Final Jeopardy Answer:

Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas

Final Jeopardy Question:

In which states were all or some ballots cast through direct recording electronic systems (DRE) without a paper backup in 2018?

This morning Mika Brzezinski told viewers she would never step foot on 5th Avenue in New York City.  Why?  Because Donald Trump has said he could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and get away with it.  In her words, “And I believe him!”  Her evidence?  During the past three and a half years he has telegraphed every attempt to corrupt the system or break down norms of behavior.  He told us he was going to seek illegal campaign assistance from foreign powers.  He said he would separate babies and young children from their mothers at the Mexican border.  And just yesterday he admitted he opposes emergency funding for the U.S. Postal Service so it cannot be relied on to process and deliver mail-in ballots in a timely fashion this November.

No surprise.  In March Trump told Fox News, increased funding for vote-by-mail would result in “levels of voting that, if you ever agreed to it, you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again.”  Trump, better than anyone, understands a fact of political life in America.  When Democrats vote, Democrats win.  The logical response?  Suppress the vote.  Make it hard for Democrats to safely vote in person, and make them skeptical their mail-in ballot will be counted.

If you believe this is the beginning and end of this story, you will again be underestimating Donald Trump.  When it comes to this master of misdirection, you have to ask, “If he’s making such a fuss about the timing of mail-in ballots, dragging out the election for days, weeks or even months, what doesn’t he want us to see?”  An answer that no one in the media is talking about.

This week, FiveThirtyEight released its first forecast of the 2020 presidential election.  Without boring you with the methodology, it is based on the following process.  Nate Silver and his team simulate the election 40,000 times, each with a difference variation of distribution of electoral votes.  So when they predict Biden now has a 72 percent chance of becoming the next commander-in-chief, it simply means there are still 28 percent of possible scenarios where Trump carries enough states to garner the necessary 270 electoral votes  for re-election.  And in almost every one of those story lines, the following four states are critical:  Florida, Georgia, Pennsylvania and Texas.  Trump must carry those four states.

What do they have in common?  In 2018, George employed DRE statewide with no paper backup.  The same was true for some jurisdictions in the remaining three states.  This did not go unnoticed.  In 2019, the Pennsylvania legislature mandated all newly purchased voting machines must have audit-able paper or image backup.  However, jurisdictions are allowed to continue to use older machines without this safeguard.

Georgia has also replaced it paperless system with one that prints a hard copy that can be reviewed by the voter before the final scan by a tabulating machine.  The paper version is retained in the event of a recount or audit.  However, as we learned during the Georgia primary in June, the system ran into several problems ranging from poll worker training to insufficient electrical power at some polling locations to handle the increased power demand.

Say what you will about the potential for fraud using mail-in ballots, it remains the only voting system in which there is a hard copy of every ballot cast.  And concerns about the integrity of mail-in ballots are dwarfed by suspicions paperless Diebold voting machines in Ohio accurately tabulated votes in the 2004 presidential election.  Equally alarming was the fact Diebold CEO Walden O’Dell was a major fund-raiser for George W. Bush and Ohio Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell owned shares of Diebold stock. In 2006, Barry Levinson wrote and directed Man of the Year in which a long-shot presidential hopeful (Robin Williams) is declared the winner due to a voting machine programming error.  [NOTE: Whether the manufacture and maintenance of voting machines should be the purview of a private company without some level of external oversight is a topic for another day.]

During Michael Cohen’s February 2019 testimony before the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, he knew his past actions on behalf of Trump made him a less than credible witness.  His solution?  He brought the “receipts,” including copies of hush-money checks to Stormy Daniels signed by Trump.  Mail-in ballots are another stack of receipts Donald Trump does not want you to see, which is an equally compelling reason for him to undermine the Postal Service’s ability to operate at maximum efficiency.

For what it’s worth.
Dr. ESP

Have you ever wondered why Democrats never tag the opposition with childish or offensive nicknames like “sleepy, crooked or Pocahontas?” Probably because they realize name-calling is a poor substitute for actually governing.  But I have a new theory.   Some of the most deserving members of Trump administration do not need new nicknames.  Their family names are far better descriptors than any epithets Democrats could come up with.

Consider the three member of DeBrotherhood of the Trumpist regime–Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis , and the most recent edition, Postmaster General Louis DeJoy.  According to Wikipedia, DeVos “is a concatenated form of the Dutch-language surname De Vos, meaning ‘the fox.'”  Can anyone argue there is no better example of the adage “the fox in the hen house” than DeVos in the Department of Education?

Next comes Governor DeSantis.  This surname is of Latin origin and comes from the word “sanctus” which means “holy” or “saintly.”  Of course, the prefix “De” is Latin for “from.”  And no one could be farther from holiness or saintliness than the chief executive of the Sunshine State.  Furthermore, is it mere coincidence the surname first appears in family records from the Lombardy region of Italy, the epicenter of the European coronavirus pandemic?  And now Governor DeSantis is responsible for his state’s holding the same distinction in America.  La ghianda non cade lontano dall’albero.

