Until it had unknotted when I heard that Doug Jones had narrowly won over Roy Moore in Alabama, I hadn't realized how tense I'd gotten over the Senate race there. Alabamans have proven that they are better than Steve Bannon and the billionaire oligarchs who fund his fascism hoped they were, they also proved they are better than Republicans who managed to barely make it over that lowest of bars but still hoped for Moore's vote or to use his victory to install an appointed Republican in the seat.
I am all in favor of encouraging Alabamans to realize they've deserved better all along. To look hard at their recent history of incredibly corrupt politicians and judges and to use this as their turning point away from that, proving to the country that in every state there are people of good will and good intentions. Alabama is hardly the only state that has had terrible corruption and terrible people elected, I know, Paul LePage is still governor here.
The coverage of the election said that Doug Jones ran a very aggressive campaign with a huge get out the vote effort - one Alabaman I heard said he'd had to build that up from nothing. I took that to mean that this is another vindication of the 50-state-strategy that Howard Dean implemented only to have it destroyed by Rahm Emanuel and, let's face it, Barack Obama who was faulted for refusing to share resources with lots of Democrats down the ticket from him.
It was a defeat for Republican depravity but it was also a defeat for snobbery, especially regional snobbery which has given Republicans a tool with which to gull a margin of voters in many places targeted by snobs to win over and over again. That is something which they've been doing successfully for decades, now, and the snobs have bought us nothing but defeat. Smart people who wanted decency to rule would have learned a lesson by now, the snobs aren't smart people and they don't care about decency as much as their high opinion of themselves.
There isn't any time to lose, I heard a Republican from Alabama say that Doug Jones will lose the seat in 2020. I hope that Jones gives such great constituent service, that he is such a good Senator for his state and the country that that is wrong but Republicans will be trying to make lies and hate and resentment and bigotry work for them. If they can be blocked from doing that in Alabama it will be a huge defeat. There would be nothing greater than to see things turn back in the direction of decency, the pivot back based on Alabama.
Right now, there's a terrible tax bill to defeat, Susan Collins and one or two other Republicans have to be talked out of voting for whatever deparavity they cook up in conference, there are lots of Republican House members from "blue states" that need to be convinced to vote for The People, not for Steve Bannon's patron.
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