Hi friends,
I’ve been thinking about uncertainty and luck and here it is — Friday the 13th, a day associated with bad luck.
A Norse myth is one origin of the unlucky association with the number 13.
There was a party for twelve gods. A trickster god crashed the party as the 13th guest and induced another guest to kill a third guest, whose name was Balder.
"Balder died, and the whole Earth got dark. The whole Earth mourned. It was a bad, unlucky day."
We are trying to get the powerful ones to take seriously the urgent problems of climate change and war. That’s hard enough. What we don’t need is (more) bad luck.
What is bad luck? It is only the increased likelihood that something unfortunate will happen.
Yesterday, I read an article about seismic trembling that lasted for more than a week after
Nothing to see here, except the likelihood that there is more of this in store for a warming world.
Meanwhile, the conversation I had with young voters about US policy toward Israel and Gaza is apparently similar to the debates happening within and among groups like Muslim Women for Harris-Walz and American Muslims for Palestine.
It is likely that folks who might otherwise support the Democratic ticket will not do so because of Harris’s willingness to keep arming Israel. Is this unfortunate — a lack of “nuance and pragmatism” — or is it a triumph over hypocrisy?
Tell Kamala Harris that there’s a difference between supporting allies in need and enabling genocide.
And then, I learned of a socialist ticket, although I have no idea whether the candidates will appear on the ballot anywhere and I can’t begin to gauge what impact their candidacy might have the outcome of what may be a very close election.
Polling is full of uncertainty.
One pollster pointed out that Trump is winning among men who have not voted. That’s very hard to adjust for — how many will actually turn out on Election Day?
The Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) issued a new report that
reveals the extent of denial in the eight critical states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. It shows that corrosive efforts to damage public confidence in elections have proliferated there despite the drubbing the election denial movement received in the 2022 midterms.
This is decidedly unfortunate.
I do not believe that we make our own luck, as there are lots of factors that shape our reality that are beyond our control. At the same time, I think we can choose wisely when we have meaningful choices.
In the face of uncertain polling, certain voter suppression and election denial, and the very real dangers of a second Trump presidency, I think it’s unwise to consider a third-party vote even in a state you perceive to be solidly blue.
The right-wing news site, the Federalist, has been recruiting election deniers to cover the 2024 election for its publication since the beginning of this year.
Rolling Stone’s Justin Glawe reports on
behind-the-scenes efforts to enact denier-based policies and sow distrust in Georgia elections among activists — some of whom currently serve as county and state election officials. The records also provide insight into coordination between election denial activists and sympathetic right-wing media, with the Federalist expressly soliciting from these networks to not just inform its coverage of so-called election integrity efforts — but to create that content.
One hope for getting us safely from November 5th to Inauguration Day is a resounding Democratic victory.
Our work and our worries will not be over. Nonetheless, it will be helpful to deny the deniers the opportunity to question narrow electoral margins.
Engage conflicted voters in conversation. Listen to their very real concerns. Discuss the dangers of casting a third-party vote.
with love,
L