Brace yourselves...democracy is coming.

I expect nothing substantive to change with this election. That doesn't mean you shouldn't get off your butt and vote.

Followers of this blog (few though they are) will have noted a pattern to my posting in the past: I post infrequently until a national election comes around, then I seem to rediscover how to type and my output goes up dramatically. Until a month or two after the election, that is, when I fall back into the role of the occasional blogger.

This time it's a bit different.

I haven't been blogging much about political issues, or candidates, or the elections themselves, and for what I think is a good reason: I do not expect anything to really change.

Oh, there will be changes, certainly, perhaps even big ones. There is every possibility that the Republicans will take control of the Senate, and though I'm not entirely convinced this will happen most other political hacks seem to think it likely. Anyway, if you're a gambler, that appears to be the way to bet.

But even if it does happen, I don't think it will make much difference. Not at the national level, anyway. Even if the Republicans take the Senate, they are very unlikely to attain the magical two-thirds majority that they'll need to stop Democratic filibusters, putting the Republicans in the same place that the Democrats have been in for years.

Of course, the Republicans could always use the so-called "nuclear option," a change in the rules of the Senate that the Democratic leadership was too chicken-shit to use themselves this last session and thus allowed unending Senatorial gridlock. If the Republicans were themselves to use this option, it would be the best thing they could do for this country...but I don't see it happening, and for the same reasons that the Democrats never used it. The Democrats didn't want to lose the ability to filibuster when they were in the minority, as they eventually would be, as the Republicans are now and eventually will be again. No one wants to lose the power of "minority rule" if they're in the minority, or expect to be.

Then there's the semi-mythical "veto proof" two-thirds majority of both houses...and the Republicans, even if they make great strides in both the House and Senate, are highly unlikely to achieve this. The President, who will veto any legislation he strongly disagrees with, will not have to suffer the embarrassment of having his vetoes overridden.

So the President will continue to ask for legislation that won't get through Congress, and Congress will send legislation to the President that he will veto and Congress will be unable to override said vetoes, and we'll have the same situation that we've had for years...nothing getting done.

In the midst of all this cynicism, perhaps this is an odd time to cajole you all to get off your butts and vote.

There are several important parts to American democracy. Congress is one, The People (that's us, gang) are another. I don't expect that I'll get much argument if I say that Congress is broken, that it's just not working properly. This makes it all the more important that our part of the democracy, We The People as it were, work that much harder. I keep saying that democracy works better if we all participate, and I do hope that someone is listening, and that's all the more important if our "leaders" in Congress aren't doing their jobs. Which they aren't.

There are forces out there trying to limit your access to democracy. Don't let them. Vote. No matter how hard they make it for you, vote. If they try to say you can't, insist. Get downright noisy if you have to. Don't let anyone try to limit your ability to vote.

Whatever your politics, whatever your party, whatever your stance, vote. Don't let anyone tell you you can't, or won't, or shouldn't. Vote.

If they try to marginalize you, make them notice you. Vote. If they try to silence you, make yourself heard. Vote. If they try to ignore you, get in their way and make them pay attention. Vote.

Just vote, OK?

The Blues Viking

The opinions expressed here are mine and if you don't like them you can get your own damn blog.