Barrels are Underrated

“Whoever intimidates, threatens, coerces, or attempts to intimidate, threaten, or coerce,  any other person for the purpose of interfering with the right of such other person to vote or to vote  as he may choose, or of causing such other person to vote for, or not to vote for, any candidate  for the office of President, Vice President, Presidential elector, Member of the Senate, Member of the  House of Representatives, Delegate from the District of Columbia, or Resident Commissioner,  at any election held solely or in part for the purpose of electing such candidate, shall be fined  under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both.”  

Federal Statute, 18 U.S. Code § 594, Passed in 1948 as KKK and Other Armed Groups Kept Blacks from Voting

“The Michigan Court of Claims has ruled that open carry of firearms outside polls on Election Day to be legal… The ruling from Chief Judge Christopher Murray came Tuesday [10/27] after Michigan  Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson's recent directive to ban them within 100 feet of polling locations for Nov. 3. After Benson's earlier directive, three gun rights groups sued, leading up to today's hearing and ruling.” Fox News 2 (Detroit), October 27th. As the President has called on his supporters to monitor polls, to which well-armed right-wing militia seem to have responded with alacrity. 

Voter intimidation is flatly illegal everywhere (the above is a federal law). The problem with that concept is that it is open to perception and relies mostly on local police for enforcement. The FBI and other federal policing agencies lack the necessary staffing to enforce the law itself. As a group of 13 ultra-right-wing militia were arrested in connection with an alleged plot to kidnap and possibly execute Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat who is unpopular with right-wing extremists, a local sheriff – the same sheriff who would have to enforce voter intimidation at polling stations – defended these purported domestic terrorists. 

Perhaps, mused Barry County, Michigan, Sheriff Dar Leaf, they were simply implementing their constitutional right to implement a citizen’s arrest of a woman they believe violated their constitutional rights (which they called an abuse of her authority surrounding coronavirus restrictions). “Six people are facing federal charges of conspiracy to kidnap, while seven others, who are associated with a group called The Wolverine Watchmen, were charged by the state.

“According to Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, the suspects in state custody attempted to identify law enforcement officers’ home addresses so they could target them, threatened violence to instigate a civil war, and planned and trained for an operation to attack Michigan’s Capitol building and kidnap government officials including the governor.” The Patriot Daily Express, October 16th. At more than one subsequent rally, where the President excoriated Whitmer and cast her as an outlaw, Trump smiled as the crowd chanted in unison, “Lock her up! Lock her up!” That she was the intended victim of extreme, Trump-supporting violence did not matter. 

In Tennessee, generally thought of as a Trump stronghold (in 2016, he carried 60.7% of the vote), there is a growing recognition that Donald Trump believes the only way he can win his by denying the vote to his opposing constituency, even if that entails blatantly illegal tactics: “The ominous music swelled behind Donald Trump Jr. as he spoke straight to camera in a recent Trump campaign ad asking supporters to join the campaign’s poll-watching group called ‘Army for Trump’:

“‘The radical left are laying the groundwork to steal this election from my father,’ he says. ‘We need every able-bodied man, woman, to join Army for Trump’s Election security operation...We need you to help us watch them, not only on Election Day, but also during early voting and at the counting boards.’

“This ‘Army’ of unsanctioned, untrained poll watchers is part of a disturbing torrent of voter suppression and intimidation activities we have seen this election season…  Already this year, my organization, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, has filed litigation and undertaken advocacy to stop coordinated efforts to intimidate voters — especially Black voters and other voters of color.” Kristen Clarke in the Tennesseean.com (Nashville), October 27th.

Meanwhile, in Pinellas County, Florida (St. Petersburg is located there):  “Two armed men dressed as security guards told cops they were hired by the Trump campaign to set up near a Florida early voting location — a claim that President Donald Trump’s campaign denied through a spokesperson.

“On Wednesday [10/21], Pinellas County Supervisor of Elections Julie Marcus told local CBS station WFLA that when sheriff’s deputies approached the two men, who had set up a tent near a St. Petersburg early voting location, they said they’d been hired by the Trump campaign.” Mediaite.com, October 22nd. Notwithstanding the local GOP and Trump campaign denial, given the above solicitation for that “Army,” it seems that miraculously, money is coming from somewhere, and very obviously consistent with the unabashed messaging from the Trump campaign itself.

