Thoughts on the 2024 Presidential Election

Democrats lost despite having many advantages: much more money ($997 KK vs. $388 KK as of October 16^th, with Super PACs raising about $550KK for each, which I think is additional), reportedly much better ground organization, popular abortion issues on the ballot, a disliked Republican candidate (many never-Trump Republicans voted for Harris and many of Trump’s first term staff campaigned against him), and many incumbent candidates down-ticket.  Yet Trump has 3.5 million more votes nationally, as of 11/9 at 11 pm ET.  In 2020 , he had 7.1 million fewer votes and in 2016, 2.6 million fewer votes.  So far, 147.9 million votes are recorded, compared to 158.5 million in 2020 and 136.7 million in 2016, so I’ll discuss turn-out below.  The final count might exceed 150 million and Trump’s margin might dip to about 3 million.  While this is a victory for Trump, I see it as more of a significant repudiation of the Democrats.

In 9 of 10 states, a majority voted to protect abortion.  In Florida, the abortion bill was defeated despite a 57% vote, because state law requires 60%.  In Nebraska, the current 3-month protection was retained but not extended to viability.  Despite the advantage of an abortion vote, Harris won only three of these 9 states.  Now, 30 states have protected abortion.

Minimum wage laws passed in 3 of 5 states.  CA didn’t raise its minimum wage to $18, and MA didn’t increase minimum wage for tipped waiters.  Ironically, Harris won in both states where minimum wage laws were defeated but lost the three states where such laws passed (AK and MO to $15 and AZ minimum wage applies to tipped workers).

All 9 states with education propositions voted for the teachers’ union preference.  Harris won only 4 of those states.  Four states (AR, RI, NM, UT) increased school funding.  CO and KY rejected school choice.  Nebraska overturned a state law that allows scholarships to private schools for low-income students.  Florida kept school board races non-partisan.  Massachusetts ended a requirement that high school graduates pass a test.

Medical marijuana use passed in Nebraska, but medical psychedelic drugs use lost in Massachusetts.  Recreational marijuana use lost in all 3 states (ND, SD, FL, although 56% approved in FL).   Trump and Harris both supported legalization.

Ranked-choice voting (RCV) was defeated in 9 of 10 states but was hampered in most situations.  In 4 states, it was packaged with a multi-party primary that, my review of news reports makes me think could have allowed all the final candidates to be from the same party even if that party got a minority of the votes, whereas NV rejected RCV packaged with a multi-party primary rule that would have advanced two people from each party to the final election.  I’d prefer to implement RCV without a multi-party primary.  In MO, the proposition to ban RCV included banning illegal aliens from voting; that’s already illegal but was used to distract people from the real issue.  In Alaska, RCV was repealed.  CO and OR rejected what I think were straight RCV bills.  The two major parties continue to collaborate to thwart democracy.

The dissatisfaction with incumbent progressive district attorneys was huge.  Nathan Hochman routed George Gascon in LA (61% to 38%); Pamela Price was recalled in Oakland (30% margin).  Kim Foxx chose not to run for re-election in Chicago.  Earlier, Baltimore replaced Marilyn Mosby.  California also passed Proposition 36 partly reversing a 2014 proposition; Prop 36 increases penalties for repeated theft offenses and certain drug crimes.

Some good things about this election:

• Many people voted for a party they had never voted for before.  This is healthy.  The Democrats have promoted “identity” politics and have taken minority voters for granted.
• People split ballots as indicated in the propositions discussed above and some legislative elections.
• I understand that 37 out of 40 “Problem Solvers” got re-elected, with a few races undecided, all of which they are leading.  The Problem Solvers Caucus are Congress people who get together with peers across the aisle to discuss how they can govern more effectively.  The  “No Labels” organization stimulated this movement.
• I understand, of course, that many of you think it is good that President Trump won.  While I don’t agree on that point, I know we agree on many things.  When I congratulated a strong Trump voter, he asked me what I’d like to see in Trump’s second administration.  I chose to also tell him what I did not want to see.  We largely agreed as you can see below my signature block.

Why did Trump have such a decisive win? 

• Probably a lot has to do with the economy.  I am disappointed that people focus on the short-term economy and secondarily that they vote to benefit themselves rather than what they think is best for the country.  (I’m not taking a position here on which Presidential candidate was better for the country, I’m simply saying that patriotism should outweigh personal benefits, at least for those who can afford to feed their families.)  Both parties encourage short-sighted voting, rather than educating us (actually mis-educating us).
• Voters rejected the Biden administration with which Harris aligned.  President Biden promised to bring us together then veered left.  No wonder people did not believe that Harris, a more leftist politician than Biden historically, would tack toward the center.  In addition to Biden’s broken promise and the economy, there were crime, the border, energy, electric car mandates, the international crises, education, etc.; each of which cost Harris significant votes.  The Trump ad that “Biden/Harris broke it and he’ll fix it was probably effective.”
• The Democrats have foisted hoaxes on voters for 3 straight Presidential elections.  In 2024, they covered up President Biden’s diminished cognition, but that hoax backfired.  In 2020, the White House orchestrated 51 former intelligence officials falsely suggesting that Hunter Biden’s laptop was Russian disinformation.  In 2016, Hillary Clinton commissioned the Steele dossier.  In each case, the mainstream media helped the Democrats.  For example, in 2020, the mainstream media failed to report that the FBI knew that Hunter Biden’s laptop was real; they did not report that many former intelligence officials refused to sign the misleading statement; and they did not expose the White House staff involvement.
• The public rejects wokeness when given a private vote.  The lack of courage in public is disheartening.  When I hear the media talk about “birthing people” and “assigned gender”, I think they are cowards to accept such censorship and rejection of science.  There are many sub-issues here, including LBGTQ+ issues; oppressive DEI; “intersectionality” postures that broaden non-profit entities’ missions and ostracize supporters who don’t agree on a tangential issue; rejection of “merit” and grades; etc.

