Let Objectivity Be Your Objective

     

     This is what they call the calm before the storm.

     Now, I'm not here to tell you who to vote for or not vote for. That's not what I do here. I just present the facts when I judge them to be true.

     Besides, assuming I have so much influence I can change votes this late in the game would be the height of delusional arrogance. So I'm not going to tell you to vote for Biden. Hell, why should I? I'm not voting for him. I'm done voting for Republicans posing as Democrats.

     I just ask you to do one simple thing: Somehow win back your powers of objectivity after four years of having it bludgeoned into submission, to remember where the window was before it got wrenched rightwards just a smidge to the left of Hitler.

     Got it? I'll assume you were partially successful, so let's begin our little thought experiment:

     Remember what presidents used to act like until January 20, 2017? Try to remember. Start with the last real, actual, duly-elected president we ever had- Barack Obama.

     Obama was far from perfect. Hell, he wasn't even a Democrat by the most generous, tongue in cheek definition of the word. I didn't vote for him, either, in 2012 and held my nose when I had done so in 2008.

    But the man wore the presidency like a well-tailored tuxedo. Trump wears it like a clown suit tailored for someone ten sizes smaller than him. When did you ever remember Obama hurling insults at elected members of Congress, Supreme Court justices or private citizens dozens of times a day, at three AM, and usually appending juvenile name-calling such as "Nervous Nancy", "Cryin' Chuck", "Sloppy Steve" or "Sleepy Joe"?

     George W. Bush was quite fond of nicknames. But even in his case, they were terms of endearment for allies of his. And Bush was a guy who'd defended torture. Bush never intentionally tried to wound anyone with a nickname. Trump does it for heartless, witless sport.

    When had Obama ever hidden in a bunker when protesters were many hundreds of yards away? When had Obama ever built a wall around the White House? Trump has. Twice. They're putting up a wall now even as we speak.

     Maybe Mexico will pay for that one.

     When did Obama ever have to call into question the legitimacy of an election months before the first ballot was even cast? Well, unlike Trump, Obama actually won the White House, the first time by a landslide over McCain. But even if he'd assumed he would lose, he would have done so gracefully and had ensured, like every single one of his predecessors without fail, a peaceful transfer of power.

    He gave that to Trump even after his birther lies and was paid for by Trump blaming his own failures in projection on a Mobius strip by blaming Obama for every way that Trump had failed.

    If antifa was real and if it was actually violent and it had been around in Obama's day, can you picture Obama calling for Antifa to "stand back and stand by"? Or Black Lives Matter?

     Had Obama ever once pitted black and white people against each other?

     Had Obama ever used left wing operatives to deny Republicans their votes even to the point of using extralegal methods and had been so shameless about it there wasn't even any doubt of his hyper partisan self-interest?

     No, he had done none of those things.

     Neither had his predecessors.

    Yet this is where we are today, in 2020. Jim Crow has not only made a comeback and he's bigger, badder and worse than ever. We're letting political parties dictate the outcome of an election when that outcome ought to be dictated by the American voter. We're letting Republican lawyers petition courts to invalidate votes cast by reliably Democratically-voting people such as young people, African Americans, Latinos and Asians.

     We're letting them do it all just like we let them ridiculously gerrymander districts to the point where they're not even contiguous, to dilute a left-leaning constituency.

     Just like we let Republicans steal the vote from 8,000,000 mostly people of color four years ago with voter roll purges, tossing absentee ballots and other right wing dirty tricks.

     These are facts. Educate yourself. I do not spend hours a day doing this shit just to lie to people who can fact-check me on a dime. I'm not the Gateway Pundit. I give you the truth, the facts. And these are facts.

     It's a vast understatement to say we are living in unprecedented times, that this election is for the "soul of the nation." It's all that and much more.

    Our so-called "president" is acting like a banana republic generalissimo. He's literally walling himself up in his gated palace because he fears and loathes you, especially if you had not voted for him. He has lawyers and armed right wing thugs screaming into phones right now as we speak setting up lawsuits and voter intimidation tactics in the certainty he loses tomorrow night. He's acting as if ballots have no shelf life lasting past midnight tomorrow because he knows the absentee ballots will greater disfavor him.

     And then creditors, prosecutors, plaintiffs and grand juries will start closing in once he's ejected one way or the other from the White House.

     Our White House, not his.

     This is not normal. Trump is not normal. And this is your chance to do something about that.

     Let objectivity be your objective. If you can honestly do that, then I know you will vote responsibly.