UPDATE: #RespectTheVote

Troll’s amorality make him very dangerous, but his laziness, lack of imagination, and overweening sense of entitlement put constraints on that threat. His bark is almost always worse than his bite. He is using his office to broadcast conspiracy theories and undermine faith in the election, but his power to tamper with the vote is very limited.

Troll is telling lots of lies about the dangers of “vote by mail” (which is the same as absentee balloting, despite Troll’s ridiculous assertions to the contrary), but there is no reason that such a system should be more vulnerable to fraud than any other. The only way significant fraud can be accomplished would be to: 1)steal or counterfeit ballots on a large scale (bottom-up fraud) which would be easily detected and interdicted; 2)slow or interrupt the delivery or collection of ballots (top-down fraud) which would require the complicity of the Post Office.

Top-down fraud is a real (the only real) danger, because the man at the top is a proven liar, cheat, and criminal who is clearly capable of doing anything, no matter how vile, in pursuit of power. The good news is that his power to cheat comes under powerful constraints. The conscientious professionalism of postal workers. The vigilance of Democratic lawmakers and governors. The patriotic integrity of (some) Republicans. The informed activism of we, the citizenry.

So what is the takeaway? We should be active and vigilant, but we should remain positive and avoid panic. We should write to (see below) and urge our elected officials to monitor preparations for the election and to countermessage aggressively against Troll’s campaign to undermine faith in the election. The latter is especially important. We need officials of all parties to repudiate Troll’s slanders against the electoral process.

In this regard I am going to stop using the “protect the vote” hashtag. Wandering around the web, I see that it is being deployed by Trollkins as much as by his opponents. This is a measure of just how cunning Troll can be when he applies himself. By threatening top-down fraud he gets his opponents to do his messaging for him: “the election is suspect.”

The election is NOT suspect. We have the power to defend its integrity, and therefore we can be confident, if and as we exert our ordinary powers as citizens, that the election will be free and fair. That should be the message moving forward: vigilance is warranted, but confidence is amply achievable. #RespectTheVote

I have sent a copy of the following message to my Congressional delegation (Cory Booker-D-NJ, Bob Menendez-D-NJ, Chris Smith-R-NJ), governor (Phil Murphy-D-NJ), and State Secretary of State (Tahesha Way). I give permission to anyone who desires to copy part or all of it for communications with your own representatives and government officers.

Dear ______,

        The integrity of our electoral process has never been so much in doubt. The President of the United States has repeatedly impugned the credibility of the upcoming election and made veiled threats suggesting he will delay or impede the process of voting. At a time when our nation is deeply polarized and beset by simultaneous economic and public health crises, a discredited or illegitimate election would fatally undermine the foundations of our democracy. We must secure the integrity of the upcoming election or risk the end of the American experiment.
       I seek immediate, open, broadly publicized, and credible assurances from you that stringent measures are in place to safeguard the voting process. All citizens must have equal and unimpeded access to the franchise, all votes must be faithfully received and accurately recorded, and the election must transpire in a timely fashion according to constitutional mandate.
       The eyes of the nation are upon you and the entire government in which you serve. If you fail in this duty millions will take note and take action. In the short term, any violation of the integrity of the election will incite massive civil dissent. In the longer term, we citizens will exact a steep political price from any officials, regardless of partisan affiliation, who fail us so egregiously.
         Please give me your reply, informing me of your plan of action and of any steps I as a citizen may take to assist you to this end. Thank you for your attention to this matter, I hope otherwise that this message finds you well.

                Yours sincerely,

                 Andrew Meyer

We Need an S.O.S. (Save Our Society) Presidential Campaign, NOW!

It has long been obvious that the United States would not survive a second Trump term, but in recent weeks it has become less and less clear that the U.S. will survive to the end of the first Trump term. The Covid-19 pandemic has confronted us with a situation in which presidential leadership is indispensable, at a moment when the nihilistic cynicism, corruption, and utter fecklessness of the current President makes presidential leadership virtually impossible. Turning the tide on the pandemic will require leadership that fosters mutual trust and cooperation, but Donald Trump is only able to helm a politics of hatred, suspicion, and communal division.

As long as the status quo persists, the pandemic will continue to spin out of control, deepening the economic crisis that comes with it. Successive rounds of government stimulus will be necessary to keep the nation minimally afloat. Eventually that well will run dry, and the economy will collapse in 1929-fashion. Since the Trump administration's fiscal profligacy had already put us into a dangerously leveraged position before the pandemic began, the chances that the government will be able to continue to maintain its good faith and credit during an uncontrolled public health disaster through next January are slim.

We have to find some way of pressuring Donald Trump into using the powers at his disposal to ameliorate the health crisis, to resign, or to at least give the reins over to someone capable of leading us out of the current impasse (a new #PandemicTsar). Trump only responds to threats to his own personal fortunes. There is thus really only one individual in the country who has leverage that can move our catastrophically destructive president to action: Joseph R. Biden, Jr.

Up until now the Biden camp has persisted in treating this campaign as a conventional electoral contest: one in which the ultimate object should be understood as winning office. But winning office will be of little practical impact if there is not genuinely a Republic left to lead. As a matter of political strategy and civic duty, Joe Biden should begin to conduct his campaign not only as a bid to win office, but as a concerted effort to preserve the nation from disaster.

What would this entail? At basis, it would involve an open recognition of the naked realities of our situation. Though Donald Trump legitimately holds the office of president, he does not in any way fulfill its responsibilities or respect any of its principles. Since he refuses to behave as a president, the Biden campaign should cease giving him any of the ordinary courtesies or considerations that would routinely apply to an incumbent president. Trump cannot flout decorum at every turn and then claim that fairness or the dignity of his office demand he be given his due.

