OK, so it’s over. Or not, actually. The hoopla of reporting results took place; I even listened. Until NPR drove me batty talking about anything they could put their voices on with very little to say.
The results gave me a lot of relief and a glimmer of hope. A sense of fear, too. Hope because the outcome was a lot better than I feared, given the media hype of a red wave. Fear, because the threat to American democracy is far from over. Change is the fundamental reality of nature. We are facing lots of changes over the next two years.
The election results are a moment. In this moment, democracy prevailed. Rational secretaries of state were chosen over election deniers. MAGA true believer Senate candidates, spokespersons for the Republican cult, were roundly trounced in Pennsylvania, Maryland, New Hampshire and more than a handful of House districts. Democratic governors in Wisconsin and Michigan prevailed, despite well-funded opposition and may yet win in Arizona. The Democrats have a chance to hold the Senate and limit the Republicans to a slim majority in the House (sorry, Nancy).
It is early for definitive lessons. But here are a few interim ones, from where I sit.
Number one: Democracy matters to people and the democratic electoral system actually worked. Faith in that system is crucial to sustaining support for democracy. There were few reports of problems and lots of concessions by the losers, like Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania. The dog of “stolen elections” may find it hard to keep hunting. There is much support for the notion that the election was, in part, about halting the erosion of democratic rights and privileges.
Second, American media is not to be trusted during a campaign. I mean all those big sources everyone points to when they want to back up an argument. I never trusted FOX, to begin with; the spin and one-sided promotion of fear and attack was too obvious. This election made me more concerned about the “non-cultish” media: CNN, NPR, and, above all, the New York Times. Reporting in the campaign turned all of them into spin machines. In this case, they were spinning the “red wave” story. Too much of their reporting was a breathless effort to garner attention and clicks. Too many bloviators on air making their reputations by pushing anxiety-inducing stories about how the Republicans were going to win 30 seats or more in the House, might take over the Senate, elect state-level election-deniers.I got so tired of hearing this uninformed hyping that I turned them all off, stopped reading the stories.
To me the polling did not support the message; it was all “what if,” and “supposed the following chain of illogic prevailed in November.” Jim Fallows has said it more elegantly than I can. The New York Times systematically fear-mongered a debacle, called the issues wrongly (democracy and abortion turned out to matter to voters), wrote their own message or biased the voices they sought out to hype the looming disaster.
This trend is more important than you might think. Television news, other magazines, tweeters, social media posters all regularly turn to the Times, sending ripples of bias and fear out into the electorate. I didn’t want to hear it; I tuned it out; turns out my instincts were right.
Third, Trump and Trumpism lost, big time. A lot of election-deniers running for Senate seats and governorships tanked. The most white, male, and toxic of them took a bath in many places. What is left of real Republicans have an opportunity (one I have been urging them to take and will write more on) to begin to purge the party of the cult of personality and MAGA-hatred. We’ll see if they seize the moment or go silently into the night. If they do the latter, we are in for some tough times ahead.
BIG CAVEAT: the challenge to American democracy is far from over. We are deeply split, politically and culturally. Very big and very private funders are pushing the tide of fascism in America. The Citizens United decision by the Supreme Court has unleashed this floodtide of funding. The Republican (slim) majority in the House contains over 150 election deniers (that’s the 2020 election!!). Proud boys are still swearing Oaths of authoritarianism and urging violence. FOX is still with us, sadly. Local culture wars continue across the country.
Last Tuesday may look like dawn, but the opportunity for change is fragile, tender, and could easily wilt. Vengeful Republicans in the House will be on the march. The Senate hangs in the balance. Political rhetoric remains heated and divisive. We may have dodged a bullet this time, but the conflict will surely continue.
I appreciate what you are saying but I think there is danger in being too soft on an issue. The truth is 24/7 news is not good for anybody. They have far too much time on their hands and not enough stuff to fill it with. It is also true that predictive reporting is flawed by definition. No matter how good the models, the weather people sometimes get it wrong. But in this election season, they were not wrong to make the predictions they did. Any party holding on to the House and Senate of a sitting president in the midterms is the vast exception to the rule. To ask in THIS political environment what the dangers of a huge republican takeover might be present are fair questions. But my significant concern is that if they had been less dramatic there might not have been the turnout for this election that there was. Fear is a great motivator. The conservative press uses it masterfully. Rush Limbaugh could have given master classes on how tone of voice and sarcasm sells. Tucker Carlson doesn't sell news, he sells fear. I do not want a press like Fox or OAN or Brietbart. Should I be equally as mistrusting of CNN or the NYT? I think not. Generally they support their reporting with serious facts. Do they spin a bit tighter say than history books? Sure. They are a business for profit first. But somehow our news must keep us engaged and motivated to participate in our world. Beige news won't do it. Perhaps they have gone too far. I don't know enough to say. I just know I have to get my information somewhere. I think I can tell the difference between hype and fact.
A masterpiece of diagnosis, analysis, writing!