As an extension of the intimidation phenomenon is the very real threat of a full-on civil war in support of keeping Donald Trump in power should he lose the election. If all those voter suppression efforts fail. One group of conspiracy theorists seem at the forefront of the risk: “On Oct. 17, roughly 100 people reportedly gathered in a conference room at a resort in Scottsdale, Ariz., for Q Con Live, an all-day event featuring speeches from some of the most prominent disciples of the QAnon movement.

“Among the conference’s ‘all-star lineup’ of speakers was Alan Hostetter, a retired police officer turned yoga instructor who has become a key figure in California’s anti-lockdown movement, which emerged this spring in opposition to state and local ‘stay-at-home’ orders designed to combat the spread of COVID-19.

“According to an audio recording of his speech obtained by hosts of the ‘QAnon Anonymous’ podcast, which has been tracking the growing conspiracy movement since its early days, Hostetter, who claims the coronavirus pandemic has been exaggerated by the media and that masks are part of a tyrannical effort to control the public, can be heard describing the U.S. as on the brink of civil war and suggesting that President Trump must be reelected in order to prevent the country from descending into violent conflict.

“This kind of ‘second civil war’ rhetoric is more commonly associated with far-right extremist movements like the ‘boogaloo’ and antigovernment militia groups (who’ve also seized on anti-lockdown protests) than with QAnon. But experts who study QAnon say they’ve observed an increase in calls for offline action among the movement’s followers, adding to the growing risk of postelection violence posed by a variety of extremist groups.” Yahoo New, October 28th.

This sounds like the Jim Crow era, when KKK and other armed segregationists literally shot African Americans trying to exercise their right to vote… with little or no risk of local prosecution... combined with the race war murderer Charles Manson imagine he could provoke in his “Helter Skelter” vision for America. It also sounds like so many totalitarian states, who either stuff the ballot box so voter intimidation is not necessary or deploy the same poll-watching intimidation. Does this sound like the United States of America, land of the free and the home of the brave?

I’m Peter Dekom, and right-wing gun barrels at polling stations is a really, really bad mix that is obviously and clearly intended to intimate anyone who might possibly vote against Trump.

Bad for Business

As an attorney in an industry that constantly needs large infusions of capital – film, television and digital media – I am in a pretty good position to gauge our relative standing in the world by understanding the reactions of global investors to American-based opportunities. The China capital faucet turned off in the summer of 2017 due to their internal governmental policies, then having less to do with the growing animosity between the US and the People’s Republic. Although Arab money had been increasingly unpopular, particularly after the Khashoggi murder by Saudi operatives, the dearth of capital from other parts of the world somehow legitimized what had been perceived as “money with blood on its hands.”

While our currency remains fairly stable, notwithstanding the deficits since every other nation in the world is facing major COVID-related economic issues, our international standing is suffering at every level. When discussing a nine-figure potential investment with a German investment representative, I was told point blank not to expect any funding from Germany until Donald Trump’s destabilizing presence was clearly gone. Wow! Even within the United States, his trade policies, his trade war with China and the hard fact that there is no way to achieve a real economic recovery under COVID-19 is well-contained – which Trump has totally mishandled – are pushing fiscal business conservatives into the Biden/Democrat camp. Even beyond the Lincoln Project.

Republicans have dominated donations to national and local candidates in past elections, but Donald Trump’s negative impact on business seems to have reversed that tide. For example, “Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden has dramatically outpaced Republican President Donald Trump in total fundraising during the final months of the campaign ahead of the Nov. 3 election, and that is also true when it comes to winning cash from the banking industry… Biden's campaign and other fundraising vehicles supporting his campaign have pulled in roughly $3 million from commercial banks, compared with just over $1.4 million for Trump, CRP [Center for Responsive Politics] data shows.” Reuters, October 27th.

Internationally, the power and influence of the United States, the ability to maximize US business interests overseas, continue to plunge. “In the eyes of much of the world, the United States is a potent yet faltering force, a conflicted nation heading into an election that will either redeem it or tug it farther away from the myths and promise that for generations defined it in capitals from Singapore to Paris and Buenos Aires to Nairobi.

“The stature and standing of the U.S. have plummeted in recent years, a number of international polls suggest. That trend has been exacerbated this year by what is widely perceived to be a disorderly and ineffectual governmental response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and now by a chaotic electoral process.

