voting

Election Eve 2024

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It’s (the morning of) election eve 2024, and given the stakes here, I figured I’d actually ramble for a little bit.

Anyone reading this around the time of publication knows what the stakes are, and if someone in the indeterminate future is reading this, historians are either looking at 2024 in wonderment at how we got to this point, or aren’t allowed to look at it because history isn’t a thing that exists outside of propaganda. Whatever the case, no need to do a deep dive into the specifics right now.

Still and all, believe it or not, I’m actually feeling hopeful that we’re going to make it through the next day (and the coming weeks) with Harris in the White House and our democracy intact.

My hand placing my ballot envelope in the outgoing mail slot of our neighborhood mailbox.

I hesitate to describe this as optimism. I think there’s a definite difference between optimism, which is often seen as (even if not intended as) ignoring reality and potential downsides in favor of blindly professing that “everything is going to be great, you’ll see”, and hope, which recognizes the downsides but also believes that better outcomes are still possible. And, personally, I strive for a more hopepunk attitude, which starts with “there’s a chance things can be better” and goes on to include “and I’m going to do what I can to make sure that’s what happens, goddammit”.

But the hope is definitely there. And I think there are good reasons for that. Others have written about this far more, in far more depth, and in far more detail than I can (in particular, I recommend Heather Cox Richardson, Jay Kuo, and Solarbird), but here’s a bit of a rundown of the key things that are keeping me from full-on panic, despair, and FUD (fear, uncertainty, and doubt):

  • We’ve had midterms and local elections, but this is the first post-Dobbs presidential election. Every election since that decision was handed down has been showing that the reality of losing the protections of Roe v. Wade is making a difference, and I don’t think that effect has worn off.
  • Related to the above, early voting numbers (which, yes, only tell a small part of the story, and there’s varying data from various areas, so there’s a certain amount of educated guesswork in any analysis) are showing strong turnouts from women, apparently across party lines. And while it’s not quantifiable yet, there’s a strong feeling that many registered Republican women may be crossing party lines on their ballots.
  • The Harris/Walz campaign has been doing a lot of get-out-the-vote work; the Trump/Vance campaign has all but abandoned this.
  • More older voters have died off (helped by Covid and the right-wing resistance to science and disease prevention efforts); more younger people have aged into voting. And while no constituency is a monolith, younger voters tend to skew more liberal.
  • Every time Trump says something, he alienates more people, and gives those on the fence more reasons not to vote for him. The rest of his campaign seems to be running with this approach.

Pulling this out of bullet points, because it’s likely to take more than one paragraph….

A lot of the very understandable concern over Trump winning again is the very real historical precedent. Speaking broadly, America has made its entrenched, systemic sexism and racism very obvious over the past decade. Trump won against Clinton in 2016; though he lost in 2020, that was against Biden, an older white man; now he’s again running against a woman, and a Black/South Asian woman at that. For many, it seems like a stretch to think that Harris can overcome the sexism and racism that has been all too obvious in the media’s rush to qualify and question her every statement, while constantly allowing Trump to fail upward at every opportunity.

I think there’s one major reason why things could change this time: This is our third time dealing with Trump as a candidate. He’s a known quantity at this point, and for most people, that’s not in his favor.

In 2016, many people (including me) didn’t think he’d actually win. However ridiculous and obviously sexist the attacks against Clinton were, I didn’t think that would sway enough of the electorate to put him into office. He was too out there, too obnoxious, too obviously racist, sexist, xenophobic, and in all other ways horrible. But while he lost the popular election (by 2,868,686 votes), the boost from the electoral college was enough to prove me (and many other people) wrong. We then got four years of things getting worse, capped off by a botched response to a global pandemic, leaving us entering the next major election cycle as bodies stacked up in refrigeration trucks because morgues were overwhelmed.

In 2020, running against another older white man, he once again lost the popular election (by 7,059,526 votes, over four million more than in 2016), by enough to lose the electoral college as well — and we all saw how well he handled that. Complaints, lies, conspiracy theories, and eventually a violent coup attempt as he egged on his followers, and he’s never stopped claiming that he was the victim.

Now it’s 2024. We know how bad he would be — he got started in 2016, spent four years doing as much as he could get away with, up to and including encouraging insurrection, and has spent the following four years spiraling ever downwards, making his dreams of heading a fascist dictatorship painfully clear. More and more high-profile Republicans have stepped forward to actively say that it’s time to put country over party and keep Trump from regaining office. Women have seen what he was able to do in stacking the courts and destroying the right to manage their own reproductive health. Minorities have seen the never-ending stream of racism, xenophobia, homophobia, transphobia, and all the other -isms, -phobias, and hatred. We all know that it’s not an act, that he’s not “just saying things” that he doesn’t intend to follow through on. And I think that this will matter.

