US Election

In every election, someone wins and someone losses.  My choice "didn't win"...   So we will have President Trump (again), a Republican Senate, probably a Republican House, and a Republican Supreme Court.

I won't get into the politics involved.  I'm not here to start any political or social arguments (I do that elsewhere).  But I will say that I am  thoroughly depressed and worried.  There are likely to be some domestic and international consequences that many people are not going to like.

I will not be watching the political news channels much for a while.  I read The Washington Post newspaper while I eat lunch.  Just skimming the headlines of the various articles will tell me everything I need to know for a while...

There is plenty for me to do in the yard before Winter sets in, and plenty to do in the house after that.  I will post about that.

A Personal Political Statement

 I like to vote on Election Day itself.  It is so easy here, you are in and out in 15 minutes.  And I love the "I voted sticker.  I have been collecting them this century.

I have a preference, of course.  But more importantly I vote.  

I've researched every item right down to the School Board.  I have my choices made.  This isn't a contested State at the Presidential level, but some down-ballot issues are important and those matter too.

So if you haven't already voted, go to the polls and VOTE.

Personally, I would say "vote for the non-Trump candidate of your choice", but vote.  But if Trump is your guy, vote for him.  Just vote!

It matters that you participate.  You can't complain about an election if you don't vote.  

I am about to make breakfast.  Too eggs sunny side up, 2 country links, and two pieces of raisin/cinnamon bread with milk and green tea.

Then I am going off to vote.  If I did nothing else for the rest of the year, that would be OK.  Voting is that important.

And then I'm going to get good and drunk tonight, sleep for 12 hours, and hope to wake up Wednesday with results I hope for...

Some graphics...

I am leaving now to go vote...

A Happy Day

Yesterday was a happy day (as is today).  Joe Biden was "called by" the TV networks as the President-Elect.  That doesn't make anything official of course, but they are rather careful about announcing their expectations.  Even Fox News declared that Biden had won, and Fox is a rather die-hard Trump supporter.

I wasn't entirely sure how the Networks could be so certain in some States where there were 100s of thousands of votes left to count and Biden had a 10,000 vote lead or even was losing, but the political TV show hosts gave some detailed explanations later.    

A lot of it had to do with the difference between how Democrats and Republicans voted this year.  Usually, the vast majority of voters vote on Election Day.  But this year, because of the pandemic, States increased the opportunity to vote by mail or early in person at a few locations.  Democrats voted by mail or early; Republicans waited until election Day.

Mail-in and early votes take longer to process.  And the votes from large cities (which are very heavily Democrat) always take longer by sheer volume.  Between the two, the cites needed days to report votes (and none may be truly complete even now).  Overseas, military, and post-marked-but-not-yet-delivered mail-in ballots still have a few days to arrive.

But professional network vote-counters know what voters were still to be heard from Saturday, the almost-certain voter registration, and typical return rates.  A good example was Pennsylvania.  The low-population rural Counties were mostly Republican and had 99% of their votes reported Wednesday.  The major cities were mostly Democrat (approaching 90% in some) and had reported only half of their votes.  

So when Trump was ahead 30,000 votes and 500,000 were still due from Philadelphia and Pittsburgh with a typical Democratic majority of 70%, there was little doubt about the outcome.   The States will not announce a winner until the last vote is counted in about a week from now, but the Networks could have a confidence factor above 99.9%.  Well, they don't want to make a mistake like "Dewey Beats Truman" again and besides, they have MUCH more information available now.

So, essentially, the voting is over.  Biden will be the next President and Harris his Vice-President.  The Electoral college will confirm that on December 6th.  Biden will have won with 4 million+ total popular votes.  I am relieved.  I've been waiting for this day for 4 years!

A long national aberration is over.  Trump's victory in 2016 was a hiccup.  Painful to be sure, but temporary.  Biden has promised to return the US to international agreements, balance taxes, restore environmental regulations, organize a National response to the Covid-19 pandemic, attend to excessive force by police against minorities, etc.

To quote President Ronald Reagan (something I never thought I would do) "It is Morning in America".

To quote President Gerald Ford (after Nixon's resignation) "Our long national nightmare is over".

To quote the Munchkins from 'The Wizard Of Oz':  

"Ding-dong! The Witch is dead
Which old Witch? The Wicked Witch!
Ding-dong! The Wicked Witch is dead
Wake up you sleepy head, rub your eyes, get out of bed
Wake up, the Wicked Witch is dead..."