“For some, a once-bright beacon of egalitarian values has faded into an aloof, disfigured power… ‘The United States was always a model to follow,’ said Gloria Jácome Torres, a 41-year-old lawyer in Mexico City. ‘Since I was a student, I always viewed the United States with admiration — everything they did there with respect to human rights, the level of education, personal liberties.’… But particularly during the last four years, her view has been soured by what she sees as a pattern of cruelty and callousness emanating from U.S. officialdom, as seen in the mistreatment of migrants and racial injustice laid bare…

“Bilahari Kausikan, a former Singaporean ambassador to the United Nations, said the fevered atmosphere surrounding the U.S. election Nov. 3 reminded him of the 1970s, when he lived in the United States and saw firsthand a superpower racked by turmoil and questioning its direction… ‘That, to me, is a period of self-doubt that was perhaps even worse, because you were defeated in war in Vietnam, the economy was in shambles, even worse than it is now. The racial polarization was always there,’ he said. ‘And it’s not just America — all Western democracies go through periodic paroxysms of self-doubt. But people should not underestimate your ability to regenerate yourself.’

“Nevertheless, in places such as Germany — where, within living memory, the United States served as a much-admired protector — angst over the mercurial American path in recent years has become palpable… Germany, which is Europe’s biggest economy, is one of the United States’ closest traditional allies, but the relationship has been severely strained by Trump’s angry outbursts over the defense spending and trade policies of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government.

“Olav Schrage, 48, a cardiologist in Berlin who has often visited the United States, said many of his compatriots view Trump as a ‘total fraud’ and an ‘appalling person.’ But what truly worried him, he said, was that ‘so many [Americans] are OK with that, and not only accept that, but also applaud it.’” Los Angeles Times, October 27th. Instability, erratic and unpredictable policymaking, jingoistic nationalism and mythology-driven populism are deeply antithetical to corporate business interests. Overt racism, in a globally diverse world, is equally problematic for international business.

No matter the election results, the mere existence of a substantial and seemingly unmovable American populist base continues to erode global confidence in the United States. While this evangelical populism and “America First” nationalism (the intentionally racist phrase from the early 20th century) has remained fairly constant since the 1970s, Donald Trump emboldened that constituency, whose self-importance is unlikely to subside in the foreseeable future. Can the United States recapture all or most of its lost stature? Time will tell. One way or another, the United States appears to have lost its claim to a moral high ground.

I’m Peter Dekom, and those “fiscal conservatives” who support Trump’s vision of the Republican Party are shooting themselves in the head.

You Fill Out My Census Not Distortion, Suppression - Widening the Gaps

You Fill Out My Census    Not

Distortion, Suppression - Widening the Gaps

It came to the attention of the Republican Party decades ago that they were a group of very wealthy individuals (and their corporations) who were interested in conserving and growing their wealth, a value that by definition was in the interest of the very few with enough wealth to matter. Their mandate focused on lower taxes, less regulation, fewer entitlements and lower government spending… except in industries where the rich could invoice the government for billions. So, the notion of benefits for most of us was an expensive and unwanted inconvenience to those who loved money more than democracy, fairness or equality. How could they get enough voters to vote against their own self-interest to let the rich have their way?

When the GOP got slammed in the 1964 presidential election (Barry Goldwater was the ultimate fiscal conservative and lost badly; see the above map with the results), they looked for political opportunities to reverse their obvious fate. They found it in the Democratic corrupt hold on the entire South, cronyism and gerrymandering on steroids. Racist Democrats, those opposed to civil and voting rights for minorities (most of the large African American population was still mired in post-Civil War Jim Crow poverty), were running the show. Dixiecrats even embraced the Klan and drafted and then enforced Jim Crow laws with a vengeance. Even purported liberal Dixiecrats, like President Woodrow Wilson who pushed blacks out of the federal civil service, towed the racist line until much, much later.

What the Dems missed, however, was a power far greater than the Southern Democrat political machine that seemed unbreakable. Religion. Evangelical Christianity. The GOP did not. God and Country! The new GOP rallying cry. Give them all the social restrictions and controls they want if they will vote for lower taxes (and lots of loopholes), massive government corporate spending (that “military-industrial complex” Republican President Dwight Eisenhower warned us about), deregulation and lower government spending when it related to individual entitlements of benefits. Abortions? Who cares?! The rich could always find a doctor who would perform the operation or fly baby girl to a state or country that simply permitted the procedure. School prayer? White tradition as the core value? Give it to ‘em!

