"Uncertainty" -- Will the Vote Actually Matter?

 

Americans have been trained to accept finagled and fudgy outcomes of elections for quite a long time, much longer than we think. Election chicanery is built in to the mechanisms of politics and voting in this country, and it always has been. We have never had truly free and fair elections, not even close, and the lengths to which campaigns and their owners and sponsors will go to steal elections outright is breathtaking.

Of course the 2000 election is the benchmark for election jiggering for most of us. I have called what happened when the Supreme Court decided the outcome -- by one vote, let it be said -- a "lawless intervention," because the Supreme Court is not tasked with electoral decisions. The Constitution gives that responsibility to the states, and in the case of a disputed outcome, the legislatures of the states determine the winner of the presidential election, not the Supreme Court of the United States. In other words, the Supreme Court had no jurisdiction but seized it anyway in as bold a move as we had seen taken by government up to then.

That was followed by an appallingly undisciplined move to electronic voting machines which are easily compromised -- with no possibility of audit or detection. All election outcomes conducted with such machines are by their nature suspect, and in 2004, it appeared that chicanery of many kinds were engaged in to ensure that Bush won the presidency, regardless of anything else.

This year's election has been primed and pumped to be a "cliff-hanger" right down to the wire. No matter what the polls indicated, the campaign horserace was always "tied" in the eyes of many mavens of the media -- because that's the narrative: they have to have their tight race or they have no story, and if they have no story, they don't make money. So while Obama was far in the lead through most of the campaign, there were always stories that the race was "tied" or that Romney was gaining or what have you.

All that changed with the first "debate," of course: the Very Game Changer that Chris Christie predicted happened. The stats turned sharply in Romney's favor as if by magic. The narrative is that Obama turned in a dreadful performance while Romney was keyed up and on point. Actually some who watched, like me, thought he was on a performance enhancing substance, oh like speed to name one. I wouldn't be surprised at all if that was the case. Obama, on the other hand, was clearly not into it, but he did his standard "workmanlike" performance, "Get through it and go home," which -- compared to Mister Hyper -- was interpreted as sleepwalking. Whatever.

But wait. How did Christie "know?" That is if he knew in advance what would happen, who told him? If he was just out on a limb, you could say it was a coincidence, but I don't think so. When the after-"debate" chatter started, chatter that seemed completely hysterical at dKos, for example (always a Republican spin palace, after all) I actually wondered if Obama was intentionally throwing the game. I would not put it past him, given the way our political class operates. He was giving it away in any case. Whatever else might have been going on Obama was not on top of the situation on stage, and he appeared not to care, either. Given Romney's "shambles" up to then, I thought his attitude toward the "debate" and his opponent was appropriate, but in the end, Obama gave me and pretty much everybody else no hope at all. His vision for the future was "stay the course." No matter what. After five years of an Endless Recession, he would continue it pretty much as is indefintely.

Sigh.

But hyped-up Romney wouldn't do much different, he'd just be more of a salesman about it and be meaner and more overtly bloodthirsty besides. This, to me, did not bode well for the future for most of us. Not well at all. Either things stay as dismal as they have been for many more years, or they get worse. And more wars. There is no "better future" in either man's vision. None.

We are doomed if we rely on the political class and the candidates for office to do something positive and productive on behalf of the People -- because they won't do it. Period. End of discussion. They don't work for us.

Which means that the election is not really in our hands in any case. Whatever we vote is what we vote. The outcome, on the other hand, is what the vote counters decide, or if the Supreme Court so chooses, what a handful of Robed Ones decide, and we don't have much to say about it one way or another. Given the nearly identical positions of the major candidates on nearly everything (certainly apparent in the Third Round) no matter how we vote, the outcome will be almost the same no matter who is installed on the White House Throne.

The only real question is how fast and nasty will the advent of the New America be.

Given Obama's propensity to accommodate Republicans and actually seek to enact their programs, even the brakes Obama has been using are no longer operative in any case.

There are only two weeks to the election, and given the current "uncertainty" narrative, I would speculate that even if Obama receives a resounding electoral victory at the polls (he won't, though), he won't take office for a second term. "Uncertainty" has been the narrative of the fattest of the Fat Cats for years now, and Romney is himself one of them. That could mean that the "uncertainty" meme is a foreshadowing of what is to come.

