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What Happened? And What Now?
The Red Wave barely made it high enough to threaten the sandcastles halfway up the beach–except in Florida, where it met all expectations both wavey and reddish. So what happened? How’d a senile career corruptocrat’s party, which stands for open borders, unrestricted abortion, child genital mutilation, and even more debt, do as well as it did as a party holding power in a midterm election in a time of massive inflation, lots of crime, and a European war?
I’ve settled on three hesitant theories that explain things, and they all make some sense.
Theory 1: They cheated enough to make a red wave into a ripple.
As long as many voting machines have online connectivity, it is a viable speculation that someone manipulated that vulnerability. (I also need more time to think through the theory that they can cheat through algorithms built into the machines. I’m open to any theories at this point.)
That aside, old-school cheating without electronic shenanigans really is a thing. Democrat machine corruption exists. There are still plenty of mail-in ballots to make it easier to cheat in plenty of states. The warning that counting might take a long time, plus those long pauses in vote-count updates, sure is suggestive.
This stuff is a recipe for election-flipping levels of fraud in swing contests. If you throw diced potatoes and chunks of beef into a pot of boiling water, don’t be shocked if there’s beef stew in an hour.
Theory 2: The GOP really does suck that much.
How can we rule this out? DeSantis doesn’t suck, and he did great. Trumpier people won (Vance), and Trumpier people lost (Oz). But the least sucky Republican did do great, and Greg Abbott did well enough too! Maybe that–not anything about Trump–is the real factor here.
Theory 3: The country–at least in this iteration–is more or less finished. A return to sanity is basically impossible at this point.
Too much corrupt leftist education. Too much porn. Too much drugs. Too much fatherlessness. Too much reliance on welfare. Too much debt. Too little religion. Too few people having babies monogamously. Not enough responsibility. Too much leftist propaganda from Big Media, Big Tech, and Big Government. Too much vulnerability to propaganda because of that education system. Too much nihilism. Too much addiction to screen-based entertainment.
Renewal is unlikely without massive suffering first. Maybe something dramatic and fast-moving along the lines of World War II, the Great Depression, or the Civil War. Maybe just a long, slow, and increasingly miserable decline with some resemblance to the decline of the Roman Empire.
So which theory is correct?
Probably all three, to varying extents. I think Theory 3 is certainly on the right track. In 2008 I feared we would lose the country, and we probably did. It’s not easy to go back after Obama’s radicalism, however less radical it may seem now. Elections have consequences, including the breaking down of a country in such a way that an election fourteen years later ends up being this ridiculous.
And what do we do now?
Everything that’s right. “Love your neighbor as yourself,” for a start.
But if you’re looking for a successful political strategy, I don’t have it either. I can only make four suggestions. Maybe they’re a good start. If you agree, maybe you can identify one personal step you can take in the right direction and one topic you can mention to your state and federal representatives later today. If you disagree, I hope you can air some better ideas in the comments.
- Every state needs electoral reform. Do everywhere what Florida has done since the year 2000. Have voter ID laws. Have less mail-in balloting. Get rid of the scummy Wisconsin Elections Commission. Take the federal government’s advice–just this once–and ban all voting machines with online connectivity.
- Pro-family policy. I don’t even know what policies. But there’s probably something. At least we could stop the anti-family policies.
- Massive education reform in every state, every city. And, if at all possible and for as many families as possible, homeschool.
- Every Republican governor should be more like Ron DeSantis.
For two demographics I think this was a clear driver: the female college student and the much older (former college girls themselves) radical so-called feminists. They heard nothing else about the election and the female candidates here in NH never let up. (Remember those out of state students who can choose where they vote? Now they vote where it will affect outcome. Their votes may be superfluous in their home state like NY or MA, for example. They certainly influenced state and local results here.)
The relentless drumming of the “right” to abortion to young girls by hideously radical older women has been effective. The girls are highly emotional and seem pretty ignorant but want to be loved. The older women seem act out in dreadful ways. In our State Senate district supporters of the female Dem candidate (and winner) were vocal, hostile and volatile and often threatening at outdoor flag and sign waving events. At one I attended, the older (70’s and up) women were the worst – one threw iced coffee at one of the sign holders. Like you see on TV. A neighborhood fundraiser for the candidate highlighted a drag Queen for the kids. The candidate won – and she wants a state income tax.
The radical democrats have an endless set of inducements.
Every state should prohibit this. Voting-age college students can and should get an absentee ballot from their hometowns. That and the military are literally what absentee ballots are for.
The word you are looking for is found.
I suspect they can do both if they wish.
This says your Theory 3 is the most likely answer except this also leads one to believe that we can restore sanity.
Maybe. Over time. With divine help.
That’s what I did when I was in college. Saw a video Tuesday of a long line at University of Michigan said to be college students waiting to register and vote. One, don’t allow same day registration. Two, how many did vote at home via absentee and then register in Ann Arbor?
I also did voted absentee when I was in college and when I was in the USAF. If college students don’t need to change their driver’s licenses when they go to college (and they don’t, and are probably prohibited from doing so), they should not be allowed to register and vote where they attend college.
Seems like most states have a definition of residency that includes “intent to stay.” Students would’t fit that, and so could be legally excluded.
Every Democrat governor, too.