These last few weeks the political landscape was rocked by a number of events including the unexpected suspension of negotiations on Biden’s Build Back Better legislation by the mercurial conservative Democratic Senator from West Virginia, Joe Manchin. He then inexplicably indicated he would still be involved in discussions. He is the crucial fiftieth vote on anything Democratic. The Democrats pivoted from Build Back Better to voting rights as the number one priority as the number of voter restrictions and repressive legislation measures proposed by “Republican” State Legislatures increased to two hundred and sixty - two.
A simple illustrative example of the expansiveness of the draconian measures is illustrated by what has transpired in Lincolnshire, a small County in the State of Georgia. All electoral officials will be replaced by “Republican” nominees and polling booths have been reduced from seven to one making it extremely difficult for minorities to vote, some living twenty - three miles away. There is also a Georgian State Law that voters standing in lines could not receive liquids or food. There is little doubt that voting rights face their biggest threat since Jim Crow.
Joe Biden presumably responding to the dramatic and underreported intervention from Raphael Warnock, the first Black Senator ever elected from the American South, confirmed in a Commencement address, honoring Jim Clyburn that the most important issue facing the country were the two Bills to avoid voter suppression that were languishing in the Senate. Not surprisingly Joe Manchin is crucial to their enactment as well as his vote is needed to overcome the arcane filibuster. Manchin has authored one of the two Democratic pieces of voter legislation. However he appears to rate “bipartisan co operation” more than democracy itself and is loth to axe the filibuster rule that requires sixty votes instead of fifty to pass voting legislation. This in the face of the filibuster suspension
the week before to allow for the raising of America’s debt ceiling. Senator Warnock’s appeal for the advancement of the franchise bills was met with high praise by all including Joe Manchin who stated it was “moving” But whether that means Manchin will deliver his vote only the divine know.
All this to the backdrop of another explosive Covid variant wave and the earth shattering reports from the January 6 House Investigating Committee. The latter whose aim was to prevent another assault on democracy would only be relevant if a democracy existed to be saved.
THE JANUARY 6 INVESTIGATION AND DEMOCRACY.
As the unbelievable, yet believable, revelations from the January 6 Investigating House Committee are released, reinforcing what so many hypothesized, that January 6 was just the giant symbol of a vast conspiracy to overthrow democracy in the USA. The abomination, like Watergate is pointing to the deep involvement of the Presidency and those surrounding him. That is where the comparison ends. While both scandals involved the democratic process and accountability, January 6gate represents the survival of democracy itself and the very essence of what America purports to stand for. In addition the unraveling of Watergate was for the large part bipartisan while January 6gate has very limited participation by the self same Republican Party.
Part and parcel of subverting the result of the 2020 Presidential election the revolutionaries want to enshrine into State law provisions that will both facilitate future “Republican” victory and in the event that this is not achieved, mechanisms whereby the result can be reversed. That is the text, the sub text is race and a continuation of America’s historical suppression of the voting rights of those of color.
The House Committee investigating January 6 may well be able to uncover criminal activity and refer the conspirators, financiers and organizers for criminal prosecution. They should be able to frame legislation for example that confirms the outcome of elections as well as protocols that ensure that the citadel of American Democracy is never so exposed to an insurrection again. However it is the States that set the rules for their elections and their ratification and unless there is a Federal Law that ensures that the franchise is available to all and that they can be fair and free, Congress’s power will be meaningless. All they would be able to do would be to formally ratify the slate of the electors presented to them by the States who would have conducted a elections according to their own discriminatory legislation.
The two Democratic Bills address the problems of the States’ efforts to suppress the voting rights of minorities and giving politicians the right to declare an election invalid. The inaction on this crucial issue brought forth a speech by the Reverend Raphael Warnock that was in the genre of Martin Luther King. He laid bare the hypocrisy of his colleagues on both sides of the Senate.
THE REVEREND RAPHAEL WARNOCK INHERITOR OF THE KING MANTLE
Placing the King mantle on Senator Warnock is intentional hyperbole. But for King, Warnock not to mention Obama and Harris would never have been. Reverend Warnock serves in the very same church in Atlanta Georgia, the Ebenezer Baptist Church, that King preached. He hasn’t the license that was afforded to King who as an activist could tell it as it was. Warnock is a politician who is involved in the arena of compromise and persuasion. However all the civil right change that King managed to give birth to is on a line as the autocratic Trump movement has moved to keep this country white. Warnock has the gravitas, the turn of phrase, the eloquence, the humility and the sense of history that so characterized Martin Luther King in his all too short life. In a brief intervention he exposed the hypocrisy of his colleagues who abandoned the sixty vote filibuster threshold to pass an economic bill but are refusing to do so for voting rights.
