Tag: 2020 election

Reforming America’s Elections the NOTC Way

Jeffrey G. Moebus

Joe Biden versus Donald Trump in 2024 is a grim “choice” indeed for most Americans. America’s duopoly gives us candidates who promise that “nothing will fundamentally change” in power relations in America, meaning your voice will never be heard in the halls of power. How do we change that? Jeffrey Moebus has a dramatic proposal worthy of careful consideration. Read on! W.J. Astore

The NOTC Way, by Jeffrey Moebus

As it stands right now, in every federal election to be held in 2022 and 2024, Americans will have five choices.  They will be able to:

1.  Vote for the Democrat.

2.  Vote for the Republican.

3.  Vote Third Party.

4.  Write-In. 

5.  Not Vote. 

What if there was a sixth choice?  

What if on every ballot for every federal election there was also a designated spot for “None Of These Candidates,” or NOTC?  

This presents the argument that “None Of These Candidates” should be on every ballot of every federal election, and proposes a nation-wide campaign to give the American Voters a real Alternative to ~ and an actual Antidote for ~ what America’s Ruling Political Class will give them for choices in 2022 and 2024:  To make “None Of These Candidates” a mandatory choice on every ballot in every federal election held in the United States for Election2022 and Election2024.  

Its ultimate purpose is to give a meaningful vote to that cohort of Totally Forgotten Voters who have been disenfranchised since the beginning of elections in America, and to offer a very quick, simple, easy, and low cost solution to that problem.  

ASSUMPTIONS.  It is assumed, first of all, that there will indeed be elections in those years; which, face it folks, at this point, no one can honestly, realistically, absolutely, positively guarantee.  And second, that the choices presented to the American Voters will be, at most, some subtle but suitable variation of the present, as follows: 

1.  The corporatist, crony “democratic capitalist,” neoconservative/neoliberal, post-modern “liberalism” and “conservativism” of the Carter-Reagan-Bush I-Clinton-Cheney/Bush II-Obama-Biden breed [which includes any “anti-Trump” Republicans intent on maintaining some semblance of a non-Trumped GOP].     

2.  The populist, nativist, neo-mercantilist, protectionist, proto-national socialism [with its attendant racist, sexist, xenophobic, patriotist wrapped-in the-Flag-mouthing-the-Bible noise while wiping their butts with the Constitution] of Trump, Trumpatismo, the Trumpatistas, and its inevitable gaggle of Greenes, Proud Boys, and Apprentice Emperor-Wannabe Spawns. 

3.  The noisy but intellectually, ideologically, and politically bankrupt and bereft neo-progressive, proto-democratic socialism of the “socialistic democrats” of the Sandersista/Warrenite, “Squad,” Green New Dealer ilk, and their Spawn.  

BACKGROUND.  The seed for all this was planted back in the first week of November 2016, as that Presidential Campaign began to finally, mercifully grind its way to its conclusion.  It suddenly became painfully obvious that if Clinton and/or Trump were the very best that our Ruling Political Class [RPC] could come up with to be America’s next President, then this Nation, this Country and Land, and, above all, this “We, the People” were in deeply serious, seriously deep trouble.

And it wasn’t just that – from the headlines, polls, blogosphere, and social media – that it was easy to conclude that Donald Trump was the patsy in a conspiracy to put Hillary Clinton in the White House.  Because, at the same time, it was just as easily concluded that The Hillary was part of a plot to ensconce The Donald.  Take your pick. 

But what was far, far more to the point was that it grew increasingly evident that, less than a couple of days to the election, more people wanted neither Donald Trump nor Hillary Clinton to be the next President of the United States, than wanted either of them to sit in the Oval Office come January 20, 2017. 

That, on the one hand, many people will vote for Clinton – because, and only because, they don’t want Trump as President – rather than because they actually do want her to be President.  And that, on the other hand, many people will similarly vote for Trump – because, and only because, they don’t want Clinton as President – rather than because they actually do want him to be President. 

Which raised the immediate question:  So who does somebody vote For if they want neither Trump nor Clinton ~ nor any of the Third Party candidates ~ as their next President?  Stated differently:  How do these people vote Against all the candidates that the Ruling Political Class has deigned to gift them? 

This becomes more relevant when the results of Trump v Clinton are explored: 

In 2016, 38.6% of all Eligible Voters [EVs] did not vote for anybody to be President.  

Of the 61.4% of EVs who did vote for President, Hillary Clinton got 48.2% of the votes, and Donald Trump took 46.1%.  Which means that only 29.6% of all EVs in 2016 voted for Clinton, and but 28.3% of them voted for Trump.  Which means that only 57.9% wanted Either of them in the Oval Office, and that between 70.4% and 71.7% of eligible Voters wanted Neither of them, respectively.  

In other words, 7 out of 10 Americans eligible to choose the next President of the United States four and a half years ago actively voted Against both The Donald and The Hillary; or, said another, kinder, gentler way, did not actually vote For either of the two. 

So the actual final tally for the 2016 Presidential race was: 

Not Voting 38.6 %
Clinton29.6 %
Trump28.3 %
Other  3.5 %

If “Not Voting” had been represented at the Electoral College in that election, it would have collected 471 Electoral votes to Clinton’s 51 and Trump’s 15.  In other words, “Not Voting” won in a landslide.  

One thing the Exit Pollsters missed that day was asking voters: “Did You vote for Trump [or Clinton, as the case may be] because You don’t want Clinton [Trump] to be President?  Or because You actually, really, and sincerely want him [her] to be in the Oval Office?  Or something else?”  

That would have given a clue as to how many people in 2016 voted not For Trump, but Against Clinton; and vice versa.  And perhaps explained, particularly, just exactly what happened in all those “swing States” that everybody just knew was Clinton Country, but turned out to be not quite. 

Fast forward to Election2020:  66.7% of Eligible Voters [EVs] cast their vote for President: Joseph Biden received 51.3% of the popular vote, and Donald Trump received 46.9% of that vote. 

Which means that only 34.2% of all eligible American voters in 2020 voted for Biden, and but 31.3% of all EVs voted for Trump. 

Which means that only 65.5% wanted Either of them in the Oval Office, and that between 65.8% and 68.7% of eligible Voters wanted Neither of them, respectively. 

