Easter marks rebirth of optimism for Biden

Biden poll numbers climb following State of the Union while Trump faces criminal accountability, at long last.

Ed. note:  It’s been a busy couple of weeks where, once again, the daily firehose of news provokes even the most avid news junkies like me to sit back and wonder, “Where do I even begin to process it all?”  The Resistant Grandmother (TRG) has attempted to maintain equilibrium by preparing for an Easter visit to California to visit my son and daughter-in-law and five-year-old granddaughter and two-year-old grandson by packing Easter egg coloring kits and a few new spring clothes for them as reminders there can still be fun and good in this world despite the relentless threats of Donald Trump and what he represents. 

But it’s not easy, as Trump and his minions keep jogging our memories with his dangers. To wit: His ongoing purge (by way of daughter-in-law Lara) of the Republican National Committee (RNC) of anyone who does not submit to the Big Lie the 2020 election was “stolen” – an omen of what would face federal employees were Trump to win again. The pattern being: toadies, in; truth-sayers, out.  Think of how such a purge would affect the expertise inherent in the Federal Drug Administration (FDA), Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Bureau of Labor Statistics, and Department of Justice, to name just a few of the agencies our modern free society depends on to keep us safe and honestly informed were Trump to win a second term. 

And then there’s Trump hawking his new bible.  For a mere $60, malleable American Christians may funnel even more money into his criminal defense fund.  The whole scheme reeks of irony and fraud as Trump famously has never been able to answer a single simple question about his knowledge of anything in the Good Book, let alone live according its values.  “What’s your favorite passage?" John Heilemann once asked him during an interview when Trump was touting his devotion to the Bible. “I’d just rather not answer that question,” Trump replied.  Heilemann persisted: “Are you a New Testament fan or Old Testament?” Even that lobbed softball stumped Trump who responded, “I really just like them both.”

Yes…so much to choose from, or try to ignore to keep even some modicum of sanity.  It’s all the more reason to enjoy the Easter holiday, Passover, Ramadan, Spring Solstice – whatever may be your spring holiday.  And we need to relish it, because there’s so much more ahead. – trg

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I’m writing this latest column in the Easter spirit of rebirth and hope.  It’s taken me a few weeks to get to this optimistic place, but I’m here now for reasons I’ll share in greater detail throughout this posting.   

Explained briefly, though, the hope rises from a belief, early as it may be, that the political center, the one that will save democracy, may be holding now, albeit 7 months from the November 5 election. 

Enough wise and wised-up Americans appear to be seeing through the defrauding New York hotelier’s promises of taking us to a place most of us don’t want to go – where the rich get richer, women lose rights to make reproductive decisions against the wishes of the state, and democracy and the sanctity of free and fair elections goes away. 

Trump’s so good at duping others by now he still holds an OK but not overly impressive position in the polls, although the last month suggests that’s changing.  According to Bloomberg, “Polls show a shift over the last month from the last five months of mostly consistent Trump leads” (26 march bloomberg.com).

Go Blue!
The changes seem especially stark in three Great Lakes states where Trump had been leading in February – by four points in Wisconsin, two in Michigan, and six points in Pennsylvania. Now, Biden leads in Wisconsin by 1 point and is tied in the two others – showing a five-six point surge for Biden in just one month.

February March
Wisconsin Trump + 4 Biden +1
Pennsylvania Trump + 6 Tie
Michigan Trump + 2 Tie
Nevada Trump + 6 Trump + 2

This is important because if Biden wins those three states alone, he re-wins the presidency – forgetting worries over Georgia and Arizona, two other swing states Biden won in 2020 but where he currently trails Trump. 

According to Bloomberg News, “November victories in the so-called “Blue Wall” northern battlegrounds would all but vault Biden to a second term” (march 26 bloomberg.com).

In a tight race, even small leads can make a difference. This year, both major candidates also face the erosion of votes coming from a third party candidate like Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.   Former Obama campaign director David Plouffe said that, in such a potentially tight three-way race, just a few points will determine a win vs. a loss:
“We could be looking at a 48 point winner, a 47 point loser and five points going to a third party candidate. So one-two, or three points could really matter,” he said (march 27 msnbc.com). 