And I'll offer a panel from 'Doonesbury' from after Nixon resigned:

Today, I will sleep easier than I have for some months. 

Political Stuff

It's a week before the US Presidential et al elections and I'm losing my mind.  I don't mind saying that I voted for Biden.  If Trump wins I think my head will explode.  I have disliked the candidate I didn't support before, but never felt complete utter disgust.

I mailed my ballot Friday.  I hope it gets there on time.  I mean, it only has to travel to the next town and 11 days should be way more than safe.  I could probably mail a letter to someone in China in 11 days.  I have a tracking number, so I will check in a couple days.

My State (Maryland) is so Democratic it probably wouldn't matter if it didn't.  Even my County (which was very Republican when I moved here 34 years ago) is now thoroughly Democratic.  Maryland is so completely Democratic that neither Trump nor Biden bothered to visit here (that I know of).  I don't even get political telephone calls or emails.

Still, you never know until it is over.  I went into some shock when Clinton lost in 2016 and even waited 2 days for everyone to announce they reported it wrong.

I was watching some TV interviews with people doing early voting in person today.  It was about how long they had been waiting to vote.  Most said "several hours".  But when the interviewer asked one lady, I just KNEW the answer.  "4 years".  And that is exactly what she said a few seconds later.  I often do that with movies, new commercials, and political speeches.  

I'm waiting with bated breath for Trump to do or say something dramatic to try a last-ditch effort to win.  Announcing  a Covid-19 vaccine, a major tax break for the non-wealthy, firing Mitch McConnell, a war with North Korea, something, who knows?  

He's desperate.  If he loses the election, a half dozen States are just waiting to charge him with a boatload of tax crimes, loan fraud, and who knows what else?  If the Department of Justice is free of his control, they might have things to investigate even he can't pardon himself for.

So nothing Trump does between now and the election will surprise me.  But watch me get surprised.  "Aliens are arriving November 2nd, NASA says so"...

If Biden was up 20 points in every State, I would still be worried.

And I ponder the consequences of Trump still being in office until January 20 even if he loses.  He could do a lot of damage in rage and revenge.  And that would be in his pattern of past behavior.  Let's just say politely that "he does not respond well to rejection".

If Trump loses, I will credit Biden for staying calm and rational in the face of insults and attacks.  I will credit Harris for energy and support and fundraising.  I will credit Obama for getting on the campaign trail at the end (not too early, not too late) and being himself at his best.  His campaign speeches were great.

But mostly, I will credit the Democratic voters who turned out in 2020 who didn't turn out out for Clinton (though if they had, we wouldn't be in this hot mess),  the Republican voters of 2016 who realized that they made a mistake (everyone makes a mistake sometimes) and changed their minds about Trump,  all the Republican strategists and columnists who turned away from Trump in the past couple years (that must have been hard to do).  

And I also will credit the resiliency of American Democracy.  Not that other Nations don't have some strong traditions and history of their own, but the Trump Presidency has been a particular challenge. The US is often said to be a "Nation Of Laws".  Sometimes that means we pay more attention to "laws" than we do to "justice".  My personal opinion is that we depend on law and limit justice in hopes of fairness and consistency.

But, as we have discovered in the Trump Presidency, we are more a Nation of "norms" than we realized.  It wasn't until Trump and Senate Leader McConnell started ignoring the informal rules that this legal loophole became clear.  Decades and even a century of informal rules have been broken or ignored for short-term political gain.

Past political leaders have always played "hardball".  They bullied their own party members to get things done and threatened the other party with consequences.  Political leaders have a lot of control over campaign funds to recalcitrant party members, funds to States, and laws which benefit some industry or not.  Politics at the top level are not for sissies.

But some rules have been agreed upon by both sides.  You don't kick the opponent party TOO hard when they are down, because the boot will be on the other foot soon enough and revenge is certain.  If you want something, you give a little bit to get what you really want.  You talk to each other to understand what they care about the most.  If you need a bridge built in your State, you look for someone on the other side who needs a highway in theirs.  Give and take.

In a democracy, "politics is the art of the possible".  In an authoritarian government, politics means "stomping on the opposition and grinding them into the dirt".  It means destroying the Civil Service.  It means ridding the government of any and all of the people who are experts in their fields who disagree with you.

Trump has been working toward "authoritarianism" for 4 years.  It's time to call a halt to the whole damaging process and get back to the usual "fight like hell but obey the norms" again.

