Electing the ‘election deniers’ may end democracy

The serious registered voter is approaching Nov. 8’s midterm election by studying issues, candidate credentials and party platforms. A clear-headed voter will vote for the best qualified candidate regardless of their political party affiliation.

Uninformed voters are those lemmings —many times blind sighted and duped by party propaganda — who vote a straight ticket without giving it a second thought. (And, then they act dumbfounded when politicians and their party pull the wool over their eyes.)

The 12 most pressing Nov. 8 election issues Americans face, as revealed by an Oct. 20 Pew Research Center report include: economy, education, election integrity, energy policy, foreign policy, future of democracy, gun policy, health care, immigration, reproductive rights, Supreme Court appointments and violent crime.

Eighty-six percent of the people surveyed by Pew noted the future of democracy is “very important.” Multiple media sources claim the results from the 2022 midterm election may give us a hint as to whether we’ll remain a democracy or revert to authoritarian and fascism rule.

The Freedom in the World 2022 report states America is one of the top five countries in the world with the largest 10-year decline of democracy attributes; “Global freedom faces a dire threat . . . the enemies of liberal democracy . . .  are accelerating their attacks.”

Two Brookings Institution articles (Oct. 7 and Oct. 22) note there are 345 people on the ballot — all Republican — who are 2020 presidential election deniers. As noted in the Jan. 11, 2021 issue of Scientific American, “scholars said the predominance of election deniers in the GOP bears alarming similarities to authoritarian movements in other countries.”

On Sept. 8, ABC News reported Donald Trump, from the 2016 primary election through today, “has made election denialism a central part of his campaigns and of Republican politics.” Yet, in December of 2020, Trump said to his staff — multiple times — “I don’t want people to know that we lost” (Newsweek, Oct. 13).

Ruth Ben-Ghiat, author of “Strongmen: Mussolini to the present,” an authoritarian and fascism scholar at New York University, claims “election denialism is a form of corruption.”

For the record, 100% of America’s 3,006 county auditors certified the 2020 vote, 63 court cases and GOP Attorney General Bill Barr also certified the election results and there were only 16 charged cases of voting illegally out of 158,397,726 ballots cast.

Of concern to the Brookings’ authors are governors, secretaries of state and attorneys general who “will have a great deal to say about how elections in their state will be run in the future” (Oct. 7). And, “denying the results of a fair election is threatening to the electoral process and American democracy” (Oct. 20).

Even Fox News owner Rupert Murdoch’s very own conservative-based Wall Street Journal discussed in the Oct. 18 and Oct. 20 issues the chaos the Nov. 8 election results may create for America. Races with Republican election deniers include Senate candidates in Arizona, Georgia, New Hampshire, Ohio and Pennsylvania plus governor candidates in Arizona and Pennsylvania.

Lisa Lerer of The New York Times agrees with the Journal’s watch-list, but also says to note the outcome of GOP election deniers in the Nevada and Wisconsin Senate races (Oct. 20).

Keep tabs of the above mentioned nine race results, plus the other 336 election-deniers seeking state and federal office. The outcome may indeed be a precursor to America remaining a democracy or reverting to authoritarian and fascist rule.

On or before Nov. 8, will you vote with a serious, fact-based and clear-headed demeanor or get hoodwinked by the GOP’s fraudulent election denialism scam?

Steve Corbin is professor emeritus of marketing at the University of Northern Iowa.