Lots can be interpreted from that. Like, Thanks much. We're knee deep in stuff now. Or, we still don't know everything, but thanks for letting us find out.
Above all, it means that nothing is final yet. What has to be accomplished is still very much out there. The final result is months away.
That can be said for causes for which liberalism have been known for some time: The work continues. Joe Biden's election sure didn't conclude them. And knowing which side's positions have won is undetermined. Maybe one side has edged ahead, but it's too soon to tell. In the meantime, one poll says that 73 percent of Republicans still think (and probably will always think) that the Biden's election was fraudulent.
Up against that Big Lie, many others have been added. But it hasn't stopped the advance of liberalism, and won't.
I'm sure you've seen yard signs put out by liberals and progressives, declaring that "In this house:"
- Love Wins
- Black Lives Matter
- Women's Rights Are Human Rights
- Diversity Is Respected
- Immigrants Are Welcome
Things like that. Things that should be recognized by everybody, but clearly aren't. Had these not been issues, the attack of January 6 would not have happened. Irrational fear would not have won out. But then, the last president wouldn't have been elected, and even if he had, we wouldn't have had to wait several days to know for sure that he had lost his re-election try.
I think other yard signs should say things like:
In This World:
- Gay People Don't Spread It
- Don't Worry: It Doesn't Rub Off
- What Makes You So Special?
- What Are You So Scared Of?
- Blue Lives Don't Matter: 1/6 Proved It
- 500,000 Reasons to Wear Masks
- Without Guns, We're All Free
- Respect Works For All of Us
- Your Religion Belongs Only to You
- The Christian Right Is Neither (I've actually seen this one)
That would take a bigger sign. Maybe even a bigger yard. But it might spark a franker and more revealing conversation that would get people thinking a little more deeply. We need that now more than ever.
People want to stop thinking about serious issues. They want to stop being serious, period, or return to some thoroughly imagined time in which nobody needed to be serious. If you take any part of any speech that the previous president made since his declaration of candidacy in 2015, it has one thread, one theme: Nothing is that serious. It's all kind of a joke, in fact. So leave it all to me--I'll handle it. "Only I can fix."
Without serious thought in a democracy, though, without serious conversation, you waste your advantage as a citizen every bit as much as you would by not voting or voting for the wrong reason. It might not seem that important, since there are so many of us, but all those thoughts equal public opinion, which is horribly split and so many have sadly based their thinking on misinformation, deception, and lies.
Worse: The truth has caught up with The Big Lie, and the latter hasn't been eradicated yet. If that day is coming, it's still a long way off. So it still stands repeating;
- The election was not fraudulent.
- The counting in every state was thorough.
- Nobody sneaked extra votes ashore.
- The number of votes in question were never enough to change the results in any state.
- Representatives of both major political parties watched the counting take place exactly so no claims of fraud could be made.
- The tabulations were verified by members of both parties within their states.
- Some verifications were made by those who voted for the person who didn't win.
- It was safer, and fairer, than many other elections have been, if not all.
- Joe Biden won 81 million popular votes and 306 electoral votes, definitively and verifiably, to win the election. The previous president won 74 million popular votes and 232 electoral votes, definitively and verifiably. He lost.
Each one would make a decent yard sign. At least, they're decent talking points just in case you get caught in a discussion with someone who remains obsessed with The Big Lie. Yes, apparently, you have to remain informed about this to keep tamping down snarky non-facts. Too many of those who did not win won't accept it. They can't get past it.
Do not accept it from anyone. Do not turn and walk away, at least not until you've set the record straight. Jim Jordan of Ohio, one of the previous president's top lapdogs, again tried to foghorn the nonsense in a Congressional committee meeting yesterday, and Gerry Connolly of Virginia had to, once again, stand up to him and told him he wouldn't be lectured by someone claiming a fraudulent election that didn't happen.
So we all can and in fact must say, at least right now, the same thing Cyrus Vance, Jr. says, succinctly and honestly: The work continues. Remaining vigilant about the integrity of democracy is endless effort. The deceivers must be shouted down.
Be well. Be careful. Wear a mask. Six days to a second vaccine shot. With some luck, I'll see you down the road.
Mister Mark
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