A few days ago, when someone mentioned to me that Roy Moore had been successfully avoiding the press since news first broke about the child molestation allegations that had been leveled against him, I suggested that, if news agencies were really serious about getting his attention, they’d send younger reporters. Well, guess what? Moore finally gave an interview, and it was to a 12 year old girl.
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The girl who conducted the interview was apparently brought to Moore by the America First Project, a pro-Trump super PAC that, one would assume, wanted to prove to the men an women of Alabama that, yes, their candidate could actually be in the presence of a child without either forcing her to touch his erect penis through is underwear, or shoving her head into his lap… I guess we’ll have to wait until tomorrow to see how effective this last minute effort was.
As of right now, it would appear as though the race is too close to call. Fox News, as you may have heard, is saying that Moore is trailing by ten points in their most recent poll, but I wound’t be surprised if they were lying in hopes of driving more conservatives to the polls, while making Democrats think that their votes aren’t needed. And they really are needed, as the only path to victory the Democrats appear to require a record turnout from Alabama’s black voters, which is probably why we’ve started seeing so much involvement from folks like Cory Booker, Charles Barkley and Keegan-Michael Key, trying to turn out the black vote.
I know I’ve said ti before, but we’ve got a hell of a lot riding on this race. A win by Jones tomorrow would bring the Republican advantage in the Senate down to just one vote, and make the possibility of retaking the chamber in 2018 a very real possibility… as we could conceivably hold every Democratic seat, and pick up those currently held by Dean Heller in Nevada, and Jeff Flake in Arizona… If we picked up those two seats, as well as this one that’s currently up for grabs in Alabama, that would give us a 51/49 advantage, meaning that, finally, we could, among other things, stop Trump from remaking the judiciary in his image by naming absolutely unqualified lunatics to lifetime appointments on the federal bench.
More immediately, however, this election could dictate the fate of the Republican tax bill currently making its way through the resolution process… The Republicans currently have 51 votes in the Senate for their tax plan, as Republican Bob Corker has said that he won’t support it. And, if Jones wins, that would bring the vote count to 50/50 in the Senate, in which case, of course, Vice President Pence would cast the deciding vote in favor of passing the bill. But, the Republicans couldn’t afford to lose even one more vote. And, with both Jeff Flake and Susan Collins now expressing second thoughts, that’s looking increasingly likely. Which is why, I’m sure I don’t have to tell you, that the Republicans, after first stepping away from Moore, have rushed back to embrace him. They know that, if they lose in Alabama, this enormously unpopular tax giveaway to the rich of theirs could all fall apart.
Just to recap, tomorrow, the people of Alabama will be voting in a special election to send either Doug Jones or Roy Moore to the U.S. Senate. Doug Jones is a former U.S. attorney, who successfully prosecuted members of the Ku Klux Klan responsible for bombing an Alabama church in 1963, killing four young girls. Moore, on the other hand, in addition to probably being a pedophile who was, while in his 30s, banned from an Alabama mall for his aggressive pursuing children, has gone on record saying not only that “homosexual conduct should be illegal,” but that Muslim Americans shouldn’t be allowed to hold elected office. And, as if that weren’t enough, he’s also a birther, who was thrown off the Alabama Supreme Court not once, but twice, for his inability to respect our laws as written. He was so vile, in fact, that even Donald Trump endorsed his opponent, Luther Strange, in the Republican primary. But here we are, just a day before the election, with a number of prominent Republicans following Trump’s lead, and at least tacitly supporting Moore, perhaps thinking that, once he’s in office, they can replace him with someone a little less distasteful. Or, perhaps more likely, maybe they’re don’t care what kind of man he is, just so long as he votes their way on tax cuts for the wealthy.
For what it’s worth, there is reason to be hopeful in Alabama. While it’s certainly disheartening to see religious fundamentalists embrace a likely pedophile, thinking, I suppose, that he’d get them closer to biblical law than his opponent, things do seem to be changing. Granted some of that is happening just because Moore is such a reprehensible candidate, but it’s absolutely insane that a seat in Alabama, which I think Jeff Sessions last won just a few years ago with over 90% of the vote, is now actually in play. And, while several Republicans have gone back on their promises to oppose Moore, some haven’t. Alabama’s other Republican Senator, Richard Shelby, for instance, just went on TV yesterday morning and said that he would not be voting for Moore. Saying “Alabama deserves better,” Shelby essentially gave his fellow Alabamans permission to sit this election out, and that’s a truly incredible thing. More impactful for me, however, was this video taken tonight of an Alabama peanut farmer standing outside of a Moore rally, holding a photo of his gay daughter, who had taken her life at 23. To hear him talking about how he broke with Moore on the subject of homosexuality is powerful, powerful stuff, and it gives me at least a little hope for the future of our nation.
Father, who says he's a local peanut farmer in Wicksburg, outside Roy Moore rally talks about losing his gay daughter at age of 23 to suicide. "I was anti-gay myself. I said bad things to my daughter, which I regret." pic.twitter.com/J0oOU0EJI2
— Vaughn Hillyard (@VaughnHillyard) December 11, 2017