Unfortunately, before we can get back to bats and artwork, we must deal with the misbegotten election of 2020, a dark tempest which has been blackening the national offing ever since it became evident that Republicans have no interest in laws, public well-being, or representative democracy but are instead trying to use underhanded means to ensure permanent authoritarian one-party rule in the United States of America.

For the election of 2016 I wrote a thoughtful and fair-spoken endorsement which stands the test of time…and yet is also clearly from the halcyon era before Trump pulled us all onto the road to hell which we are now walking together as a nation. You should go back and check it out! I used to write so prettily before it became evident that nobody cares about that sort of thing!

The outrageous acrimony of the 2020 election however calls for a different approach. When disputes devolve to pure emotional terms of screaming, fighting, and breathless accusations of lies & criminality, it becomes hard for conscientious arbiters to figure out who is lying. There is a story from the Bible about this(confused Evangelical Christians might recognize this unknown text as the mysterious black rectangular prop which their lord and savior, Donald Trump, was holding in his June 1st photo op).

“How does this thing go in the VCR?”

Solomon the Wise, the heir of King David of Israel, was renowned for his probity, honor, and good sense in adjudicating other people’s disputes (sadly his wisdom abandoned him in his own family affairs, which were a mess, but we can talk about that later if at all). Anyway, two women came to King Solomon with a seemingly insoluble dispute about an infant. Here is the relevant passage from the King James Bible (Kings, Chapter 3, Verses 16 to 28):

Then came there two women, that were harlots, unto the king, and stood before him.And the one woman said, O my lord, I and this woman dwell in one house; and I was delivered of a child with her in the house. And it came to pass the third day after that I was delivered, that this woman was delivered also: and we were together; there was no stranger with us in the house, save we two in the house. And this woman’s child died in the night; because she overlaid it. And she arose at midnight, and took my son from beside me, while thine handmaid slept, and laid it in her bosom, and laid her dead child in my bosom. And when I rose in the morning to give my child suck, behold, it was dead: but when I had considered it in the morning, behold, it was not my son, which I did bear. And the other woman said, Nay; but the living is my son, and the dead is thy son. And this said, No; but the dead is thy son, and the living is my son. Thus they spake before the king.

Then said the king, The one saith, This is my son that liveth, and thy son is the dead: and the other saith, Nay; but thy son is the dead, and my son is the living. And the king said, Bring me a sword. And they brought a sword before the king. And the king said, Divide the living child in two, and give half to the one, and half to the other.

Then spake the woman whose the living child was unto the king, for her bowels yearned upon her son, and she said, O my lord, give her the living child, and in no wise slay it. But the other said, Let it be neither mine nor thine, but divide it. Then the king answered and said, Give her the living child, and in no wise slay it: she is the mother thereof.

And all Israel heard of the judgment which the king had judged; and they feared the king: for they saw that the wisdom of God was in him, to do judgment.

The real mother was the woman who actually cared about the child and would rather see him given to a lying stranger than be destroyed. Again and again this year, similar choices have been put before America’s two different parties and their answers have revealed exactly which party is concerned with the national well-being and which party does not care if the nation is destroyed so long as they can cling to power and appoint incompetent judges (no matter how little of a national mandate they have).

The most telling of these incidents involved the second round of stimulus money, which is necessary to forestall a ruinous recession on Main Street. The Democratic House passed a generous second stimulus bill back at the end of spring. The Republican senate keeps tearing it to pieces and filling it with poisonous pills so that it cannot pass. Even if the stimulus money would help the entire nation (and help Donald Trump get re-elected) it is unacceptable to Mitch McConnell if it gives anything to needy Americans or gives the Democrats the appearance of a win. A truly cynical (but probably correct) interpretation is that McConnell has decided that Biden will win the election and he wants the nation to fail as precipitously and absolutely as possible during a Biden administration. (McConnell, one of American history’s greatest villains, is like the harlot who does not care if the child is killed…if that harlot were 300 million times more vindictive, spiteful, & murderous and somehow also looked like a melted turtle).

Other similar “Go ahead and cut him in half” moments include the Trumpist stance in the national argument over face masks & lockdowns, the acquittal of Donald Trump in the Senate despite overwhelming evidence of guilt, the grotesque mischaracterization of the Muller report, the abandonment of longstanding national allies, the jettisoning of the emoluments clause etc etc etc…

So, to be nakedly blunt about my political endorsements, every Republican other than Mitt Romney should be voted out of office as quickly as possible (if you are in Utah, Massachusetts, Michigan, or France…or wherever it is the plutocratic-yet-honest Romney calls home these days, you can judge him on his own merits). The GOP is now a party of Quislings, liars, extortionists, criminals, and outright white supremacists who are not worthy of holding public office. When Solomon said “cut the United States of America in half” Republicans happily got out their saws, scalpels, lasers, calipers, and scales to ensure that they have exactly enough of the corpse to claim complete control in accordance with the rigged anti-Democratic rules they have been foisting upon us. The health of the child in this endeavor has never entered GOP calculations at all.

I have traditionally been in sympathy with Republican’s stated platform of strong national defense and sufficient R&D to keep the nation competitive in the future (and you know…solve problems and make life better). Their actions have revealed that their true motivation is naked love of power and all other items are pretexts which will be swiftly abandoned in pursuit of their true goal.

Of course intelligent people will recognize there is a problem for all of us within the parameters of my metaphor. The Republicans do not care in any way about the nation but are happy to threaten our collective well-being in order to take what they and their billionaire masters want. Our current crisis arguably stems from past episodes where Democrats sighed heavily and let the Republicans walk away with the living child instead of cutting him in half (the controversial Bush/Gore election of 2000, the terms of the financial bailout of 2008, and the Obama administration’s capitulation to government shutdown theatrics all spring to mind). What if there were no Solomon? What if the loud and aggressive bad harlot had walked off with the baby because its true mother was afraid of hurting it by fighting? How can we save a hostage which the Republican party is perfectly happy to kill?

In days to come, we will find out if there is an answer. But fellow citizens, remember: you are not merely the threatened child in this scenario, you are Solomon too. The power to find a good solution belongs to you, dear voter…and nobody can take that decision from you. Well…they can’t take our capacity to make decisions about our lives unless we vote for Trump to become King of America (and, appallingly, that horrible scenario happens to be on the ballot tomorrow).

[P.S. Coincidentally, Joe Biden is a very decent person and a gifted leader who might actually have it in him to be a great president. However the shocking malfeasance of Republicans during the last four years has made writing about Biden unnecessary. Biden is a patriot and he is not a criminal. Sadly that is all we are required to know about him until Donald Trump is out of the White House]

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