The Republican Party was so successful in these efforts that its rising constituency was actually convinced that deregulation, lower taxes and massive military spending were core “American values,” and that Social Security, public education, universal healthcare and Medicare were the devil’s creation. Since these later programs were social benefits and America was fighting the communist/socialist domino theory all over the world, they seized on that word. Social programs were now left-wing socialism… even though they really were just social programs. Socialism was an entirely different construct: government ownership of land, factories and all manner of economic value creation. Their voters were soon convinced there was no difference, and since social programs cost rich folks tax dollars, the tiny minority of GOP Scrooge McDucks were deeply satisfied at that conflation. Business-friendly values simply became part of the evangelical view of America. And racial injustice gave too many rich Americans an easy “blame someone strategy.”

Cut to the late 20th and early 21st century. There was a demographic shift in the wind. That lovely southern rural-values voter constituency, which had long since expanded into majority rural America, was rapidly becoming overwhelmed in an America that was well north of 85% urban and reaching a point where racial, ethnic, religious and gender minorities were about to become a majority. What was worse, the rising generations (Millennials and younger) had no understanding of the “evils” of communism or socialism. They did not live through the “red scare” or watch the battle against communism during the Vietnam War. “Socialism” wasn’t a bad word when they were facing staggering student debt, narrowing job opportunities (artificial intelligence and robotics were accelerating) and steeply unaffordable housing. Hey, Bernie?!

They also were not particularly attracted to “organized religion.” “Tolerance” and environmental concerns were their core values. And that was before the pandemic and an obvious (to the majority of those younger constituents) mishandling of the impact of the virus. Republicans, now distancing themselves from their clown-prince leader, were moving in a new direction. The only younger voters the GOP could count on were those who believed the system was leaving them behind (read: educational qualifications) and committed evangelicals.

The GOP is not a stupid gaggle of blithering idiots, no matter what many Democrats may believe. Many earned their wealth though hard work, education and risk-taking brilliance. But it was equally clear that that uber-religious constituency that they had relied on, that immoveable bevy of voters (roughly 30% of the vote) that Trump completely usurped, was being overruled by a tsunami of voters with very different political agendas. Coopting the evangelical, rural values constituency – if it were still able to work at all – was no longer enough to protect GOP interests. 

The perceived “next era” GOP mandates were (1) to stack the Supreme Court (with lifetime appointments of younger judges) to make sure liberal legislation would be dead on arrival even if a vast majority of Americans wanted otherwise and (2) to marginalize and suppress voters likely to reverse the Republican fiscal policies at the polls. Undermining liberal states, hobbling them fiscally and politically, was crucial. The GOP, which still controls the majority of state governments and currently the presidency and the Senate, had three clear vectors to implement those goals: (i) voter suppression, (ii) stacking the judicial system with ultra-conservatives and (iii) making sure the Census undercounts components necessary for Democrat-friendly representatives and budgetary allocations.

We’re watching the Republican rush-rush effort to place Amy Coney Barrett on the Supreme Court through a late term appointment once decried by the GOP in the waning year of the Obama administration. So what! We need that appointment, because we might lose. Voter suppression, through restrictive voter qualifications (voter IDs), gerrymandering, moving polling stations far from minority communities, culling voter rolls of likely liberal constituencies, voter manipulation and intimidation, making remote voting increasingly difficult and literally creating last minute rules (thank you Texas with one early vote ballot box per county) to keep non-white traditionalists from being able to vote.

Writing for the October 24th Los Angeles Times, James Rainey presents just one set of examples: “A Memphis, Tenn., poll worker turned away people wearing Black Lives Matter T-shirts, saying they couldn’t vote. Robocalls warned thousands of Michigan residents that mail-in voting could put their personal information in the hands of debt collectors and police. In Georgia, officials cut polling places by nearly 10%, even as the number of voters surged by nearly 2 million.

“The long American tradition of threatening voting access — often for Black people and Latinos — has dramatically resurfaced in 2020, this time buttressed by a record-setting wave of litigation and an embattled president whose reelection campaign is built around a strategy of sowing doubt and confusion.

