The Witness Chronicles, 11/4/24

Thoughts on the future

Photo by Kiana Bosman on Unsplash

Final Thoughts on This Bonkers Year

Less than 24 hours left as I write this

I’ve written 300+ near daily posts in the past year here, with most about the election, and now it is upon us and that’s a strange feeling. Will I miss it? No, because one side has descended into the lowest places I’ve ever seen a campaign go.

And with just a short time left, Trump and his followers are doubling down, threatening to shoot journalists in what they always claim is a joke when called out on it. These things are not a joke. There have been multiple stories of Trump supporters attacking poll workers who ask them to remove campaign messages from their clothing and hats before they can enter the polling.

Politicking within 100’ of a polling place is a federal crime.

That’s certainly not the worst of it and we will see this continue after the election, especially if Harris pulls out a win, which I think she will. But I have to believe that because the alternative is so unthinkable.

Trump has been campaigning nonstop for over nine years and it is hard to imagine turning on the news and not seeing his face sporting his trademark orange pancake makeup and either an angry snarl or a silly grin. I wonder how he will fare if he loses and he no longer has incessant rallies to boost his narcissistic need for adoring attention?

No doubt he’ll just keep going with his stolen election claims, but I also wonder how long the American public will put up with it. Nine years of this has been a long haul for all of us and a world without this man would feel like a new beginning.

Which is exactly what Kamala Harris offers despite being attached to the Biden administration and claims that she has done nothing. Vice Presidents are basically paid to do nothing; they are the backup. I do not see her simply continuing the Biden agenda now that she is in the limelight and able to make her own choices.

Kamala appeared in the opener on Saturday Night Live and genuinely looked like she was having a ball tossing jokes back and forth. After an inquiry from the FCC regarding equal time, NBC gave Trump 90 seconds during a NASCAR race this weekend. Fair enough.

I know I should be commiserating about the inevitable claims of victory by Trump and the following chorus of lawsuits if he doesn’t, but I think everything has been done that can be done to ward that off. Election systems and processes all over the country have been hardened and this time Trump no longer has a compliant DOJ to look the other way.

Personally, I’ll still be writing The Witness Chronicles, but look towards expanding my subject matter to other issues like climate change which is here and far worse than even doom and gloom scientists had predicted. The weather events being experienced all over the country are so widespread that there are few of us not hit by them or knowing people going through them.

It’s a remarkable expansion of climate’s effects into far larger regions of the country, not just Florida or California’s problem. My prediction is that this will be the biggest issue in elections to come for the rest of our lives, but I’ve been wrong about that for years.

One of the sadder stories this year has been the decline of Joe Biden after a remarkable presidency. That decline overshadows the incredible laws he shepherded through a divided congress that brought us widespread infrastructure reform, revitalization of manufacturing and our semiconductor industry, and increased energy independence. The effects will be felt, in a positive way, for many years to come.

History has a way of being kind to ex-Presidents who went out on a low point not of their own making. The sweeping changes the Biden legislation passed are things that take time to show results but in them he did one remarkable thing that could cement his positive memory. He did not limit the largesse to states that supported him. He spread it around to places that desperately needed it, a game changing approach to national political power and a unifying act.

Unifying acts are what we need these days after being told ad infinitum how awful our opponents and their followers are. Unity has been at the core of Kamala’s closing campaign message just as division has been Donald Trump’s. I think we are all ready to move past the drama.

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