I also think that, even with America’s systemic sexism and racism, Harris is the right candidate at the right time to finally be the first woman to hold the office of President. I’ve said before that at the time, I didn’t think Biden needed to step down, and that — due in large part to that sexism and racism — it might have been a mistake. In the weeks following that decision, as I’ve watched Harris campaign, I’ve changed my mind. I think — hope, strongly hope — that people, especially people who aren’t old, cis, white, men, who were disillusioned and unexcited about voting in another contest between two old white men, have been and will be turning out to vote for Harris.

I’m sure there are more reasons that I could bring up. And none of this has been easy. But now that we’re down to the wire?

I have hope.

My 2024 ballot showing my vote for Harris and Walz.

I’ve voted (for Harris/Walz, obviously). If you haven’t yet, I hope you do, and I hope you vote for Harris/Walz.

We can be better. We won’t go back, we can move forward. And when we fight, we win.

(Please…we’ve got to win.)

Thoughts on July Fourth

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This is not a day I currently celebrate; my current Facebook cover photo pretty much sums up my feelings on the subject.

White text on a black background quoting the final line of Justice Sotomayor’s dissent in Trump v. United States: ‘With fear for our democracy, I dissent.’ The final two words are in red.

Don’t fall for the propaganda and disinformation campaigns (Biden’s age is just this cycle’s “but her emails”, the headlines about his health are the same as were run about Hilary’s health back then, he has no intention of stepping down, it would just cause chaos and problems if he did, and a vote for Biden is also a vote for Harris if that’s who you’d prefer).

In your local elections, vote third party all you like (and push for ranked choice voting so there’s a better chance of your candidates winning), but on the national stage, please, I’m begging — put pragmatism and the health of our country over pure idealism. While a multiparty system would be better, we only have that in theory, and the reality is that there are only two candidates who can actually win. A third-party vote may arguably be a vote against Trump, but it’s not a vote for Biden and — however little you may think of Biden — getting him into office is the best (and quite likely only) chance there is of you being able to support your third party candidates at any level in the future.

Remember that voting for either candidate isn’t just about the individual person, but also all the people they bring with them as part of their administration. Biden is imperfect, but has done a lot of good under very trying circumstances, and is surrounded by people who support him and help him work towards a better country. Trump and his cronies are focused on nothing less than the dismantling of our democracy and the installation of a fascist dictatorship. (And they’re not even trying to hide it anymore.)

It’s also about correcting the direction of the SCOTUS. Trump was able to grab control of the Supreme Court by appointing three justices during his first term and there’s a reasonable chance that more vacancies will open over the next presidential term. We’re seeing now how much those appointments can affect things long after the president who made the appointment has left office. If Biden (or Harris) is in office when the next openings come up, we have a chance at reclaiming some amount of sanity for that branch of the government.

And when it’s time — vote. Too many people are convinced that voting doesn’t matter, when we’ve seen time and time again how slight swings one way or another can make huge differences. If those of us left of the Republican party (whether just a little left or way the hell out there) were even remotely as good at mobilizing, showing up, and voting as the Republicans are, instead of throwing fits that we don’t have the ideologically perfect candidate and staying home and pouting or giving a “protest vote”, we’d be in far better shape. We might even have an ideological center that’s closer to the center, instead of a left-wing party that’s in line with other nations’ right-wing parties, and a right-wing party that’s determined to out-Hitler Hitler.

Don’t like Biden? That’s fine. You don’t have to like him. But please recognize that with a Biden administration, you’ll have the freedom to make your complaints known, and hopefully affect the system and make change. That won’t be an option if Trump wins again. If nothing else, vote for the party you’ll have a better chance fighting against.

And maybe eventually this will feel like a holiday worth celebrating once more.

VOTE

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Everyone: When it’s time to vote, GET OUT AND VOTE.

The list below (originally found on Facebook) focuses on Alaskan elections (Alaskans can be particularly prone to the “my vote doesn’t count so why bother” mentality, particularly in Presidential elections where Alaska has few electoral votes and the races are often called before polls have even closed in Alaska), but I’d be willing to bet good money that similar close results can be found in whatever region you live in (I’ll admit that I haven’t taken the time to personally research and verify each of these specific instances, but I have no immediate reason to doubt them).

Also, you’ll notice that most of this list has results not from high-profile Presidential elections, but from local elections, from as broad as gubernatorial to as local as school district races. Sure, that’s because those races often deal with smaller voting populations, but those are also the races that are often far more directly impactful to the people who are (and who should be) voting. They may not be as “sexy” and exciting as big-ticket races, but they’re just as important — and not infrequently, arguably more so.

YOUR VOTE COUNTS!

DON’T EVER THINK YOUR VOTE DOESN’T COUNT, BECAUSE IN…

1845: ONE vote brought Texas into the Union.

1868: ONE vote saved President Andrew Johnson from impeachment.

1876: ONE vote gave Rutherford Hayes the presidency of the United States

1939: ONE vote passed the Selective Service act.

1960: ONE vote per precinct elected John F. Kennedy President.

