A Different Kind of President

President Obama surprises citizens near the White House:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3iZb6eP73rk&feature=share

Saturday Poetry

 

All your strength is in your union;  all your danger in discord;  therefore be at peace henceforward...And as brothers live together.  

 

                                                                  -- Henry Longsworth Longfellow

                                                                      as quoted in university yearbook

                                  

N. B.  It is in the kind of union that you find strength, for not all unions are equal in virtue.   

Accountability and Punishment for Any Crimes Is Essential Says Neuroscientist

 At the link below a noted neuroscientist states that in order for Americans to heal from the methods and practices of victimization, the American people will need to see punishment for the many crimes suffered at the hands of OML.  

Accountability for OML Crimes Necessary

 

 

Trump Forces Ramp Up Efforts to Overturn Election Results

 RED ALERT

Trump and his dead-enders -- as MSNBC is calling them -- are escalating efforts to try to overturn the election results.  Most recently they pressured two counties to refuse to certify their election results.  This, two weeks after the election. After the pressure, the counties gave in.  This is wrong on so many levels, including probably legally.

New York Times writer, Michael Schmidt, has stated that the Trump style -- now so long apparent --  introduces an unknown variable into the process.  I agree very much.  As Americans look to Thanksgiving and Christmas, distraction and fatigue are leading to accidental apathy.  This apathy is itself terribly dangerous.  For as former Governor John Kasich of Ohio energetically urged on national television tonight, the people watching at home must themselves  become leaders in ensuring that the election of 2020 is not, in fact, stolen.  

 

Biden Elected

From Saturday

 

Joseph R. Biden, Jr., has been elected the 46th President of the United States.

I will have more to say later. 

 From The Philadelphia Inquirer -- 

City elections officials said they were working to count ballots around the clock, as planned.

“We are doing the canvass, we are not stopping for nobody,” said Omar Sabir, one of three city commissioners, who run elections. “We’re here, we’re counting. The count has not stopped.”

If anything, another elections official said, Philadelphia is ahead of schedule when it comes to tallying mail ballots.

The confusion may stem from national news organizations' unfamiliarity with election results reporting in Pennsylvania. Counties do not always update the state system as often as they update their own websites, and at 11:40 p.m. the state’s website showed only 74,132 votes for Biden and 32,414 for Trump out of Philadelphia.

Were Polls Wrong Or Has There Been Vote Suppression?

 In these early hours after Election Day, there is already an opinion piece on the Philadelphia Inquirer website about hour wrong the pollsters supposedly were.  I won't read the article until a bit later, but as one who has seen his share of vote suppression over the years beginning twenty years ago in Florida, I have more than a mild sense of curiosity about the lower-than-expected vote totals for Joe Biden.  And the attempts at vote suppression continue at this hour with lawsuits already filed or being filed by Our Military Leader and his sycophants, as they are being called.

Yes, Mr. Biden was not the perfect candidate.  Still, he has managed to come out well in the end, currently leading in both the popular and Electoral College tallies.  We should give him credit.   And no one should tolerate any attempts to interfere with the legitimate vote count in America today.  With Covid concerns, we knew the results would probably be delayed, and they are.  This, however, is no reason to lose confidence in the process or attempt to create an alternative reality which comes from some alternative universe. 

Election Results Trending Toward Joseph Biden

Continuing the count

 On the morning after the U.S. election, Joe Biden looks increasingly to have captured the White House.  As numbers slowly pile up, the trend is reasonably clear that Mr. Biden has a path to win. 

This is not the first time in American history when there was a close election.  And considering the fact that it was conducted during a pandemic, Americans can be proud of the elections workers who have labored diligently and continue to do so to count every vote.  

 

Will the U. S. Vote End Up Being a Replay in Outline of Election 2000?

Mid-Night:

 Allan Nairn on Democracy Now! is raising serious issues about the vote situation as it stands at this hour in America.  It is beginning to seem possible, if not likely, that the announcement of a victor in this year's election will be delayed, perhaps by days, if not more.  It is still too early at midnight Eastern time in the U.S. to say exactly what is going to happen.  But as Nairn points out, if the United States were a true democracy both parties would have already admitted the obvious which is a majority of the voters have voted for the Democratic candidate, just as they did four years ago.  

Admittedly, the announced numbers are not complete.  But this may actually be part of the problem.  For Nairn is alleging that Trump saw that Democrats were going to emphasize vote-by-mail and thus he could turn the U.S. Postal Service into a vote-suppression operation.  We have already seen evidence of this.  Even just on Tuesday, the Postal Service has defied a court order to sweep their offices in ten problem locations for undelivered ballots.  And there is more.

He further asserts that it is not hard to see the Republicans readying their attorneys to flood into courts in various places to try to contest votes, especially those made via the mail.  

Your Musical Patriot, while not privy to OML's thinking, knew that relying on the mail for his vote was not a good idea.  Thus, he made his vote early, but in person.  

Florida Vote Corrupted?

 Blogging the 2020 Vote

 

Early returns in Florida raise familiar questions about the integrity of the vote there.  With lower vote totals than expected for Joseph Biden, especially in Miami-Dade County, suspicions about the quality of the vote information we are getting from there mount.  This is the county with the famous "white shirt and tie" riot conducted by Republican staffers from Capitol Hill in 2000, with the goal of disrupting the legitimate vote count there.  

And there are indeed reports in different parts of the country regarding broken vote machines, polling sites moved at the last moment, as well as acts of voter intimidation.  All of these are familiar (sadly) problems. 

However, at this very early point in the vote tabulation, one voting rights organizer I heard said that fortunately, the acts of threatening voter intimidation were not wide-spread in America this day in November 2020.