So began Warnock: “I come to the floor today after a long week of wrestling with my conscience. Before we left Washington last week, we in this chamber made a change in the Senate rules in order to push forward something which to all of us is important. We set the stage to raise the nation’s debt ceiling, and yet as we cast that vote to begin addressing the debt ceiling, this same chamber was allowing the ceiling of our democracy to crash in around us”.
Then he continued: “So.. I will be honest, this has been a difficult week for me as I’ve pondered how I am going to vote on this debt ceiling… I feel like I’m being asked to take a road that is a point of moral dissonance for me, I believe that both our democracy and our economy are important. I believe that it is misplaced to change the Senate rules only for the benefit of the economy when the warning lights on our democracy are flashing at the same time. I happen to believe that our democracy is at least as important as the economy…..Well the people of Georgia and across the country are saying voting rights are important enough. And so we cannot delay. We must continue to urge the party of Lincoln not to give in to the very forces of voter suppression that Dr. King described in that 1957 speech while standing in the shadow of Lincoln.
The Pastor of King’s Ebenezer Baptist Church ended his short admonition: “…..we cannot wait. With uncanny and eerie relevance, Dr. King’s words summoned us to this very moment. He said the hour is late. The clock of destiny is ticking out and we must act now before it is too late.”
Whether this moved Manchin and any Republicans enough to support the dropping of the filibuster remains to be seen. Manchin hasn’t axed this proposal yet and added that the Senator, “…did a very good job making his case”. Certainly following Warnock’s speech Biden publicly repeated his assertion that voting rights were the domestic priority
BIDEN, CLYBURN AND WARNOCK
President Biden makes very few Graduation Commencement speeches but his choice of the South Carolina State College was not surprising as he too attended a Community College. The occasion was the physical handing over a Graduation degree earned sixty - one years ago by his life long friend Jim Clyburn, who currently is the Chief Democratic Whip in the House of Representatives. Clyburn is also the doyen of South Carolina politics and the de facto leader of the African American political arm certainly in the Southern States. It is widely acknowledged, including by Joe Biden, that it was Clyburn’s ringing endorsement of Biden’s rock bottom primary campaign that was the turning point to Biden becoming President. There is a synchronicity in their approach to politics and to life. Both have deep seated convictions but have the political savvy to be just ahead of the curve and understand the practicality of politics. They don’t bear grudges and rarely if ever get personal.
However there is little doubt that Clyburn privately reinforced Biden’s decision to throw his full weight behind the Voting Bills.. Clyburn is acknowledged as the force that persuaded the forty - sixth President to announce on the campaign trail that the first Supreme Court Judge he would nominate would be a qualified woman of color. It came as no surprise to Jay H. Ell that Biden, a creature of the Senate who had been as opposed to breaking the filibuster as Manchin, had announced a few days earlier that the State attacks on voting rights made it essential if the Republicans wouldn’t support democracy that the Democrats should go ahead with breaking the filibuster rule..
Nor was it not surprising that Biden devoted a chunk of his Commencement address with a passionate plea to pass the Voting Rights legislation. He reminded the assembly that his motivation for entering politics was the Civil Rights movement before launching into a tirade at the current “Republican” Party’s onslaught on democracy, “I have never seen such an unrelenting assault on the right to vote. Never….. as John Lewis said, ‘Without the right to vote there is no democracy’…..it is not only about who gets to vote or making it easier…. It is about who gets to count the vote….this new sinister combination or voter suppression and election subversion is unAmerican, undemocratic and sadly not unprecedented… I directed every Federal Agency to promote voting… and the Justice Department has doubled voting rights enforcement…We’re going to keep up the fight till we get it done…..”
The media ignored the speech much as they had paid scant attention to Warnock’s oratory. There has been a lack of the sense of urgency on this crucial issue all round. However the leader of the Senate didn’t ignore the signal from the Commander in Chief. Chuck Schumer announced that he would bring the issue to the floor and if the Republicans filibustered he would move that it, like financial matters and Judicial appointments, would not be subject to a sixty vote threshold. If this does indeed happen front and center in this fight would be Reverend Raphael Warnock who with his understated charisma will dominate the debate. But that scenario begs the question of where Manchin, Senator Krystyn Sinema as well as the Senate Republicans like Collins, Murkowsi and Romney stand. If the latter fail on this central tenet Trump’s takeover will be complete.
AT THE END OF THE DAY.
Trump is dreaming of a White Xmas and in sync with his total lack of sensitivity is holding a Press Conference at Mar- O- Lago on January 6.
On January 17 2022, Martin Luther King Day, marches have been organized across America.
Eight hundred religious leaders of all faiths have written an open letter supporting voters’ rights.
For as long as the media are fixated on Trump and not recognizing the competence of Biden and his agenda, even downplaying him, they are not helping to save the democracy they operate in.
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