From Aircraft to Dikes ... Pick Your Election Analogy

I don’t do as much politics here as much as I used to – though some of you, especially those who follow me on twitter, may think I still do too much.

The general feelings outlined in my October 2015 post still apply, and I still keep track of things, vote, and have my opinions. I just keep them more to myself.

That being said, traditionally the Labor Day Weekend kicks off the political season, but this year I don’t think the political season ever ended since 2016. Anyway, I will use this as an excuse to bounce something off the front porch.

Over the weekend I had two people drop me a line. One very reluctantly voted for Trump in 2016, and the other voted 3rd party. Unsolicited, they both came out to state they reluctantly are going to vote for Trump this November.

The one who voted 3rd party in 2016 simply refuses to play the game of voting for Biden when it is clear he won’t/can’t do the job – but the real power will be with Harris. A Harris-Schumer-AOC (he sees AOC as the future power broker in the House) as just too much for him.

The one who reluctantly voted for Trump has nothing positive to say about Trump, but reading between the lines, he’s more of a policy vs. personality type, and sees nothing but a horror show of unified (D) government.

I think both are valid arguments for people in the center, and fit in to a larger theme of those who, once again, do not feel the (D) have given them a valid option to Trump.

Take a look at Angelo Codevilla’s 31 AUG 2020 bit over at Claremont Review of Books on Michael Anton’s new book, “The Stakes: America at the Point of No Return.”

Yes, it is that Anton, the author of 2016’s essay, “The Flight 93 Election.”

Especially for my fellow brethren of 2016’s NeverTrump brigades who still hold the banner high, this argument holds no water and brings nothing but contempt and bile – and I understand that – but they can’t deny the importance this line of thinking has to many in the center to center-right of the country.

Will it be enough to bring Trump enough in the Electoral College? I have no idea. After 2016, I am out of the predictions business (my "unrealistically optimistic" COA for a Trump victory was actually close … so much for my view of what is “unrealistic.”)

Back to Anton’s argument. He starts somewhere everyone here is familiar with – a topic I have been making since before even Obama was President – that of the goal of weakening voting requirements to enable voter fraud. Yes, that is the goal from universal mail in voting to ballot harvesting. You only need a small percentage to move close elections.

Anton’s commentary on the 2020 election does not belabor the obvious: it is a binary choice. The unprecedented level of opposition President Trump has faced explains, but does not excuse, some of his shortcomings. As Anton puts it: “[t]here’s little wrong with President Trump that more Trump couldn’t solve.” Then he adds what is really radically new about the 2020 election: should the Democrats win, the ruling Left—which includes just about everyone who controls American government and society’s commanding heights—is ready, willing, and eager to implement plans that would make it virtually impossible for conservatives ever to win national elections again. These plans include the importation and counting of non-citizen voters. Elections-by-mail would shift power from voters to those who count the votes, just like in Venezuela. Though reelecting Trump makes the republic’s survival possible, and preserves all manner of good options, it guarantees nothing. Trump’s defeat guarantees disaster—like in 2016, only much more so.

What was the old Tory line from the Thatcher years? “We have to be in power until Labour regains its sanity.” I think this is in the same line of thinking. One would think that fair and secure elections would  be a bi-partisan thing, but it isn’t – and that is a shame. Many elections in the USA would be considered corrupt by international standards. 

As it is 2020, the flood of leftist violence in (D) controlled cities has to be a top concern. My take is that a decision was made that the chaos would be a plus to (D) as they assumed the Trump would overreact (which he almost did) and it would be to the advantage of the (D). However, Trump held back his worst instincts and (D) lost control of the monster they created. Now there is a blowback that is helping Trump. As such, cities are – here and there – trying to regain control. Much of the damage is already done, both real and political.

That is a tactical issue that does not seem to be much of Anton’s book (perhaps much of it was done before this summer’s events). He is looking at larger issues indirectly related to the ANTIFA shock troops; 

They do not believe they have to worry about controlling their own violent troops because they are sure that they have nothing to fear from conservatives. That is because conservatives have continued to believe that the United States’s institutions and those who run them retain legitimacy. Conservative complaisance made possible a half-century of Progressive rule’s abuse. The War on Poverty ended up enriching its managers while expanding the underclass that voted for them. The civil rights movement ended up entitling a class of diversity managers to promote their friends and ruin their opponents. The environmental movement ended up empowering the very same wealthy, powerful folks while squeezing the rest of America into cookie cutter living and paying inflated energy prices. The feminist movement delivered divorce and abortion—far from benefiting women, it has made millions dependent on ruling class favor. The COVID-19 pandemic has had almost nothing to do with public health and almost everything to do with separating, impoverishing, and disconnecting people inclined to vote against the ruling class. As leftist judges rule, conservatives respond by appointing judges who pledge not to rule. As leftist governors establish their brand of effective sovereignty by decree, conservative ones obey court orders. So long as, and to the degree that, the illusion of legitimacy stands—so long as the Right obeys while the Left disobeys and commands—there is no end to what the Left can do because there is so little that conservatives do to fight back.

Now we look to what is in front of us. Codevilla does not leave on a happy note. I remain firmly in the camp that all this “second civil war” talk is unhelpful, unrealistic, and dangerous, but on both sides it is creeping up. I do think that unless there is a clear blowout for Biden and the (D) that they will not go quietly in to the sweet night. They’ve already signaled that. It would make FL 2000 look like a bingo parlor.

Consider the 2020 election. In July, the Democratic National Committee engaged some 600 lawyers to litigate the outcome, possibly in every state. No particular outcome of such litigations is needed to set off a systemic crisis. The existence of the litigations themselves is enough for one or more blue state governors to refuse to certify that state’s electors to the Electoral College, so as to prevent the college from recording a majority of votes for the winner. In case no winner could be confirmed by January’s Inauguration Day, the 20th Amendment provides that Congress would elect the next president. Who doubts that, were Donald Trump the apparent winner, and were Congress in Democratic hands, that this would be likelier than not to happen?

Before or afterward, were conservatives not unanimously to roll over, and were a few incidents to result in loss of life and conflict between police forces on opposite sides of the affairs, America might well experience an explosion of pent-up rage less like the American Civil War of the 19th century and more like the horror that bled Spain in the 20th.

Welcome to the official start of the 2020 political season.

A final note: don’t worry, I won’t be doing much political stuff from here on out. I just won’t. I also won’t tell you who to vote for – unlike what I did here in the 2004, 2008, and 2012 elections. I’ll just ask you to vote.