I Voted

The returns are coming in and I'm not really paying attention.  I'm fairly pessimistic.  I think a Democratic House is likely but not a given.  Republican Senate pretty likely but I would like to be surprised.  I feel like we won't flip the senate seat in Texas.  The governors races in Georgia and Florida feel unlikely.

I was cautiously optimistic in the last election.  I felt like the Presidential race wasn't in question, but I was really hoping we were going to flip the PA Senate seat.  Neither of those came out how I was hoping.  That result really makes this election harder to get excited about.

I did my thing though.  I made sure to vote.  I made a contribution down the stretch.  I tried to change some minds.  I did what I could to support those people that were doing more than I was.  I can't help but feel like I should have done more.  For the last couple of days I've had a real feeling of ineffectiveness.  It felt pretty clear that Wolf and Casey and Doyle and Frankel were all going to win whether I showed up or not.  I did get to vote for John Fetterman this time.  In 2016 he lost in the primary so I didn't get a chance to vote for him.  That was nice.

My pessimism is actually about the US House.  People are thinking that with a Democratic takeover of the house that oversite might make a comeback.  There are predictions for all kinds of hearings and investigations.  I would love to see closer scrutiny of many of the agency heads as part of that.  But the confirmation hearings we've seen so far give me pause.  Several witnesses in those hearings simply refused to answer questions.  I can see people being called to testify under oath and doing the same thing - just declining to answer.  The recourse committees will have would be to refer those witnesses to Justice for contempt of Congress.  In any prior administration one would assume that the AG would pursue those charges.  In this administration I can feel that charge just being left in a drawer.

Hopefully I don't understand it properly.  If not, the investigations don't feel like they'll go anyplace.

Yes we can!