Reframe Your Inbox: Vote ✅

Hey everyone -- welcome to another edition of Reframe Your Inbox, a pseudo-semi-monthly(ish) email newsletter in which I share some meandering thoughts on books, politics, work, and life.

One housekeeping update. This will likely be the last edition of Reframe Your Inbox for a while. I plan to write fewer newsletters and articles, and instead spend these hours on a new book proposal. Good work takes time, and the book idea that’s been bouncing around in my head for more than a year will never evolve beyond its current state if I don’t devote some serious time to it.

Now, to today’s topic. Over the past few months, two activities have helped me recharge my mental and emotional batteries. The first is researching and writing a new article, “Why Obama Writes,” which will be published on Medium soon. As we (or at least I) eagerly anticipate the first volume of President Obama’s memoirs, this article traces the forty-fourth president’s lifelong passion for writing and explores why he keeps at it.

The second activity keeping me sane is calling and writing letters to voters. As I discussed in my latest appearance on the Feeding Curiosity podcast, the difference between a half-hour making get-out-the-vote phone calls and a half-hour doomscrolling apocalyptic political news couldn’t be starker.

With that in mind, I have a couple asks. The most important: VOTE. If you have the time and resources to do so, get involved in this election. Even if you hate making phone calls or don’t live in the United States or aren’t able to vote for whatever reason, there are many ways you can help out. Reply to this email if you want some ideas.

This election is not over. In a genuinely free and fair democracy, it would be (though in a genuinely free and fair democracy, Hillary Clinton would be president).

Unfortunately, that’s not the democracy we have. It’s easy to look at favorable polling or encouraging fundraising numbers and overlook the scale of the obstacles facing democracy in America. To name just a few: Racist voter suppression laws and tactics. Armed right-wing militias at polling places. Coordinated efforts to depress turnout. Unregulated social media platforms (and presidential bully pulpits) swarming with disinformation and dark money. Media outlets that seem to have learned very few lessons from 2016. Foreign interference, some of it solicited by the incumbent president. A politicized Department of Justice. A politicized Supreme Court. A politicized Postal Service. An undemocratic Electoral College. A shameless president desperate to preserve his self-image (and perhaps his immunity from prosecution). A shameless Republican party, along with its corporate backers, determined to change the rules -- determined to do whatever it takes -- to cling to power. Oh, and a global pandemic. (Sorry for subjecting you to more doomscrolling...)

Any one of these factors by itself could swing a swing state. And any swing state could swing an election. 77,000 votes in three states. 0.06 percent of all votes cast. That’s all it took four years ago.

It’s not 2016, of course. I could prepare a similarly lengthy list of reasons why 2020 is different, starting with the regrettable fact that Donald Trump is the president. We can win this election, and given the intimidating medley of anti-democratic hurdles I’ve just listed, the possibility of victory alone is reason for optimism. But we should be under no illusions that such an outcome is guaranteed. To paraphrase the old saying: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice… American autocracy. (I still prefer George W. Bush’s version.)

Over the next seven days, let’s do everything we can. And after Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are sworn in on January 20th, 2021, let’s make sure their first priority is a pro-democracy agenda that takes on corruption, strengthens institutions, and reforms American elections so we never find ourselves this close to the brink again.

See you on the other side.