Lincoln Mitchell

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This page contains links to recent blogs by Lincoln Mitchell

Posted in: US Politics

The Landslide Fantasy

While nothing would please me more than to see Donald Trump and his Republican enablers drubbed at the polls in the coming weeks, there are several reasons why this should not be at the center of the post-election strategy. First, the likelihood of a landslide happening is extremely small. Moreover, while a landslide victory for Biden is a good, if ambitious, goal, making that the lynchpin for ensuring Trump leaves office sets the bar way too high. Lastly, this approach is disempowering because it implies that absent a landslide defeat, Trump will be able to remain in office.

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The US Needs a National Election Law and Commission

As the US careens towards an election that is already ripe with confusion, misinformation, voter suppression and lack of confidence-a situation that is likely to get much worse in the coming weeks-it is increasingly apparent that America’s electoral structures and rules are not working. The undemocratic nature of the electoral college and the US Senate have been well documented, but on a more granular level, American elections are inconsistently, and frequently, poorly, administered. This is in significant part due to efforts by those in power to limit access to the franchise, but it is also frequently the product of incompetence and antiquated rules and structures.

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Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s Death Makes the Election Even More Volatile

The Vichy-like capitulation that has defined the Republican Party since 2016 means that whomever Trump nominates will be confirmed by a close vote along party lines. There may be one or two Republicans who vote against the nominee, but McConnell needs fifty votes (in case of a tie the vice-president casts the deciding vote) and he will have them.

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Joe Biden’s Foreign Policy Paradox

The paradox facing Biden is that if he wins, he will preside over a country whose ability to lead internationally, and whose role in the world, has changed dramatically over the last four years. The combination of Trump’s foreign policy, the terrible damage Covid19 has done to the US, the weakening of American democracy over the last four years and the real possibility of instability here, even if Biden becomes president, means that the US will be in no position to simply reassume the mantle of global leadership. Additionally, the American people, worn out by all these problems, have become reluctant to become too involved with the rest of the world.

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Democracy, the Constitution and Rule of Law

impossible without rule of law, slavery, apartheid in the post-reconstruction south and even voter suppression today have all been legal in a technical sense. Unfortunately, while the law has helped strengthen democracy in the US, it has also been a handmaiden of efforts to limit democracy throughout American history. That is very possibly where we will again find ourselves in the days after the polls close in November when the future of American democracy could be determined in the courts, the legislatures, but also in the streets.

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This Election Is More Normal Than It Looks

The 2020 presidential election is, on the one hand, unlike any other in American history. No presidential election has ever been held in the midst of a pandemic that creates significant problems for voting because many people are reluctant to leave their homes or come in close contact with anybody else. The economic downturn, demonstrations associated with the reinvigorated Black Lives Matter movement and increased political violence, while not quite as unprecedented, have never all occurred at the same time during an election. More significantly, there has never been an election when the incumbent president has made it clear that he might not accept the outcome if he loses. Efforts by the American government to limit reporting about Russian and other foreign intervention also makes this election sui generis in American history.

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The Violence May Get Worse

Rittenhouse’s search for some twisted form of heroism and vigilante justice should never be legal or permissible in a free or democratic society. The Portland events are a little more complex. Counterdemonstrations, are, and should be, protected by the First Amendment, but when those actions are linked to provocations, they contribute to violence. Had the pro-Trump demonstrators been on foot, waved banners and chanted slogans, rather than threaten protestors and fire paintball guns into crowds of demonstrators, it is much less likely that anybody would have been shot and killed.

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A Democratic Breakthrough in America

The tension between the Constitution and principles of democracy have been around for a long time, but the same demographic and political trends that made the Trump presidency possible, have made this conflict more damaging than in recent years. Today, three of the four bodies that govern America are controlled by a party that has not won the plurality of votes in a national presidential election since 2004-and only twice since 1988. Donald Trump’s presidency, the Republican majority on the senate and the conservative majority on the Supreme Court are, therefore, not the products of majorities or truly democratic processes, but of a minority of voters who happen to live in the right states.

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Joe Biden Hits It Out of the Park with His VP Pick

Harris is an unusual politician in that she has the legal and political skills to humiliate people like Attorney General William Barr during a hearing regarding the Mueller Report, but also has an infectious laugh and upbeat disposition. In this way she is able to use her ample political talent, while also showering herself to be human and likable as well. That skill set will be very valuable both during the campaign and as part of the Biden administration if the ticket wins.

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The Republican Dilemma

The Republican Party is faced with a quandary about whether or not to rally around the president and become complicit in his most egregious efforts to undermine democracy. The argument for doing this is that Trump may just succeed and remain in office after January of 2021. If this happens, the Republicans will buy a few more years in power and a few more years of not being held accountable. However, by backing up the president now the Republicans would also put themselves at risk of, politically speaking, jumping on the Titanic just moments before it hits the iceberg.