For example: as Thomas Friedman noted, Biden is so far ahead in the polls now that he can comfortably afford to refuse to engage in a debate. Trump is desperate to debate, as these provide some of the few moments in which the trajectory of the campaign might be turned. Ordinarily tradition would demand at least one debate: it would be unseemly to hold an election without any. But tradition has been so thoroughly defecated upon by this president (words chosen judiciously) that it would be completely absurd for anyone to claim it should be respected on his behalf. Biden should demand that the price of having a debate will be the release of Trump's recent tax returns: one for each debate (up to a maximum of four or five, say). Whatever paltry demurrals Trump offers in the face of such extortion can be safely brushed aside. A "president" who cannot show the public his tax returns is not worth laughing at, much less arguing with.

Other tactics might include seeking the endorsement and active campaign participation of past presidents, especially George W. Bush. Ordinarily it would be unthinkable for an ex-president to electioneer against his successor, but since Trump is not genuinely successor to any mantle of leadership, his tenure does not need to be respected in that regard. At least, unless and until he begins to fulfill the most basic duties of his office.

All of these provocations should be keyed to a single unifying message: ACT NOW. Trump's failure to control the pandemic should be kept harshly spotlighted, all of the levers of electoral pressure should be brought to bear to push him into leading (not bloody likely), quitting (only slightly less improbable, but one may hope), or at least getting out of the way (probably our best and perhaps our only shot). If Biden were to re-tool his campaign this way, aside from bringing the Trump nightmare to an end at the ballot box, he might do something even more extraordinary: save the Republic before the first vote for him is even cast.

I Mourn for Hong Kong, But I Mourn Even More for China

The new Hong Kong security law passed by the PRC went into effect today, and arrests under its jurisdiction have already begun. Though we are in its very early stages, a sea change in the politics and culture of the island city is clearly underway. How much of the vibrant and open civic culture that thrived in Hong Kong will survive is unknowable, but what is certain is that the city will not be the same for the foreseeable future.

I cannot help meeting this news with a profound sense of personal loss. For me, as for so many others, Hong Kong is a beloved place. Its civic life and dynamic culture were the setting of some of my most exciting and eye-opening experiences as a young student and traveler. Those memories made my returns in middle age with family and child sweetly nostalgic.

Of course, all such bittersweet impressions are profoundly selfish. The loss to the people of Hong Kong who are forced to live through this transition vastly outweighs any impact it has on people like me. Loss of freedom is certainly not a rare event in human history, but the recent global trend has arguably moved in the opposite direction. That the people of Hong Kong should suffer through this regressive moment is horrific. No one who has enjoyed freedom can experience its loss without terrible pain.

But as sad as I am for the people of Hong Kong, I am even sadder for the people of China more generally. I have spent much more time in the rest of mainland China than I have in Hong Kong, and the most hopeful development that I witnessed over the many decades that I returned to the PRC was the extent to which the differential gap between the larger PRC and Hong Kong closed as years and decades passed.

When I first traveled by train from Hong Kong to Beijing in 1987 (transiting between a fall semester program at Tunghai University in Taiwan to a spring term in the CET program at the Beijing Foreign Language Normal College 北京外国语师范学院), Beijing and Hong Kong were not recognizably "compatriot" cities. There were many aspects to this difference, but the most salient was the degree to which cultural and commercial life were still highly politicized in Beijing. Large billboards on Changan Boulevard in Beijing exhorted passersby to follow Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought. Non-conformity in all dimensions- sartorial, architectural, literary, etc.- was still dangerously controversial. Commerce was so politically charged that a dual currency system was in effect, relegating foreigners to a separate consumer economy.

That differential has not gone away, but it has narrowed drastically, to the benefit of all. The clothes one sees people wearing on the streets of Beijing today are as various as those in Hong Kong. Likewise other dimensions of cultural and commercial life have become much more diverse, vibrant, and dynamic, largely because aspects of cultural life that were once highly politicized (it was once "counterrevolutionary" to wear American bluejeans, for example) have become anodyne.  This has not merely brought abstract benefits such as "freedom of choice," but has materially improved the lives of millions by spurring the Chinese economy to realize long-latent potential for rapid growth.

Since so much of China's recent prosperity has been driven by a process that has made the larger PRC more and more like Hong Kong, it is tragic to see China's leaders try to strong-arm Hong Kong into becoming more like the rest of China. The CCP is shouting at the tide of history. The forces of dissent that Beijing is trying to stifle in Hong Kong are not absent in the rest of China, they merely lack safe avenues of expression.

The economic miracle that the CCP has overseen for the last four decades was laid on a political foundation: the de-politicization of economic and cultural life were the necessary conditions of China's rise. For that process to continue, China's leaders must follow the political logic intrinsic to the trajectory of reform upon which they embarked in 1980. Power-sharing and decentralization are key. Without such developments, corruption, waste, and ecological degradation will intensify to the point of choking off economic growth. Beyond this, questions of sovereignty like those persisting in Taiwan, Tibet, and Xinjiang will continue to worsen.

Hong Kong should not become more like Wuhan or Tianjin. Rather, for the welfare and prosperity of all China's people, and for the stability and security of China as a whole, the cities of the mainland PRC should become, both in their municipal politics and in their relationship to Beijing, more like Hong Kong. This principle is the downhill slope of history. The fact that CCP leaders do not seem to understand that reality is tragic, in that it portends strife and suffering. But there is also hope, that perhaps the repression we are witnessing today in Hong Kong is a passing phase, and that the city will return to its true self in the fullness of time.