The Morning After: Election "Week" & The Edge of Sadness

Personal on-the-ground experiences confirmed that our elections--like so much in our society--can't be trusted. Where do you go from here?

Two years ago, in the aftermath of the 2020 election farce, I was informed that if I just worked at an election, I would see how everything was really hunky-dory and that claims of results-changing fraud couldn’t possibly be true. So, this time around, I volunteered to be an election worker and a poll observer. And, as the fictional detective Adrian Monk might say “Here’s what happened…

*It took one written request and multiple email requests to our local Town Clerk to be told there was no room for me to actually work the election (that is, to be among the people who actually check voters in and count the ballots). Maybe that’s true, but I did reach out at least eight or nine months in advance, after we’d moved in October 2021.

*I talked to our town’s Republican Party chapter about how to get in as an election worker. I was told that both local parties are supposed to have equal access to be election workers, but that they (the local GOP) generally get a certain amount of the run-around to get people in there. And unless you really make an in-person fuss, getting involved is very difficult.

*I was able to have success working with our Massachusetts gubernatorial candidate, Geoff Diehl and his campaign and be a poll observer. In this case, it’s because nothing formal is really required. Elections are public events and so long as observers follow certain rules (maintain a certain distance from voters, don’t talk with voters, and don’t wear campaign paraphernalia), they can watch the proceedings—including after the polls close.

I took the late shift. I went to a town about a half-hour away that was considered a bellwether for the state and took the late shift. I got there at 8 PM when the polls closed. And in order, here is again what happened…

*The poll observer who was there before me told me the machines had broken down and they had to do a replacement.

*There was no Wi-Fi in the high school where we were, so I couldn’t receive texts. But when I did leave to follow the ballots back to City Hall, I saw one from my wife which informed me that the race had already been called for Democrat Attorney General Maura Healey. The call came at 8:01 PM. Yes, they called the results one minute after the polls closed. Before a single Election Day ballot could be counted.

*By 10 PM or so when the results were back at City Hall, the Town Clerk wearily put her head in her hands, looked up at the police officer and said simply “My machines failed me today. It’s happening all over all the state.”

Now let’s be clear that the Town Clerk was perfectly honest. She cared about her job. And even though I’d guess she was a Democrat, based on both my geographic region and a somewhat snide comment she made about Trump, she could also be heard lamenting all the mail-in votes, and saying how much harder it makes the job.

Let’s further keep in mind that all of my experiences, from my hometown to where I was on Election Night are both small towns with populations under 10,000. I live in a state that, with the exception of some liberal Republican governors, is completely dominated by the Democratic Party. And these issues still happened. What happens if I live in Milwaukee, Detroit, or Philadelphia? What would I have seen there?

This is all happening in the context of a massive machine breakdown in Arizona. In the state that is ground zero in 2022, Maricopa County—merely the biggest county in the entire nation—saw nearly one-third of its machines break down right away in the morning. With Republicans being mostly Election Day voters (as opposed to mail-in), this is clearly a massive issue.

So given all this, from the small window of problems that I saw firsthand, which correlate to the bigger problems that are taking place on the national stage, let me ask this—Is there any reason anyone in the United States should feel remotely confident that the final election results are really the expressed will of the people? Of course we can’t.

This is, of course, exactly what our society’s leadership class—a group that most definitely includes prominent Republicans, whom can be identified by how much they personally benefit from the current structure—wants. They want mistrust among the populace. They’re happy to give us the political equivalent of a pro wrestling match on a Tuesday night in November—we watch the returns, root for our team, and then race in with analysis, while the outcomes are being essentially managed (not directly controlled, but skillfully managed) from our betters on high.

It's sad, and I don’t write that lightly. I truly feel deeply saddened on this morning. Even though I’ve everything I’ve said and written on election integrity over the past couple years can be backed up with primary source data (as opposed to anecdotal news reports), the reading of substantive reports that didn’t correspond with my own opinion, and blended in with some personal experience, the majority of people will choose to dismiss it.

