Inkwell: Authors and Artists

    
Perhaps so - I searched for it using the NY Times search and Google
search, and couldn't find it. I was wondering if perhaps they
removed it?
  

    
I think early voting may change the dynamic where applicable. I
expect to see a couple of lead changes over the course of the count,
as early and mail in votes are counted first, favoring blue, then
the rural districts report a red shift, yielding to blue(r) again as
urban districts report. The time zone effect will also favor blue
early as northeastern states favor blue, then the Midwest and
intermountain west states favor red, then west coast states assert
more indigo as their polls close near midnight in the network HQs in
New York, DC, and Atlanta.

It's gonna be an allnighter.
  

    <scribbled by lperson Wed 6 Nov 24 10:17>
  

    
I would be very surprised.
  

    
Emily, thanks for electoral-vote.com. I don't dare turn on the TV
for fear of finding myself 24 hours later, even more dazed and
confused than I already am. A site that I can check throughout the
day seems much more manageable.
  

    
Two quotes 
“Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.”  - HH DL

“When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.” - HST

I think things might get chaotic in a few places. Two or three
events to reflect on. The Brooks Brothers “riot”, and Kyle
Rittenhouse. Two ends of a spectrum of reactionary militant
responses to chaos and a power vacuum. I hope we don’t have any guys
like the fool at Mar-a-Lago aiming to disrupt things. The difference
between now and 11/22/2000 is that the protestors show up in camos
with long guns. I hope things stay quiet. Nobody can shut off TFG’s
mic now. He has his own platform. 
  

    
>I'm beginning to think we're going to know tonight

Before dawn, certainly.
  

    
That would be great but I’m not holding my breath. If I had to bet,
I’d bet on a week at least while Trumpian shenanigans go on. At the
end, he’ll lose but it could be a really annoying process. 
  

    
axon wrote:

>It seems as though the meat of the MAGA are not
economically distressed, but instead offended about progressive
culture shifts that erode their historical white privilege. They're
certainly being *told* that they are being marginalized
economically, but if so they should be easy pickups for the
Biden/Harris economic recovery. 

I have reluctantly come around to believing this, as well, like the
last remaining scale of American exceptionalism falling from my
eyes.
  

    
I saw a headline this week (didn't click) that young adults
increasingly don't believe in American exceptionalism - that ours is
any better a country than anyone else's. Not a bad thing, I don't
think. It's hard to fix a problem until it's assessed and
quantified, and believing we're something special has landed us in
one mess after another. 

My 30-ish nephew, way too experienced for his age with the health
care and insurance systems here, had zero problems slamming the door
behind him to go live in France. There's your downside.
  

    

> let alone polling neck and neck

thank you, Andrew, for being a rare Internet commenter who doesn't post,
"neck in neck."

jstraw, thank you for the All Orifices Are Clenched image, which shall
remain with me throughout the proceedings!

and now, a long post, taking us back to The Well of past years, when an
orange-faced man was president...


Back in October of 2017, a bunch of us in The Well's News conference (we
call our online forums "conferences" here, for the uninitiated...) Anyhoo,
we're discussing the newly Trumpified era in all its urgency. 

The subject at hand was bridging the divide. Several of us listened to this
fascinating episode of On Being, which featured Jonathan Haidt on the
psychology of self-righteousness.*

Our dear Wellfriend Angie Coiro wrote, and I quote with her permission: "We
can't bridge the divide. That ship has sailed. We can't expect people to be
other than what they are. The way the 'other side' sees the world has
almost nothing in common with 'this side'...Ain't gonna happen."

So I wrote this big ol' response about different people and people in my
family and some friends being conservatives. I wrote about what I'd learned
since leaving the liberal Portland bubble, living on the road a while, then
settling into purple territory with deep red roots.

I wrote about my dad, a deep red Republican his entire life, who was
nevertheless a very smart, thoughtful, and compassionate man, a Stanford
graduate who read The Economist every week and had a Ronald Reagan Ranch
calendar over his desk. My dad's one of the most interesting and
open-minded thinkers I've ever known... and a Republican.

Unfortunately, my rural Internet connection died before I could finish the
post. I gave up in a huff.

By the time I came back to try again, I had a much shorter and more potent
response to make. It was this:

- - - - - - - - -
 
Topic 3509 [news]:  News of the World, Mars, and Beyond

Response #652 of 1892: "three vise men or a wirgin" (magdalen) 
 
 > that ship has sailed. 
 
 
 no, it hasn't. 
 
 my father is visiting. he just told me he's registered with the Democratic
 Party! people change, my friends, they do!