So the final popular vote percentages for 2020 were: 

Biden34.2 %
Not Voting 33.3 %
Trump31.3 %
Other  1.2 %

Which, not merely incidentally, but very emphatically and categorically BELIES ANY CLAIM BY ANYBODY OR ANY PARTY, PERSPECTIVE, OR IDEOLOGY ~ BIDEN’S AND HIS, TRUMP’S AND HIS, OR ANYBODY ELSE’S AND THEIRS ~ HAS ANY KIND OF A “MANDATE” FROM ANYBODY TO DO ANYTHING ABOUT ANYTHING IN THIS COUNTRY.  It also indicates that Biden’s plans and pleas for “Strength Through Unity” are going to be a very tough sell; and not just out in the hinterlands of Flyover Country.  

In any event, if “Not Voting” won in a landslide in 2016, it was a bit closer in 2020:  With 270 the magic number, “Not Voting” would have taken 278 Electoral College votes to Biden’s 162 and Trump’s 98. 

Again, there were no Exit Pollsters asking voters: “Did You vote for Biden [or Trump, as the case may be] because You don’t want Trump [Biden] to be President?  Or because You actually, really, and sincerely want him to be in the Oval Office?  Or something else?”  

And that would have given a clue as to how many people in 2020 voted not For Biden, but Against Trump; and vice versa.  And perhaps explained, particularly, just exactly what happened in all those “swing States” that at least some folks just knew was Trump Territory, but turned out to be not quite.

#NOTC22/24:  The  Real Alternative and Antidote for Americans in 2022 and 2024 

Another poll that has never been taken but needs to be is one that asks voters who did not vote for President, “Why didn’t You vote for President?”; with the possible answers being: 

1.  I didn’t vote, period.  [An obvious follow-on question being “Why?”]

2.  I didn’t have anybody that I could vote FOR.

3.  I didn’t want to give my vote to anybody because I was equally AGAINST all the candidates, as well. 

4.  Other: ____________________ . 

Such a poll would have provided some interesting details as to what at least some Americans believed, or thought, or thought they knew, or actually, really understood about American politics, elections, government, and governance at that time.  After all, in 2016 at 38.6%, those non-Voters were a significant plurality; and in 2020, within a percentage point of the winner. 

Does that fact not tell us something about the American system of choosing who its supreme political leaders shall be, and, by extension, about America’s system of government and governance?  And what the American people think about it?  At least when it comes to choosing a President? 

People don’t vote for lots of reasons.  There are those who share Emma Goldman’s sentiment that “If voting could actually, really change anything, it would be illegal.”  Or they remember Papa Joe Stalin’s timeless admonition that “It’s not who votes that counts; it’s who counts the votes.”  Or, they can only concur 100% with George Carlin’s “Don’t vote.  It only encourages the mother-fuckers.” 

THE PROBLEM.  But one other reason folks don’t vote is because there is no candidate that they can, in all honesty and sincerity, actually vote For,even if it is just Against somebody or even Everybody else.  So the question becomes: How can these people make that judgment and conviction known in a way that has any actual impact in the real world, which Not Voting does not and can not have?  How can these people make a vote of conscience, and thus give voice to their beliefs, desires, and intents?  And, more importantly, how can they get their votes to count; Papa Joe’s reminder notwithstanding?  

THE SOLUTION.  In Election2020 again, Voters had five Choices.  They could: 

1.  Vote for Trump.

2.  Vote for Biden.

3.  Vote for a Third Party candidate.

4.  Write-In their own candidate.

5.  Not Vote. 

What if there was a sixth Choice?  What if on every ballot there was a designated spot for “None Of These Candidates,” NOTC? 

This sixth Choice would have been a very real, viable, formal, and forceful alternative to Choice 5 in that it is a way to be very explicit for those who are Against every available candidate that America’s political system and its ruling elites have bequeathed unto us.   Against them, and the platforms, programs, promises, platitudes, past and present performances, and social, cultural, economic, legal, and political worldviews, mindsets, operating paradigms, and the systems and structures that come along with them.  

And it does that in a way that simply Not Voting simply can not do. 

Option 6 would enable those who feel that way to openly express their conviction, and make it actually be counted not simply as just another  non-action of another non-Voter, but as one who voted for NOTC, for “None Of These Candidates.”  

Note:  Voters in Nevada have had the “None Of These Candidates” option in all federal, state, and local elections since 1975; and not by writing it in, but simply by pulling a lever on a voting machine just like every other Candidate.  

In 2016, “None Of These Candidates” received 28,863 Nevadan votes, while Clinton took 539,260 and Trump got 512,058, a difference of 26,202.  One wonders how those numbers would have changed if “NOTC” wasn’t an option and all [or even some] those NOTCers voted for either one or the other. 

In 2020, NOTC-NV took 14,079 votes to Biden’s 703,486 and Trump’s 669,890, a difference of 33,596.  Apparently, Nevadans felt they had a bit more of a choice this time than last. 

OBJECTIONS TO OPTION 6.  There are a number of immediate and obvious objections to NOTC being an option on ballots:  

1.  The biggest objection will no doubt come from the Ruling Political Class itself with the denunciation of the effort to the effect that “If You don’t like our candidates and the platforms, programs, and promises they are proposing, then do like we did, get organized, find money, and come up with Your own.”  Ie, start another Third ~ or is it fourth, fifth, or sixth ~ Party [see Objection 3 below]. 

To which the rest of us can simply respond:

“Look.  We all have neither the interest in, nor the time nor inclination for all that simply because we all have much, much more important things to do besides come up with candidates and their platforms.  We are all too busy trying to live our lives, pay our bills, plan for our futures, and deal as best we can with the total mess You people and Your politicians and all their non-elected bureaucrats, appointees, advisers, and other experts have made of this nation, its government, its system of governance, its economy, and civil society.  We are particularly busy paying our taxes, for which we Citizens are getting an increasingly less and less of a suitable return on our ‘investment’ in our governments than ever.  

“Plus, it is not our job to come up with suitable candidates and platforms.  After all, that’s what we have a Ruling Political Class for, isn’t it?” 

2.  Another objection would be “Well ~ not that it would or could ever possibly happen ~ but what happens if ‘None Of These Candidates’ actually wins an election?  Or forces a run-off?  Then what?”  