Nevada – probably OK
Along those lines but in non Blue Wall states like Nevada, Biden’s trailing Trump by two points – a position similar to that of Nevada Senator Catherine Cortez Masto when she faced challenger former Nevada Attorney General Adam Laxalt in the 2022 midterms.  She maintained a two point deficit throughout much of the race.

But the secret sauce helping Democratic candidates in the Silver State has proved to be the Culinary Workers Union – a powerful force that has often transformed a two point shortfall for Democratic candidates there into a win on election day.

Peach State fuzziness
Only Georgia, where the Trump Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations (RICO) trial spearheaded by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has been sidelined during hearings concerning her affair with a prosecution staffer, has seen Trump gaining ground during the February-March period.  As the Willis hearings dominated headlines, Trump’s popularity among Peach State voters grew between February and March by one point from + 6 to + 7. 

One could argue that, given the weeks of hearings where Willis’s questionable judgment was front and center, Trump’s gain might have been even larger.  Although Judge Scott McAfee ruled she may stay on, the hearings’ tawdry testimony may have hurt the Democratic brand, as Willis is a Democrat – inadvertently affecting Biden. 

Still, it’s disheartening that the same Georgia voters whom Trump tried to defraud by pressing Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to find “11,780 votes, or just one more than we have” to deny Georgia voters their choice for president four years ago, essentially seem to be okaying that same dishonesty to occupy the Oval Office again this year.  But then, seven months in politics is a long time…

Authoritarian surrender?
Another possible factor in Trump’s holding steady in the polls is his lack of criminal accountability.  Voters may have adapted a sanguine attitude toward Trump thinking, “He must not have done anything too wrong, as no one has been able to make him pay for it.”  It’s a kind of surrender to depravity common in authoritarian societies where citizens have been conditioned to believe, “Everyone is corrupt, so what’s the difference?  There’s certainly nothing I can do. This is just the way things are.”

Yet the Nikki Haley candidacy suggests that a sense of resignation hasn’t taken over all GOP voters.  Of those Republican primary voters who chose Haley, 63 percent have said they would vote for Joe Biden over Trump in the general election. Another 51 percent said that a criminal conviction in any of the 88 criminal charges facing Trump would make him “unfit to hold office” and function as the “no go” reason not to vote for him (“Only Half of Republicans Would Vote for Donald Trump if Convicted: Poll” (14 february newsweek.com).

April 15 offers that criminal reckoning
With the criminal trial against Trump for 2016 election interference and its 34 count indictment slated to begin in Manhattan on April 15, “convicted felon” may be the one title that offers the bridge too far for Haley’s voters and other Republicans and Independents who cannot envision putting a criminal in the White House. 

No rest for the weary
While the uptick in polls and the possibility of criminal accountability offer significant evidence the campaign is shifting in Biden’s way, seven months out from the election is no time to rest easy, says Mark Elias, a Democratic elections lawyer who has successfully battled anti-voting measures instigated by Republican state legislatures. 

For example, Trump’s virtually flaunting a gag order imposed by the judge in his upcoming Manhattan trial caught headlines just this morning.  And, following the authoritarian playbook, Trump has been using projections – accusing others of doing what he is actually doing – by describing Biden as a “enemy of democracy” and “stealing elections.”  The idea is, making words and ideas mean nothing will take away their potency.  And if everyone looks bad, then he, Trump, won’t look as bad.  After all, it’s a game plan that’s worked for dictators like Trump friend Vladimir Putin.  Why not him?

But Elias warns that allowing ourselves to get overcome by the daily firehose of events will sap needed energy for the critical seven months ahead, saying:
“It’s too easy between now and November to get sidetracked by the other news of the day. Every day Donald Trump is spreading lies and misinformation about democracy.  And democracy is what will be on the ballot in November.”  

Autumn rebirth?
Nov. 5 promises to be a cold day for many of us, compared to spring when it’s warmer. But to Elias and those voters who won’t buy into Trump’s bibles or falsehoods, it could offer the rebirth of democracy we need.

– trg 

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