Welcome to the summer of 2020, the summer of voter suppression, where if you are a voter in an Atlanta black neighborhood it takes 3 to 4 hours in driving rain to vote, while if you are a white suburbanite you can walk right into your polling station and you can be done within 15 minutes. And if you want to vote by mail, you may have the same experience as Stacey Abrams, former governor candidate of Georgia, who received in her “voter by mail package” a return envelope that was steamed shut so that she could not return it….forcing her to go out and waste 3 hours in line to vote. This is Georgia, Republican controlled Georgia. So, while we are protesting in the streets; changing people’s mind; reflecting an 80% mood for a change from a Republican governance of anger, hate and division, it doesn’t really matter much if we cannot get our vote registered at all because of a process rigged in favor of Republicans, by Republicans. Just ask Stacey Abrams. She had the governorship of the State of Georgia stolen from her by an electoral system that was rigged against her by a Republican controlled electoral system that removed or gerrymandered 500,000 voters away from electing her to office. They are trying to steal the current election in Georgia.

I am very worried. We are well beyond halfway down the road to dictatorship, and everybody tells me, “Don’t worry, once the Democrats take over in November, we will be able to get back on the right path”. But what if the Democrats don’t win in November; what if the Republicans are able to suppress the vote everywhere, as they did in yesterday’s exercise in futility in Georgia, where certain neighborhoods had to wait up to 5 hours to cast their vote, a test that seems a little more than unfair in a Democracy that is supposed to be a model for the rest of the world. What does that tell the rest of the world about the effectiveness of all the peaceful, positive, multi culture, multi-generational demonstrations that show the will of the people, if the will of the people cannot be reflected in our voting booths? Just like what happened to Stacey Abrams in Georgia and what is happening again in Georgia, is now also being prepared to happen in Florida and Wisconsin and Arizona and Iowa, etc. etc. “ad farewell Democracy”. Who are the experts, the patriots, the guardians of our freedoms; where are they; and how are they going to be able to protect and monitor these “catastrophes in the making”; or am I just a modern day Cassandra, “cursed to utter true prophecies, but never to be believed”. Maybe I should consider cross dressing!

I think that not only can it happen here, but that it is already happening here. Republicans are laying the groundwork right now with the encouragement and assistance from The White House, whose fog machine is just now getting warmed up, and which will soon reach Cyclone proportions. Lying, distraction tweets about a 75 year old peaceful protester in Buffalo, New York, who was knocked to the ground by overly aggressive, ignorant police who ignored the blood leaking from his ear onto the concrete; later only to be deliberately mis-labeled by a dirtbag President of the United States as an agent provocateur who was really intent upon inciting violence, by almost killing himself by cracking his skull open. This is our President’s outrageous claim. They are trying to steal the election in Wisconsin and every other state possible.

The only incitement that we can really expect is the incitement of confusion and anger and divisiveness that will continue to emanate from a small, desperate, criminal in the White House, scurrying around to find more “Law and Order”, egregious, distracting activities such as military helicopters drowning out and buzzing innocent demonstrators, while the media gets (justifiably) distracted looking into the chain of command to find out who ordered such illegal activities. It is a simple strategy. Let us not make this any more complicated than necessary. This tiny little man is scared to death that he is going to lose the November election, and then spend the rest of his life dodging prosecutors trying to put him in jail. He knows the full scale of his criminal deeds done before he was elected, and he is haunted by the multitudes of every ghost invading his nightmares every night, finally giving him a glimpse of the sweats and the “I can’t catch my breath” syndrome he so richly deserves. Look for Mr. “Ex-President, future convict, Donald Trump” to turn the noise volume up louder than anything we’ve ever heard before to make sure people aren’t paying attention to the voter suppression he and his Republicans cronies are going to unleash on our elections. It is not the Russian we need to worry about as much as our own home-grown, greedy, power hungry, thieving, Republican assholes.

They send all the cops to a staged fire or a staged kidnapping uptown, while they rob the unprotected bank downtown. Where is Bruce Willis when you need him?

