology of America.  The flag of the United States, the “Star Spangled Banner”, was “claimed” by one side of the partisan debates for the past four years.  If you supported President Trump, you got the flag.  You put it in front of your house, or on the back of your truck.  If you didn’t, well, it wasn’t yours.

It was a way to make “Resistance” feel somehow “un-American”.  

I resisted that trend from the very beginning.  There’s been a flag, the Star Spangled Banner, waving at the front of my house for decades.  With the election of Donald Trump, I was even more determined to keep it there.  American patriotism is not defined by partisan loyalty, and I was not going to allow one side of the debate to claim it.

But it’s been tough sometimes.  There are things that “we’ve” done in the past four years that I’m not proud of.  The same flag waving over my front door also waved over the border post in McAllen, Texas as children were taken from their parents.  It was on the uniforms of soldiers sent to clear peaceful protestors from Lafayette Park.  And Neo-Nazis in Charlottesville “proudly” carried it as they chanted, “Jews will not replace us”.  

The President that I worked to remove, by election, indictment and impeachment, literally wrapped himself in the flag.  It was “his”: to love America you must love Trump.  Towards the end it almost became a joke.   How many American flags were there on stage as Donald Trump falsely claimed election victory election on Friday?

Our Flag

So it was with a full heart that I watched Joe Biden and Kamala Harris claim the real victory last night in Wilmington, Delaware.  Sure there were Biden/Harris posters, handmade signs and a sweet fireworks display with drones.  And of course there were flags on the stage.  But what struck me was the number of people in the crowd carrying the Star Spangled Banner.  From little kids waving little flags, to full-sized parade flags carried by adults, to even flags thrust through the sunroofs of the assembled “drive-in”, socially distanced crowd.  

They were reclaiming our flag for Joe Biden, and for themselves. They were saying:  we represent America too.  And our America can be one of change, of hope, and of diversity.  President-Elect Biden (there – I finally typed it, I feel better already) offered a message of hope and dignity last night.  He repeated his mantra of the last two years:  though he was elected as a Democrat, he will be a President for all Americans. 

Legitimacy

There will be a battle on social media for the next few weeks.  “The Demon-crats cheat” has been the cry since before the first vote was mailed in.  Recognizing that he might well lose, Donald Trump tried to rig this election, to make it about letting “his” voters choose, and disenfranchising the rest.  The strategy couldn’t have been clearer than in the vote counts.  Mail-in voting was dominated by Biden, Election Day turnout by Trump.  It fit so perfectly into the “cheating” narrative Trump was pushing.  Where did those “mysterious” Biden votes come from in Philadelphia? Why weren’t they counted from the “start”?  It’s Philly; the Democrats always cheat in Philly.

Dude – they were in the mail, the mail Trump intentionally slowed.  And they “appeared” later, because the Republican Pennsylvania legislature wouldn’t let them be processed or counted until Election Day.  This wasn’t an accident:  it was a “grand design” of the Trump campaign to back their narrative.  The problem for them is – most people know it’s not true.

One Nation

The shock of the election for me was how many millions of people still supported Donald Trump.  But imagine the shock for them, those folks who claimed the flag, to find that even more Americans wanted Joe Biden?  No wonder the “rigged” election myth found fertile ground.  We live in our “bubbles”.  How could there possibly be so many Biden (or Trump) supporters?

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris earned 74 million votes, and still counting; the most votes ever for a Presidential ticket.  And they have an Electoral College victory, one that ultimately will be larger than Trump’s in 2016.  While it may take a week or two for that to “sink in” with the American people, I believe that most Trump supporters will come to see it as legitimate.  

And then, for a little while at least, we can all stand under the same flag: E Pluribus Unum.  Out of many one.  

Note: So I try to write essays in advance – and I had a long one on the election process all ready for today. But last night’s Biden victory speech was too important ignore – and so I wrote “Our Flag”. If you have more time on your hands than you should – here’s the “process” essay – Sunday-Sunday-Sunday.

Old School

Elections have changed in the COVID era.  The “old-school” election took place on Tuesday.  The vast number of voters went to the polls, where they were “processed” by poll workers.  They got a ballot, made their selections, and their ballot was checked and tabulated.  The precinct tabulations were added together, and the election results reported out in a few hours.  We knew “who won” by late Tuesday evening.

Process

Early voters today go to a central polling place, where the same processing occurs.  “Processing” is about three things.  First, it’s about identity, are you who you say you are.  In the “Red Map” era, that’s become much more involved, as many states demand a State Identification document for “proof”.  For most suburban voters, a Driver’s License solves the problem and it’s not a big deal.  For urban voters, and particularly for lower income voters, obtaining a state ID is a more difficult issue.  And that’s intentional, the ID laws are written to keep them from voting.