“Then come up with a brand new slate of candidates and run the election again, with NOTC remaining a choice.  Presumably the fact that NOTC either won the election or forced a run-off would [or at least could] send a very loud and clear message to the RPC that their reign of unbridled power ~ at least when it came to this particular federal election ~ is over.  At least for now.” 

3.  A third ~ and the weakest ~ objection could be from those who would claim that NOTC would undercut efforts by Third Parties to have a real impact in elections, and thus government and governance, by taking support and votes away from them, their candidates, and their agendas. 

At this point ~ and with very, very few exceptions as far as actually, really impacting the outcome of any election over the past 120 years ~ any votes for any and all Third Party Candidates are essentially wasted, other than providing the voter with the personal satisfaction of voting her or his conscience, and of, somehow, “sending a message.”  That is a principal reason that the PRC would be so quick to recommend it, as noted in Objection 1 above. 

And in present day America, no Third Party built on any particular ideology and focused on any specific issues, by itself, is in a position to have any effective impact whatsoever on any election whatsoever, let alone on how the government is run after the election. 

If, on the other hand, NOTC was a choice on all ballots; and if all Third Party voters would add their vote to all those Americans who reject both of the major party’s candidates by voting NOTC; and if the RPC had to then go back to the drawing board for another election with different candidates and a different set of promises:  If all that happened, Third Partiers would have a much bigger say in how things are run in this country than they do now, or have ever had in the past. 

THE PURPOSE RESTATED.   The purpose is simply to provide an alternative and antidote in 2022 and 2024 to whatever kept one-third and more of the electorate from voting in federal elections in 2016, 2018, and 2020.  It is to provide an option for those who do not have a candidate they can honestly and sincerely vote FOR, by enabling them to specifically and directly vote AGAINST all of the candidates.  And it provides a way of doing that that Not Voting, or voting Third Party, can not now and will never do. 

NEXT STEPS.  There are two possible ways that “None Of These Candidates” can be mandated to be included on all ballots for all federal elections in 2022 and 2024: 

1.  The ratification by 38 States of an Amendment to the Constitution to that effect.  Given that it took less than 10 months for the 21st Amendment ending Prohibition to go from being proposed by Congress to being ratified by the then-required only 34th State, this could happen very easily if a critical mass of conscientious, concerned, and committed Citizens determined to make exactly that happen in plenty of time for Election2024.

2.  The mandating by State-established process and procedure [legislative action, voter referendum, etc] that NOTC be available as a choice on all ballots for all federal elections held in that State.  This could happen very easily if a critical mass of conscientious, concerned, and committed Citizens determined to make exactly that happen in their State in plenty of time for Election2022; particularly in those states with US Senate elections.

3.  If all else fails, organize a nation-wide, state-level, grass roots campaign to encourage voters to write-in “None Of These Candidates” on their ballot on election day.  Particularly in those States with U.S. Senate elections in 2022, and then everywhere in 2024.

CONCLUSION.  Given the numbers of Registered Voters who didn’t vote for anybody for President in either 2016 or 2020, a very strong argument can be made that, for a significant number of Americans, the RPC had effectively eliminated the last, ultimate, and final refuge of the American voter: the so-called “lesser of two evils.”  In those elections, that option was clearly not available. 

Instead, we, the Electorate, were bequeathed with a choice between two lessers, and a great deal of evil, no matter which way the elections turned out.  

And so, the question remains: How could those folks who wanted none of those three as the next President have made their votes count?  And count far more than any Third Party efforts?  The answer is: By having “None Of These Candidates” as an official choice on the ballot.  

And the way to ensure that Americans have a real Choice in 2022 and 2024 ~ and thus a real Alternative and Antidote to the reality-tv extravaganza that American politics, government, and governance has become ~ is to make #NOTC22/24 happen on a national level on every ballot in every federal election those years.  Again, making it happen one State at a time; and again, with a priority on those holding U.S. Senate elections in 2022.

If this makes sense to You, seems worth exploring further, and particularly, if You have any feedback to offer on it, please contact me at notc.alaska@gmail.com.  Also please share it with anyone You think might find it of interest.  Thank You for Your consideration. 

Jeffrey Moebus, a retired U.S. Army Master Sergeant, spent two years in Vietnam in the 1960s and two years in the pre-Operation Desert Storm Middle East in the 1980s.  He lives in Sitka, Alaska on the sailboat he brought up from San Francisco Bay ten years ago this summer, and is the POC for Veterans Against War [Sitka Platoon] at vaw.sitka@gmail.com.

The Storming of the Capitol!

Let freedom ring!

W.J. Astore

It wasn’t exactly the storming of the Bastille or the sack of Rome, but yesterday’s scenes from the Capitol were disturbing enough to the self-avowed “most exceptional nation.”

If only the mob of protesters had shouted “We want affordable health care for all!” or “Racial equality!” or “Peace now!” or “Money for the poor!” instead of “USA! USA!” and “Trump! Trump!” as they marched through the Capitol on Wednesday.

But I suppose protesters who shout for health care, racial equity, and peace get clubbed and gassed, whereas Trump supporters by comparison get handled with kid gloves.

Trump, the law and order man, has always been unlawful, a man of disorder. As I wrote early in 2016, Trump disqualified himself from the presidency with his empty and dictatorial boasting. That he would incite a mob to gather at the Capitol to contest the election result was hardly surprising. What is surprising is how the Trump mob so easily breached the Capitol’s defenses, such as they were. In at least one case, it appears the police removed a barricade and let the pro-Trumpers in. Someone should be fired for this national humiliation.

It’s a small miracle that only one person was killed, an Air Force veteran who was reportedly shot in the neck as she tried to break into an inner chamber room. An avid Trump supporter who’d traveled from California, she’d be alive today if not for Trump’s selfish and reckless call for a protest at the Capitol.

Of course, predictable calls for Trump’s impeachment are coming from Squad members like AOC and Rashida Tlaib. Really. In two weeks, Trump leaves office. And you want to squander energy and time in yet another unsuccessful attempt to impeach him. At the same time, you won’t even fight for a vote on Medicare for all.

