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The Expansionist
Tuesday, November 06, 2018
 
Dirtiest Campaign in Modern Times
I am 73 years old, and have been aware of national politics for some 65 years. Never have I seen such a disgraceful, ugly, disgusting, and irresponsible campaign run by either major national party — in this case, the Republican Party. I don't know about the campaigns in all the states, but I am keenly aware of the race for the U.S. Senate seat from my state, New Jersey, and a House seat from my state as well.
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In the Senate race, a slimy Republican newcomer named Bob Hugin (hyúe.gin) has run a number of reprehensible TV spots that accuse the Democratic incumbent, Bob Menendez, of crimes, on the basis of an indictment on financial wrongdoing in accepting favors from a FRIEND. What the commercials do not reveal is that Menendez was NOT CONVICTED of anything, and NOT EXPELLED FROM THE SENATE. Donald Trump complained, in connection with the Supreme Court nomination of Brett Kavanaugh, about the cavalier disregard by his critics for the assumption of innocence under our legal system. But here a Trump ally dismisses the notion that a person is presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Menendez wasn't even convicted in the 'court of pubic opinion'!
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When those revolting ads didn't seem to be doing the trick, Hugin took out ads some three weeks before the election accusing Menendez of having sex with underage girls in the Dominican Republic, trying to latch onto the #MeToo movement, which the Republican Party has NOT supported heretofore. These scurrilous ads seemed to have significant effect, and public-opinion polls showed Hugin pulling within 5% of long-term Senator Menendez.
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Then Menendez's ads started to pound away on Hugin's lack of political experience, his making a multimillion-dollar fortune by gouging the sick, as an executive of a pharmaceutical company, and on Hugin's pledging fealty to the Trump Administration's Far-Right program of giving the super-rich huge tax breaks but only peanuts to the poor and middle class, at the cost of increasing the national debt by a trillion dollars in less than two years, and the polls crept back up to a 15% advantage to Menendez.
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In the other extremely dirty campaign, Tom MacArthur, a Republican, accuses Andy Kim (an Oriental — and no, “Oriental” is not a dirty word, and is far more specific than “Asian”, which covers South Asians, Central Asians, and people of the Middle East) of associating with, and presumably backing the views of some (unnamed) Radical Islamist in urging a jihad against the United States. So we are to assume that this nonwhite challenger is a Moslem madman who wants to destroy the (dominantly Christian) United States. Nice, huh?
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Voter Suppression and Gerrymandering. MSNBC's Rachel Maddow Show has made much in the last ten days or so of Republican sliminess in trying to suppress voting by likely Democrats, thru active measures to refuse the right to vote in various contemptible ways. In Georgia, the man who is in charge of verifying voter credentials has purged something like a million and a half people from the rolls. This goes far beyond legitimate measures, such as removing people who have died or left the district. He has also shunted aside, possibly until after the election, applications for voter enrollment from 53,000 Georgians! This disgrace to the human race is himself running for Governor in the present election. You'd think he'd want to eliminate all appearance of conflict of interest by recusing himself from voter-validation duties until the election in which he is a candidate is over. But only an honorable person would do that, and the Republican Party is in very short supply of honorable people nowadays. I am so old that I can remember honorable Republicans, such as Dwight Eisenhower and Nelson Rockefeller.
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In Kansas, the county board of elections has removed the one voting precinct from Dodge City, a municipality of some 13,000 people, mostly Hispanics, to outside city limits in a location more than a mile from the nearest bus stop, even tho the typical precinct in Kansas has only 1,200 registered voters, and there are perfectly good locations for a polling place within city limits and public transit. The one polling place in Dodge City before it was moved outside city limits was in a county facility that has a number of other events scheduled around the same time — but not today. And there are SCHOOLS that could host a polling place.
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Moreover, Republican-dominated state legislatures have GERRYMANDERED their states for the obvious, express purpose of maximizing Republican representation and minimizing Democratic representation. (Of course, Republicans would say “Democrat representation”, because Republicans refuse to use the proper, respectful term “Democratic” in such a locution. How would they like it if every non-Republican called Republicans “Repubs” or some other disrespectful term?)
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Maddow has shown a chart of calculations for how much more Democrats would have to poll in the popular vote to get more than the 23 Members necessary to take over the House: on the order of 18% above the Republican vote (and thus 68% of the total vote, assuming two candidates per district), not the 50% + 1 that should be all that's necessary to win a race in a real democracy.
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In short, the Republican Party — or should we say “Republican Conspiracy”, “Mob”, or “Mafia”? — is acting with all its might to CHEAT its way into continued control of Congress.
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Turnout Should Not Be the Determinant. Everything in American elections turns on turnout. That is not democracy. We consistently poll less than half of all voters every election. The expected turnout in this hotly contested election is 41%. That's disgraceful, and we should DO something about it, not just lament it. That thing we should do is institute MANDATORY VOTING, whereby everyone is required to vote or pay a hefty fine, unless a should-be voter has a legitimate reason for not voting, for instance, being housebound by accident or ill health such that s/he can't even get to the post office to mail in an absentee ballot. Various genuine democracies have mandatory voting, and it works fine.
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Extravagant Language. In decrying the ugliness of today's political rhetoric, some observers have said silly things such as that we have “never been more divided”. Apparently Donald Trump is not the only person who doesn't know history. “Never been more divided”? Haven't these people heard of a little thing called “the Civil War”, which killed over half a million Americans on both sides? It was in all the papers, and even in by far most history textbooks, altho some Southern liars call it “the War Between the States”. No, it was NOT a war between states but between two federations, the Union and the Confederacy. New Jersey didn't pick a fight with Texas (tho I suspect that at the time, New Jersey had far more people than did Texas). So yes, the surviving Union has indeed been more divided, FAR more divided. But our divisions today are nonetheless alarming. One way we have become more divided is in the most-unwise initiation of early voting and absentee ballots for no good reason. An election used to be a civic event, a celebration of our shared democracy and responsibility. It could be festive, and used to be an actual holiday for which employers would have to give their employees time off, with pay, perhaps even the entire day off. No longer. With early voting and absentee ballots, the voting period and time needed to count ballots can take weeks. In the case of idiotic California, just counting mail-in ballots and certifying the results can take WEEKS beyond the official voting day. That is insane.
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No One to Root For. The hard choice that voters too often must make is between “the lesser of two evils”, and that is indeed the choice we must make today. I have serious problems with my knees and balance that make walking difficult and dangerous, but I am going to try my best to get to my polling place, on crutches, to vote against Bob Hugin. My Congressman is in no danger of being ousted in this solidly Democratic district in the Blue State of New Jersey's largest city (Newark). So if it weren't for voting AGAINST Hugin, I could stay home and out of the RAIN that will occupy much of the day. (If it rains all day, I can't chance a crutch slipping on wet pavement.) So I'll test how well I can manage to walk to the polls, and if I am confident I can walk to and from my precinct without falling, I will do my civic duty. At least if I do get there, I won't have to wait more than a few minutes, because New Jersey, the third state to ratify the Constitution, has long experience in running elections, so has it down to a science. This is not one of those places where there are insanely long waiting times. One woman in some other state had to wait SIX HOURS in EARLY voting, not even on Election Day. New Jersey and other truly little-D democratic states are responsible, and know that the very most important governmental responsibility, short of defense during an actual military invasion, is to consult the people as to who should staff a government that is supposed to be of the people, by the people, and for the people.

- posted by L. Craig Schoonmaker @ 10:09 AM

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