…AND IN ALASKA…

1978: Jay Hammond won the nomination for Governor over Walter Hickel in the primary election by just 98 votes statewide. That’s less than 1/4 vote per precinct!

1978: ONE vote elected Tim Kelly to his Senate seat in District F.

1982: TWO votes gave the nomination for State Senate in District J to David McCracken in the primary election.

1984: ONE vote gave Mary Ratcliff the nomination for State Representative, House District 12, in the primary election.

1986: 17 votes (less than one vote per precinct) elected Rick Uehling Senator from District H, Seat B, out of 14,389 votes cast.

1988: SIX votes elected David Finkelstein to State Representative, House District 12 in the primary election.

1990: TEN votes elect Terry Martin to State Representative, District 13, Seat B. Just ONE vote per precinct.

1990: Four contests in the general election were decided by a margin of less than ONE PERCENT of the votes cast in each contest.

1992: FIVE votes gave Al Vezey the nomination for State Representative, House District 32 in the primary election (less than ONE vote per precinct).

1994: 1.1 votes per precinct elected Tony Knowles as Governor and Fran Ulmer as Lieutenant Governor out of 216,668 votes cast.

1996: ONE vote gave Ann Spohnholz the nomination for State Representative, House District 21, in the primary election.

1998: A TIE was broken by a flip of the coin to elect Wayne Morgan after a runoff Election for a school board seat in the Kuspuk School District.

2003: 14 votes gave Mark Begich the 45% plurality threshold needed to elect him Mayor of Anchorage.

2006: A TIE was broken by a flip of the coin to give Bryce Edgmon the nomination for State Representative, House District 37, in the primary election.

2016: In the Anchorage municipal election, Proposition 9, Girdwood Police Protection, passed by THREE votes.

Linkdump for October 2nd through November 9th

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Sometime between October 2nd and November 9th, I thought this stuff was interesting. You might think so too!

Occupy the Vote. Make a Difference. #occupythevote

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Washington state is expecting a 47% turnout in this election — and people bitch and moan about how nothing ever changes.

I support the #occupy movement. But I’ve got a sneaking suspicion that if every one of the #occupy protesters actually voted, there are a lot of races that wouldn’t be as close as they end up being. If every #occupy protester told their friends to vote — and not just, “you should vote,” but “no, seriously, YOU SHOULD VOTE, we’re going to the polls/filling out our ballots now,” a lot of races wouldn’t even be close.

Yes, protests are important. Yes, we need to make our voices heard. But we also need to remember that shouting in the streets isn’t the only way to make our voices heard. Fill out your ballot. Put it in the mail. Put it in a drop box. If you don’t live somewhere where you can vote by mail, then take the hour out of your day to go to the polls.

But don’t ignore your right to vote, then bitch because nothing ever changes.

And don’t whine that “my vote doesn’t make a difference,” or “it’s just one vote.” Over the past couple decades, we’ve seen too many elections, national and local, where recounts were triggered because the final tally was so close. A few more votes — those tiny, insignificant, single votes — all of a sudden aren’t so minuscule.

#occupythevote

Vote!

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Vote Obama '08 This is it — voting day!

Hopefully, you’re one of the many people who’ve taken advantage of the option to vote early in one form or another. If not, then please take the time out of your day today to go by your local polling place and cast your vote.

Don’t let the news scare you away, either. If the race follows the polls — and keep in mind, that’s still a big “if” — then the big networks could be calling the election long before many people on the West coast have a chance to vote. Don’t let that stop you! Anyone who remembers the last two presidential races (especially 2000) knows how eager the networks are to declare a winner, long before most votes are cast, and with plenty of time for things to change. Besides, there’s a lot more than just the presidential race at stake here, there are tons of Senate, House, and local seats and measures that you can have input on.

Know your voting rights! Hopefully this won’t be an issue for you, but better to be prepared. Don’t let goons from the other side (whichever side that may be) keep you from voting. If you do have problems, know what to do:

If you see something weird or discomfiting or arguably illegal going on at your polling place tomorrow. don’t post about it here. Or, at least, don’t post first.

You’ve got two choices tomorrow as to where to phone in your information, and I’m going to advocate doing both. First off, there’s Obama Voter Protection:

Call 1-877-US-4-OBAMA (1-877-874-6226) and let them know what problems you’re seeing. If you can’t get through, use this online form and/or call your local campaign HQ.

Alternately, or in addition, I strongly encourage you to call Election Protection, a nonpartisan organization:

We all love being able to break news here about what we’re seeing, but what matters most tomorrow is giving that information to people who can do something about it . And then … wait, what are you doing at a computer in the first place on Election Day? Get out there. Do More Than Vote.

Lawyers like me will be at polling places all over the country tomorrow to protect every citizen’s right to vote in an atmosphere free of intimidation, coercion and deception. But we can’t do anything if we don’t know what the problem is. So don’t post it here — call it in.

It’s time for a change, people. Make this one count.