Likely lesser issues:

• 6.7% fewer votes have been counted than in 2020 (despite presumably more eligible voters), but that might end up less than 5%.  Assuming the 6.7%, if all these 10.6 million had voted, Harris would have needed 67.6% of them just to tie the popular vote.  In 2020, 72% voted early in-person (26%) or by mail (46%) vs. 60% combined in 2024 (I couldn’t find further breakdown).  In 2020, ballots were sent to 21.3% of voters; even if 2% of those mailed ballots were fraudulently returned “on behalf” of people who were dead, in prison, or in nursing homes, that’s only 0.4% of the total vote and 5.9% of the 10.6 million.  I’ve seen no claim or evidence of “voter suppression”.  Voter suppression, and fraudulent voting do not appear to have been meaningful factors in either 2020 or 2024.  When writing this originally, I thought low turn-out was not an issue, but I’ve since seen some data that suggests that the voter turn-out reductions came in Democratic-leaning counties.  So, this could have been a significant factor.
• Third parties: Jill Stein, Robert Kennedy and Chase Oliver each have 600,000-700,000 votes and there were 350,000 other write-ins.  Overall, this is a minor effect, probably harming Trump.
• Actions against Trump were seen as partisan. 

The Democrats are blaming the loss (sometimes claiming that “accountability” is different than “blame”), on Biden, Harris, Harris’s campaign strategists, and voters.  Few accept personal responsibility or that the party’s platform is responsible.  Sure, Biden’s attempt to get re-elected and his terrible performance as President were critical, but his critics (such as Nancy Pelosi) pushed him to take those positions and actively participated in the hoax (for example, criticizing Robert Hur for accurately reporting the President’s condition.  Only Dean Phillips challenged Biden in the Democratic party and when he did, his peers said he was destroying his promising career and helping Trump.  Now those same people who caused Biden’s failure or aided and abetted it, point fingers at him.

Voters are criticized as racist, misogynist, religious zealots, ignorant, etc.  The below exit poll data shows that Trump’s support among White males has been significantly decreasing.  His support among minorities has steadily increased, probably because minorities did unusually well economically in his presidency (until COVID), because of education issues, etc.  Although he did worse with Whites than in the past and better with minorities, there still is some bias against voting for a Black female, but it does not seem to be the major reason for Harris’s loss.

2016 Margin       2020 Margin       2024 Margin

               White Males                                           +31                       +23                       +20                       Trump did worst with White men when running against Harris

               White Females                                       +9                          +11                       +5                          White women liked Biden best and Harris least.

               Black Males                                          -69                        -60                        -58                        Trump has been gaining support among Black men, albeit is still far behind.

               Black Females                                      -90                        -81                        -85                        Black women overwhelmingly vote against Trump and exhibit the most pro-gender voting.

               Latino Males                                        -31                        -23                        10                          Trump has been gaining support among Latino men and actually had a majority among them.

               Latino Females                                    -44                        -39                        -24                        Trump has been gaining support among Latino women.

See below my signature block for what I’d like to see and not see during Trump’s second administration.  These are numbered to make it easier for you to refer to them; they are not prioritized.

 

Claude Thau

claude.thau@gmail.com

Phone direct: 913-707-8863; Schedule time with me by clicking here

Click here to connect with Claude on LinkedIn

I continue to believe that if people spoke with each other rather than ignoring each other or yelling at each other, we’d learn that there is a lot we agree on!  For example, the strong Trump voter with whom I corresponded agreed on #1-17 and #21-25.   On #18 (Speaker’s Project) and #19 (Ranked-Choice Voting), he’d need more info.  We have at least some overlap on #26-27 and would need more discussion to ferret out disagreement.  On #29, he is a strong supporter of school choice because of the teachers’ union’s far left agenda that forces two teachers in his family to teach things they don’t believe in; I’d want to learn more about those issues. We disagreed on #20 (abortion somewhat); #28 (agreed relative to tips and overtime, but not on other issues).  On #30, he is open to considering my position.  That’s a lot of agreement and potential agreement!

