Is It Over?

Ordinarily, the approach of Election Day would be greeted with excitement and anticipation, perhaps moderated to some degree by a dose of realism about your candidate’s prospects for winning. In 2020, it’s different.

In this election the focus has been too much on fear. Fear of the coronavirus, fear of foreign interference in our electoral process, fear of voter fraud or counting irregularities, and fear of not being able to making our government work again.

Fear is the primary tool of Donald Trump in trying to make a convincing case for re-election. And it is reinforced by his propensity to lie or exaggerate at every opportunity. Sadly, the core of his supporters seems oblivious to his cavalier disregard for truth or accuracy in talking about the public’s business.

Not only does Trump inflate the accomplishments of his own administration, but he denigrates his opponent Joe Biden, trying to paint the former vice president as corrupt and inept. He has encouraged Attorney General Barr and his personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani to find something criminal in Biden’s history.

Trump does not limit his verbal assaults to opponents. He castigates members of his own administration when they do not provide unquestioning support for his outrageous rhetoric. He attacks Dr. Anthony Fauci, the country’s leading infectious disease expert, because the doctor refuses to endorse the White House laissez-faire attitude towards the coronavirus.

Even as health workers labor mightily to care for the more than 9,000,000 Americans infected by the coronavirus Trump scorns them. He accuses doctors and hospitals of manipulating the pandemic’s spread in order to generate more income for themselves, telling his rallies, "Our doctors get more money if someone dies from COVID. You know that, right?”

Trump uses the Black Lives Matter movement to stoke fear and to signal not so subtle racism. Demonstrators against suspected police abuse are assailed as anarchists and mayors and governors trying to maintain order are denounced for not cracking down harshly on the generally peaceable protesters. Social media and television have been awash with campaign ads that magnify the limited violence.

Trump and Republican candidates for Congress are attempting to make law and order an issue, claiming Democrats want to “de-fund” the police. The claim is blatantly false. Some law enforcement officers have been cajoled into participating in campaign appeals for Republican candidates. This is inappropriate. Law enforcement must be applied in a nonpartisan manner.

The response of Trump and the Senate Republicans to the death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is another blow to the idea of an independent judiciary in today’s America. Senate Judiciary Committee Chair, Lindsey Graham pledged support for Trump’s nominee to replace Ginsburg before the candidate was announced. It was obvious that Graham viewed the proceedings as a platform for his re-election campaign. He even begged for campaign contributions when discussing hearings with the news media in the Hart Senate Office Building, a violation of Congressional ethics.

Amy Coney Barratt may prove to be an impartial jurist in the future, but neither the appointment process nor the subsequent hearings provided any meaningful evidence of what we can expect. Before 1925, the Senate Judiciary Committee did not invite court nominees to appear in a public hearing. Maybe it is time to stop wasting the public’s time and return to that practice.

Another disturbing aspect of this year’s election is the obscene amount of money being spent--- more than $14 billion dollars by the two parties, about half in the presidential campaigns. Some of the money has made its way to the two US senate battles in the Carolinas. Both senate races have received over $250 million.

The unfortunate thing is small donors ($200 and under) are providing less than 25 percent of the money. Campaign finance laws are a sieve thanks to Mitch McConnell and the US Supreme Court. Whenever there is talk about activist judges, think Citizens’ United, the 2010 decision that opened the floodgates for corporate political contributions and declared there is no evidence that money necessarily corrupts politics.

Thanks to the Super PACs encouraged by Citizens’ United, big donors have acquired outsized influence. Sheldon Adelson has given Trump’s re-election effort $180 million while Michael Bloomberg has pledged at least $100 million to support Joe Biden. I find little comfort in the fact that Democrats are winning the money race this election cycle. Money seldom develops any long term loyalty.

Finally, Election Day may turn out to be just the beginning of a long nightmare. Both parties are lawyered up. Even as state officials sought to develop voting rules, there has been constant litigation with the parties maneuvering for advantage at the ballot box and after.

How will absentee ballots be treated? How long for early voting and where are voting sites going to be? When must absentee ballot be postmarked and when can voting officials start counting them?

Politicians in a democracy should be able to work our election processes to protect everyone’s right to vote.  Everyone, regardless of party, should be able to find agreement on process. Haggling for weeks after the election over whether an absentee ballot can be count if received three days or six days after Election Day is ludicrous in a democracy.

If you can’t win with the voters, seek to control the count of the ballots---a disastrous policy for a democracy.  It is as if we fear our fellow American more than any external enemy.