Once again, America will likely take the wrong lessons from these riots. The Capitol police will likely call for more money, more resources, more officers, more guns, more security cameras, more barricades, etc. There are already calls for more Internet censorship. Homeland Security funding will surely get a boost. And certain people will dismiss too easily the alienation and indignation of Trump supporters.

What I mean is this: Americans are upset. Angry. Alienated. Confused. And rightly so. And until our government serves the people instead of corporate, financial, and similar lobbyists and special interests, the potential for future mobs will remain. Donald Trump is a total buffoon, a shell of a man, a narcissist with ambitions centered always on himself and his self-image. But imagine a more skilled manipulator, one less narrowly focused on himself, one with a stronger work ethic, one with boundless ambition for power. Such a person could truly lead an insurrection or coup, and yesterday’s scenes suggest such a takeover would be easier than we think.

The answer is not more guns, more security, more police, nor is it impeachment. The answer is a government accountable to the people and for the people. If we don’t want our government to perish from this earth, it needs to be of the people, by the people, for the people. But it’s not, and until it is, a repeat of yesterday’s scenes, but on a much larger and more violent scale, will remain a possibility.

Who wouldn’t want a “Speaker of the House” podium?

Ten Observations on the 2020 Election

No mandate except that nothing will fundamentally change

W.J. Astore

In no particular order, here are ten observations on this year’s election:

  • Trump lost the election more than Biden won it. Trump lost mainly because of the pandemic and the economy. Biden ran on little other than “not being Trump” and squeaked by on that weak message. Sure, he’s president, but he has no mandate.
  • 74 million Americans didn’t vote for Trump solely because he’s racist, sexist, bigoted, and ignorant. Sure, some of them voted due to White supremacy and so on, but some pro-Trump votes reflect the bankruptcy in ideas from Biden/Harris. The Democrats simply offered little to the working class, e.g. the total rejection of Medicare for All during a pandemic. Biden was quoted as saying nothing would fundamentally change in his administration. How’s that for inspiration?
  • To establishment Democrats like Biden, the Republicans may be rivals but Progressives are the real enemy. So far, Biden’s announced staff and cabinet has zero Progressives in it. “Diversity” for Biden and the DNC does not include diversity in policy views. “Good” policies are those that favor the donors and owners. Anyone to the left of Biden need not apply.
  • If the Democratic Presidential primaries taught us one thing, it’s that voters have no say. The DNC has the only say, and they pick the candidate who will best protect their sinecures, in this case Joe Biden. Voters were told, take him or vote for Trump. Or go pound sand.
  • The DNC exists to defeat Progressive challengers like Bernie Sanders and Tulsi Gabbard. Both Sanders and Gabbard refused big cash from big donors, and that is simply not allowed. A “respectable” candidate must be beholden to the big donors, else the DNC simply won’t support you. Indeed, it will do most anything to stop you.
  • Surely one of the most despicable acts I’ve seen in politics was the smearing of Tulsi Gabbard as a Russian asset by NBC News and Hillary Clinton. They essentially denounced an Army major and Congresswoman as a traitor, or at the very least a useful idiot, a tool of the Kremlin. What was Tulsi’s main message again? Oh, she was against America’s wasteful and wanton regime-change wars.
  • The big winners of the 2020 election were predictable: Big pharma, private health insurance companies, the military-industrial complex, fossil fuel companies, and so on. Biden/Harris will continue to serve their interests.
  • When the senior leaders are Biden, McConnell, and Pelosi, you know Washington is bereft of new ideas and innovative leadership.
  • Even more ignored than climate change in this election was any serious talk of ending America’s wars overseas. Look for them to continue at least until 2024.
  • America remains a country of two parties: A Republican Party increasingly in Trump’s mold, and a Republican-lite Party (otherwise known as Democrats) in service to business and the moneyed interests. In a “pay to play” system, how could it be otherwise? The results of 2020 prove America needs a new party. Call it the Workers’ Party, the Progressive Party, the People’s Party, what-have-you, but recognize that, without campaign finance reform and public funding of elections, 2024 is likely to produce yet another round of a Trumpist candidate against a DNC corporate tool/Republican-lite. And they dare call it “choice”!

Readers: What did you learn from this election?

Black and Blue in America

I started writing for TomDispatch.com in 2007. I really thought I had one article to write, focusing on the disastrous Iraq War and the way in which the Bush/Cheney administration was hiding its worst results behind the bemedaled chest of General David Petraeus. Here we are, in 2020, and my latest article is my 75th contribution to the site, which truly amazes me. Special thanks to Tom Engelhardt for publishing my first piece back in 2007 and for setting a stellar example of what alternative freethinking media can be.

We Could Use A Leader Like George McGovern Again
By William J. Astore

As I lived through the nightmare of the election campaign just past, I often found myself dreaming of another American world entirely. Anything but this one.

In that spirit, I also found myself looking at a photo of my fourth-grade class, vintage 1972. Tacked to the wall behind our heads was a collage, a tapestry of sorts that I could make out fairly clearly. It evoked the promise and the chaos of a turbulent year so long ago. The promise lay in a segment that read “peace” and included a green ecology flag, a black baseball player (Brooklyn Dodgers second baseman Jackie Robinson, who had died that year), and a clenched fist inside the outline of the symbol for female (standing in for the new feminism of that moment and the push for equal rights for women).

Representing the chaos of that era were images of B-52s dropping bombs in Vietnam (a war that was still ongoing) and a demonstration for racist Alabama governor and presidential candidate George Wallace (probably because he had been shot and wounded in an assassination attempt that May). A rocket labeled “USA” reminded me that this country was then still launching triumphant Apollo missions to the moon.

How far we’ve come in not quite half a century! In 2020, “peace” isn’t even a word in the American political dictionary; despite Greta Thunberg, a growing climate-change movement, and Joe Biden’s two-trillion-dollar climate plan, ecology was largely a foreign concept in the election just past as both political parties embraced fracking and fossil fuels (even if Biden’s embrace was less tight); Major League Baseball has actually suffered a decline in African-American players in recent years; and the quest for women’s equality remains distinctly unfulfilled.

Bombing continues, of course, though those bombs and missiles are now aimed mostly at various Islamist insurgencies rather than communist ones, and it’s often done by drones, not B-52s, although those venerable planes are still used to threaten Moscow and Beijing with nuclear carnage. George Wallace has, of course, been replaced by Donald Trump, a racist who turned President Richard Nixon’s southern strategy of my grade school years into a national presidential victory in 2016 and who, as president, regularly nodded in the direction ofwhite supremacists.