Things I expect to see in a second Trump administration:

1. Ukraine:  I imagine Trump will threaten Putin to secure a peace settlement.  Ukraine will lose some territory but remain independent.  Ukraine’s loss is clearly Biden’s fault.  As I’ve indicated in my blogs, Biden triggered Putin’s invasion and kept Ukraine from winning by putting crazy restrictions on Ukraine’s actions.
2. Environmental progress: We’ll continue to make environmental progress because it makes sense economically.  I hope we internalize more of the cost of environmental impact.  (Art Laffer, a contender to Chair the Federal Reserve, is pro-carbon tax, so maybe Trump will support a carbon tax.)  The automobile manufacturer EV mandates (50% by 2032) seem likely to go away, which I think is a good idea because it is not even clear that EV are better than hybrids; we don’t have good enough batteries yet; we rely on China for rare earth minerals; and the EV cars may be less safe and bad for our infrastructure.
3. Energy: We’ll have a more intelligent energy program which will help other countries be able to depend on us for energy, rather than being dependent on our enemies.  More energy production in the USA is good for the environment because our production is much cleaner than production in Venezuela, Iran, Russia and the Arab countries.  The energy policy will increase jobs and income and may help reduce our debt.
4. Debt: Unfortunately, both candidates ignored this critical issue during the campaign.  Instead, they both tried to buy votes by promising more give-aways (which aren’t even their prerogative as President).  It is important to remember that even if a President avoids a deficit, our debt will continue to grow because of off-ledger items and interest due.  This is a serious issue which is made worse by the threat of war.
5. Israel: Both Trump and Biden have claimed to be Israel’s greatest friend.  We’re still benefiting from Trump’s past impact, such as the Abraham Accords.  Unfortunately, although Trump is more supportive of Israel, he may want to punish Netanyahu for past slights.  If Trump threatens to support Israel more strongly, Hamas might be more motivated to negotiate or at least release US hostages.  I continue to fear a third World War.  If we appease Russia and Iran, we make such a war more likely.  We need Teddy Roosevelt “Speak softly but carry a big stick.”  In the context of Ukraine, this could mean threatening Putin privately, so as not to embarrass him.  Perhaps such behind-the-scenes threats might be attractive to Trump relative to Israel because he might avoid seemingly supporting Netanyahu.
6. Supreme Court:  Reform is probably dead.  I’d support term limits, but the Democratic plan to move existing judges to non-voting jobs and to end the filibuster and pack the Court was a disaster.
7. The filibuster and electoral college will continue.  I support both.  The Democrats who were so critical of the filibuster may be using it a lot.
8. Border: Trump will strengthen the border, and I would support no longer bestowing citizenship automatically to people born on USA turf.
9. Anti-business bias of the Biden administration: Trump will temper this.
10. Separation of powers may improve, despite Trump’s lust for power.  The Supreme Court strongly supports separation of powers and will thwart Trump if he tries to grab too much power.  I’m open to reducing the Federal Education Department because it seems that education should be managed at the state and local level.
11. Election fraud: Our elections will at least temporarily be protected against unlimited ballot harvesting and banning of photo voter ID for federal elections, both of which the Democrats have repeatedly tried to push through.
12. Federal administrative and college due process improved during Trump’s first term but, under Biden, federal agencies once again became prosecutor, judge, and jury. 
13. Military strength is like to improve, and the USA will be better respected militarily.
14. The private ballot will likely be protected in labor union elections.
15. Public charter schools/open enrollment in public schools: Trump may support these, which would be great.  We must give inner city children a way to escape the terrible education we’ve been providing to them.
16. Improved free speech, for example, on college campuses (which have selectively protected for liberals but not conservatives).  I hope the media will have the courage to abandon language such as “birthing people” and “assigned gender”.
17. People competing in sports based on birth gender.

Things I’d like to see but don’t expect Trump to support:

18. Progress in implementing the “No Labels”  Speaker’s Project Speaker’s Project and similar Congressional reforms.
19. Ranked-Choice voting: both parties oppose it because it threatens their grip on power.
20. Abortion: more states protecting abortion.

Things I don’t want to see in a second Trump administration:

