Schwab: You can see democracy’s foes from 220 miles above earth
Published 1:30 am Saturday, April 3, 2021
By Sid Schwab / Herald columnist
It goes without saying — which is why it needs saying — that without fair and unencumbered elections in all states, wherein the people’s votes actually matter and count roughly equally, democracy dies.
If we were watching from outer space, studying a country having two distinct, opposing parties, it shouldn’t be difficult, assuming it’s the case, to tell which of them believes in democracy and which doesn’t. Which one favors giving average citizens the ultimate voice, and which one does everything it can to create and maintain a self-serving plutocracy.
We find ourselves in the International Space Station, looking down 220 miles on exceptional America. And what do we see? Two parties, working hard for legislative action affecting elections and the safety and ease of voting, but with diametrically opposite intent. For fun, let’s not figure out the party names yet. (Incidentally, the science keeping us afloat and alive up here is the same as the kind telling us about covid-19, the vaccines and climate change. Which is why we’ll remain safe and breathing.)
Oh, look; way down there, in the House of Representatives, one party has already passed legislation aimed at reducing the influence of dark money, striving for uniformity among states for voting by mail, limits on unfair gerrymandering, numbers of voting locations and drop-boxes per population, ethics reform, and more; including requiring presidential candidates to release their tax returns.
Even up here, you can see the other one is trying to make voting by mail harder if not impossible, to limit or eliminate drop-boxes, and, despite how well mail-voting works in several states without it, including ours, to require ID. While making access as difficult as possible for minority voters. Which one, shall we conclude, believes in the indispensability of voting rights in a democracy and which one doesn’t? (No peeking!)
As to the act of voting, per se, all we need to know is that, in a state it just lost for the first time in nearly forever, one party made it a crime to provide food and water to people waiting for hours to vote, in lines possibly visible from up here. This tells us that forcing selected portions of the population to wait like that is deliberate.
It also reveals that their rationale — that it’s to prevent people who provide food and water from politicking the standees — shows who they really are. Specifically, they’re certain no one in their party would even think of providing comfort to hot, tired, hungry voters. And that they choose not to consider ways it could be done without giving political advantage to the providers. We can think of several. It’s not hard.
By simple observation, then, we know one party favors equal access to voting by all eligible citizens, and one clearly doesn’t. (No fair reading ahead!) To the former, eligibility includes law-breakers who’ve fulfilled their debt to society. Ironically, it’s the party that insists we’re a Christian nation and, therefore, ought to believe in redemption, that demagogues the very idea.
As to the aforementioned dark money, a conference call about it between mega-donors and an adviser to Sen. Mitch McConnell can be heard from the ISS (we have the technology). According to The New Yorker’s Jane Mayer, one party is very, very worried. They call it a power grab by the other party, but their problem, in fact, is with its bipartisan appeal.
“The speakers on the call expressed alarm at the broad popularity of the bill’s provision … about secret political donors. The participants conceded that the bill … was so popular that it wasn’t worth trying to mount a public-advocacy campaign to shift opinion. Instead, a senior Koch operative said that opponents would be better off ignoring the will of American voters and trying to kill the bill in Congress. … because the broad public is against them when it comes to billionaires buying elections.” (New Yorker: tinyurl.com/listen2jane)
“Ignoring the will of American voters.” “… kill the bill in Congress.” “Billionaires buying elections.” Can it be any more obvious to whom congressional members of that party really listen, and why? Could it be any clearer in whose interests they’re acting? Can you barely wait to learn which is which? After finding out, will you care enough to vote for the democracy-saving one?
As with the choice between former Vice President Joe Biden and Trump, true conservatives must yet again decide between party and country; between preserving election fairness or letting their party destroy it. Back on Earth, we see it clearly: the party trying to protect democracy rather than end it has been the Democrats all along. Surprised?
Email Sid Schwab at columnsid@gmail.com.
