Archives for 2020

Right now, the experts I follow on Twitter seem equally divided among

• Coup coup coup with a response of no, it’s an autogolpe
• They look like clowns but they are damaging the country
• Eat drink and be merry for tomorrow we die

There are also some more or less rational attempts to look at deadlines and the actual intentions of the various state officials.

I try to stick with the last, and what I see there is that the election will be decided fairly. With a few exceptions, like those two in Michigan, election officials and secretaries of state are doing their jobs with integrity.

Ignoring today’s clown show (what kind of hair dye dissolves in sweat? Shoe polish?), the courts are doing their job. The Trumpies are something like 1 – 30, and the one was solely on procedure.

With every unit that confirms the election results, the Trumpies have one fewer avenue to pursue. Events are closing in on them. Republican legislators in several of the swing states have stated they have no intention to go against the will of the voters.

Trump is following one of his customary gambits: sue and sue and sue until the other party runs out of money. His presidency has, in effect, been the infliction of an abuser on the country, and we are reacting to that. We are extremely sensitive to his actions, and we would just like them to stop. This is the end of the abuse, and Trump is reacting as abusers do. He can’t sue the American public, but he will try to keep the punishment going.

The legal fight is going against Trump.

The bureaucracy (with the sad exception of Emily Murphy) is standing on the side of law and order.

An article in Politico this morning said that Biden’s organization will ramp up public opinion for starting the transition. And, sure enough, the Chamber of Commerce and National Association of Manufacturers, good Republican organizations, called today for the certification of the transition. I suspect we will see more calls with every day that passes. The purpose is to pressure Republican members of Congress to pressure Trump.

I’m not fond of predictions, but it’s hard for me to see how Trump is doing himself any favors with any but the most extreme members of his party, perhaps 10% of the population. He will hurt Republican chances in the Georgia senate elections.

The Republican members of Congress who are sticking with him (most of them) should be shunned by all decent people. This whole business is making me think about the virtues of the practice of shunning. We have only one party now that wants to govern the country. We will have to deal with that.

For now, there is so much crazy that it’s hard to think about how things should be. Joe Biden has had literally thousands of people thinking about that since the spring, and he has plans. He is not allowing Trump to derail those plans.

We need to start the transition ASAP, but so far the consequences are not as dire as some make them out to be. Biden’s people have experience in government, and he’s got all those plans. The transition teams are probably focusing on what they can: mainly personnel choices. What they will learn when they have access to the civil servants in the agencies, who want to do a good job, is exactly how broken things are. That is the basis from which they will have to start.

The progress on the logistics of getting a vaccine produced and distributed is probably the most important area in which the transition teams need to be involved. But even there, it’s likely changes will need to be made.

So I see this period as something to be gotten through with my sanity intact, which means not getting involved in whether it’s a coup or an autogolpe or which Michigan official is more likely to break under Trump’s pressure. I’m pulling back to look at the bigger picture, and that looks like the country will get through this. If you feel like you need to do something, help campaign in Georgia or call your Republican members of Congress and tell them what you think.

What I ThinkPost + Comments (324)