Progress, anyone? Indeed, that class photo of mine even featured the flag of China, a reminder that Nixon had broken new ground that very year by traveling to Beijing to meet with Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong and de-escalate the Cold War tensions of the era. Nowadays, Americans only hear that China is a military and economic threat; that Joe Biden and some Democrats are allegedly far too China-friendly (they aren’t); and that Covid-19 (aka the “Wuhan Flu” or “Kung Flu”) was — at least to Donald Trump and his followers — a plague sent by the Chinese to kill us.

Another symbol from that tapestry, a chess piece, reminded me that in 1972 we witnessed the famous Cold War meeting between the youthful, brilliant, if mercurial Bobby Fischer and Soviet chess champion Boris Spassky in a match that evoked all the hysteria and paranoia of the Cold War. Inspired by Fischer, I started playing the game myself and became a card-carrying member of the U.S. Chess Federation until I realized my talent was limited indeed.

The year 1972 ended with Republican Richard Nixon’s landslide victory over Democratic Senator George McGovern, who carried only my home state of Massachusetts. After Nixon’s landslide victory, I remember bumper stickers that said: “Don’t blame me for Nixon, I’m from Massachusetts.”

Eighteen years later, in 1990, I would briefly meet the former senator. He was attending a history symposium on the Vietnam War at the U.S. Air Force Academy and, as a young Air Force captain, I chased down a book for him in the Academy’s library. I don’t think I knew then of McGovern’s stellar combat record in World War II. A skilled pilot, he had flown 35 combat missions in a B-24 bomber, winning the Distinguished Flying Cross for, at one point, successfully landing a plane heavily damaged by enemy fire and saving his crew. Nixon, who had served in the Navy during that war, never saw combat. But he did see lots of time at the poker table, winning a tidy sum of money, which he would funnel into his first political campaign.

Like so many combat veterans of the “greatest generation,” McGovern never bragged about his wartime exploits. Over the years, however, that sensible, honorable, courageous American patriot became far too strongly associated with peace, love, and understanding. A staunch defender of civil rights, a believer in progressive government, a committed opponent of the Vietnam War, he would find himself smeared by Republicans as weak, almost cowardly, on military matters and an anti-capitalist (the rough equivalent today of democratic-socialist Bernie Sanders).

Apparently, this country couldn’t then and still can’t accept any major-party candidate who doesn’t believe in a colossal military establishment and a government that serves business and industry first and foremost or else our choice in 2020 wouldn’t have been Trump-Pence versus Biden-Harris.

Channeling Lloyd Bentsen

As I began writing this piece in late October, I didn’t yet know that Joe Biden would indeed win the most embattled election of our lifetime. What I did know was that the country that once produced (and then rejected) thoughtful patriots like George McGovern was in serious decline. Most Americans desperately want change, so the pollsters tell us, whether we call ourselves Republicans or Democrats, conservatives, liberals, or socialists. Both election campaigns, however, essentially promised us little but their own versions of the status quo, however bizarre Donald Trump’s may have been.

In truth, Trump didn’t even bother to present a plan for anything, including bringing the pandemic under control. He just promised four more years of Keeping America Trumpish Again with yet another capital gains tax cut thrown in. Biden ran on a revival of Barack Obama’s legacy with the “hope and change” idealism largely left out. Faced with such a choice in an increasingly desperate country, with spiking Covid-19 cases in state after state and hospitals increasingly overwhelmed, too many of us sought relief in opioids or gun purchases, bad habits like fatty foods and lack of exercise, and wanton carelessness with regard to the most obvious pandemic safety measures.

Since the presidencies of Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan, and especially since September 11, 2001, it’s amazing what Americans have come to accept as normal. Forget about peace, love, and understanding. What we now see on America’s streets aren’t antiwar protesters or even beat cops, but Robocops armed to the teeth with military-style weaponry committing indefensible acts of violence. Extremist “militias” like the Proud Boys are celebrated (by some) as “patriots.” Ludicrous QAnon conspiracy theories are taken all too seriously with political candidates on the Republican side of the aisle lining up to endorse them.

Even six-figure death tolls from a raging pandemic were normalized as President Trump barnstormed the country, applauding himself to maskless crowds at super-spreader rallies for keeping Covid-19 deaths under the mythical figure of 2.2 million. Meanwhile, the rest of us found nothing to celebrate in what — in Vietnam terms — could be thought of as a new body count, this time right here in the homeland.

And speaking of potential future body counts, consider again the Proud Boys whom our president in that first presidential debate asked to “stand back and stand by.” Obviously not a militia, they might better be described as a gang. Close your eyes and imagine that all the Proud Boys were black. What would they be called then by those on the right? A menace, to say the least, and probably far worse.

A real militia would, of course, be under local, state, or federal authority with a chain of command and a code of discipline, not just a bunch of alienated guys playing at military dress-up and spoiling for a fight. Yet too many Americans see them through a militarized lens, applauding those “boys” as they wave blue-line pro-police flags and shout “all lives matter.” Whatever flags they may wrap themselves in, they are, in truth, nothing more than nationalist bully boys.

Groups like the Proud Boys are only the most extreme example of the “patriotic” poseurs, parades, and pageantry in the U.S.A. of 2020. And collectively all of it, including our lost and embattled president, add up to a red-white-and-blue distraction (and what a distraction it’s been!) from an essential reality: that America is in serious trouble — and you can take that “America” to mean ordinary people working hard to make a living (or not working at all right now), desperate to maintain roofs over their heads and feed their kids.

It’s a distraction as well from the reality that America hasn’t decisively won a war since the time George McGovern flew all those combat missions in a B-24. It’s a distraction from some ordinary Americans like George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Jacob Blake being not just manipulated and exploited, but murdered, hence the need for a Black Lives Matter movement to begin with. It’s a distraction from the fact that we don’t even debate gargantuan national security budgets that now swell annually above a trillion dollars, while no one in a position of power blinks.

