What follows here is pretty scary.
It’s intended to be.
Everything I talk about here could happen, very easily.
These are just four of the things that could go wrong with the election in November.
This is not doomsday scenario, conspiracy theory stuff.
These are things that unbiased political observers are talking about.
They are things that are already happening.
They all add up to a nightmare scene in November that could leave our country paralyzed.
We’ve been through enough already. We can’t afford that.
And it’s up to us to ensure that it does not happen.
#1: The polls are a mess.
That’s not a stretch of the imagination; it’s already happening.
Look at the April primaries in Wisconsin, how people were forced to choose between their vote and their well-being.
Amazingly, they chose to come out in droves to beat back a Republican attempt to elect a conservative Wisconsin Supreme Court justice.
Look at the primaries in California, where Los Angeles voters waited in line for four hours, because of technological issues, and understaffed polling places.
Look at the primaries in Kentucky, where the polling places were cut from 3,700 polling places to 190, severely limiting the number of voters.
Look at the primaries in Georgia, plagued by untrained poll workers, or unmanned because of the coronavirus.
Everywhere, polling places are being shut down, due to fewer volunteers (fearful of getting sick) or Republican attempts to limit voting.
When they are open, they’re a mess, with fewer workers, not trained on new equipment.
And then we have to ask this: Do we really think the coronavirus will go away by November?
If we’re in round two of the pandemic this fall – or still in this ever-growing round one – how will people vote?
Mail-in ballots?
Yeah, about that….
#2: Mail-in ballots are problematic.
Politicians everywhere (more Democratic than Republican) are encouraging people to get mail-in ballots.
It’s not that easy, though.
Only five states send ballots to all voters: Colorado, Hawaii, Oregon, Utah, and Washington.
Most states will send out ballots upon request.
But some states – fewer than 20 states, at this point – will send out ballots only if you have a valid reason (usually being out of state at the time of the election).
That’s changing, and some of those states are reacting to the pandemic, and are sending out ballots to anybody who requests one.
On top of that, the Post Office itself is in real trouble.
It’s been running a deficit for about 15 years now, and it’s being forced to come to Congress, looking for funding.
The Republicans are not inclined to fund it.
In the episode of Last Week Tonight (above) John Oliver does his usual entertaining, incisive job of spotlighting the threats to mail-in voting.
In an earlier episode, he explains how the Post Office got to this point, and why the Republicans aren’t inclined to keep it going.
In a nutshell:
The Post Office got hamstrung when Congress forced it to pre-pay benefits for its retirees. Then Congress put a cap on its prices.
The situation is compounded by Trump’s dislike of the USPS because it does business for Amazon, and his arch enemy Jeff Bezos.
The Republicans would be happy if the USPS wasn’t in existence in November.
They know that the fewer Americans who vote, the better their chances.
But despite their best efforts, there will be a large number of mail ballots in November.
Because of that, don’t expect results on Election Night. The more likely scenario is, it’ll be like last month’s primary in Kentucky, and we won’t know the winners for two weeks, because we’re counting mail-in ballots.
And that’s OK.
It could be shades of 2000, Bush vs Gore – hopefully it won’t come down to a Supreme Court decision.
A lopsided victory for Joe Biden would reduce the likelihood of that.
What about online voting?
Unfortunately, that’s not the answer.
Even aside from the technological failures we saw in the Iowa caucuses, it’s too high-risk, too vulnerable to security breaches.
#3: Trump refuses to leave.
Again, this isn’t just my overactive imagination.
Trump is already started to delegitimize the election, with his accusations of voter fraud in mail-in ballots.
Casting doubt on the legitimacy of an election is just about the most dangerous thing a candidate can do for a Democracy.
You may recall him trotting out this act in 2016.
In the days before the election, certain that he would lose, he started to cast doubt on the results. Until they came in for him.
Remember the “busloads of illegals” voting in New Hampshire?
Or that Hillary won California because of the voter fraud there?
Now, some experts see Trump’s squashing of the Lafayette Square protests as a sort of test for “his” military, to see how far they would go to protect him specifically.
Rick Wilson and Molly Jong-Fast, two editors with The Daily Beast, discussed that scenario on their podcast, The New Abnormal with former Dept. of Justice federal prosecutor Glenn Kirschner.
Wilson is one of the founders of The Lincoln Project, and he’s a former Republican strategist with sources in the military.
He warned, “Inside the defense dept, and the uniformed services, there is a growing sense that Donald Trump’s desire to be re-elected is going to push them further and further into dangerous positions.”
But he was quick to add, that didn’t mean they’d aid and abet him if he tried to stay.
“They swear an oath to the Constitution, not the man.”