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It Is Happening Here

Donald Trump’s decision to send storm-troopers into Portland is only surprising if you haven’t been paying attention. It is only a shock if you have willfully looked past the three and a half year long assault on American democracy that the Trump administration has been. And it is only a standalone act that will not be tolerated by our courts or federalist system if you have barricaded yourself into a Pollyannaish fantasy world. A more grounded view of what is occurring in Portland and elsewhere is that with the election three and a half months away Donald Trump has telegraphed that he will use violence, security services personally loyal to him and a very dubious grasp on the Constitutional limits on his office to do whatever is necessary to intimidate his opposition and remain in office.

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America’s Preexisting Conditions

The impact of the virus has been so devastating in the US in large part because of our own preexisting conditions, not as individuals, but as a society. The deep racism in America which means that so many aspects of life, from public security to housing to work is experienced differently depending on race, a healthcare system that leaves many with inadequate coverage, income inequality that forces many to work in unsafe jobs and in unsafe conditions and the lack of a social safety net all made the Covid-19 hit the US particularly hard.

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All The President’s Crimes

The notion that an American president would do nothing, and say nothing, if confronted with the knowledge that a foreign adversary was offering bounties to the Taliban for killing American troops is so outrageous that it is easy to dismiss as the rantings of a left-winger deluded by an irrational hatred for the president. However, these are not rumors from some obscure website but findings in reported in some of America’s most respected media outlets. When confronted with these reports, the White House has responded not with strong statements of support for our troops but by asserting that the President was not briefed about this. Sadly, given the limited mental capacity of the president, which lead to difficulties briefing him, this may in some sense be true.

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Defund the Police is a Great Slogan

“Defund the Police” is best understood as the beginning of a negotiation between the demonstrators and the government. You don’t begin a negotiation where you think it will end, but where you would like to see it go. That is what we are doing on the streets of hundreds of American cities and town. It may not end with police budgets zeroed out as some might like, but it is pretty clear that is also not going to end with a return to business, and policing, as usual. This three word slogan has drawn almost universal criticism while contributing to fast and real policy change. We need more terrible slogans like that.

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The Collapse of the Trump Regime

Widespread demonstrations are occurring in almost all major cities and even in the rural areas. In the biggest cities numerous demonstrations are being held often at the same time and sometimes seem to spontaneously emerge in different neighborhoods. Residents, small businesses and houses of worship offer encouragement and supplies to the demonstrators. Radical reform is already being implemented in some cities. The president has barricaded himself in his official residence and erected fences that have immediately been covered with opposition slogans. The security forces have given very strong indications that loyalty to the law and Constitution will ultimately override the president’s wishes. The economy is in terrible shape with millions out of work or out of school, and for good measure a deadly pandemic is still killing between 500-1200 people a day.

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This Time The Demonstrations Must Not Be Ignored

Some may look at the protests around the US and ask how did this happen, but the more astute among us should be wondering why it doesn't happen more frequently. The specific incident that precipitated these demonstrations was the murder of an African American man named George Floyd by a police officer named Derek Chauvin while other officers stood by and watched it happen. In my view Chauvin and every officer who were present but did nothing to prevent this murder should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Unfortunately, I am also aware that this kind of killing continues to occur all too frequently in America. It is heartbreakingly easy to add Floyd’s name to long list of African Americans killed by police. There is not enough room to say all of their names, but we all should know the names of Michael Brown, Eleanor Bumpurs, Philando Castile, Eric Garner, Oscar Grant, Breonna Taylor and many more.

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Deus Ex Machinas Will Still Not Rescue Us from Trump

Since Donald Trump was elected president in November of 2016, many of his critics and opponents have convinced themselves that the end of his presidency was just around the corner. This tendency began during his campaign when many believed that inevitably Trump’s bizarre statements, checkered personal history, overt racism, history of being a sexual predator, extreme lack of qualifications and insufficient intellectual capacity would stop him from getting nominated and then elected.

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If We Are All Warriors Now, Maybe We Should be Treated That Way

In Trump’s increasingly diseased mind, the American people should risk death not to defeat fascism, bring down totalitarian Communism, protect our country from Jihadist terrorism or to build a stronger, freer more democratic America. Rather, Trump is asking the American people to do this so he can get a few more shots of the political adrenaline, in the form of temporarily improved poll numbers or a few more retweets, that he so intensely craves.

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Ignoring Covid-19 Won’t Make It Go Away

This toxic stew of white supremacist protestors calling, often while heavenly armed, for the various states to lift social distancing related restrictions, presidential leadership that is essentially in denial about the pandemic, projections for total deaths that have doubled in the last week or so, and indications that the Coronavirus is now spreading to smaller towns and rural America will be devastating for America. Leaving aside the human co

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We Need to Rebuild Not Reopen the American Economy

The discussion about when to reopen the American economy is, pardon the direct language, prima facie stupid. The notion that the American economy can be reopened with things quickly returning to normal, whatever that is, reflects a uniquely American brand of magical thinking. The American economy cannot return to normal so long as a thousand or more Americans are dying from Covid19 every day, while millions of Americans are wisely fearful of leaving their homes any more than absolutely necessary, thousands of small businesses have closed their doors and millions of Americans are out of work. Pronouncements by deluded governors, rallies by loyal members of the Trump deathcult and incoherent press conferences by the President are not going to change that.

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