“Voting rights activists depict the fights against expanding voter access as a last-ditch effort by President Trump and his allies to disenfranchise citizens who tend to favor Democrats. The administration insists — despite no evidence of a widespread problem — that it must enforce restrictions to prevent voter fraud… ‘We have an incredibly polarized country and we have a political party whose leader thinks it’s to the party’s advantage to make it harder for people to register to vote and to vote,’ said Richard L. Hasen, a UC Irvine law professor and authority on voting. ‘So that is where we are.’

“Trump’s efforts to tamp down turnout, particularly among voters of color, stands in stark contrast to other recent GOP presidential candidates, including John McCain and Mitt Romney, who spoke of a ‘big tent’ party and expanding support among Black, Latino and Asian American voters… ‘There are two strands in the Republican Party,’ Hasen said. ‘There is one that has tried to be more inclusive, as a means to win elections, and there is a voter-suppression wing. With Trump in office, it’s clear the voter-suppression wing is dominant right now.’”

And as for that Census, in an election environment where tiny margins can swing critical districts in swing states, it does not take much to change results. The October 24th Associated Press summarizes the status of the current Census, which has come to an end: “From tribal lands in Arizona and New Mexico to storm-battered Louisiana, census workers were unable to reach all the households needed for a complete tally of the U.S. population, a count ended last week by a Supreme Court ruling.

“Community activists, statisticians and civil rights groups say racial and ethnic minorities are historically undercounted, and shortcomings this census could hurt their communities for years to come… The count determines the number of congressional seats each state gets, where roads and bridges are built, how schools and healthcare facilities are funded and how $1.5 trillion in federal spending is allocated annually… ‘An undercount in our community means schools are overcrowded, hospitals are overcrowded, roads are congested,’ said John C. Yang, president and executive director of Asian Americans Advancing Justice.

“The census ended last week after the high court sided with the Trump administration and suspended a lower-court order that let the count continue to Oct. 31… The Census Bureau says it reached over 99.9% of households, but in a nation of 330 million, the remaining 0.1% represents hundreds of thousands of uncounted residents. In small cities, even handfuls of undercounted residents can make a big difference in the resources the communities receive and the power they wield.

“And door-to-door census takers fell short of 99.9% in many pockets of the country… In large parts of Louisiana, which was battered by two hurricanes, census takers didn’t even hit 94% of households… In Window Rock, capital of the COVID-19-ravaged Navajo Nation, census takers reached only 98.9%... Other areas where the count fell short of 99.9% include Quincy, Mass.; New Haven, Conn.; Asheville, N.C.; Jackson, Miss.; Providence, R.I.; and New York’s Manhattan, which many residents left in the spring because of the coronavirus.” 

The big casualty in all this is democracy, which is why the prestigious The Economist considers the United States to be a “flawed democracy” were popular representation is significantly distorted, and where several recent elections have produced successful presidential candidates who lost the popular vote. Do you care? Prove it! Vote if you have not already.

I’m Peter Dekom, and in my United States, it’s time to MAKE DEMOCRACY GREAT AGAIN!

Unprepared!

Americans are living in a period where there is a tsunami of change… and we are flailing. Our political systems, our very mindsets, seem unprepared to grapple effectively with these changes. I’ve discussed many of the massive global military threats we face and tackled the very likely impact of artificial-intelligence-driven automation on our socio-economic structure. We have to deal with these impending realities, already effecting a level of fear laced with the greatest polarization and economic inequality this nation (the world?) has ever faced. And we do so with a political system that favors states over cities and farmers over other workers. Based on a currently unamendable constitution that was created 230 years ago, we are facing change that was never contemplated by our Founding Forefathers.

Writing an OpEd for the New York Times (September 16 th ), Ganesh Sitaraman, – a professor at Vanderbilt Law School and author of The Crisis of the Middle-Class Constitution: Why Economic Inequality Threatens Our Republic – delves into our seeming political misfit based on structures and systems created literally in a different era: “[Our] Constitution has at least one radical feature: It isn’t designed for a society with economic inequality.

“There are other things the Constitution wasn’t written for, of course. The founders didn’t foresee America becoming a global superpower. They didn’t plan for the internet or nuclear weapons. And they certainly couldn’t have imagined a former reality television star president. Commentators wring their hands over all of these transformations — though these days, they tend to focus on whether this country’s founding document can survive the current president.