It’s similar to the way so many people dismiss the now-obvious problems that exist with the COVID-19 vaccine, from side effects ranging from heart problems to blood clotting to the newly introduced cause of death Sudden Adult Death Syndrome (yeah, that sounds normal). Because if our elections can’t be trusted and our medical class can’t be trusted, can anything be trusted?

We already know that our ruling class completely lied to us about the existence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, ushering in trillions of dollars in debt, thousands of lost lives, an exponentially greater number dealing with gravely serious PTSD, has still never been held accountable, and now uses the same talking points in dealing with an even more dangerous situation in the Ukraine. So if they’ll lie about that and get away with it, if they’ll lie and traumatize people about COVID-19 and the vaccine and get away with it, isn’t lying about the veracity of our elections small potatoes by comparison?

I truly love the basics of politics, from the discussion of issues to the analysis of their political impact. What I wish could be talked about are subjects like the following…

*Republicans still won what looks like it will be a decent majority of the total votes for the House of Representatives, but that won’t translate into the right seat gains—a dynamic that’s the opposite of what usually happens. What caused the change and how can the GOP execute better in closely contested districts?

*On a related note, Democrats have clearly mastered so-called “ballot harvesting”. This isn’t illegal in many states. It’s basically how Democrats used early voting and mail-in ballots to run get out of the vote operations throughout the fall and bank up votes from people who might  not otherwise bother to go to the polls. How can the Republicans first counteract this, and then eliminate the practice entirely? In short, how can we make Election Day a Day Again?

*How do the Republicans deal with an obvious conundrum—Trump’s appeal to the working classes, across racial lines, remains essential to the GOP becoming a majority party. At the same time, Trump antagonizes suburbanites that might otherwise vote Republican. How do you reconcile these two disparate groups, who often have completely different economic interests and political histories?

*Is Ron DeSantis the man who can meet the challenge noted above? The Florida governor made a heckuva case for himself, winning traditionally Democratic Miami-Dade County in a shattering landslide. As one pundit put it—there was a Red Wave, Ron DeSantis just used it all for himself. But can that translate nationally? DeSantis’ leadership changed the electorate itself in Florida, as rational people everywhere fled for safe haven amidst medical tyranny. The Hispanic vote in Florida has always been more conservative than Hispanics elsewhere. Can Ronny D’s magic work in other key swing states, which may have lost conservative voters to Florida. It’s the kind of subject I’d love to talk about and analyze from all sides.

And I’m sure I will eventually analyze all this and more. The problem is, that topics like this used to define American politics. If you knew the answers to questions like these, you reasonably knew how an election would go. Now, it’s just one small part of the equation. The bigger part is who our country’s ruing class will allow to win and whether there will be any courageous people anywhere in positions of power who will stand up and say “Enough is enough.”

Dealing with a world where our important institutions have repeatedly and obviously demonstrated their manifest untrustworthiness is scary. It’s why most people ignore the obvious and just allow themselves to be gaslit, never really fighting back against The Approved Narrative. Because if you can’t trust that, who do you trust?

For me, the mere need to ask that question means God is calling us to a deeper trust in Him—in the infinitely larger world of eternity that intersects with our own fallen world, and is bigger, with more moving parts, then we can possibly imagine.

For me, that means a deeper trust in the actual doctrine and sacraments of the Catholic Church, revealed by Christ and protected by the Holy Spirit. Even amidst the personal sinfulness of those of us who are members, and the often scandalous actions of those in positions of power, the Catechism of the Catholic Church, confession, and the Eucharist remain.

It means a deeper commitment to the Mother of Christ, through the rosary. The spiritual treasury of the Church offers us a 33-day program of renewal and commitment to Our Lady’s Immaculate Heart, wherein we allow her to shape us in the image of her Divine Son. For me, November 29, is a favored starting date, with its conclusion on the great Marian feast day of January 1.

That’s what it means to me to trust in God. Everyone eventually has to take their own time in meditation, in the silence of their heart, to decide what their answer to that question will be. I simply believe that in a world where the reliability of institutions seems to erode more with each passing day, that Holy Mother Church is with us to the end.

Everyone have a happy Thanksgiving. I’ll be back in this space after that once more of this insanity shakes out.