Patrick Semansky/AP Photo
Ornaments hang from a tree during the 2020 Christmas preview at the White House
One can get vertigo reflecting on just what a close call this was for the American Republic.
For starters, it is a miracle that Republican judges, from the U.S. Supreme Court to the Wisconsin Supreme Court, as well as countless district court and state court judges, had had a bellyful of Donald Trump and refused to play his games. Given the hard-right partisan makeover of the courts, this was in no way guaranteed.
It is a similar miracle that local and state Republican election officials took more pride in doing their jobs well than in stealing the election for Trump. Given all the voter suppression that Republicans have carried out in past years, this was a pleasant surprise as well.
All of this suggests that more of the deep state, otherwise known as core American democracy, is alive and well than we feared.
And it is miraculous that the Democratic Party at all levels, and the entire grassroots infrastructure of the progressive movement, went all in for Biden. Given that the fractious Democrats are famous for not being able to organize a two-car funeral without bickering about the details, this was in no way assured. But you have to go to the left wing of Jacobin magazine and the warmed-over far-left sectarian faction of DSA to find some dunce who argued that Biden was not worth voting for.
It was a miracle that the COVID vaccine breakthrough did not occur even two weeks earlier. Whether or not some vaccine makers held back good news, we got very, very lucky.
It was a miracle that Putin decided to show off his hacker prowess on everything but the election itself. He easily could have created enough havoc on Election Day to throw the results into doubt and facilitate any of the several Trump scenarios that, mercifully, did not come about.
Maybe Putin, having watched Trump do his bidding for four years, concluded that all the useful damage had been done, and that Trump was such a loose cannon that he might turn against Moscow next.
Of course, we will not fully exhale until Joe Biden is inaugurated in just one month. And then the business of rebuilding can begin. But look at all the bullets we dodged.
Blessings all around.