“But there is a different, and far more stubborn, risk that our country faces — and which, arguably, led to the TV star turned president in the first place. Our Constitution was not built for a country with so much wealth concentrated at the very top nor for the threats that invariably accompany it: oligarchs and populist demagogues.” The problem, of course, is both that too many American institutions have been built under this constitutional structure and the status quo benefits too many incumbents who have been accorded disproportionate power over “the rest of us.”

Sitaraman continues: “What is surprising about the design of our Constitution is that it isn’t a class warfare constitution. Our Constitution doesn’t mandate that only the wealthy can become senators, and we don’t have a tribune of the plebs. Our founding charter doesn’t have structural checks and balances between economic classes: not between rich and poor, and certainly not between corporate interests and ordinary workers. This was a radical change in the history of constitutional government.

“And it wasn’t an oversight. The founding generation knew how to write class-warfare constitutions — they even debated such proposals during the summer of 1787. But they ultimately chose a framework for government that didn’t pit class against class. Part of the reason was practical. James Madison’s notes from the secret debates at the Philadelphia Convention show that the delegates had a hard time agreeing on how they would design such a class-based system. But part of the reason was political: They knew the American people wouldn’t agree to that kind of government.

“At the time, many Americans believed the new nation would not be afflicted by the problems that accompanied economic inequality because there simply wasn’t much inequality within the political community of white men. Today we tend to emphasize how undemocratic the founding era was when judged by our values — its exclusion of women, enslavement of African- Americans, violence against Native Americans. But in doing so, we risk missing something important: Many in the founding generation believed America was exceptional because of the extraordinary degree of economic equality within the political community as they defined it.”

We tend to skirt the issue of challenging what has become perceived as a near-sacred document. I am reminded how difficult that foundational document is to change, probably impossible given the degree of contemporary polarization. The last amendment, the 27 th , was passed a quarter of a century ago, in 1992, restricting the ability of Congress to give itself an immediate raise; it was placed into formal consideration 203 years earlier, in 1789.

Ok, that’s the legal structure, but what about mere human beings grappling with a huge long- term change in their environment, one that shakes their very existence to the core? Issues like Malthusian population explosion and geographically-redefining climate change? The stuff that pushes people out of their homes, trashes their livelihoods, foments desperate conflict, forces mass migration and reshapes global priorities and boundaries? Especially if those transitions are glacially slow, constant with occasional extreme, harsh and stark reminders. It seems that such massive long-term changes are not concepts that human brains can grasp and deal with particularly effectively.

David G. Victor – professor at UC San Diego’s School of Global Policy & Strategy and co-director of the Initiative on Energy and Climate at the Brookings Institution – Nick Obradovich – a research scientist at MIT’s Media Laboratory – and Dillon J. Amaya – PhD student at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography – provide the explanation and how meaningful policies can still be adapted in this excerpt from the September 17 th editorial in the Los Angeles Times:

“So why isn’t the public heeding scientists and demanding climate action by politicians that could help deal with these destructive extremes? You can point fingers at the influence of fossil fuel companies, at misinformation from climate deniers and at political obstructionism, notably from a fragmented Republican party. But a much deeper force is also at work: the way our brains function.

“Humans aren’t well wired to act on complex statistical risks. We put a lot more emphasis on the tangible present than the distant future. Many of us do that to the extreme — what behavioral scientists call hyperbolic discounting — which makes it particularly hard to grapple with something like climate change, where the biggest dangers are yet to come.

“Our mental space is limited; we aren’t primed to focus on abstruse topics. Except for a small fraction that are highly motivated, most voters know little about the details of climate change, or the policy options relating to it. Instead, voters’ opinions about such things derive from heuristics such as political party affiliation and basic ideology…

“The arrival of extreme events — hurricanes, wildfires, drought and torrential deluges — is not proof to many people that scientists are right and that a complete rethinking of climate policy is overdue. Instead, voters see these shocks more as evidence that things are out of whack. Change is needed, and voters deliver that verdict not by reevaluating policy but by casting politicians out of office.

“Political scientists call such decision-making retrospective voting, and it too is rooted in how the brain deals with complex topics. It seems less than rational, but for busy voters, focusing on immediate, visible results and situations is a practical way to assess politicians, even if those results and situations are many steps removed from elected leaders’ actual responsibilities.