21. Pursuit of internal political “enemies”: I hope he ditches his idea of revenge.  Some people say he should pardon Hunter Biden.  I wouldn’t push for that, but I would not object.
22. Taiwan taken by China: Trump says he’ll threaten China with 200% tariffs if they invade Taiwan.  I’m not comfortable that such a threat is sufficient.  But I think our enemies will be much more wary of us with Trump at the helm.  Biden’s weakness lit the world on fire.  Now that the world is on fire, I’m not confident that Trump can put out the blaze.
23. The Environmental Protection Agency closed down: this agency needs to operate at the national level.
24. Rudeness, lies, misrepresentations (from either party).
25. More new executive orders that encroach on Congress’s authority.  However, executive orders cancelling prior executive orders are fair game (e. g., student loans)
26. Mass deportation: I hope Trump does not expel illegal immigrants who have lived here peacefully a long time.  In addition to sympathy and appreciation of their contributions, deporting them is harmful to their families and employers, thereby having a meaningfully bad impact on our economy.  I have been opposed to sanctuary cities but may change my position if Trump is too extreme.
27. Rampant Tariffs: Targeted tariffs (to induce fair trade, for security reasons, etc.) are appropriate, but Trump went too far in his first administration and says he’ll go further this time.  I’m concerned about the impact of tariffs on our economy, inflation, and foreign relationships.
28. Unwise Tax give-aways: As a high tax guy in general, I wouldn’t have voted for Trump’s tax cuts.  However, in fairness I note that revenue from income taxes has increased well since his tax cuts were adopted.  Of the tax cuts scheduled to be cancelled, I’d most favor reducing the tax-free threshold for estates, but that won’t happen.  I hope he backs away from ending income taxes on tips, overtime and social security benefits and resurrecting the state and local tax deduction. 
29. Private/Religious school choice with public funds: I’m a strong believer in public charter schools and open enrollment in public schools to allow inner-city children to escape their poor educational environments.  I have not supported school choice (letting students use public money to attend private school; whether or not denominational).  However, the Left can push me into the arms of the Right on this issue if it is the only way I can see to help inner-city students.
30. Re: Trump trials.  I’d rather have seen the Trump election obstruction legal action continue, but that won’t happen.  The improper retention of government documents was a good case, except it was compromised by: a) the decision to treat Hillary Clinton more laxly than other people when she endangered national secrets with her computer; and b) by not letting President Biden off the hook despite having knowingly kept papers than he shouldn’t have had and telling his biographer to be careful with them because they weren’t supposed to have them. 

Why I Think President Biden is the Worst President Ever

Published 2Sep24.  Updated on 5Sep24 to add #7 (Charter Schools).  I had intentionally left that off originally because I didn't have the data at that time.

In a previous blog explaining why some voters favor Trump, I covered much of this information.  Here, I have separated it out and organized it better.  Short summary:

1.       President Biden has set the world on fire, while reducing our ability to defend ourselves.  This alone would justify my conclusion.
2.       We needed deficit spending to keep the pandemic from causing a depression.  However, when such disasters are over, we need to save for the next crisis.  Instead, President Biden has gone on an unprecedented spending spree.
3.       Under his leadership, the Democratic party has undermined our election process with major deceptions in each presidential election and by interfering in opposition parties.  In addition, he has tried repeatedly to outlaw requiring voter photo ID in federal elections and to allow unlimited ballot harvesting.  At best, Biden is the second-worst president in history in this regard to Trump.
4.       His energy policies have limited (relatively clean) energy production in the USA and boosted (dirty) energy production in Venezuela, Iran, and Russia.  He makes our allies and independent countries dependent on our enemies, enriching those enemies  and costing us jobs and revenue, while worsening the world’s environment.
5.       He has concentrated more power in the Executive.  This has been a long-term trend, well before Biden, but it continues to escalate.    
6.       After promising to bring us together, he has been the second-most divisive president in my lifetime (Trump wins the title).
7. He has been the least supportive president as regards public charter schools.  In matched-student comparisons, such schools have improved urban reading and math results by 16%.

The details:

1)     The world is on fire worse than any time in my lifetime.  This is not an accident; it sadly can be attributed directly to President Biden (Ukraine, Afghanistan).  Neville Chamberlain is widely disparaged for his 1938 agreement allowing Germany to annex the Sudetenland in return for a promise to make no further land demands.  President Biden, in contrast, has made numerous decisions that have exacerbated the situation. 

In President Biden’s fantasy world, he is the second coming of FDR.  But FDR strengthened the military tremendously in the years before we entered WWII.  Each of President Biden’s military budgets has increased by less than the inflation rate.  Wake up!  China, Russia, Iran et. al. are serious threats to democracy, including in the USA.

2)     The inflation during a President’s first term is generally not related to their policies; it is the result of prior administrations.  We needed deficit spending to counter the impact of COVID.  However, in good times, we must save money so we can operate at a deficit when crises such as COVID or war occur (10 Lessons from the Pandemic).  Instead, President Biden President has gone on an unprecedented spending spree that will burden future generations with intolerable and unnecessary debt levels.

Here's a CBO Projection of Debt (not reflecting Biden's Proposed Tax Increases.  

A CBO report on the 2024 deficit recently projected it to be 27% higher than projected in February in February, at 99% of GDP, rising to 122% of GDP in 2034 and continuing to rise thereafter.  The increase of the past six months was caused by support for Israel and Ukraine, student loan forgiveness, higher Medicaid costs and FDIC insurance.

3)     Undermining our electoral process:

Hoaxes: The Democrats have created significant election deception for three consecutive presidential elections.  I don’t hold President Biden responsible for the 2016 deception, but he certainly is responsible for 2020 and 2024.

2016: Hillary Clinton’s campaign funded the “Steele Dossier” hoax.

2020: President Biden’s staff stimulated 51 Intelligence officers to state falsely that the Hunter Biden laptop appeared to be Russian disinformation.  (The media failed to report how the statement was created and that many intelligence officers refused to sign it.)  The CIA had proof that the statement was false, but James Clapper, former National Security Director, testified that he intentionally avoided access to CIA classified information that he was entitled to see because he “wanted only to go on what I had seen publicly”.   That is, he wanted the plausible deniability which he has since relied upon.