Just remember that there is going to be tons of distracting insanity, all coming from the White House, all designed to distract from the voter suppression efforts that are happening right now. Perhaps you may have forgotten that there has been a reform Democrat Voters Rights Act bill languishing on Mitch McConnell’s desk for the last 6 months. Six months, and this useless anachronism continues to defy the will of one hundred million voters who are in the streets demanding action. Such is the state of affairs in 2020 America, our Democratic Republic, the home of the free and the brave.

Get ready. Next, we are soon to be subjected to some new, outlandish Donald Trump speech to the nation on race relations, purporting to tell black people how to live their lives, delivered by the “President of Compassion and Empathy” himself. It will smack more of pouring gasoline on the fire of racism, especially if he pulls another Bible like stunt for a background photo/video image of a “Coronation like” event where he can honor himself as the expert or “stable genius” of his hallucinations. It would be laughable if it were not so downright evil. And if it is ghost written by ace staff speechwriter Stephen Miller, a man who has never had a nice word for any person of color ever, you can be sure it will incite plenty of desired controversy, despite Stephen’s futile attempts to feign caring and Donald’s inability to not stutter incomprehensibly over any line that even approximates empathy.

This is a moment in history for a change, for a transformation for a total reform away from a greed based racism of injustice that brutalizes every aspect of life for peoples of color to a justice that creates an equality of opportunity; for decency and dignity for all. An 8 minute video of a man’s life being snuffed out by an officer of the law as he begged for his life, “I cannot breath” says that the American people have had enough of repressive, militaristic law and order tactics. They want true policing that protects and serves. The Republicans should not be allowed to smother and suffocate this moment as was done to George Floyd’s life.

They are trying to steal the elections in every other state they can get their grubby, greedy hands on.

Power and greed. Somebody call Bruce! Do not let this moment die.

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1 COMMENT

  1. Half of the black voters in Georgia should stage a protest outside the white polling places, ensuring that no whites are able to vote.

    • No: two wrongs don’t make a right.

      Answer is to vote in Nov. as if democracy itself depends on it, since it actually DOES.

      • Yes, But…how hard would it be for a man with no conscience, a man whose only concern is his own self-interest, to convince a number of like minded corrupt Republican Governors to muck up the November elections “Georgia style” sufficiently for the “Cheater in Chief” to declare a national disaster requiring that he stay in office until “we can fix this mess” which, of course, he would declare with a straight face “this was totally not my fault”.

  2. First people thought Mueller would save America. Then people thought Schiff would save America.Now people are thinking Biden and the Democrats will save America. Everybody keeps waiting for one savior or another to come through. We have to save ourselves. I thought the women’s march nearly coincident with the inauguration was a great start. Then the Muslim ban protest afterward. I remember thinking at this rate we’ll be protesting every weekend. Protesting and contacting Congress members about ACA worked to establish the will of the people, and luckily John McCain responded. Then at some point, we got tired and basically stopped protesting, and the Trump administration became even more bold and complacent. Now here we are. We need to keep repeating the message through protests and contact with congress. We have to be able to say we did our part.

    • Yes the fix is in – unless we rise up and take back this country. The young WILL NOT vote, they may go out after a 3 month lockdown to vent frustration but they will not bother to vote in November and where will that leave us? With Putin’s agent re-elected, unless…we re

  3. I’m wondering if Stacey Abrams receiving an already-sealed envelope (which she tried to open with steam, but failed) was no accident, or a one-off event: I’d bet good money some GA election law rule says if the envelope is returned to election officials sealed with cellophane tape, glue, with signs of tampering, etc, the ballot must be discarded.

    GOP are such sneaky little slime-balls….

    • This is a propaganda tactic. First you made up a story, and then you drew a conclusion from your own piece of fiction. If you live in a humid climate, envelopes routinely seal themselves. I live in a temperate climate, and right now there is a box of 200 business envelopes (Well, half a box,now). The tip of the triangle is sealed on every last one of them now, just from sitting in my desk drawer for however long it has been.

      I expect a lot of envelopes in Georgia had that problem. A rule against an envelope that looks like it may have been tampered with is not unreasonable. Next time the state should make sure to use those envelopes that have the peel-off paper. There were a lot of other, more egregious issues in Georgia.