Today’s never-ending wars and rumors of more to come remind me that George McGovern was not only against the Vietnam conflict, but the ones in Afghanistan and Iraq, too. Joe Biden, meanwhile, voted for the Iraq War, which Donald Trump also spoke in favor of, then, only to campaign on ending this country’s wars in 2016, even if by 2020 he hadn’t done so — though he had set up a new military service, the Space Force. Feeling the need to sharpen his own pro-war bona fides, Biden recently said he’d raise “defense” spending over and above what even Trump wanted.

If you’ll indulge my fantasy self for a moment, I’d like to channel Lloyd Bentsen, the 1988 Democratic vice presidential nominee who, in a debate with his Republican opposite Dan Quayle, dismissed him as “no Jack Kennedy.” In that same spirit, I’d like to say this to both Trump and Biden in the wake of the recent Covid-19 nightmare of a campaign: “I met George McGovern. George McGovern, in a different reality, could have been my friend. You, Joe and Donald, are no George McGovern.”

Prior military service is not essential to being president and commander-in-chief, but whose finger would you rather have on America’s nuclear button: that of Trump, who dodged the draft with heel spurs; Biden, who dodged the draft with asthma; or a leader like McGovern, who served heroically in combat, a leader who was willing to look for peaceful paths because he knew so intimately the blood-spattered ones of war?

A Historical Tapestry for Fourth Graders as 2020 Ends

What about a class photo for fourth graders today? What collage of images would be behind their heads to represent the promise and chaos of our days? Surely, Covid-19 would be represented, perhaps by a mountain of body bags in portable morgues. Surely, a “Blue Lives Matter” flag would be there canceling out a Black Lives Matter flag. Surely, a drone launching Hellfire missiles, perhaps in Somalia or Yemen or some other distant front in America’s endless war of (not on) terror, would make an appearance.

And here are some others: surely, the flag of China, this time representing the growing tensions, not rapprochement, between the two great powers; surely, a Trump super-spreader rally filled with the unmasked expressing what I like to think of as the all-too-American “ideal” of “live free and die”; surely, a vast firenado rising from California and the West, joined perhaps by a hurricane flag to represent another record-breaking year of such storms, especially on the Gulf Coast; surely, some peaceful protesters being maced or tased or assaulted by heavily armed and unidentified federal agents just because they cared about the lives of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, among others.

And I suppose we could add something about sports into that collage, maybe an image of football players in empty stadiums, kneeling as one for racial equality. Look, sports used to unite us across race and class lines, but in his woebegone presidency, Donald Trump, among others, used sports only to divide us. Complex racial relations and legacies have been reduced to slogans, Black Lives Matter versus blue lives matter, but what’s ended up being black and blue is America. We’ve beaten ourselves to a pulp and it’s the fight promoters, Donald Trump above all, who have profited most. If we are to make any racial progress in America, that kind of self-inflicted bludgeoning has to end.

And what would be missing from the 2020 collage that was in my 1972 one? Notably, clear references to peace, ecology, and equal rights for women. Assuming that, on January 20th, Joe Biden really does take his place in the Oval Office, despite the angriest and most vengeful man in the world sitting there now, those three issues would be an ideal place for him to start in his first 100 days as president (along, of course, with creating a genuine plan to curb Covid-19): (1) seek peace in Afghanistan and elsewhere by ending America’s disastrous wars; (2) put the planet first and act to abate climate change and preserve all living things; (3) revive the Equal Rights Amendment and treat women with dignity, respect, and justice.

One final image from my fourth-grade collage: an elephant is shown on top of a somewhat flattened donkey. It was meant, of course, to capture Richard Nixon’s resounding victory over George McGovern in 1972. Yet, even with Joe Biden’s victory last week, can we say with any confidence that the donkey is now on top? Certainly not the one of McGovern’s day, given that Biden has already been talking about austerity at home and even higher military spending.

Sadly, it’s long past time to reclaim American idealism and take a stand for a lot less war and a lot more help for the most vulnerable among us, including the very planet itself. How sad that we don’t have a leader like George McGovern in the White House as a daunting new year looms.

William Astore, a retired lieutenant colonel (USAF) and professor of history, is a TomDispatch regular. His personal blog is Bracing Views.

Joe Biden Wins!

United, but for what causes?

W,J. Astore

I’ll admit it: I never saw Joe Biden as president. Not when I remembered his abortive presidential run in 1988, when he lied about his college record and plagiarized speeches of Bobby Kennedy and Neil Kinnock.

He made an effective vice president for Barack Obama, mainly at first because he reassured White America that the Black guy was OK. Being vice president is an “It must have been cold there in my shadow” kind of job, but Joe handled it pretty well, and even catastrophically deferred to Hillary Clinton as Obama’s rightful successor in 2016.

After that debacle, Joe persisted, and in the campaign of 2020 he found a Democratic establishment that loved his pro-business and pro-banking record, his strong support of high military spending and overseas wars, and his past calls for cuts to Social Security as well as his steadfast opposition to Medicare for all. Our kind of Democrat, the owners and donors said, and with a big push from Obama, Biden found himself anointed as the candidate to defeat the Orange Ogre.

But Biden didn’t defeat Trump; Trump defeated Trump. Trump’s response to Covid-19 was so incompetent, so reckless, and so tone-deaf to lives lost that even the usual spin about fake news and alternative facts didn’t work. Indeed, Trump first said the pandemic would magically disappear, then tried to blame it all on China, then said the media was covering it only because it hurt his chances for reelection, then persisted in holding rallies that turned into super-spreader events for the virus.

Despite all of Trump’s flaws, despite all of his lies, he still almost defeated Biden, a stunning achievement when you really think about it. To my mind, the closeness of this election, the narrowness of Biden’s victory, is as much a reflection of the weaknesses of Joe Biden as it is the strength of the Trump cult.

What kind of president can we expect Biden to be? He won’t be anything like Trump, which in some ways is a bad thing. What I mean is this: Trump turned the narrowest of victories over Hillary Clinton into mandate-level deeds. He got the big tax cut Republicans covet. He got to pick three Supreme Court justices and to redefine lower-level courts for a generation. He served his base and made no apologies.