2024: Despite his 2020 claims that he would be a “one-term”, “interim”, “transition” president,  President Biden decided that he wanted to run again.  During his term, he hid his deteriorating mental faculties by avoiding interviews and obscuring doctors’ visits (meanwhile excoriating Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin for a smaller transgression in health transparency).  When Robert Hur accurately described the difficulty in indicting him about his intentional keeping of classified documents, the Democrats engaged in character assassination.  Reports of Biden’s failures were characterized as political lies and films of his instability were falsely labelled “doctored”.  The Democrats suppressed opposing candidates in Democratic primaries at least partly so that Biden’s losses would not be exposed.

Now the Democrats try to convince us that President Biden did a patriotic thing by voluntarily stepping down.  The truth is that he tried to hoodwink us and that he strongly resisted stepping down.  Now we have a Presidential candidate who was not vetted in any primaries and who is running the shortest Presidential campaign in history.

Suppressing democratic elections:  During Biden’s presidency, the Democrats expanded earlier practices by spending $51.5 million in 2022 to interfere in Republican primaries in 12 states to nominate Republicans who would be easier to beat.   They say Trump is a threat to democracy, yet they finance the Trumpiest candidates.  How’s that for hypocrisy?  Interfering in the other party’s primary is unpatriotic and a strong threat to democracy.  It continues today.

Likewise, the Democrats also took a variety of clearly undemocratic and immoral steps to undermine the “No Labels” party.  You might argue that Biden did not lead some of these efforts, but he was the leader of the party, the President of our country, and should have urged Democrats to discontinue these activities.

The Democrats have also colluded with Republicans in several ways to thwart democracy.  These may not be Biden’s responsibility.  “Sore loser” laws exist in most states precluding a candidate for running for a position if they lost a primary election for that post.  The parties work together to undermine Ranked-Choice voting because it poses a threat to their duopoly.  They engage in joint gerrymandering, creating safe districts for each other.  In safe districts, the general election is decided in the primary of the party whose seat is assured.  Thus, a small percentage of that party (generally those most extreme) determine who will win the general election.

Election reform: President Biden continues to lie about election laws in GA and other states (see Voting Laws and Voter Suppression and Election Fraud).  Meanwhile, Democrats continue to try to allow unlimited voter harvesting and ban requiring voter photo ID for federal elections.  (See section 303a and 307(f)(2) of H.R. 1 and sections 103-104 of the HEROES Act. HEROES Act.)  In my view, the Democrats’ (fortunately unpassed) bills to accomplish these goals are a significant threat to democracy, moving us back toward Tammany Hall/Richard Daley/Pendergast elections.  My local Democratic newspaper repeatedly refused to publish a letter to the editor I wrote on this topic because they insisted I was wrong.  When I finally sent them the relevant text of the laws, they discontinued communication without acknowledging that I was right.

4)   Energy policy: President Biden’s energy policy strikes me as a Saturday Night Live skit.  Prior to entering office, Biden said his position was “No ability for the oil industry to continue to drill.  Period.”  He also said “no new fracking” and “no new oil and gas permits on public land”.  While in office, he said “we're going to be shutting [coal] plants down all across America”. 

The Keystone XL pipeline was subject to a huge number of regulatory bodies in the US and Canada with numerous expensive studies required over many years.  Each time they passed the “last hurdle”, the US added new requirements for political reasons.  Frustrated that the XL Pipeline passed each requirement, President Obama finally approved the project in March 2012.  In November 2015, Secretary of State John Kerry said there was a “perception” that it would increase greenhouse-gas emissions and whether that was true or not, it was not in the US’s interest to continue the pipeline.  So, in a colossal example of perfidy, Obama shut it down.  Trump appropriately allowed it to re-start.  On his first day in office, Biden canceled the Keystone XL pipeline, making a mockery of US regulations and laws.  What is the purpose of a regulatory process if the president can cancel the project because some of his constituents don’t like it?

Nord Stream II: After blocking the Keystone XL pipeline, President Biden decided to help Russia build Nord Stream II to get gas to Germany while by-passing Ukraine.  He did so, despite bipartisan opposition, by waiving multiple Trump-era sanctions.

Boosting foreign oil: After putting the industry on notice that he wanted to put them out of business, Biden blamed the industry for energy shortages.  He turned to Venezuela, Iran and Saudi Arabia to boost production.  What sense does this make?

a.      Attacking our fuel sources makes our energy supply less stable, hurts our economy and costs jobs.

b.      He made concessions to Venezuela and Iran, helping terrible regimes and funding terrorism.

c.      He helped Russia export oil, undermining Ukraine and funding Russia’s war.

d.     He made our allies and third world countries dependent on our enemies for energy.

e.      He increased worldwide pollution significantly because those foreign sources develop energy in much less environmental fashion than we do.

LNG: President Obama embraced LNG exports for geopolitical reasons and because exported LNG was more environmentally friendly than foreign local coal.  Trump embraced LNG exports, approving permits on average in 7 weeks. 

