Beggars can't be choosers
The title of this post is probably the best summary of my thoughts on the results of the 2018 Midterm Elections. Going into the election, I felt like a beggar, begging the country to not lose what could have been the last actual elections we had. Had Democrats not won control of the House, it would have meant that in the future the elections could be in name only, much like they were in the Soviet Union.
The Democrats did gain control of the House. Hooray! This is an unequivocal win, and it gives at least some hope for the future.
Unfortunately, it's not all good news, and I don't mean just Dems losing control of even more Senate seats (the election map there was always heavily weighed against them).
Starting at 10pm, I kept telling myself that I was going to sleep as soon as I checked the results on House-Senate-Governors-MA, and, after reloading each of those 4 tabs, and looking at individual results there and clicking to see how many precincts reported where, I would repeat the whole thing again. I finally convinced myself that it was time to sleep after 3am, only to wake up at 6 and do more checking, as if the results wouldn't show up if they weren't being watched.
The worst news of the night for me was the governor races in Georgia and Florida, ranked in that order. Brian Kemp against Stacey Abrams winning isn't just a win for Republicans in Georgia, -- it's a win for the idea that any kind of shameless absolutely clear-cut voter suppression, lies, anti-constitutional action and downright crime is par for the course, and the Evangelicals (because it's them who handed him this win) and other ultra-right will not care about any of that and will vote for the candidate. We knew that the racists would vote for Kemp, but to see the Evangelicals being ever so "evangelical" in their "I don't care for biblical values, so long as my hatred can win" is quite disappointing. And the same happened in Florida, with the retirees and white trash winning the race for DeSantis. In a way, it sends a message to other republicans that they just weren't downright despicable enough. Oh, sure, they blew dog whistles and focused on fear-mongering and lies. But did were they openly and shamelessly racist? No? Well, there you go, that's why they didn't win.
By the way, thank you baby boomers -- the generation who've statistically led the most peaceful, most economically golden lives in this country. They were handed a country, of which they took their fill, and now they are hell-bent on leaving literally less than nothing for the future generations in the economy, environment and social issues, all the while feeling arrogant and smug and angry about "those millenials." I speak from personal knowledge here, seeing how I interact with many such people daily. They don't give a fig about the environment -- about the planet they are leaving to their children and grandchildren. Even the smartest of them will bury their heads in the sand gladly and cheerfully, believing any kind of tripe so as not to hear the extent of their political crimes, as long as there will be even a tiny upside to them in terms of reduced taxes, even when that upside will have a minimal overall effect on their remaining lives.
So I'm glad and I'm sad. And ready to work harder and do even more. And also just sleep deprived.
This entry was originally posted at https://angerona.dreamwidth.org/1583877.html (
comments).
Please comment there using OpenID.
The Democrats did gain control of the House. Hooray! This is an unequivocal win, and it gives at least some hope for the future.
Unfortunately, it's not all good news, and I don't mean just Dems losing control of even more Senate seats (the election map there was always heavily weighed against them).
Starting at 10pm, I kept telling myself that I was going to sleep as soon as I checked the results on House-Senate-Governors-MA, and, after reloading each of those 4 tabs, and looking at individual results there and clicking to see how many precincts reported where, I would repeat the whole thing again. I finally convinced myself that it was time to sleep after 3am, only to wake up at 6 and do more checking, as if the results wouldn't show up if they weren't being watched.
The worst news of the night for me was the governor races in Georgia and Florida, ranked in that order. Brian Kemp against Stacey Abrams winning isn't just a win for Republicans in Georgia, -- it's a win for the idea that any kind of shameless absolutely clear-cut voter suppression, lies, anti-constitutional action and downright crime is par for the course, and the Evangelicals (because it's them who handed him this win) and other ultra-right will not care about any of that and will vote for the candidate. We knew that the racists would vote for Kemp, but to see the Evangelicals being ever so "evangelical" in their "I don't care for biblical values, so long as my hatred can win" is quite disappointing. And the same happened in Florida, with the retirees and white trash winning the race for DeSantis. In a way, it sends a message to other republicans that they just weren't downright despicable enough. Oh, sure, they blew dog whistles and focused on fear-mongering and lies. But did were they openly and shamelessly racist? No? Well, there you go, that's why they didn't win.
By the way, thank you baby boomers -- the generation who've statistically led the most peaceful, most economically golden lives in this country. They were handed a country, of which they took their fill, and now they are hell-bent on leaving literally less than nothing for the future generations in the economy, environment and social issues, all the while feeling arrogant and smug and angry about "those millenials." I speak from personal knowledge here, seeing how I interact with many such people daily. They don't give a fig about the environment -- about the planet they are leaving to their children and grandchildren. Even the smartest of them will bury their heads in the sand gladly and cheerfully, believing any kind of tripe so as not to hear the extent of their political crimes, as long as there will be even a tiny upside to them in terms of reduced taxes, even when that upside will have a minimal overall effect on their remaining lives.
So I'm glad and I'm sad. And ready to work harder and do even more. And also just sleep deprived.
This entry was originally posted at https://angerona.dreamwidth.org/1583877.html (
comments).
Please comment there using OpenID.