Which brings us to the newest member of this trinity of incompetence, Mr. DeJoy.  Interestingly, none of the websites which provide information about the origins of surnames (e.g. NAMES.COM or ANCESTRY.COM) shed any light on the etymology of this one.  The only available data suggest the name is relatively new, first appearing around 1880.  And the preponderance of DeJoy families reside in Rhode Island.  The most alarming tidbit is the fact  there are 666 (I’m not making this up) census records with the last name DeJoy.  (Source: ANCESTRY.COM)

[NOTE:  There are no references to DeJoy’s middle name. Is he trying to hide something?  My money is on Damien.]

Since being confirmed as postmaster general in May 2020, DeJoy has brought anything but joy to the postal service under the guise of “timely legislative and regulatory reform.” So far, that reform consists largely of cuts in funding for essential services and a reorganization which has stripped upper management of most of its professional expertise.  These firings have certainly earned him the title, “DeJoy of Sacks.” Of course, timely means before the November election after which there hopefully will be no DeJoy in Mailville.

One can only imagine how Trump would expand this team DeHell if re-elected. I have no doubt, he would establish the position of assistant undersecretary of animal husbandry in the Department of Agriculture, and his pick to fill the position would be queen of the puppy farms Cruella DeVille.  And the epic cinema chronicle of the Trump years, “Girth of a Nation” would most likely be produced and directed by the ghost of Cecil B. DeMille.

As for America and democracy as we know it.  In the immortal words of Porky DePig, “De-De-De-De-Dat would be all, Folks!”

For what it’s worth.
Dr. ESP

NOTE:  The following is my response to a op-ed piece in our local paper in which the writer questions how the son of a immigrant could possibly be anti-immigration.  To make his point, the writer provided a history of Mary Anne MacLeod’s immigration from Scotland to America and her early life here.  For the record, MacLeod would later marry Fred Trump and give birth to Donald Trump.

I applaud Patrick Keogh for sharing the story of Donald Trump’s mother Mary Anne MacLeod’s immigration to and early life in America.  Mr. Keogh is correct to point out it is the story of the parents and grandparents of an overwhelming majority of Americans, including my own grandparents who came to this country from Eastern Europe at the beginning of the 20^th century.

Unfortunately, Mr. Keogh falls into the trap of mixing the myth of Donald Trump his supporters want you to believe with the reality.  At the end of his essay, Mr. Keogh claims Trump only “wants folks to comply with our laws just like his Mom did.”  Except of course when those laws might apply to him and his family.  In the case of immigration:

• In August 1996, Melania Knavs (Trump) came to America on a B1/B2 tourist visa. In violation of the law, she immediately began working as a paid model.
• When this became known in October of the same year, Ms. Knavs applied for an H-1B visa. According to the Department of Homeland Security website, eligibility for an H-B1 visa requires the applicant have “theoretical and practical application of a body of highly specialized knowledge and attainment of a bachelor’s or higher degree in the specific specialty.”  Despite claiming to have a degree in Architecture and Design from the University of Ljubjana in Slovenia, in 2016, it was revealed she dropped out after one year.  Providing false information on a visa application is a federal crime.
• Melania Knavs applied for and received an EB-1 visa in 2001. Although this particular visa is often referred to as “the Einstein visa” because of its association with Nobel prize winners and renown scientists, it is occasionally awarded to actors and models who excel in their fields.  However, if Ms. Knavs again claimed to have received a college degree, she violated a federal law.
• In 2005, Melania Knavs applied for U.S. citizenship. The first question on the N-400 forms asks the applicant to affirm that he or she has “been a lawful permanent resident of the United States for at least 5 years.”  If she checked the box after providing false information on two previous visa applications that would also constitute a violation of federal law if she then signed Part 16 of the form which certifies “under penalty of perjury” the information provided is “complete, true and correct.”
• Part 8 of the N-400 requires the applicant provide information about schools attended including dates of attendance. If the application (which has never been made available for public review) does not accurately reflect having dropped out after one year, she would again be guilty of perjury under the Part 16 signed certification.

On August 9, 2016, once discrepancies in his wife’s immigration history were revealed, Trump announced Melania would hold a news conference “over the next couple of weeks” in order to counter reports she violated immigration laws when she came to the U.S.  We’re still waiting.

The double standard does not end there.  Trump has called for an end of what he calls “chain migration,” by which adult American citizens obtain residency for their relatives.  In November 2017, Trump tweeted, “CHAIN MIGRATION must end now! Some people come in, and they bring their whole family with them, who can be truly evil. NOT ACCEPTABLE!”  On August 9, 2018, Donald Trump’s in-laws Viktor and Amalija Knavs became U.S. citizens in a private ceremony in Manhattan under that same family-based immigration program Trump repeatedly demands must end.

If Donald Trump wants to present himself as the “law and order president,” I suggest he replace the portrait of Andrew Jackson in the Oval Office with a needlework sampler which reads, “Compliance with the law begins at home.”

For what it’s worth.
Dr. ESP