Biden averaged 11 months to approve (nearly 7 times as long) until, in January 2024, he “paused” approvals to reconsider whether to allow them.  A review may well have been a good idea.  However, as President Biden has made so many energy decisions based on politics rather than sound reasoning, there is cause to be skeptical.  (A court ruled that he could review policy, but that the law required him to process applications in the interim.  In weighing the court’s ruling, I sadly must keep in mind that President Biden has repeatedly taken steps that he knows are not within his jurisdiction.)

This article gives the anti-LNG-export argument, that it is dirtier than local coal (because of diverting natural gas to LNG rather than increasing natural gas production) and will replace renewables (countries that invest in LNG facilities won’t want to convert to renewables).

My main take-away is that we make major decisions based on unreliable studies, as this article argues regarding studies under Obama and Trump.  The current studies also might be wrong.

Opponents suggest that, if we don’t export LNG, countries will develop more renewable resources.  Did they consider that countries may build the facilities anyway, to receive LNG from Russia (which had record LNG exports in December), Iran and Qatar, our biggest LNG competitors?

Electric cars: I’ve been an advocate of alternative fuels for a long time.  In the mid-1990s, I successfully insisted that Transamerica allow me to have a flexible fuel vehicle for my company car.  But the hellbent for leather approach to electric cars does not make sense to me.  We seem to be plunging ahead without knowing what we’re doing:

a)        Some studies indicate that hybrids might be a better approach, but Biden won’t “pause” his pushing of the electric car button.

b)       Electric cars require a tremendous amount of rare earth minerals which are mostly mined in China (and secondarily in the Congo with forced labor).  President Biden is creating a huge strategic risk for the USA by giving China control over a critical resource and worldwide pricing of this resource.

c)         Biden has picked some projects to invest in that are trying to develop rare earth minerals from waste (I don’t think the federal government should be picking winners and losers).  On the other hand, he has blocked mining of rare earth minerals.

d)       We don’t know the impact electric cars will have.  Currently there are reports of fires and the cars are much heavier, likely requiring more infrastructure costs that reportedly have not been considered in environmental impact studies.

  5)   Within our Federal government, Presidents are grabbing increased power, with President Biden and his administration continuing to take executive power to new limits, spewing rules at an unprecedented pace without due process.  They cancel student loans, assume control over energy production, try to put industries out of business, invalidate contracts on a widescale basis, set aside huge acreage by executive fiat, create internet and labor law, etc.  (Whether I support the policies or not, I do NOT support the Executive Branch unilaterally making such decrees.)  Agencies act as prosecutor and judge.  Congress abdicates authority, passing laws such as the Inflation Reduction Act which authorizes the President to pick winners and losers.  What could possibly go wrong?

The increased power at the Federal level and particularly in the President has contributed to our national elections becoming so contentious as the stakes and number of issues increase.  Elected Presidents presume they have a multitude of mandates no matter why they got elected.  The Democrats are intent in further undermining the separation of powers that is critical to our success (Separation of Powers).

6)  President Biden promised that he would bring us together.  Instead, he has divided us.  He went from moderate to progressive.  He benefited from the quick development of the COVID vaccine under Trump and he continued some Trump policies relative to tariffs and borders but has never said anything favorable about his opponents.  He claims that Trump handed him a terrible economy, but by the end of Biden's second month in office, the real GDP had recovered to its pre-pandemic level (according to the WSJ, 16Aug24), having improved 48% in the previous three quarters.  Clearly, Biden was not responsible for that recovery.  As noted, he had particularly lied about election laws and has tried to undermine our elections in several ways that have divided us.  We really need a president who will work to bring us together; we haven’t had one since Bill Clinton.

7)  According to Jason Riley ("Biden and Harris Work to Crush School Competition", WSJ, 4Sep24, "Biden is easily the most anticharter president in American history."  President Clinton created the Charter Schools Program and President Obama expanded it.  President Biden's proposed FY2025 Education Budget is $82.4 billion, a 4% increase over FY2024.  However, he proposed a 9% cut for the Charter Schools Program.  In addition, Riley quotes Christy Wolfe of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools as saying the Biden administration is creating more obstacles to make it harder to get the money.  (Note: I'd likely conclude that the Federal government should be less involved in Education, but that is not the point here.)   President Biden is, in his own words, "not a charter-school fan", even though a large matched-student study by Stanford University shows that charter schools produced 16% better learning in both math and English for urban schools.

What Would Likely Happen if Trump is Elected in 2024?

Although I’m a never-Trumper, I acknowledge that Trump did some good things as president and that his Presidency was greatly more favorable than President Biden’s term. 

Many people voting for Trump are hoping to reprise what was happening in our country pre-pandemic.  However, for the following reasons, a second Trump presidency is hugely unpredictable and less likely to have the favorable consequences of his first term.  (Admittedly, predicting is speculative, particularly with respect to Trump.)

1.        Trump has no principles.  He does what feels good to him and is very volatile.  It is not clear that he would try to do things he did in his first administration.