More Political Silliness And Illogic

This is partly about "the political games" but also about the illogic and careless language used by the talking heads on TV.  And I don't like either side of both issues!

First, the "the political games".   The Facts:  FBI Director Comey sent a letter to "Congress advising them that more emails were found that might involve their previous committee investigations, as he had promised to do if new information was discovered.  No specific information was included, and he noted that the possibilility of misunderstanding.

The basis of concern is that Huma Abedin (wife of Anthony Weiner of sexting shame-fame) is an associate of Clinton and there MIGHT be some Clinton emails not yet discovered.  She used a family laptop to send some emails to Clinton.  The content has not been made public at this time is not known at this time. Nothing suggesting anything improper has been offerred. 

The FBI, after reviewing all the emails on Clinton's server, has found nothing of concern and closed the investigation months ago.  A very few emails with classified information were sent TO her without proper notifications.  Her replies were lawful; if you don't know received information was classified, YOU are not at fault. The FBI said so.

OK.  As far as I can think, if Huma sent Clinton any emails, they are on Clinton's email system and already examined by the FBI.  This starts to look like the Kevin Bacon game.  Can you connect anyone socially unacceptable to Clinton?  LOL!

As far as I can tell now, the letter was addressed TO House Committee Chairman, all Republican of course.  I will explain something about the details of Government letter-writing.  There is "TO", there is "cc" (courtesy copy), and there is "bcc" (blind courtesy copy) just like on emails.

Only in Government letters, the cc and bcc is not on the original TO letter.  The "TO" recipients do not know about the cc and bcc list unless they ask for a file copy of the letter.  The cc list does not know about the "bcc" list unless they ask (and the originators admit to it).

So, unless things have changed (and they might have - I've been retired for10 years),  the Republican Committee saw only that they had been sent the letter, the Democratic minority leaders saw they had been sent a copy of the letter to the Republican Chairmen, and only Comey and his staff know who got sent a bcc copy (bcc's are usually sent only to internal staff who need to know about such things for media questions and file-keeping.

Is that confusing enough?  I spent 30 years in Government and got very used to those kinds of subtleties, LOL!  It all makes sense to me!  LOL!

Second, the talking heads discussions...

Everyone I heard on MSNBC and CNN got it all WRONG!  Clinton mentioned the Comey letter send to the Republican Committee Chairmen.  As usual, she was utterly technically correct.  The letter was indeed addressed to the Republican Committee Chairmen.  She said that with the same accuracy I would in discussing "TO, cc, and bcc".  She understands that stuff  and speaks of it accurately.

The TV talking heads did not!  They said Clinton claimed the letter was sent "only" to the Republicans and casitigatd her for a deception..  The ccs were sent to the ranking Democratic Minority Leaders.  But they received cc copies; they were not the original TO recipients.

Meanwhile, Clinton is saying that she would like any available information to be released ASAP, as there is noactual information in Director Comey's letter but there are suggestions.  Trump, on the other hand is claiming the non-information in Comey's letter as some proof of guilt  

As odd as that might seem in the real world, it matters in Government.  Comey very DELIBERATELY and EXPLICITLY sent the official copies of the letter to the Republican Committee chairmen  and NOT the official copies to the Democratic Ranking Members.  But cc'd them to cover his ass.  A true Washington wimpy asshole who needs to be removed...

Conclusion:  Comey wished to try to stay out of trouble by playing it both too carefully and too ineptly.  Whoever wins the Presidency, he is going to be gone for the crime of political incompetence.  He can't claim it was urgent (the FBI had the information 5 weeks ago), and he can't claim any factul reason for presenting the mere statement that the FBI was investigating new information 11 days before an election. 

Ex FBI officials have said there is an informal, but previously modern unbroken rule of avoiding all political statements 60 days before an election.  That Comey broke that rule says a lot about his intent. 

US Election

Well, we are down to the final few weeks of the US Presidential election, and quite frankly, I wish it was tomorrow.  Or even yesterday.  I am SO tired of it I could scream!

At least it seems that the decision is no longer in doubt.  We will be referring to "Madame President" for the first time ever here, Democrats will have won a 3rd consecutive term controlling the White House since 1940 when Franklin Roosevelt was re-elected to a 3rd personal consecutive term, and (to steal a phrase from an previous generation) a long national nightmare will be over.