  4. Stacy Abrams is a dynamic, personable and smart person who I believe would have made a terrific Governor of Georgia but she had the election stolen from her. A nomination for a seat in the U.S. Senate was hers for the taking, but instead she chose to create an organization to organize voters and address voter suppression. Many of us around the country were disappointed that she didn’t choose to go for a Senate seat, and since she’s still youngish perhaps parlay that into a Presidential nomination down the road. However, like so many others I admired her gumption in making it clear (and quickly) she wasn’t interested so as to clear the field for others to make a run. Also like others I admired the enormous task she took on, and hoped she’d coordinate with the Obama/Holder effort taking place with similar objectives. Basically, there was a lot to love about Stacy Abrams.

    Having said all that I have some thoughts that are likely to make me deeply unpopular because they are critical of Ms. Abrams. I believe that like Beto O’Rourke she squandered a Senate seat over premature Presidential ambitions. With the organization he’d built and the money on hand to flesh it out after taking a well-earned break O’Rourke could have beaten Cornyn and while Texas is maybe, sorta in play he’d have made it clearly so. But he let ego overcome judgement. Abrams, who has made it clear she wants to be Biden’s VP pick has done the same thing.

    If you think that’s unfair, and overly critical I’m not done. There is NO ONE who knows more and more painfully just how corrupt the state government and voting is in her home state. While she’s smart and savvy enough to lend her presence to other states, you’ll have a very, very difficult time convincing me she shouldn’t have focused the bulk of her effort in Georgia and addressing the ballot access issues – from getting more polling stations established in Democratic areas, to better voting machines and of course ensuring not just absentee ballots were sent out but training poll-watchers to help ensure poorly trained or corrupt poll workers didn’t deny people their right to cast provisional ballots if they hadn’t gotten their absentee ballot. Georgia was close enough that preventing 100k votes out of what will surely be three to five times that number that would/will be intentionally suppressed would make the difference and help us retake the Senate.

    After the debacle in WI, and given what happened in GA in 2018 is there ANYONE who didn’t see what with the Covid-19 crisis in progress happening in GA earlier this week? Hell, Ted Baxter from the Mary Tyler Moore show could have predicted it. Maybe it was in fact all over the news in GA but I’d have expected to see Ms. Abrams shining a national spotlight on her state predicting what the GOP would do, especially after WI. Instead, the few times I saw her on TV she was either directly or indirectly making it clear she would like to be Biden’s VP pick.

    I think it’s great Biden committed to picking a woman to run with him on our side, and also making it clear he’s not just open to the idea of a woman of color but has specific ones in mind. The thing is, he’s got some really, REALLY great ones to pick from who like Abrams are smart, dynamic and would be great on the campaign trail. Off the top of my head Kamala Harris, Susan Rice and Val Demings come to mind. Abrams has been a state level legislator. Compared to the other three I mentioned she’s nowhere near as qualified. Harris, Rice and Demings have every quality Abrams has but also DC, “executive” and national security experience. Sorry Ms. Abrams, but to use a baseball metaphor you are at best a solid Triple-A prospect, while the other three are all bona fide major league stars.

    Again, GA was going to be a mess this week in the best of circumstances and I believe Abrams should have been focusing all of her attention and considerable skills where she is known best and had built up enormous credibility – loved by supporters and feared by opponents. She could have directed, even in the current news environment considerable attention on Georgia and the corruption of its election practices.

    I know blunt and pointed criticism of Ms. Abrams is unlikely to go over well here or on any progressive site on which this might be shared. It might even make me some enemies, or at least diminish what reputation I’ve managed to build up. However, Georgia IS gettable this fall but the only way that’s going to happen is with Stacy Abrams offering both the leadership and the “grunt work” she did in her campaign for Governor. That’ not going to happen with her spending the summer not just pining for (pretty much openly) and even campaigning for a spot on our national ticket. Especially when there are multiple, far more qualified options.

  5. This is highly unlikely. Georgia is unique in that they are a wholly captured state by the Republican Party. Every other state consideted in play (save Florida…as I don’t consider Ohio in play) either has all relevant officials as Dems or is split. That is a big difference.

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