2.        Who will serve in his cabinet and in the White House if he gets elected?  The adults who were in the room the first time are likely to be replaced by people in whom I’d have a lot less confidence.  Why would any intelligent reasonable person want to report to Trump?  He has no loyalty and is most likely to stab you in the back. 

When have we ever seen a former President run for re-election and have so many former staffers expressing that he is unfit to be President?  Is it not scary that so many of those who were closest to him feel that he is unfit?  Lots of people criticize Nikki Haley and William Barr for supporting him.  It remains clear that they still consider him to be unfit.  They just consider the alternative to be worse.

3.        His Vice President running mate is telling.  In 2016, he picked Mike Pence, a man of great personal integrity and a patriot.  Pence had tremendous experience and was an effective deal-maker in Congress.  This time, Trump picked J. D. Vance, a young, inexperienced individual whose history since graduating from Yale Law School shows little accomplishment other than enriching himself by writing a book and creating a move that expose the dysfunctionality of the family into which he was born.

4.        His tariffs were a bad idea.  Now he is saying he wants across-the-board tariffs, which clearly can’t be a good idea.  How can across-the-board anything be a good idea?  Across-the-board is the lazy person’s way to avoid having to think and evaluate.

5.        He promises to deport all illegal immigrants no matter how long they have been here, how much they have contributed, whether they have a clean record, and the impact on their families and the economy.

6.        He (like the Democrats; please note I am not praising the Democrats!) has promised stupid things to pander for votes: no tax on tips, free IVF, etc.

7.        Being a lame duck may also make Trump less effective, but I think that will be balanced by his use of Executive Orders.  I have spoken against the growing use of Executive Orders for at least 12 years.  These undermine our separation of powers.  Trump is not alone in this regard.  President Biden told us things were illegal, but he’d do them anyway.  But Trump is likely to ratchet them up even further.  There will be more fights between the Executive Branch and the Courts.  (I think the Supreme Court will continue to support separation of powers, but if you inundate the Supreme Court with issues, it can’t address them all.  Trump is likely to leverage that approach.)

8.        The Democrats and media will fight Trump tooth-and-nail, perhaps even harder than before.  Although the Democrats say “When the Republicans go low, we go high.”, the Democrats lied repeatedly about Trump in his first term and will continue to do so. 

9.        Trump would be inheriting a very different world situation in February 2025.  Trump has not demonstrated that he has the skill set to handle such a situation.  He claims to have a lot of skill as a negotiator, but his “skills” are limited to bullying, temper tantrums, threats, name-calling, etc.  He is NOT a skilled negotiator.  See my blog Risks To Which Trump Exposed Us.  These risks remain and will likely get worse in a second Trump presidency.

10.   In 2016, I described his limited attention span.  It has not gotten any better.  He is often incoherent, as he was in his debate with Biden.

11.   I am worried that such an irrational, emotional person could hold the keys to nuclear war.

12.    Trump could easily walk away from revenge, but he continues to suggest retaliation and has consistently been vengeful his entire (at least, adult) life.  Do you want a large part of the next four years to be focused on revenge more so than governing/  The recent Supreme Court decision making it harder to hold him accountable is troubling and will encourage him to misbehave.  He will undoubtedly continue to engage in childish, petty name-calling which is not constructive.

13.   A president needs to understand the consequences of his actions and modify his behavior to accomplish his goals.  Instead, Trump alienates the voters he needs to win by making fun of Harris’s name and ancestry. 

Incredulously, he speaks in an important swing state (Georgia) where the very popular governor is supporting his candidacy and goes into a prolonged rant against that governor.  When Trump previously tried to defeat that governor, the Georgians demonstrated that they overwhelmingly (for very good reasons) favor Kemp over Trump.  Why a competent, sane person do that?

He had a tremendous opportunity when he attended a Black journalists’ conference and Kamala Harris was not present.  The interviewer asked him a challenging question: Why should African-Americans vote for him in the face of the many slights she rattled off?  From my perspective, this was a GREAT opportunity for him.  He could have responded:

Thank you for asking.  I don’t believe in identity politics.  Just because someone is African-American does not mean that he should vote for me.  That alone is one reason why African-Americans should consider me.  Unlike Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, I don’t take them for granted.  You mentioned disrespectful comments; yes, I’ve done some of those, but look at my overall approach and policies.  Can you imagine a President of the USA saying “If you have a problem figuring out whether you're for me or Trump, then you ain't black.”  When I was president, the unemployment rate for African-Americans hit a historic low.  African-Americans had record increases in real income.  That does not necessarily mean they should all vote for me; for example, affluent professional African-Americans did not experience such benefits themselves. 

Another issue is that the Biden/Harris campaign has set the world on fire.  Who suffers if we have a major world war?  African-Americans are 50% more likely to be in our military than Caucasians, so a war exposes them to more risk.  In addition, they are half as likely to be officers, which exposes them to more risk.  And if a war brings economic hardship, that falls most on the less affluent members of our society, and they are disproportionately Black. 

