How America Broke The Vote

Reflecting on Remembrance Day about the massive national effort expended by Canada in two World Wars, it's hard to see the nation ever repeating its selfless performance. The Canadians military seems more dedicated to following the prime minister’s diversity policies than continuing the meritocratic body it was in the two great conflicts.

Face it, Canada couldn't defend the back shed anymore. What defence Canada has is provided by the Americans who are vilified as yokels and fools by this nation's bien pensants. 

But if there is one thing we can defend it is our democracy. With simple pencil and paper, Canada is continuing the noblest traditions of citizenry at election time. Without resort to technology or intellectual frippery, Canada has a national election in six weeks. Election night is over by midnight. Citizens are assured the results are accurate.

All of this simplicity seems to have escaped Americans. They designed a state-by-state system that assured only one outcome: a bitter distrust of the result. If the hope for the election was an outcome that the warring realities could accept then it was a costly blunder (the presidential and congressional campaigns are estimated to  hit nearly $14 billion).

Some big states like Texas, Florida and Ohio wound up the presidential and House results to everyone's satisfaction by midnight on Nov. 3 . Others, as we well know, are still engaged in a process that, like Lent, will continue for six weeks. 

Some states counted the votes promptly. Others appear to have taken hours- and days-long siestas during the counting to gather themselves. Then dropped large tranches of votes in the dead of night that reversed everything seen previously in the counts.

Some allowed full transparency. Others put up cardboard dividers to keep prying eyes from seeing what was happening at 3 A.M.

Some states used the COVID-19 scare to authorize ballot harvesting (unauthorized partisans collecting votes at source and then transporting them to the polling place. Chain of custody anyone?) Others protected the sanctity of the ballot.

Some permitted massive early voting as much as a month in advance and untested mail balloting systems. Others stuck to their knitting from previous elections.

Some states changed their policies in the six months before the election, using judges to overrule the constitutionally appointed legislatures on extending election day by three, six even 15 days. (The founders of the U.S. created one election day so no one could game the system seeing how many votes they needed in later-reporting states. The new March Madness model that extends for weeks belies that goal.)

And so on. I mean, has no one heard of a pencil and paper? Trump, who boosted his 2016 numbers by almost over 10 million votes, saw the Democrats pull a similar boost for the cadaverous Joe Biden (whose enthusiasm numbers were nil) in a select few key urban areas, dramatically flipping state races in the night with bags of votes allegedly from parts unknown. 

Thus Americans were left shaking their heads. How could this happen? According to NBC News, before polls opened in Michigan, Republicans led 41% to 39% in Mail-in Ballots requested. Republicans also led 42% to 39% with Mail-in and in-person ballots returned. But Biden was somehow 38% up on mail-in votes cast. 

Ditto Wisconsin. Before the polls opened, Republicans led Mail-in Ballots requested 43% to 35%, and Mail-in and early in-person ballots returned 43% to 35%. Almost all of the Mail-in ballots found after officials stated they would stop counting were for Joe Biden. 

Biden underperformed across many major cities compared to Hillary Clinton in 2016. In NYC, Chicago, and Miami, he was down 201,408, 260,835, and 6,945 respectively. In states Biden needed, however, the charisma-challenged Democrat gained massively in the major urban areas. In Atlanta, Milwaukee, Detroit and Pittsburgh Biden was up 76,518, 67,630, 28,429, and 29,150 respectively.

While Trump’s vote total tracked closely to down-ballot votes for senator etc., Biden got huge numbers of ballots where there was no selection for any other position but president. In Georgia: Trump-only ballots: 818; Biden-only ballots 95,801. This statistical anomaly repeated in many of the “swing states” 

What do these examples prove? Only that when you have 50 states with conflicting voting protocols mated with pollsters who were either incompetent or pulling for Biden added to the Electoral College— you’ve created your own monster. Both candidates can now make a credible argument for having won the election— or for how he’ll motivate his crestfallen followers after inauguration.

Biden is making haste to certify his apparent win before more malfeasance is brought forward. Trump is scrambling to assemble evidence of fraud that might impress the SCOTUS associate justices. No one will be happy. The only agreement is that someone will be inaugurated on January 20.

Risibly, Biden has started making noises about healing. At the same time his lieutenants are creating something called the Trump Accountability Project. If you want to know what that means, look up pictures from the Chinese Great Leap Forward in the 1960s. This vendetta is also counter to any notion that Trump and his 71 million supporters will just shrug their shoulders and take one for Old Glory. 

In fact they’re planning a massive rally in Washington on the weekend to say “Here’s what you can do with your healing, Joe”.

So let’s celebrate Canada on this front. Get all our smug anti-Americans in the media to raise a glass of Screech to the value of simplicity. Send the U.S. a crate of golf pencils with no erasers. And thank them for making sure we don’t get vaporized in an atomic attack.

Bruce Dowbiggin @dowbboy is the editor of Not The Public Broadcaster (http://www.notthepublicbroadcaster.com). The best-selling author of Cap In Hand is also a regular contributor to Sirius XM Canada Talks Ch. 167. A two-time winner of the Gemini Award as Canada's top television sports broadcaster, his next book Personal Account with Tony Comper is now available on http://brucedowbigginbooks.ca/book-personalaccount.aspx