Over the weekend, the Washington Post had an article about how "More than 500,000 mail ballots were rejected in the primaries. That could make the difference in battleground states this fall." A friend sent it to me yesterday, adding that he was "F*cking scared." (By the way, "f*cking scared" tends to be the default position of many Democrats. And I understand the feeling, since a great deal is truly,deeply at stake. But as I always say, if you are "f*cking scared," imagine how Republicans feel. Further, I think it's good when Democrats are wary and concerned -- not just for what's at stake, but also because it means you won't be even remotely complaisant, but will work aggressively to help get out the vote. Being "f*cking scared," though, is another matter because pretty much no one wins anything running scared.) Anyway, I wrote him back that I saw an MSNBC story about this report on Sunday. Their conclusion was that it is an issue to be aware of and to be wary of, but states had problems during the primaries because they were new to this. However, since then most have readjusted their laws to eliminate most of those problems, and they also have more experience. And like the article, MSNBC was specifically looking at battleground states. We continued this discussion later in the evening, and he remained "f*cking scared. And so I mentioned to him a thread that Nate Silver, the polling maven of FiveThirtyEight.com, posted on Twitter. I suspect this Washington Post article may have prompted it. His discussion was about mail-in voting and addressed people's concerns of ballot rejections, alongside the convenience of it. The whole thing was extremely interesting, but three tweets stood out. I've put them together below for easier reading. He wrote -- The point about convenience is important, and why it's best to avoid conclusions such as "mail ballots are rejected at (slightly) higher rates than in-person ballots, and more Democrats (at least in 2020) vote by mail, therefore polls will overrate Democrats." I find his point fascinating -- and keep in mind, this is from someone who studies such things and has a high reputation. So often, when one has concerns, including totally legitimate concerns, it's too often easy to lose sight of the reality that few things are one-sided. That though there may indeed very real issues to be concerned about with mail-in votes being suppressed or not counted for any number of reasons, this doesn't even remotely mean that there aren't problems that can come up that keeps in-person ballots being counted -- not, perhaps, because of the intentional acts of suppression, but because of the very common realities of life. A vote not made has the same impact as a vote made, but not counted.
Will they cancel each other out? Will there be more problems with mail-in voting suppression? Will there be more problems with people not casting votes in-person? I have no idea. I just know that "votes being counted" is a issue to be wary of that hits both sides, not just mail-in My friend was not completely placated in the slightest. As he said, "I will be f*cking scared until the election is over." But he acknowledged that he was at least less f*cking scared than before... One small step for man, one giant step for mankind.
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If you missed Last Week Tonight with John Oliver last night, his Main Story was a wonderful, often very funny, and point-by-point detailed and scathing take down of Trump's continued insistence of how he's building a Border Wall. Paid for by Mexico, of course. Wonderful as the story was, I do have an issue with one point they made. To bend over in fairness, the show states that just because new material has gone up where 250 miles the old wall was, that doesn't mean it's just replacing the same wall, that there is actually new wall. And to make their point, they show a clip of what's not much more than a wooden sawhorse that had served as the old wall. The implication is that 250 miles of new wall has been built -- and I've seen enough stories that have explained that the new material is just fixing what was substantively there before, not replacing something that totally inadequate. That aside, the Main Story is excellent. Before the Democratic Virtual Convention, my periodically-mentioned and wildly-opinionated friend (making me look like a piker) Myles Berkowitz made the observation that he thought the "virtual" speeches with no audience would likely work better for Democrats than having cheering crowds, since it would allow the message to get out more directly. I think in some cases that turned out to be true, more than I expected, but not all of them. Some speeches would have been helped by having rousing moments.
