Vote like your life depends on it
The November 3 US election, and preelection registration deadlines in the various states are fast approaching. It is critical that Americans living abroad register now (or confirm your status if you believe you are already registered).
That might be a big ask, given all that’s going on. I fully understand if you are disillusioned. I sympathise with any urge simply to ignore the election and tell people you’re Canadian.
The current American president defends the Confederacy and overtly aligns himself with white supremacists.
He orders the deployment of heavily-armed, ‘‘anonymous’’ federal agents and condones the use of chemical agents against peaceful American protesters.
He undermines our closest alliances impulsively as though taking directions from a foreign adversary vested in Western collapse.
He tanks the economy with ill-conceived trade wars and skyrocketing deficits while using his official position and some of our ambassadors to generate profits for his own businesses.
And he gets away with it all because he relentlessly undermines the rule of law, including by appointing the equivalent of mob capi to head bedrock institutions such as the Departments of Justice and State to loyally shield him, their don, from accountability.
And on top of it all is the deadly incompetence. Well before election day, the administration’s incompetent response to Covid will have killed more Americans than did the Nazis in World War II.
But there is cause for optimism. The president has torn the facade off the party he burrowed into.
America is finally having an authentic conversation about race because white nationalists no longer discreetly dog-whistle; they are emboldened to march publicly with their hateful iconography and thus can no longer be euphemised.
Similarly, we are beginning to wrestle more honestly with the perils of incipient theocracy as we witness the rush of self-appointed moral enforcers, who have distorted American politics for decades, to embrace arguably the most debauched, venal president in the history of the republic in exchange for power and profit.
Finally, it is important to remember that the current president lost the 2016 election by millions of votes, actually finishing fourth behind Didn’t Vote, Hillary Clinton, and Weren’t Eligible to Vote.
He was installed in the Oval Office by the Electoral College, an institution forced into the constitution by our slave states as a hedge against abolition of human bondage by a future president elected from the more populous northern states.
The president’s Electoral College triumph was the result of razor-thin margins of victory in the popular vote in just three states.
The Electoral College remains a powerful mechanism for perpetuating homogeneous, minority rule, which is in part why the current president and his party continue to wage aggressive campaigns to suppress the vote.
If you don’t exercise your franchise, you endorse all that.
Whatever your view of the current situation in Washington, whatever your view of America’s best future, your vote is precious and powerful.
Don’t squander that power now. And don’t let anyone steal it from you. Stand tall and be heard. Lives depend on it.
You can easily walk through the registration and voting process at votefromabroad.org or similar non-government website.
Well before election day, the administration’s incompetent response to Covid will have killed more Americans than did the Nazis.