- - - - - - - - -


* Haidt is the guy currently super popular for his book The Anxious
Generation. The On Being episode mentioned above can be found at
https://onbeing.org/programs/jonathan-haidt-the-psychology-of-self-righteousne
ss-oct2017
or on your podcast platform.
 
  

    
Now that it's the big day: coping mechanisms? I'm afraid I'll be
compulsively watching YouTube videos all day* (except for driving my
ballot downtown), and you bet I'm completely ready to forgive myself
whatever I need to do to get through. 

What all are you doing as the time creeps by?

*court proceedings, sovereign citizens interacting with normal
people, and - so shoot me - cat videos. Now you know.

mag slipped in with my very own words! 
  

    
And while I appreciate your abbreviated response, magdalen, I do
wish I'd seen the original.
  

    
I'm shying away from single/simple explanations of MAGA. It seems
driven by diverse motives and beliefs that aren't consistent across
the nation. A lot have bought the Fox fantasies that feed fear and
discontent, others may network with Q Anons, and there may be those
who honestly believe that MAGA victory will be good for the economy
or for their particular concerns. 

What's weird to me is that they are so accepting of Trump's
apocalyptic vision of America, that they reject the hopeful vision
Democrats offer in favor of grievance and fear.

I've been thinking Harris is well positioned to win, but I remind
myself how I was feeling after the 2016 Democratic convention, which
was such a wonderful and positive event - and seeing the darkness
around the Republican convention... how could Hillary lose? But she
lost, because Trump managed to take the electoral collage. I'm sure
that can happen again. So I'm not making assumptions, I just think
we'll know when we know, and then we'll have to deal with it.
  

    <scribbled by lperson Wed 6 Nov 24 10:18>
  

    
My coping mechanism is distraction. Were on our eighth errand of the
morning. This is not like me.
  

    
>coping mechanisms?

Total immersion here. MSNBC on as background video (I have music on
audio), reloading new tweets, monitoring socmed generally.
Dispensing doses of hopium PRN.

>I'm sure that can happen again.

I'm not. It's a nonzero probability, sure, but it's incalculably
remote. This is not 2016, and rehearsing the PTSD from that debacle
is not the same as resolving it. The myriad reasons Clinton lost do
not need to be relitigated now, but it is worth remembering that
there *was* a myriad of defects in strategy, tactics and execution,
while the Harris surprise launch and dash to the finish has been
utterly flawless from wire to wire. Every prominent observer
attempting to second guess this campaign has pie on their faces
today.
  

    
My simplified read regarding MAGA is that they're willing to accept
an alternate reality, either by fully accepting that Trumpist lies
are true or by believing that Trump doesn't really intend to do the
things he says he'll do. Some people whose beliefs are in the second
category are reachable.
  

    <scribbled by lperson Wed 6 Nov 24 10:18>
  

    
Jeezus.

"National Guard units in several states and local law enforcement
agencies are on alert or standby this week as authorities prepare
for any violence by extremist groups upset about the election
results. ...

Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes told a judge last week that
he regularly wears a bulletproof vest because of threats from
critics who accused him of not running a fair election system, the
Arizona Daily Star reported. ... 

In New Mexico's Sandoval County, just north of Albuquerque, SWAT
team units have been placed on call. Last year, Solomon Peña, an
unsuccessful New Mexico Republican candidate for the state House,
was facing federal charges for allegedly shooting at Democratic
officials' homes. ..."

Lots more at
<https://www.axios.com/2024/11/04/police-national-guard-prep-election-violence>.

I really feel for the poll workers today. Bless them, this is no
normal time.
  

    
I'm listening the Resistance Revival Chorus with Rhiannon Giddens:

"All You Fascists Bound to Lose" -- written by Woody Guthrie.

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWUa7aAIfLE>
  

    <scribbled by coiro Tue 5 Nov 24 11:53>
  

    
Oh, bless you, Susan.

In the interest of keeping spirits high: Dee Snider just posted a
pic of an elderly man outdoors, wearing a "2nd Infantry Korea" cap.
His tweet: 

"Today, this 94 year old Korean War veteran (and lifelong
Republican) hobbled into the voting booth, crossed party lines and
voted for democracy. The very same democracy he fought for 75 years
ago. Thank you, Dad! You’ve always been my hero!"
  

    
Damn, I have something in my eye.
  

    
Gotta love Dee Snider!

I interviewed him for RECORD magazine in the fall of 1984, when Twisted
Sister was touring their hit "We're Not Gonna Take It." He was absolutely
giddy because he had recently met his hero, Alce Cooper.

He's been standing up for democracy a lot in recent years.