Well, once again we had federal elections in America. And once again millions went out to vote, whether mail-in, early, drop box, or in person. America has one of the least secure and transparent election systems in the world, with voting rolls full of dead people, illegible people, and people who have moved away.
The result is the system is not about obtaining the will of the people or majority rule, but an exercise in futility. It is an effort to placate the general public into thinking we still have a fair and accurate election system.
The rulers of America know that Americans will generally support the government and not revolt as long as they believe in the system. Casting a ballot is a vote of affirmation in the system.
It is foolishness to believe that the election is safe and fair. Why would the government leave the choosing the candidates up to the people? Why would the people controlling the government actually let the people choose their representatives?
Of course, most federal government elected officials are mere pawns in the system as well. Very few have any ability to change anything substantial. They might occasionally huff and puff about some topic, but they just go along voting as directed by their party bosses, who are also just taking orders. AOC is a prime of example of this. She might claim to be a progressive Democrat, but she is supporting the imperial war machine without qualm. She is just doing what she is told.
Some might say, “what about Trump? He changed a lot of things. And he got in judges that are making a difference.”
Let’s look at the judges. Yes, these judges are working to slow and or roll back previous judicial overreach. The Federalist Society provided the judges to Trump. These same judges look like they might just be favoring big business as well. They essentially serve the oligarchs. Trump’s judges might throw the people a bone, but their main group to protect are the rich and powerful. And while overturning Roe was a good thing, it also sabotaged the recent elections. And maybe that was the intent.
Democrat judges are the same way. Even RBG was a pretty pro-big business judge. Breyer was all about supporting big business. Judges of both parties are allowing the FBI to get away with claiming “national security” for its interference with domestic and foreign politics and doing things like pushing the Russian collusion hoax.
I almost didn’t go vote Tuesday. My wife and two adult children did not care enough to vote. We live in a purple state, in county controlled by a corrupt Democratic machine. The local machine ensures that the Democrats will stay in power, so our votes really don’t count much here, even in local elections.
Of course, this is not new. Ballot box stuffing in various forms has occurred for most of the years of the Republic. Various political machines have controlled the voting results in major cities and have used this to control their states.
This is not just ancient history. In Nevada until recently, there was the Reid Machine, which effectively controlled the state through its ability to deliver and control votes. The casinos supported this as it kept the unions in line and Nevada kept the lowest gambling taxes in the country.
The issue is that most normies believed that their votes counted and, if there was cheating, it was minor. They believed that the overall result was fair and true.
We don’t know when elections went entirely off the rails, but it was sometime in the last 30 years. In 1992 B-1 Bob Dornan lost by a few hundred votes in Orange County, California in a race it was shown that there were at least 1k or so illegal votes. At least in California before that Democrats mostly stole seats by gerrymandering, like in 1980 when 6 Republican House seats became 1 with 5 Democrat seats. They did the same for the state legislature.
Democrats claimed that Bush stole the 2000 and 2004 elections. They made lots of noise about the evils of voting machines and the corruption of the vote counting systems. There were even Senate hearings on this just a few years ago, hosted by, among others, Kamala.
I don’t know if Bush/Cheney/Rove stole two elections. I do know that Bush had a highly organized campaign system in 2004 and used patriotism and wars and gay marriage to manipulate voters to vote for Republicans. I knew people who were at the very bottom of the 2004 system, block captains, who were given electronic devices to aid them in their efforts. If they were planning to steal 2004, then they would have done a Biden and just sit back and steal it. They would have been indifferent to campaigning.
Now, maybe there was something with Ohio that year, maybe not. Ohio was a purple state back then, as was Florida, but both started trending red and we see that both are red states today.
Roman elections during the Roman Republic were never quite as clean as ours and there were all sorts of ways elections were manipulated for the rulers. However, one of the reasons Rome descended into a hundred years of on again, off again civil war culminating with the end of the Republic, was that the system became totally broken and people lost faith in it.
Our rulers have to pretend enough, so that most at least run a campaign, even when they know they will win. They are putting on a show. The candidates themselves might not know the elections are rigged, but those that are behind do. Plus, elections are opportunities for grifters and con artists to get money selling a candidate. Or running a SuperPAC against the other side. If campaign consultants can get a big donor to spend a hundred million dollars supporting a bad candidate for governor, a lot of them money is going to the consultants. It is a multibillion-dollar operation and why would they admit the truth when there are billionaires to fleece.
Maybe it is even done without the knowledge of the idiots being selected.
Clean elections should be easy. We should have explicit voting rolls that show exactly who is an eligible voter. There should be no dead people, former residents, felons, illegals, or anyone else on that list. The only reason will do not clean voting rolls is because it benefits the Democrats.
We don’t have transparent and secure elections because the status quo benefits Democrats and a few corrupt Republicans that are in on it.
So what can we do? Even if we do not vote, we have effectively acquiesced to the corrupt system.
We could advocate for clean elections, but that likely will not happen. The powers that be will prevent any real changes.
We could just refuse to participate, but then someone may well vote in your name.
Maybe we just need to await for the collapse. It has seemed soon since 2006. At some point, the failures of the Deep State will be too much to hide and it will collapse on itself.
The GOPe is trying to blame everything on Trump. Of course, it is a lie designed to shape the anti-Trump narrative. The GOPe prefer to stay in the minority and lose gracefully and sabotage the populist efforts.
However, the blame is on both Trump and the GOPe. Both could have funded building clean elections efforts in all 50 states. They could have funded lawyers to sue to fix various problems, such as drop boxes, vote harvesting, and mail-in voting. They could have funded amendments and lobbyists to change the laws.
Trump has spent 2 years crying about stolen elections but done absolutely nothing besides moan to actually fix the problems. Likewise, the GOPe has done nothing to fight for clean elections. Since neither has done anything to clean up the problems, unlike DeSantis, neither wants clean elections. Trump is just spouting off empty rhetoric.
So just accept that our elections are symbolic and about as meaningful as in the old Soviet Union.
I largely agree but I can’t quite reach your level of cynicism, though it’s very understandable. I’ve come to believe that cynicism is poisonous to the soul and spirit and I have to actively fight it. It’s a constant battle these days. I’ve actually thought to myself that maybe I would feel better about life if I didn’t vote. Then I would have no right to complain and without a right to complain, I would not get so wrapped up in it, and ultimately not be so disappointed, ignorance being bliss and all. I used to be a huge Packer fan, but I became so cynical and jaded about the NFL I can’t even think about it anymore. I’m happier now that I don’t even know what’s going on. The problem with politics though, is that they are literally working on methods to enslave us. We need to actively fight every single battle as hard as we can. Even if it means voting and being disappointed in the process. I can say that here in north Idaho, the “true conservative” right has been fairly successful this cycle in local elections with a few exceptions. So that has been gratifying. Had it gone the other way, we might be moving out. I’m amazed at how relatively few people vote in off year elections. I read that US Congress Democrats won around 45 million total votes this year. But Biden won 80+ million? Doesn’t pass the smell test. Vote early and vote often! And with blissful joy and gratitude in your heart that you even get the chance to have it counted. Around the rest of the world, most people’s votes truly count for nothing.