Lemme See...

[thisnewday]

Just got my mail-in ballot from the county board of elections.

Now, lemme see, who should I vote for?

Just kidding...

LPK
Dreamwidth
9.24.2020 

Comments

[rosegardenfae]

Lol, just got mine today too. Decisions, decisions.

[thisnewday]

If only all of life's decisions were this easy. Although it may be that not many will be this consequential. Wishing us the best...

[smokingboot]

Very best of luck to you!

[thisnewday]

Thanks, at this point there is growing concern about what will happen after election day regardless of what the results turn out to be.

That's because Trump and his minions seem hell-bent on destroying confidence in the electoral process and in undermining the very laws and institutions which are the basis of our constitutional democracy.

I'm very much afraid that life in these once-United States is going to look very different following this 4-year debacle and whatever may come in its aftermath...

[smokingboot]

I can only observe from the outside with little deeper understanding of American issues.
Though your nation's institutions may have taken a battering, there is hopefully a resilience to the better principles in US society that will recover quickly once he is gone. If he doesn't go, God knows what will happen next.

[thisnewday]

"Though your nation's institutions may have taken a battering..."

There are two troubling things in this regard, one of them institutional, the other, um, societal/cultural? Not sure how to define the second one, exactly.

Anyway, the institutional problems have to do with flaws in the US Constitution itself, the most obvious and most often referenced being the Electoral College. Which I won't even get into here because it has been so often discussed and because it's illustrative of others rather than definitive in itself.

Making this point, much better than I could ever hope to do, is a monologue by comedian/commentator John Oliver which was recently linked by our friend Rebeccmeister.

The language in it is awful, but he pulls no punches and the points he makes are actually quite substantial. If you can tolerate the raucous, bawdy nature of it, the link is here: https://youtu.be/pkpfFuiZkcs

The societal/cultural (?) problem I see is that our institutions are only as strong as the support they receive from the society at large, especially when they are under assault as they obviously are now.

One of the things I've said from the start of Trump's presidency is that Obama showed us what we COULD be while Trump has shown us what we ARE. And that does not bode well for the future of our Democracy.

Anyway, sorry to be such a downer, but that's how things look from where I am. I'm very fearful that in Joe Biden the Democrats have not provided us with the champion we need to save our democracy from the likes of an ethically, morally and, apparently, financially bankrupt Donald Trump.

Other than that, I'm hopeful that all of us will have a great day, lol...

[smokingboot]

Hi Larry

Very interesting, thanks for your thoughts. I followed the link, but it doesn't seem to be available in the UK, odd because other John Oliver material is...

One thing I find strange is that to my eye, Trump and Johnson are caricatures.There's something hyperbolic about everything they do, and maybe that is what draws people to them; on some level, they are cartoons, and cartoons have to look simple. My hope is that Trump finally accepts and encourages his followers to accept the real threat of Covid, that he'll support the people who are suffering. Here of course, we lurch from one mistake to another, Boris unable to form a consistent policy from one day to the next.

Biden may not sparkle, but perhaps he's just an ordinary decent man! I hope so. A Biden win might give the US a chance to review those institutions you mention, to heal cracks, mend the broken, and replace that which doesn't work.

We are stuck for a while. I am not sure how long BJ will last, as his own party can't bear him, but my suspicion is that they'll let him carry the can for Covid and Brexit together, then get rid of him. We too have institutional weakness, we tend to apathy and a belief that everything will sort itself out. It never occurs to us that the sorting out may take decades!

Wishing you very well

Debbie