Once again it is time for some Twitter (for those with a litigious bent there is a trademark symbol just after the “r” in the previous word) like random musings from the mind of a quiet, unassuming, at least in my own opinion, person observing the ramblings, rumblings, and revelations in the media. Additionally, now I know that Twitter and Facebook would censor what I have to say any way.
I just read what is an interesting editorial explanation for what has happened with the recent elections. This was an editorial written by a man named Thomas L. Knapp titled, “Yes, the election was rigged. No, not like that”. In the article he professes his belief that the election was not rigged to elect Joe Biden but rather the election was, “… rigged to ensure the status quo and for our de facto one-party system. It was rigged by party committees, by state legislatures, and by the Commission on Presidential Debates. It was rigged with committee rules, state ballot access laws and debate requirement intentionally designed to keep both “major party” dissidents (e.g., Tulsi Gabbard) and third-party and independent candidates as far off of voters’ radar as possible. It was not rigged to benefit a particular person. It was rigged to preserve a system: The post-World War II, military industrial complex centered “consensus” system.”
The trouble with this rigging is that the rigging is being exposed. Why is Arizona fighting to not have an independent audit of their voting machines? In other states why are hard drives being destroyed and evidence of potential linking of voting machines to the internet being destroyed? Why is evidence to confirm signatures either being withheld or destroyed? Why did governors and courts decide to change voting rules outside of their constitutionally authorized powers? If this election was truly fair and not rigged, then why is it that independent audits cannot be performed? For goodness sakes any publicly traded company is always under some form of audit or another under the auspices of protecting the shareholders. If it is good for the shareholder then it is even more important to protect the voter after all is not every single American a shareholder in our country? I must wonder how many auditors were told to just accept the status quo when Enron was ripping off their shareholders and in other cases in which fraud was committed in publicly traded companies.
Yes, the status quo may change if a truly fair election is held and I must ask what is wrong with that? Our Constitution was written to allow for change through the amendment process. The only constant in life is change. Why should we not demand that the stop to this erosion of trust in our republic begin today and right now with this election? I do not care what the status quo is because the status quo is eroding, increasingly being corrupted and I personally would prefer to start the change sooner rather than later after tension has bottled up even more than it already has. I may not like Joe Biden and I certainly did not vote for him but if he won the election fair and square, I am willing to accept that result. However, as it stands, I cannot accept him as a legitimate victor with what I am hearing and seeing (i.e., suppression of ballot observers, suitcases being pulled out from tables after all, but a few vote counters are left after a nonexistent leak in a building, votes being switched by voting machines, no independent audits, courts refusing to hear cases because of procedural matters instead of merits, and …).
I also perused the editorial page of another news publications website and in the middle of each page and as a pop out it had an AP report detailing Senator John Thune’s claim that if the election is contested in the Senate on January 6, it will go down ‘Like a Shot Dog’ in the Senate. Ok, so Senator Thune is the number 2 Senator in the Senate behind Senator McConnell. If I were to look at this from the perspective that I wrote of my first paragraph today, then yes, I can see where Senator Thune is coming from. Both he and Senator McConnell represent the status quo, or they would not have the positions that they have. I am beginning to wonder if South Dakota and Kentucky both use the Dominion Voting Machine?
Reading the same publications websites, I noticed an absence of President Trump’s message released yesterday. I did not look at any other websites or publications but considering the news site that I watched it on, OAN, I seriously doubt it was significantly shown anywhere else. Regardless, I like it and found it compelling. I typed in “president trump election update” in Google and the top of the search provides a map showing the 2020 Election Results with a map showing Joe Biden with 306 votes and Donald Trump with 232 votes and underneath the top stories are links to Politico, and two for CNN links. Then it follows links from Politico, BBC, Washington Post, and more CNN before a Reuters link. So if you want to view this I have provided the link below:
Lastly, I read an editorial about teacher’s unions in my state working to get a 1.5% increase in sales tax on next year’s ballot. This while the state I live in is wracked by COVID inspired shutdowns decreasing state revenues because there just is much less revenue to tax. To me this makes no sense as teachers and more importantly administrators of the school systems have worked through the entire shutdowns and have been paid while businesses are shuttered, and jobs have been lost. I can understand that teachers have had to work harder to balance their workloads between distance and in person classrooms and that they most likely do deserve more pay. In fact, I would argue that teachers deserved more pay before the lockdown. The problem is if there is no money there just simply is no money. Maybe the administrators and unions should have thought about this when they demanded remote learning for a population who is practically unaffected by the virus. Sure, some of the teachers may fall into an at risk population but wouldn’t it be easier to work around those cases than a blanket approach that costs more and is detrimental to our children? Perhaps some of the school districts should cut funding for some of their capital projects and from special programs and give the saved money to their teachers? Perhaps some of the administrators should take some furlough days so that the teachers can get a raise? I know I am not alone in my concerns, but I shudder to think what the costs to our children and their futures not going to school is going to be?