These comments raise the question: How are we going to improve Black affluence?  In addition to my economic policies, we need to improve the public education system.  We talk about systemic bias in this country, but the public school system is the most systematically biased institution we have and the Biden/Harris team steadfastly supports the teachers unions who have failed the less-affluent portions of the African-American population.   I also directed record sums of support to historically-black colleges.

Am I the President who allowed our cities to burn?  Would I have ordered the police to stand down and let minority-owned businesses burn to the ground?  Of course not, I’m tough on law which is important to protect minority neighborhoods.  But I coupled that with pushing through the First Step Act which may important changes to our judicial and penal practices.  It was hailed by most everyone as a positive and momentous law.

I could obviously go on for a long time.  How has the Biden/Harris border policy affected African-Americans?  Again, it depends on where they live, their affluence level, etc. but illegal immigrants have taken jobs away from African-Americans, they have put downward pressure on wages at the lower end and they have increased crime in the inner city and in prisons.  He could have also mentioned his tariff policy (although I disagree with it).

Instead, Trump blew up.

Trump supporters might say I just made a great case for electing Trump.  I acknowledge that but, besides that other points made herein, this bullet shows how incompetent Trump is.

14.   A Trump presidency would further destroy the Republican party.  From my perspective, Trump is the RINO (“Republican” in name only).  It is a typical schoolyard tactic to cover your weaknesses by pinning them on someone else.   A resounding defeat of Trump would be good in this regard.

The LWV is a partisan organization masquerading as a non-partisan to benefit from non-profit status and to push its favored agenda

The breadth of partisan extremism in our country is breath-taking and discouraging.

For example, the League of Women Voters describes itself as “a nonpartisan, grassroots organization (their bolded text, as per their website).

However, for a long time, they have failed to be non-partisan.  For example, on 2024-07-25, we received a survey that included the following questions.  When I read such “surveys”, I think maybe they should lose their non-profit designation because of slanted advocacy.

#7: Which of the following is the biggest threat to voting?

·        New ID laws

·        Reduced early and mail-in voting opportunities

·        Confusing new voter laws

·        Mis-and disinformation that misrepresents issues

·        Voter intimidation

·        Other, please explain:

I think the biggest threat to our elections is the continued Democratic Party efforts to ban photo voter ID for federal elections and to allow unlimited ballot harvesting.  It is not hard to figure out why LWV chose to leave those issues off their survey.

#9: Which issues are you most passionate about?  Please prioritize your top 3 issues with “1” being the most important issue to you.

·        Universal health care

·        Racial justice

·        Women’s rights

·        Reproductive rights

·        Environment/climate change

·        LGBTQIA+ rights

·        Dark money

·        Immigration reform

·        Ensuring open and equal access to voting

·        Gun safety

·        Passage of the ERA

·        Other, please specify

Note the absence of so many issues such as Education, Public Safety, Balanced Budget, Foreign Affairs (Israel, Ukraine), Freedom of Speech, Border control (could be argued that is it part of “immigration reform”), etc.

I went to their website today and submitted the following comment:

“I am a moderate who has voted equally for Democrats and Republicans.  LWV continues to present itself as non-partisan but does not act accordingly.  For example, question #7 in the survey form you recently sent lists voting threats without mentioning outlawing photo voter ID and unlimited ballot harvesting, both of which the Democrats continue to try to pass.  Question #9 ignores issues such as balanced budgets, border control, safe streets, education, etc.  Have you considered that LWV is guilty of misinformation or disinformation by slanting its surveys to favor Democrats?”

The LWV responded promptly as follows:

Hello,

Thank you for reaching out with your concerns. We are a nonpartisan organization, although we do take stances on certain issues based on careful study and input from our members. You can find out more about our nonpartisan status here: https://www.lwv.org/blog/remaining-nonpartisan-hyper-partisan-times

Kind Regards,

 

Brittany Clark  She/Her Office Manager T 202 263 1300  E bclark@lwv.org   League of Women Voters of the US 1233 20th Street NW, Suite 500 Washington, DC, 20036 www.lwv.org | www.vote411.org

I responded to their response the next day:

Thank you for your response.  As I mentioned originally, I am a moderate who has voted for Democrats and Republicans equally often.  For example, I voted for President Biden in 2020.

You seem to be a wonderful, idealistic person.  Your love and support of animals is admirable.  (I support EarthWatch, for example, and took my daughter on a wonderful EarthWatch trip measuring the intelligence of dolphins.  A lady I know is on the leading edge of lawsuits to defend animal rights.  You might like me to put you in touch with her.)

I suspect you realize that your response does not justify LWV’s slanted surveys and ignored the issue I raised. 

It appears that LWV management decides what they want to do, then sends surveys out slanted to justify their action, but really intended to raise funds.  My theory may be wrong, but it is clear that LWV surveys are intentionally slanted.  I commented this time, but I’ve observed the bias for a long time.

It is sad that such a great organization has chosen to abandon its fundamental principles.

If you are a person of conscience, I suggest that you encourage LWV to improve or that you choose to work elsewhere if LWV insists on partisanship.

Note: As of 23Oct24, Ms. Clark has not responded to my 7/26 email to her.