Election Days are long, especially when you\u2019ve already voted. And waiting on the results may well be longer \u2013 days longer – so I\u2019m getting some thoughts down before we get the final \u201cfinal\u201d results.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For thirty-five years I was the head boys track coach at the local high school. I know: it\u2019s track, an \u201cindividual\u201d sport. But they have team scores in the meets, and being part of a \u201cteam\u201d makes athletes perform above themselves. Running \u201cfor themselves\u201d is limited, running for the guy beside you, who has trained as hard as you have: that makes athletes \u201crise up\u201d (I know \u2013 another Hamilton reference). <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n We would run eight or so Invitational meets a year. And in most of those, we put our best team together, put them on the track or in the field, and let them go. But for the Conference and District meets, we did a lot of \u201cscouting\u201d and preparation. We wanted to win, to be Champions, and we would not only put our best team forward, but in a way to maximize our scoring.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So in the weeks before the meet I would put together a score sheet: us versus the rest of the Conference. I would match everyone up, event by event, and try to anticipate how we would score. There would be the \u201cdream\u201d meet, where everything went right. There would be the \u201cnormal\u201d meet, where some things would go wrong, but we would be OK. And there was the \u201cminimum\u201d meet, the absolute worst we could do and still win the meet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Why am I telling you all of this? Because winning sports contests and winning political campaigns are very similar. Take it from one who has done both. So I have my Joe Biden list, my \u201cscore sheet\u201d. Instead of the different events, from the hundred to the mile to the pole vault to the discus, we have states. Each state is an individual contest: Pennsylvania, Florida, North Carolina, Georgia, Ohio, and all the rest. But all add up to the \u201cteam win\u201d, or the Biden Presidency.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And I spent Election Day, hoping for the \u201cdream\u201d election, where Texas, Georgia, Arizona and Ohio all go to Biden. For as long as I\u2019ve been a Democrat (that\u2019s at least sixty-one years) I\u2019ve believed that if EVERYONE got to vote, Democrats would win. On Tuesday, it was time to put that to a test. Over one hundred million people voted, before even the day of the election. Estimates are that another sixty or seventy million more voted on the day. So if you believe that more votes helps Democrats \u2013 then it should be the \u201cDream\u201d list.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But, in almost every Conference championship meet we ran, there were moments when it looked like the \u201cdream\u201d meet was out the window, and we were working on the \u201cminimum\u201d score. And in the past few days, there have been times when I started to think that way. Social media doesn\u2019t help, panic is infective, and some of my Facebook \u201cfriends\u201d are panicking. I\u2019ve got as good or better information than they do, and I know better. But that doesn\u2019t change my indigestion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And, no matter how well we planned our strategies, there were those meets when things fell below the minimum. We didn\u2019t plan on our star miler getting tripped in the race, we didn\u2019t have a backup when our best 100-meter runner pulled a hamstring, and sometimes (though seldom) some other coach had a better \u201cplan\u201d than we did.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I didn\u2019t feel that way on Election Day with the polls still open and voters lined up. We didn\u2019t seem to need the minimums. We had the dream solution in sight. But then the votes started coming in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The \u201cdream\u201d solution went out with Florida and North Carolina. It took a bigger hit here in Ohio. We found out something that I didn\u2019t want to believe \u2013 that there are still many Americans who think that what Donald Trump represents is \u201cgood\u201d. I wrote a whole essay on that, but I can\u2019t print it. It\u2019s too close to the \u201cbone\u201d of too many friends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So now it\u2019s Thursday morning, and the minimum list is the only one left: Arizona, Georgia, or Pennsylvania \u2013 and Nevada. That\u2019s what our Presidency depends on. Biden can still win, but so can Trump. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I wadded up the checklist yesterday. I\u2019ve got it memorized, along with the vote totals for each state. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Today we will know.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Score Sheet<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Election Day<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
What\u2019s Left<\/h3>\n\n\n\n