The choice has most likely been made; we await the reveal.

"Uncertainty" -- and The Libya Thing

What's going on in Libya is one of those Grand Mysteries of Empire that defy logic. The situation there was never apparently dire. It was just "uncertain."

And for some time now, Our Rulers have been obsessed with the notion that somehow "Uncertainty" is crimping their style and their pocketbooks, and the whole -- and only -- point of Government is to provide them (Our Rulers) with "Certainty" so that they may be comfortable in their own skins and reliably profitable as they scam the rest of humanity.

Simple.

So when things began to go south in Libya, the "Uncertainty" Principle was invoked, louder and louder, to justify military intervention. Well. Intervention. It was not entirely clear that those who were calling loudest for Intervention were aware that the kind of intervention they were calling for was actually a military intervention. It is not clear that these people understand even the most basic aspects of civilization, to tell you the truth.

Which gets us into another question of whether the Ruling Class is actually composed of ignorant and savage Barbarians. But that question will have to wait for another time.

Meanwhile, the Uncertainty in Libya filled the Rulers with dread. What if the Wrong People got hold of the Oil? You see? You see how awful it is? When rebellions erupt in Oil Rich regions, it becomes imperative to ensure that only the Right People have their grubby hands on the Oil Spigots. In Libya, the problem was that nobody knew who ultimately would have their hands on the Spigots, when and if they were turned on again, and that was intolerable.

Either the Madman Gadaffi would restore his authority and cooperation with his Oil Buddies, or the Unknown Rebels would win, with who knew what results?

Ergo, Intervention was imperative.

All the yabbering about "humanitarian" concerns is so much jejune palaver meant to mask the true nature of the mission: not to seize the Oil outright -- that's never necessary -- but only to ensure that it goes to market with as little hassle and interference as can be and that the profits from the sale of the Oil go to the Right People, not the wrong ones.

Under the circumstances, there are no "humanitarian" concerns at all.

The United States of America does not do "humanitarian interventions" in any case; we should be quite aware of that by now. The United States only does Interventions that enhance the pecuniary interests of the Government's sponsors. Unless those interests are served first and foremost, there will be no Intervention no matter how horrible the consequences for the Poor Devils on the ground.

So. What we're looking at with the Libya Thing is an Intervention intended to impose
Certainty on an Uncertain situation for the purpose of providing as much comfort and convenience to the Oil Oligarchs as possible.

That hundreds or thousands of Libyans will die in the process is of neither interest nor concern to those who must have Certainty.

Never was.

"Uncertainty"

One of the constantly repeated mantras of Our Overclass has been to call on "uncertainty" to explain everything -- including all their many crimes and abuses. "Uncertainty" is asserted as the reason for lack of lending by the banks, for the continuing high unemployment rate, for the stockpiling of enormous amounts of cash by obscenely profitable corporations, for the "necessity" of continuing to pay vast bonuses to the very individuals who crashed the economy several years ago, for the failure of foreclosure prevention programs, for the requirement by the Overclass that the plebes and proles be forced to pay for all the many programs under way to prop up the High and the Mighty, and to see social programs on behalf of the Underclass wither and die.

"Uncertainty" is said to be the underlying reason for the many known and unknown Imperial wars the United States is engaged in, for the rendering, disappearing and torturing of terrorism suspects, for the continued operation of the nation's many gulags at home and abroad, including Guantanamo, for the failure of courts to intervene in the ongoing assault by the Overclass on the political and civil rights and liberties of the American People.

"Uncertainty" rules. Everything.

But ask yourself. Are you ever "certain" of anything? Do you ever take a risk of any kind? If you don't, why not? And if you do, how have you survived?

The corporate (and general Rightist) fear of and invocation of "uncertainty" has become very nearly a religious experience for them. By invoking it as the primary cause of all the problems they -- and we -- face, they are essentially setting up a Golden Calf, an idol to worship.

There will be consequences. If they understood the uncertainty principle... ah, but the key is that they do not and cannot.

And that, my friends, is an opportunity for everyone else.

Thus, we might say, the uprisings we're seeing more and more of, and the complete inability of the High and the Mighty to control, or even predict, the outcome.

Hm.

Fascinating.

Don't even need a tinfoil hat for this one... ;-)