What is the likelihood that Biden adopts a progressive agenda? That he takes no prisoners, that he rides roughshod over Republicans, that he calls them traitors and dictates terms to them? Unlikely indeed. Even if Democrats win a majority in the Senate, which we won’t know until January and runoff elections in Georgia, Biden will likely position himself as a centrist, i.e. a moderate Republican, a man willing to reach across the aisle for bipartisan accord.

It’s likely Biden will even appoint Republicans to his cabinet. I’m betting we’ll see more Republicans in his cabinet than progressive Democrats.

I won’t shed any tears when Trump departs, perhaps into a new self-named media empire. Because for Trump it’s Trump now, Trump tomorrow, Trump forever. Biden, unlike Trump, has at least some experience with public service, and that can’t be a bad thing.

The question is: Which publics will Joe Biden serve with the most passion?

Too Close to Call!

W.J. Astore

Who knew that choosing Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, two pro-business, pro-establishment, anti-progressive tools with limited charisma, would result in an election that is currently too close to call?

Meanwhile, Trump has made his own call. He won! Here’s what he had to say earlier this morning:

Trump falsely declared himself the winner around 2:30 a.m. Eastern. He said he would call on the Supreme Court to stop counting ballots in states where he led, while urging more counting in states where he was behind. He claimed “fraud” (for which there is no evidence) and he called the election an “embarrassment to the country.”

My wife and I had a good if grim laugh at this. Trump is like that ten-year-old bully in a class election who says: “Let’s count the vote until I’m winning, then we’ll stop.” Every kid would shout that that’s unfair and wrong, until the bully threatened to slug them.

It’s truly astounding that so many Americans think Trump is a competent and desirable president. Again, though, it didn’t help matters when the DNC tilted the table in Biden’s favor, then picked Kamala Harris as his running mate, another establishment tool who faded fast after her fifteen minutes of post-debate, that-little-girl-was-me, fame.

Of course, Biden/Harris may yet prevail, assuming Americans can muster some patience and that the Trump-leaning Supreme Court doesn’t intervene. But if they lose, the loss is truly on them and the DNC operatives who went all-in on them.

Thoughts on Election Day

W.J. Astore

Some thoughts on this presidential election day:

  1. Trump isn’t running against Biden/Harris. He’s running against a caricature of the Democratic Party. The usual lies: the “radical left” is coming to take your guns; they hate America; they want open borders so that America will be flooded with non-white foreigners; they’re godless socialists; they favor abortion on demand; they want to turn your kids against you by controlling education; and so on. The truth is entirely the opposite: Biden/Harris are in fact the darlings of Wall Street and are without a radical bone in their bodies.
  2. Trump and the Republicans are running without a platform. It’s rather remarkable that the Republican Party is totally subservient to Trump. Meanwhile, Trump’s “platform” is more of the same, including yet another capital gains tax cut. And if Trump wins, you can count on the “radical” Democrats approving that tax cut.
  3. Trump still wants to overturn Obamacare during a pandemic, which could lead to 20 million people losing their health care coverage. It’s no surprise that repealing the Affordable Care Act (ACA) helps the rich the most, as their taxes will decrease. (As an aside, polls show Americans favor the ACA more than they do Obamacare: they are, of course, the exact same thing.)
  4. Trump’s rallies have served as super-spreader events for Covid-19. In short, the president is a pandemic vector, yet his supporters continue to love him and defend him. Death cult?
  5. Way back in April 2019, I picked Biden/Harris as the Democratic dream ticket. You know: an elder white guy balanced by a younger black woman, sort of like a network news team that is supposed to show inclusion and diversity while broadcasting steadiness. Yes, the fix was in from the beginning. Biden has said nothing will fundamentally change under his administration, the one promise he will be certain to keep.
  6. Compared to Biden supporters, Trump supporters are more fired up, more committed to their man and how he makes them feel. Meanwhile, Trump is at pains to show how many people cheer for him at his rallies. If Trump loses, how will these supporters process that loss?
  7. I can’t remember a presidential election in which foreign policy has been so infrequently discussed. Presidents possess the most latitude in dealing with other countries, yet rarely did Biden or Trump answer any questions in detail about world affairs. The impression from their “debates” is that China and Russia are enemies and that a new cold war is essentially inevitable. Neither candidate talked about defense spending except to stress it probably would go up. The U.S. dominance of the world’s trade in weapons went unremarked upon. America’s wars they pretty much ignored.
  8. A final thought: If you think your vote is worthless, you’re wrong. If it was worthless, various forces wouldn’t be trying to buy it, or block it, or otherwise restrict it. The choices may be depressing, but I’ve found voting itself to be uplifting. Get out there and vote!

Beware a Return to Normalcy

A century ago, Warren Harding bloviated about normalcy.

W.J. Astore

About forty years ago, I took undergraduate courses in U.S. History, where I first learned about “normalcy.” Normalcy came from the (successful) presidential campaign of Warren G. Harding in 1920. After World War I’s devastation and Woodrow Wilson’s attempt at internationalism, what Americans wanted most of all, according to Harding, was a “return to normalcy.” Harding, running against Wilson’s record though not Wilson himself, won the presidency.

Wilson himself favored a sort of high-minded preaching when he addressed Americans; in his own way, he may have been as narcissistic as Trump, and probably more racist. Again, while Harding didn’t run against Wilson, he did run against his legacy, and to many Americans he seemed like a good and decent man and was considered handsome to boot.

Another word associated with Harding’s campaign a century ago was “bloviate,” which basically means BS. A quick Google search confirms that bloviation is “a style of empty, pompous, political speech which originated in Ohio and was used by US President Warren G. Harding.” I guess I did learn something in those history classes.

I mention these two words, normalcy and bloviate, because in many ways they sum up Joe Biden’s strategy in 2020. He’s promised a return to normalcy, i.e. a return to the Obama/Biden years, and this does hold some appeal to Americans who are sick and tired of Trump’s lies and incompetence. But Biden himself has told us little about what he hopes to achieve, preferring to bloviate, which suggests he won’t be doing much to improve the lives of ordinary working Americans, assuming he wins.

The presidency of Warren G. Harding was an ill-starred one. He surrounded himself with corrupt cronies and was humiliated by the Teapot Dome Scandal. Harding died at the comparatively young age of 57 in 1923; his vice president, Calvin Coolidge, took over and led the country until 1928. Interestingly, Coolidge had made his reputation putting down the Boston police strike in the name of preserving “law and order” during the Red Scare of 1919. Perhaps his most famous sentiment as president was the idea that the business of the American people is business. It seemed to make sense during the Roaring Twenties until the Wall Street Crash of 1929.