“When it comes to climate change, this sort of brain-driven behavior tends to create churn in political leadership rather than the continuity needed for long-term planning. It ejects whoever happens to be in office, rather than the real culprits. It doesn’t help that when politicians know they are at risk of losing office due to disasters, they may pursue quick payoffs, neglecting longer-term policies like those needed for emissions mitigation and climate adaptation…

“This grim analysis explains why political systems will always be playing catch-up. Even with the conspicuous signals of regular extreme events, public support for the policies needed to stop global warming will be fleeting. But that realization can also inspire new policy strategies that are better suited for our political brains.

“First, investments in technology can help immensely because they lower the cost of reducing emissions, making change appear less costly and easier to adopt. New energy technologies also create new interest groups that can help keep policy makers focused on controlling emissions when voters’ minds drift.

“Second, we’re likely to do better with policies that generate immediate and tangible benefits. A good example is efforts to control soot — a potent warming pollutant and also a central ingredient in noxious local air pollution. Even countries and societies that care little about global goals find it in their self-interest to protect the air their citizens breathe.

“Third, our political institutions can help people focus on the long view by surveying climate impacts on a regular basis, so that each extreme storm is less a novel event and more a part of a pattern that needs sustained policy attention. One model is California’s program of localized climate assessments that inform decisions about land-use planning and development. Another is the Obama administration’s regular, nationwide assessments, which are at risk of termination under President Trump.”

Some turn to religious, like those evangelicals who believe God could never leave us hanging, that His biblically-recounted pledge after the Great Flood never to wreak such a global catastrophe on mankind again is enough assurance against the ravages of climate change. Others seek to find groups to blame – immigrants or foreign powers or people of different faiths or racists – act accordingly, circling their cultural wagons. But unless we are willing to face reality, adapt our institutions and mindsets accordingly, history teaches us that such unprepared and stubborn nations never survive. With the election looming days away, will we opt for science and preparedness or conspiracy theory, misinformation and shooting from the hip? Or is it just too late no matter which way the vote goes.

I’m Peter Dekom, and I am probably old enough to avoid witnessing the final death throes of a great nation, but there is so much denial circulating around me, so much polarization and pain, that I feel like screaming… er… blogging… even as it appears not enough people really care.

The Writing on the Wall… In Blood

 

The biggest political question for the Republican Party, addressing its very survival, is what it looks like after the January inauguration… no matter who wins. To retain its populist mantle, which virtually precludes horse-trading and compromising with Democrats, it risks permanently disenfranchising its moderate wing of fiscal conservatives and social moderates. 

That’s the backbone of the Lincoln Project, a scared group of unrepresented moderate Republicans who are truly terrified at the rhetoric of an unabashed racist president – despite his protests that he was the “least racist person in this room” at the last presidential debate (“methinks the lady doth protest too much”) – one who is cutting off desperately needed STEM-educated/skilled immigrants to the fill the void that US educated workers seem unable to fill and whose erratic trade policies and COVID denial are hobbling their business opportunities everywhere. We’re watching the horrific pandemic numbers rising now as the second wave rolls over us, which will slam the economy even harder.

But as the Republicans discovered in 1964 – see my recent You Fill Out My Census    Not:

Distortion, Suppression - Widening the Gaps blog for specifics – a group of wealthy business/ professional class voters (moderate fiscally motivated Republicans) seeking lower taxes and reduced federal regulation simply cannot generate enough votes to elect… er… almost anybody. They need enough additional voters to carry a majority where it matters, people willing to vote against their own self-interest, for “other reasons,” social, cultural, racial and most of all religious. And right now, that additional constituency is very much in Trump’s pocket, win or lose. Without those populist and racial sentiments, that base (representing somewhere between 25% and 30% of all voters since at least the 1970s), a GOP candidate probably cannot win even a nomination to represent the Party in a national election.

Indeed, in this era of negative campaigning and vituperative, often wildly inaccurate fake social media exacerbated by the loosened purse strings from Citizens United, moderate Republicans have systematically been shoved out the door in primary elections by righter-than-right challengers (probably better described as immovable doctrinaire “populists”). With few exceptions, like Mormon Utah, moderate traditional Republicans just do not stand a chance anymore. But as the rising younger population is increasingly educated, as tolerance and climate change become core values, and as the United States skews more urban and more diverse, traditional populism is on the wrong side of American history.

