The system is fundamentally damaged. We have a President who was elected by a minority of the electorate. We have a Senate, where a minority of the populace is represented by a majority of the Senators. Wyoming has as many Senators as California. South Dakota as many as New York.
The Senate Majority Leader ignores hundreds of Bills passed by the House of Representatives. Instead, he spends all the Senate’s time confirming judges to the Federal Court; judges selected by outside groups of un-elected people who provide a list of their preferred judges to the President’s people. A Senate who refused its constitutional duty to provide Advice and Consent to a President of the opposing party; refusing to allow his Supreme Court judge a hearing, fabricating an excuse that they now ignore when the President is of their party. A President impeached by the House of Representatives was tried in the Senate without witnesses or testimony and promptly acquitted by the members of his own party.
Unlimited money is spent by shadowy groups to misinform, malign and mislead the electorate to get their chosen politician elected. More effort is spent by State governments in trying to prevent people from voting than to ensure people can vote. As I write this, there are countless lawsuits being filed around the country trying to make it harder for people to vote:
- In Iowa, the Trump campaign and GOP groups filed an emergency petition to the state’s Supreme Court because absentee ballots were mailed to voters with their names and date of birth pre-filled for them. The court sided with the GOP and 70,000 ballots will have to mailed again; blank.
- In Alabama, the Secretary of State is appealing an appeals court ruling that allows voters to drop off their ballots curbside during a pandemic.
- In Pennsylvania and Wisconsin lawsuits are being filed and decisions appealed over due dates for absentee ballots.
- In Texas and Ohio, state lawmakers are trying to limit the number of drop boxes available for voters to drop their absentee ballots.
- In Louisiana, the Secretary of State has instructed that ballots can only be delivered to the registrar’s office, so the city of New Orleans is suing the state.
Speaking of litigating, this has become the chosen method for those seeking to change things they don’t like in society. Legislating is hard work, especially if what you’re trying to legislate is unpopular with a majority of the populace. So instead, shadow groups file lawsuits to test legislation they don’t care for, appeal their losses and try to get to the Supreme Court. There’s a reason the current GOP is so intent on filling judicial vacancies at a blistering pace. They know they can’t legislate their unpopular positions into public policy, so they’re punting to the courts and hoping their chosen judges will rule in their favor.
The wealthy under this system get sickeningly wealthier, and find unique and legally questionable ways to avoid paying income taxes. The IRS is perpetually understaffed, so rather than tackle the complex returns of the super rich, with their teams of accountants and attorneys, they audit the poor to see if they really earned that Earned Income Tax Credit they claimed. My mother was audited one year as a retired woman in her 70’s because she didn’t think she earned enough money on Social Security to have to file her taxes. The IRS came after her for $2500. That $2500 is significantly more income tax than the President of the United States paid over a couple of decades. A man who is an alleged billionaire.
I offer no solutions to this dysfunctional mess. No one is paying me for my opinion. There may not actually be any solution as it would require an overhaul of such epic proportions that the wealthy and powerful would take extraordinary measures to prevent it. The system has been tested over the last four years by a man unwilling to even pretend to play the game by the rules. His party has protected him so they could get the tax cuts and judicial appointments they wanted, and they have succeeded. The question that looms before us now, is if the powerful people who want this mangled version of a Republic to continue so they can continue to benefit will be able to overwhelm the desires of the majority of the electorate who wants it stopped. We’ll find out in 19 days.
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