History, as they say, doesn’t repeat itself but it does echo. Biden/Harris in 2020 is a little like Harding/Coolidge in 1920. Biden is the normalcy guy who bloviates; Harris is the VP who may well have to step in as president, but who as a “top cop” in California was no friend of labor but very much pro-business. Naturally, judging by our history, whether in 1920 or 2020, you can forget about any progressive policies unless and until we experience a cosmic crunch like the Great Depression of 1929. Even then, FDR and the New Deal didn’t come along until 1933.

History can be a depressing subject to take — a record of crimes, follies, and disasters of the past. We’re supposed to learn from it so as to avoid repeating the same. Assuming Biden/Harris win this week, we shall see if there’s any substance to them, or whether it’s just normalcy, bloviation, scandal, and business-friendly policies all over again.

Those Pesky Hunter Biden Emails

Joe and Hunter Biden in 2010

W.J. Astore

In trying to cover the Hunter Biden email story with his usual zest, honesty, and outspokenness, Glenn Greenwald ran afoul of the bosses at The Intercept and issued his resignation. Matt Taibbi covers Greenwald’s resignation here, and Greenwald himself has posted the article that got him into trouble here. At her own site, Caitlin Johnstone cites Greenwald’s resignation as exposing the rot in mainstream media outlets. As Johnstone puts it:

I don’t know that the Hunter Biden October surprise shows anything more scandalous than you’d expect for any major US presidential nominee. I do know that the uniform conspiracy of silence and obfuscation from the mass media about it is uniquely scandalous and says bad things about the future of journalism in western news media.

The Bidens have yet to deny the authenticity of these emails. Even so, the mainstream media, joined by digital powerhouses like Facebook and Twitter, have worked to minimize the story. In some cases, not just minimize but to misdirect, as in suggesting the emails are part of a Russian disinformation campaign in favor of Trump, even though there’s no evidence of this.

As one Washington Post article bizarrely put it: “We must treat the Hunter Biden leaks as if they were a foreign intelligence operation — even if they probably aren’t.” [emphasis added]

Come again? Obviously no Vulcans work at the Post, since there’s a complete lack of logic in that statement.

I think what’s going on here is obvious. For the mainstream media, it’s payback time for Donald Trump. Trump has described journalists as “the enemy of the people,” and don’t think that scarily intimidating statement has been forgotten by the press. Also, there is a modicum of guilt within the media, I think, for their role in facilitating Trump’s rise in 2015-16. They never took him seriously in the sense of believing he could win, but they did love all the high ratings (and money!) he generated.

Readers here know that I reject both Trump and Biden as viable presidential candidates. Trump is a narcissist, a liar, and an incompetent leader; Biden is a fading bureaucrat who’s thoroughly compromised by his business, industry, and banking ties. Arguably, Biden is the lesser of two evils, but that certainly shouldn’t mean that the media should protect him from Hunter’s sad record of influence-peddling in the Biden name.

More so than most people, I imagine, journalists are tired of Trump. They want things to go back to “normal.” But censorship in the cause of normalcy is too high a price to pay, especially for the lesser of two evils.

Biden-Trump, The Final Debate

No inspiration, no vision

W.J. Astore

I didn’t fall asleep easily last night.

Neither candidate, Donald Trump nor Joe Biden, inspires confidence, and their final debate performance highlighted their flaws.

First, Donald Trump. He remains the narcissist-in-chief, in which everything is about him except when it reflects poorly on him, in which case scapegoats are found. Trump talks about Covid-19 deaths always in the abstract, except when he talks about himself getting the virus. Then he boasts about his quick recovery and how he’s now immune to it. Trump is always the best at everything. He’s the best president that Black people have ever had, with the possible exception of Abraham Lincoln. He’s the least racist man in America. The usual BS.

Muted microphones kept Trump’s worst impulses in check. You could see him wanting to butt in, to interrupt, and then he would check himself. It’s rather amazing that the only way America could have the semblance of a debate was through muted microphones and repeated warnings from the moderator.

What strikes me still is Trump’s laziness and lack of discipline. He really should dominate Biden quite easily. When Trump focused on Biden’s record, when he called him out for not doing anything of note in his eight years of being Obama’s VP, when he attacked him as another promise-breaking politician, Trump scored points. But Trump couldn’t focus his attack. He kept returning to Hunter Biden and the kind of Washington in-fighting that turns most people off.

For an America in despair, Trump simply promised more jobs, cheaper gas, and higher Wall Street profits. There was no vision, no hope, and most certainly no solace offered by this president. There’s no poetry to Trump, and only martial music. Even in militarist America, the Trump drumbeat is growing tiresome.

Turning to Joe Biden, he had a good night for Joe Biden. Good as in he remained vertical and mostly on target throughout the debate. Biden was strongest when he addressed the American people directly: when he showed empathy and talked about the pain and despair Americans are feeling. I did catch Biden looking at his watch once, but I’ll cut him some slack because I wanted the debate to be over as well. Overall, I don’t think Biden’s performance in this debate moved the needle in this election.

With regards to national security, naturally there were no questions about ending our wars, or reducing the Pentagon budget, or downsizing nuclear arsenals, or anything like that. “National security” focused on alleged Russian and Iranian interference in our elections and the small nuclear arsenal of North Korea. Of course, the best people at mucking up our elections aren’t Russian or Iranian, they’re American. From gerrymandering to voter intimidation to closed polling sites and lengthy lines in disadvantaged neighborhoods, Americans need no help from foreigners to interfere with our “democracy.”

For a country in despair, a country suffering from a pandemic and from a loss in confidence, neither candidate offered a clear vision for a better tomorrow. Perhaps it simply doesn’t exist in their minds. They are both remarkably limited and flawed men. One is almost certainly a sociopath in which all human relations are transactional, the other is a muddled functionary who’s been wrong more often than he’s been right.

More than microphones were muted in this final debate. Fresh thinking was muted. Inspiration was muted. Generosity was muted. And, dare I use the word, grace was muted.

Small wonder I had trouble sleeping.