The election results will probably give nominal control of the US Senate to the Democrats by a small majority.  It is possible that the House of Representatives will become Democratic , but I'm not expecting it today (but who knows what things will look like in 3 weeks)?  Trump and the Republicans have the 3 weeks to make things better or worse.

If the Al Smith Foundation Dinner last night was any clue, it will get worse for the Republicans.  As background, the Dinner "is an annual white fundraiser in the United States for Catholic charities supporting needy children, held at theWaldorf-Astoria hotel in New York, on the third Thursday of October. It is organized by the Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation in honor of Al Smith the former New York Governor and the first Catholic US Presidential candidate.  The dinner is hosted by the Archbishop of New York.

The idea is for the 2 major Presidential candidates to engage in self deprecating humor and some gentle digs at their opponent.

Trump failed at that utterly.  That's not just my opinion.  He received boos and several points when he just made his regular speech at a few points.  Commenters said afterwards that they had never heard boos at the event before.

Apparently, Trump does not understand humor at all.  He did have a few funny lines, none of which were aimed at himself, and even as delivered fell flat.  I suspect several of them would have gotten laughs if delivered by a professional.  Sarcasm can be funny, but not when delivered in anger.

Trumps best joke was when he mentioned 'Michelle Obama made a speech and everyone loved it. It was great.   My wife, Melania, made the exact same speech and everyone gets on her case.'

The audience loved it.  It is probably the best humor about plagiarism ever!  But even THEN, it wasn't aimed at himself.

The crowd stayed with Trump while he ticked down a list of what he called "corny" jokes about being a former Democrat and sarcastically calling himself "modest." And they mostly laughed along when he joked about Clinton accidentally bumping into him back stage and saying "pardon me."
"I very politely replied: Let me talk to you about that after I get into office," Trump landed the punchline. Trumps as said previously that Clinton should be in jail for various reasons.  Clinton was seen laughing.

His 20 minutes went downhill rapidly after that.

Clinton, on the other hand went straight to herself for humor.  "I took a break from my rigorous nap schedule to be here," Clinton told the audience.   And "Usually, I charge a lot for speeches like this."

She got in some rather harsh zingers, but they didn't get boos and there were definitely Trump supporters in the audience.  Rudy Giuliani was there and was the subject of one Clinton joke.  Clinton mentioned the many dignitaries in the audience positively, and then said "and then there is Rudy Giuliani".  Ouch!

“Now, many don’t know this,” Clinton continued, “but Rudy actually got his start as a prosecutor going after wealthy New Yorker's who avoided paying taxes. But, as the saying goes, ‘If you can’t beat them, go on Fox News and call them a genius".  Giuliani, a Trump surrogate speaker of increasing vicious attacks on Clinton, looked like he had a hot coal up where the sun doesn't shine...

But for the most part, Clinton was making jokes on herself and light digs at Trump, and Trump was his usual mean self.  I understand that.  People who are internally confident and happy can make jokes about themselves.

Not to say too much about myself in all of this, but I don't find self-humor threatening.  I tripped over a cat once while a friend was there, and landed on my hands and knees.  My first words were "so this is what it looks like from their point of view".

People like Trump can't laugh at themselves.  If one of his staff had written the absolutely funniest self-deprecating joke ever created, Trump would not have used it.  It would be against himself, and he can't imagine anyone against him.  Because they would simply be "wrong".

My point here, long time in coming, is that Trump can't be President because he lacks the fullness of self-awareness that allows most of us to laugh at ourselves.  I had a friend who did the almost slapstick gag of stepping onto a small boat from the pier and fell into the water as the boat moved away.

I laughed my ass off.  It was as if you actually saw someone slip on a banana peel.  He was livid, angry, enraged...  If I had done that myself, I would have keeled over in laughter at myself as I pulled myself onto the boat, and asked if anyone got a picture of it!

Narcissistic megalomaniac bullies cannot laugh at themselves.  Most of the rest of us can.  At ourselves, and at them...

But basically, all this means that the US Presidential election is decided.  Clinton will win; the question is by how much and will she carry the Senate and/or House along with her.  For the Democratic party, life looks good for 2 Presidential terms.  The interim elections are always iffy.  But the gains of the day are sufficient for the day.

I will be glad after election night Nov 8th.  No mor3e Trump for a while.

But do you know what is generally annoying?  In several places around the US, some people are starting their campaigns for the 2020 Presidential elections...