Does this foretell a the formation of a new, fiscally conservative political party? But how will they garner enough votes to win fair representation? Do these moderates simply have to wait out this era of rising populism until its main supporters just die off or are sufficiently marginalized? That could take a long time. Perhaps, they simply have to swallow their pride and embrace the new GOP, hoping for a few policy scraps that might benefit them… or, gulp, accept the Democratic Party, believing that maybe they will have better luck there pursuing a more moderate path? Oddly, healthcare for all is less an issue for big business, because with a competitive federal alternative, their own employee healthcare costs could plummet. Are my fears justified? Is the persistency of populism truly inevitable?

Writing for the October 25th Los Angeles Times, Noah Bierman provides this reality-check: “Even if President Trump loses reelection, evidence is growing that his populist, personality-driven movement will continue to dominate the Republican Party, overpowering conservatives who are trying to sketch out alternatives… The clearest signs can be seen among the Trump acolytes making early moves to win the 2024 Republican nomination.

“South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, who spoke in New Hampshire earlier this month, has been getting advice from Corey Lewandowski, a former Trump campaign manager… Michael R. Pompeo delivered a blistering attack against China, Trump’s favorite foreign punching bag, at a speech to the Wisconsin Legislature last month, one of the Secretary of State’s many eyebrow-raising turns toward domestic politics.

“And last week [mid-October] Nikki Haley, Trump’s former United Nations ambassador, endorsed a candidate for governor of Montana who is best known for body-slamming a reporter… ‘People are laying the groundwork to consolidate that Trump base,’ said Amanda Carpenter, a Republican Trump critic and former advisor to Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, another would-be successor to the president. ‘Even with a big loss, he will still be the kingmaker of the Republican Party in many senses.’… The prospect seemed unthinkable in 2016, when Trump was an establishment pariah beating back attempts to prevent him from securing the nomination, and then later in the year staving off defections only days before the general election.

“Even more recently, several Republican senators in tight elections have tried to distance themselves from Trump as his electoral prospects have dimmed… But Trump remains the most popular figure in his party and even if he loses is unlikely to keep quiet in future primary races up and down the ballot, including in red states and districts where candidates have little incentive to moderate their positions… Candidates have seen that Trump’s grievance-based rhetoric, which spread in the tea party movement that preceded his entry into politics, holds sway over a large segment of Republican voters who feel marginalized or ignored amid the country’s social and economic changes.

“‘There’s money behind it now, and not only is there money, there is established media,’ said Lawrence Rosenthal, chair of the Berkeley Center for Right-Wing Studies and author of ‘Empire of Resentment: Populism’s Toxic Embrace of Nationalism… Something like Fox News can veer into the next pretty face,’ he added. ‘Breitbart is not going away.’

“Rosenthal argues that American conservatism is now linked to populist movements in Europe and elsewhere, filling in an ideology around Trump’s persona… The issues on which Trump has changed GOP orthodoxy — strict limits on immigration, hostility to trade deals, isolationist foreign policy, ignoring big budget deficits — have been largely popular with the Republican base. His style of grievance, white-identity politics and determination to destroy institutions has been accepted by leading Republicans and celebrated by his most loyal supporters.”

We have a president suggesting he will not leave office regardless of the election results. He seems to have encouraged well-armed, right-wing racist militias to “stand-by,” suggesting that he would encourage a populist civil war if that were what was needed to keep him in office. At the time of this writing, 224,000 Americans have died from the novel coronavirus, and still his base in unwavering. 

Even if Trump is pushed out, how will populist-committed Congressional Republicans work with their Democratic counterparts? Or will they mirror the obstructionist gridlcok they imposed on Obama’s second term? And if the Dems dominate both houses of Congress, how will they deal with a constituency that will have mostly certainly become the disloyal opposition, ready to throw monkey wrenches into our governing machine? And if Trump wins, will the nation even be able to hold together? Can the GOP win without massive voter suppression? Probably not.

I’m Peter Dekom, and those 270 Electoral College votes needed to take the presidency are just the tip of the iceberg that is crashing into the superstructure that is supposed to hold the United States as a functioning democracy.