But I do think Myles is spot-on correct in the reverse. I think the Republican Virtual Convention is not only going to be hurt by not having cheering crowds, it's going to be deeply hurt. Consider: regardless of what you think of the messages of each party, Democratic Conventions speak about inclusion and tree-hugger "touchy-feely" issues that given them the reputation of bleeding-heart liberals. Those don't require cheers and dropping balloons, they require heart-drenched speeches and maybe someone with a guitar singing "Kum-bayah." Republican Conventions speak about waving the flag, explaining why Democrats are radical commies and how libs are going take away your guns and ruin America the Beautiful. Think back to Trump's Inauguration Speech which is known for its Dystopian View of Life, ending with former Republican president George W. Bush turning to Michelle Obama and saying, "Well, that was some weird sh*t." But it's more than just dystopian speeches. This year, the RVC is going to have to explain why what everyone know isn't true is true. They're going to have to explain, despite over 180,000 Americans dead, sheltering at home, children not having school, everyone needing to social distance and wear masks, no national testing, and Europe and most of the rest of the world getting control of the coronavirus while blocking Americans from traveling to their countries that Trump and Republicans have done a great job handling the pandemic. They're going to have to explain, despite 55 million new applications for unemployment, businesses going bankrupt, and the GDP plummeting at an annual rate of a ghastly 33 percent that the economy is just great. They're going to have to explain, despite social protests that have rocked America, that Trump has done more for black people than any other president in history. They're going to have to explain, despite record heat this summer, massive wildfires throughout California, and two hurricanes about to crash into the United States, that Climate Change is fake science. When you have to tell the American people something is true when they know in every corpuscle of their body and in everything they see and understand that it isn't true, and when you are telling people a dystopian view of America and want everyone to think you're describing the glory of all that is grand -- you need cheering crowds. Need them. You need people weeping with joy in a frenzy like at a religious revival. You need the band playing the most heart-soaring marches whose music wipes out the words. You need those balloons. Need them, need it all. That's people you're trying to convince the people at home. You know you have the delegates -- they're delegates, after all. But you need viewer at home to be just as convinced that everything you said is probably true. And not just true, but pretty wonderful given all that cheering, frenzy, marches and balloons. If the speaker says something that seems way too dark and makes zero sense to what you know, what you are sure of -- but there are people cheering it wildly, well...maybe they know something you don't. Maybe it's better to joint to crowd, join the party. But without the cheering, without the frenzy, without the signs, without the hats, without the band music, without the balloons...all you have at home as you listen is -- "Hunhh??" That and, "Well, that's some weird sh*t." You're going to have four days of Trump rambling on -- either delivering prepared speeches he terrible at delivering or going off-script into who-knows-where land about what a great job he's done despite all evidence and how Joe Biden is crazy, slow, and the most-radical communist in the world, and by the way, you might want to try bleach or listen to the pillow guy or that beautiful alien DNA doctor about demon seed. Four days of that. And listen to Don Jr., and Eric and Ivanka and Tiffany all telling you about how awful Hunter Biden is, and Melania extolling the beauty of her new football field that replaced the Rose Garden. And some other family members, though I suspect his sister and niece won't be among them. And Rudy Giuliani, Matt Gaetz, Jim Jordan, the couple from Missouri who were arrested on felony charges for illegal use of rifles at protesters (really) Karen Pence, Kellyanne Conway, Franklin Graham, Kimberly Guilfoyle -- girlfriend of Don Jr., Ben Carson, Nicholas Sandmann -- described as "student who sued news outlets after confrontation with Native American activist" and Dana White, president of the Ultimate Fighting Championship. Imagine these speeches -- and more -- for four days without cheering crowds, wild frenzy, marching music, confetti, banners and balloons. And we haven't even got to that Democrats had three month to plan their virtual convention because they knew a real one was unsafe, and Republicans have had about three weeks. Maybe it will go great. My money is on -- "Well, that was some weird sh*t."
On this week’s Stay at Home edition of the NPR quiz show Wait, Wait...Don't Tell Me!, the guest contestant for the 'Not My Job' segment is Bryan Cranston. Boy, he is a really good, entertaining storyteller. Host Peter Sagal had an easy job interviewing this week.
On this week’s episode of 3rd and Fairfax, the official podcast of the Writers Guild of America, the guest is Ian Brennan, who co-created the series The Politician, Scream Queens, Glee and Netflix’s alt-history limited series Hollywood talks about his show and also how rewriting the past may impact the future.
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AuthorRobert J. Elisberg is a political commentator, screenwriter, novelist, tech writer and also some other things that I just tend to keep forgetting. Feedspot Badge of Honor
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