Second it’s about voting only once.  There are many opportunities to vote:  early in-person voting, absentee or “mail-in” voting, and regular in-person Election Day voting.  While the Democratic Party joke is to “Vote early and Vote often”, in reality the system is designed to prevent exactly that.  Not only do the ballots need to be counted and protected; but a record needs to be kept of all voters and when they vote (not who they vote for).  So when you get a “mail-in” ballot, but still choose to go to the polls on Election Day, the “system” has to “know” that you had both.  Only one can count, so either you “spoil” the “mail-in” when you vote at the polls,  or you commit voter fraud, and are subject to criminal sanctions.

Third it’s about getting the “right” ballot.  Different jurisdictions have different issues up for vote.  Here locally in Pataskala there are two possible school districts, several different local governmental jurisdictions, and a variety of precinct level issues.  So when you vote, they need to make sure you are voting on the correct issues for your residence.

COVID World

When a voter chooses to vote by mail, the first two parts of the “process” don’t take place until the Board of Elections receives your ballot.  And in COVID world, millions of Americans decided that it was safer to vote by mail.  Who can blame them, COVID infection rates are higher than ever.  Over 100,000 Americans are getting infected a day, and over a thousand are dying from the disease daily.

When that mail-in ballot arrives at the Board of Elections, the small number of central workers goes through the processes for each one.  And, since many state legislatures restrict when the processing can begin and don’t allow the ballots to be touched until Election Day –it takes a while.

So in the “good old days” we all did our “Norman Rockwell” and lined up at the polls to vote on Election Day.  Only the really sick, aged, or those out of town were allowed to vote absentee.  It was Election Day, and the results were out on Election night.

But now we can vote for almost a month before the technical Election Day.  And many millions of Americans vote by mail.  We don’t pay Boards of Elections to have the numbers of personnel to process all of those mail ballots in an evening, so it takes more time to count them.  Just as we now have a voting season, we also have a counting season (A time to vote, a time to count – Turn-Turn-Turn*).  

Partiality

Boards of Election recognize that their work is fraught with danger.  Everyone is worried about someone cheating, adding or subtracting votes to control who gets elected.   One way to deal with that would be to have a “neutral” counting system, kind of a “monastery” of vote counters who don’t have a “dog in the fight”.  But no one really trusts that impartiality,  and so we have the opposite.

In each Board of Election in each county or parish or district, there are parallel jobs.  If the Director is a Republican, the Deputy is a Democrat.  If the head clerk is a Democrat, the Assistant Clerk is a Republican.  When votes are counted, at least two do the counting – you guessed it, one Democrat, one Republican.  We keep our election system honest by making everything transparent, and then putting both political parties in as part of the process.

We also allow observers into the process to watch.  They are only observers (JAFO) and have no part in the process.  They can’t talk, they can’t touch, and if they see something, they have a separate procedure to report it.  But that has led to a problem in our recent elections.

In 2000, a group of Republican staffers determined that the vote re-count was going against their candidate.  They disrupted the process.  Inside as observers, they began to chant, yell, and pound on the walls.  It got so bad, that the re-count was halted, giving the staffers exactly what they wanted.  And that tactic is now part of partisan “lore”:  everyone is willing to try to gain that advantage.  So the “observers” are now trying to be participants, and if they get kicked out, have a “cause celebre” to put on YouTube.

Unofficial

So here we are on the Sunday after Tuesday of “election season”.  The “final unofficial” counts are almost complete.  The networks, appointing themselves to the task of declaring “winners”, may actually have gathered the courage to make their declarations.  Maybe NBC, ABC, CBS, Fox and the Associated Press will say what we all can reasonably see:  Joe Biden is the next President of the United States.  

Not that what they say actually matters.  The states will certify their results in about a week. The candidates will have the opportunity to question, or demand recounts, or whatever, after that.  The final certification of results will be the first week of December, and the Governors will certify their Electors to the Electoral College and that time. And it actually isn’t until January 6^th, 2021, that the Congress receives and counts those votes, and declares an official winner for President and Vice President (US Code §15).

Which gives Donald Trump plenty of time to question the results, stir up rumors of cheating, and deny the will of the voters.  

A time for votes, a time for count.

 A time for whining, a time for protests.

A time for courts, a time fear.

A time for a new leaders, 

I hope it’s not too late.*

(*Apologies to the Byrds and Pete Seeger for co-opting their song!!).