Glenn Kirschnir, the DOJ prosecutor, added, “If Trump decides he’s not gonna leave, I still have confidence, in both the military and in our law enforcement agencies… I still have faith that when Trump loses in a landslide, and he tries to grab hold of something in the Oval Office and not leave, they will drag him out.”
But Kirschner saved his harshest words for Trump’s Attorney General.
“Bill Barr will try to find any trumped up reason to try to negate the election results and declare that they should be thrown out, and that Trump should remain President.
“I think all of that will fail. You can begin to smell the desperation, in both Donald Trump’s Tweets and Bill Barr’s conduct.
“But let’s face it – Bill Barr gassed the American people, and he flash-bang granaded the American people while they were exercising their First Amendment right to peacably assemble and petition the government for an address of grievances. That is kind of a cardinal sin and crime.
“And if Bill Barr isn’t held accountable for that, beginning in January, with a robust, full-fare, apolitical, non-partisan criminal investigation, hopefully to be followed by an indictment trial and imprisonment, of Barr and others – then shame on us.”
Jeff Kowalsky – AFP/Getty Images
#4: The Second Amendment nuts refuse to let him leave
The military aren’t the only ones flexing their muscles. The gun rights activists have been proudly displaying their strength (in numbers and arms) ever since the pandemic began.
Make no mistake – when they showed up with their guns in open-up-the-economy protests in Virginia, Minnesota, and Michigan, it was a trial run. How much can we get away with?
They’ve been making their presence known at Black Lives Matter protests, too, in various militia forms – Boogaloo Boys, Proud Boys, Three Percenters – all making sure that people know they’re there to “keep the peace.”
And as always, they’re spurred on by Trump.
Before his 2016 victory, he warned his zealots, “if Hillary wins, she’ll take away your guns.”
“But,” he added, “the Second Amendment people might do something about that.”
That’s scary AF, as the kids say.
Speaking of scary: Just watch this video of a loyalist saying that if Trump was removed from office (during the impeachment process), they would revolt.
“My 357 Magnum is comfortable with that.”
Just a note to any of the Three Percenters who might have read this far: your movement is named after a myth. It’s fake news.
The Revolutionary War was not an uprising of the three percent of the populace who owned guns.
And please don’t compare the patriots who took up arms in 1775 against the tyranny of King George III with the “proud boys” in 2020 America who are hurt that their favorite reality TV star isn’t allowed to be their President anymore.
My advice? Put down your guns and go home, before you get somebody hurt. Or yourself.
If you don’t like things the way they are, go out and change the laws. And vote.
That’s how America works.
* * *
I hate to be the harbinger of doom… Oh, who am I kidding? I LOVE being the harbinger of doom!
But I do bring some good news.
There are things we can do.
This article in American Progress does a great job of breaking down what we can do to make our elections safe, using lessons from the Wisconsin primary in particular.
Its main point is, we need to act quickly.
Most important, we need to get people out to vote.
Particularly in swing states (Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, and Wisconsin).
If Biden can win in a landslide, it gives Trump less leverage to protest the results.
We need to make voting effective and secure.
Help your city and town officials. Find out:
What are our local polling places/voting machines like?
What systems are they using?
Most importantly, are people trained?
There’s a lot of new machinery, and there will be a lot of mail-in ballots.
Town clerks are already talking about how overwhelmed they are.
We need to make voting safe.
Volunteer to help at the polls.
This is a real example of grassroots activity genuinely affecting national results.
A lot of polling place volunteers are retirees, older – more susceptible to the virus.
It’s a great opportunity for younger citizens – spurred to action by the Black Lives Matter movement and the Parkland shootings – to have a real major effect.
We need to make sure voting is available.
Work to open more polling places.
Make sure your schools are available for polling, where you can.
Suggest that your pro sports teams follow the lead of several NBA teams (the Atlanta Hawks, Detroit Pistons, and Milwaukee Bucks) who have offered their arenas for polling.
(This developed after LeBron James founded an organization to encourage minority voters, and to fight the suppression of those voters.)
Ask your Senator and your Rep in Congress: Save the post office. And provide funding for fair elections.
If you are able, give money to people who can make a difference: the Lincoln Project (just look at the astounding job they’ve done with their earth-shifting ads), the Democratic party, Everytown, USA (fighting the NRA).
Or support Senatorial candidates in key states, where the race is close (Arizona, North Carolina, South Carolina, Kentucky, Maine).
I honestly don’t know what to do with the 2nd Amendment nuts.
The question is, are the police going to side with them? Or us?
There probably will be examples of both.
Like I always say:
There’s a lot of crazy people out there.
But just remember, there’s more of us than them.
And we won’t give up.
#EndTheNightmare
Daddy Gibs 