The Blues, Facts, No More Moping

For more than a week I have been moping around, living the blues and now have a better understanding of a certain type of country-western music. You know the type of CW music where your dog died, your spouse ran away with your best friend, your beer is warm and your pick-up from the 1950s is low on oil and has a flat tire.

But the following gave me some perspective. The below table lists total eligible voters and percent of eligible voters. You will notice the following, the number of total of eligible voters increase with each Presidential election. The percent of actual voters varies by election.

Year        Total Eligible Voters       Percent Who Actually Voted
1980        159,635,102                 54.2%
1984        167,701,904                 55.2%
1988        173,579,281                 52.%
1992        179,655,523                 58.2%
1996        186,347,044                 51.7%
2000        194,331,436                 54.3%
2004        203,483,455                 60.1%
2008        213,313,508                 61.6%
2012        222,474,111                 58.0%
2016        230,931,921                 59.2%
2020        240,628,443                 65.2%

In this election there were about 244 million eligible voters. Trump received about 75.5 million votes while Harris received about 72.4 million votes. Trump received less than 2% more votes then he did in 2020 while Harris received about 11% less votes than Biden in 2020.

The reason Harris lost was not her campaign, her message, her vision or her plans. The reason she lost was eligible voters did not turn out to vote. About 60.6% of eligible voters actually voted. Significantly less than 2020 when about 65.2% of eligible voters and very similar to the previous four Presidential elections.

And for the record, this past election was fair and accurate as was 2020 as was every other Presidential election in US history. Anyone who thinks that Trump won the 2020 election is one of two things and I do want to be polite here. Either a complete and total F***ing idiot or wants to end American democracy. Both could be true.

When bad things happen going forward Harris supporters will want to blame Trump supporters and this is understandable. But Trump was very clear on what he would do if re-elected. Every person that voted for him support his positions on women’s rights, gun control, climate change to name a few. His supporters want a White Christian Nationalistic government. In my lifetime, there has never been a greater difference between two Presidential candidates. They had clearly opposite visions of American going forward.

So if Harris supporters want to blame someone, they [we] should blame the tens of millions American who did not vote. Trump supporters changed minimally from 2020 to 2024, what changed is the number of Americans who chose not to vote.

Some will want to blame Harris. That’s stupid. She ran a great campaign. She was very clear on her vision for the country. And she did not lie while it was hard to tell when her opponent was not lying. There is a difference between political spin and an outright lie.

So when a woman dies while pregnant because she cannot get health care, its non-voters fault. As the frequency and intensity of natural disasters increase, its non-voters fault. Every time there is school shooting or any other type of mass shooting its non-voters fault. Every poorly appointed cabinet member by Trump is the non-voters fault. Trump’s attack on democracy will continue and if he wins, its every non-voters fault.

I believe the millions of Americans who were eligible to vote and chose not to do so should lose access to federal programs including but not limited to the following; student loan forgiveness, social security benefits, Medicare benefits, and again this is to name a few.

To non-voters, either get in the game or get the hell out of American. Every bad thing that happens under the Trump Presidency is your fault.

And for all that supported Harris, its time to stop moping and get back into the fight. None of the issues that my grandchildren will have to face in the future have changed. I refuse to spend one more minute worrying about what could have been. Clearly the path will be much harder, but I will focus what still can be.