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What Are We Gonna Do Now To Save Our Democracy?

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AMERICA THE BEAUTIFUL by Ray Charles From THE DICK CAVETT SHOW. September 18, 1972.
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What Are We Gonna Do Now To Save Our Democracy?

by John Kendall Hawkins

"Are you done with that dumpling?"

- Words Trump is said to have whispered in Obama's ear about Angela Merkel, during the presidential transition period of 2016

Now that polls have closed and the votes have been counted and the only thing left to do is wait for Donald J. Trump to concede defeat, and maybe work out a deal to resign ASAP in exchange for Mike Pence's pardon -- just to get rid of him. (F*ck off, DJ, the MSM talking heads are taunting.) Of course, the pardon would only cover his federal crimes, not the sh*t New York wants to hang on him (ouch). The good news is that with a pardon for felonious excesses he will be able to vote in future presidential elections, because he's not Black or a felon (and if he moves back to wall-driven Mara-a-lago, it won't matter if he's a felon anyway, because the ban doesn't include Whites, it seems: see 2000: Charles Colson, Nixon's "hatchet man.").

However, some people believe Trump may do a runner, seek refuge in a country without an extradition treaty with the US. Scotland's out: They almost had an angus burger last time he was there. Maybe Turkey, Erdogan'd be willing; DJ could find a nice studio apartment, with views, near the Istanbul Red Light district and continue his pre-presidential pursuits. Or maybe he could slip into Papua New Guinea, start a cargo cult, blow a dogma whistle. There's a South Pacific island what loves American militarism there and Spam has been a staple, ever since. And Trumpism is a kind of Spam. He could go as John Frum and be immediately worshipped as a crazy God.

Meanwhile, there are practical, sane things we can do in America to save the Republic, before it degenerates into chaos and a previously unfelt ineffectuality brought on by a serious loss of face on the global stage. On that note, the ex-Singaporean ambassador to the UN recently put out a compelling scenario -- Has China Won? The Chinese Challenge to American Primacy -- that sees China taking advantage of the "chaos" in America, brought on by the Trump era, to seriously undermine the dollar as the global exchange currency. This would do some real damage to the American economy and right-cross the glass-steagall jaw of the middle class, already reeling.

Here. presented in the order that it occurs to me now, and for whatever it's worth, is my List of Tweaks for our Democracy:

ELECTIONS

-- They need to be fixed. All recent post-election MSM attention has been paid to Trump's silly charges of Voter Fraud, which distracted us, like a card sharp trick, from the somber reality that had it not been for Corona forcing more white voters to mail in their ballots, little attention would have been paid to mail-in voters. There has never been more scrutiny put on such ballots. Earlier in the year, investigative journalist Greg Palast warned in his book, How Trump Stole the 2020 Election, that in 2016 Trump stole it by having his Repugnican collaborators in swing states toss away millions of valid votes for specious reasons. Palast expected the same this year, and no doubt, though not credited, because not mainstream, sharp scrutiny was put on such votes. Note that in the four states where recounts were done, it was the tallying of African-American voters that made the counting process so long this time around. For instance, the last counties to be counted in Pennsylvania included Philadelphia and Allegheny (Pittsburgh), mostly Democrat, mostly Black, where Trump's 500,000 vote lead with 90% counted disappeared up in smoke as Blacks were counted. After the election, Palast was giving away his book for free, as well as a humorous but accurate Ted Rall comic book -- call it Black voter disenfranchisement for white dummies -- and the reader is well-advised to procure these downloads at Palast's site to be up to snuff when it happens again.

-- As Palast has noted, not only African-Americans, Hispanics, and university-aged voters need protection from disenfranchisement, but Indigenous voters, too. They are, according to Greg Palast, "1200% more likely" to have their votes not counted than whites. In 2004, had Indigenous votes been counted, John Kerry would have won the presidency. This year, Indigenous voters were responsible for making sure Biden won in Arizona.

-- Gerrymandering needs to be eliminated or regulated by the Election Commission.

-- Post-election reports continue to tell us, albeit with little fanfare by the MSM, that our electronic voting issues are not solved, and potential wide-spread abuse is rife. Touch Screen machines that change votes were especially prone to failure or manipulation.

PARTIES

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John Kendall Hawkins is an American ex-pat freelance journalist and poet currently residing in Oceania.

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