Sunday, February 23, 2020
Chapter One (253 Days Until the 2020 Election)
I'm writing a new novel, a non-fiction historical narrative set in America in the year 2020. The working title is Risk 2020 - The Great Civil Vote. It's about the continuation of democracy in the United States, or the end of it. It's about the survival of the US Constitution and rule of law, or its inevitable demise if Trump is allowed a second term. It's a real-time online work-in-progress contemporary novel spread out across social media sites I've hardly used until now. It will be my contribution to the Great Civil Vote of 2020, the vote that determines the direction of the country and the rest of the world. It's a numbers game that does not determine a winner based on the total number of votes from votes cast, but an elaborate, traditional, perhaps antiquated system of electoral votes distributed among the 50 states of which 270 (of 538 total) is required to win the presidency. That's the game. Because of demographics, history, the lay of the land, gerrymandering, tribal tendencies and state rules and laws, only a handful of swing states will determine the election's outcome. I know bits and pieces of the overall history of our battleground states since 2000, and don't yet know current forces at work to leverage/influence/manipulate battle-state outcomes this November, but I'm sure I'll learn all about the frontline conflicts that will occur in Florida, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, Arizona, Colorado, Missouri, Ohio, North Carolina and Minnesota. These states decide if Trump is defeated or wins reelection. For me, this is the only real contest that matters. Defeat must happen. He cannot be reelected. There are degrees of victory or defeat, but this binary decision (Trump wins or Trump loses) is paramount.
The working title, Risk 2020, comes from a board game I played with my friends growing up in Bellingham, WA in the 1970s and 80s. The object of Risk is world domination. Winning involves luck, diplomacy, deception, manipulation, cunning, alliances, betrayals, and smart decision making, essentially, a sociopathic mindset. I loved playing Risk when I was younger and welcomed the intensity, insanity, and emotional thrill of this brutal, exhilarating game of power, chance and warfare. Back then, winning was all that mattered. I was born with the competitive drive to win when it mattered. That drive isn't as strong anymore, but in certain activities it comes back to me, the need to compete and seek victory at all costs. America is a country obsessed with winning. The most perceptive line about America in the entire Hollywood film canon comes from Patton, 1 minute and 46 seconds into this clip:
It explains so much about so many things. It explains Lance Armstrong. It explains the Houston Astros. It explains who we worship, who we pay the most millions to, who we revere and erase from history. It will explain what happens in the next 253 days until November 3, 2020, Election Day.
This line from Patton also explains so much about me. Given the family I come from, the parents I have, and my natural internal hard wiring as a white male Canadian who immigrated to the United States at five and fell in love with chess, checkers, Ants in the Pants, Don't Break the Ice, football, kickball, squareball, the Game of Life, Monopoly, Careers, Stratego, poker, Battleship, Risk and an unusual political board game about presidential elections and electoral voting totals called Landslide, I understand the full meaning of what America loves and will not tolerate. At 56, I still clearly have this essence inside me, together with a fundamental adherence to fairness, facts and the truth.
And so, I'm joining Team Purple against the dreaded Team Orange in this two-team Civic Battle for the future of America. Whichever team wins becomes the writers of history and the deciders of the heroes and villains of our present day drama that has unfolded like the most outrageous made-for-TV fever dream any writer from any era could have imagined. My fiction reading has all but stopped of late because, seriously, how can fiction compete with the utter lunacy of real life as reported in the NY Times and Washington Post since the day after the last big election 39 months ago.
Chapter One (253 Days Until the 2020 Election)
I'm writing a new novel, a non-fiction historical narrative set in America in the year 2020. The working title is Risk 2020 - The Great Civil Vote. It's about the continuation of democracy in the United States, or the end of it. It's about the survival of the US Constitution and rule of law, or its inevitable demise if Trump is allowed a second term. It's a real-time online work-in-progress contemporary novel spread out across social media sites I've hardly used until now. It will be my contribution to the Great Civil Vote of 2020, the vote that determines the direction of the country and the rest of the world. It's a numbers game that does not determine a winner based on the total number of votes from votes cast, but an elaborate, traditional, perhaps antiquated system of electoral votes distributed among the 50 states of which 270 (of 538 total) is required to win the presidency. That's the game. Because of demographics, history, the lay of the land, gerrymandering, tribal tendencies and state rules and laws, only a handful of swing states will determine the election's outcome. I know bits and pieces of the overall history of our battleground states since 2000, and don't yet know current forces at work to leverage/influence/manipulate battle-state outcomes this November, but I'm sure I'll learn all about the frontline conflicts that will occur in Florida, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, Arizona, Colorado, Missouri, Ohio, North Carolina and Minnesota. These states decide if Trump is defeated or wins reelection. For me, this is the only real contest that matters. Defeat must happen. He cannot be reelected. There are degrees of victory or defeat, but this binary decision (Trump wins or Trump loses) is paramount.
The working title, Risk 2020, comes from a board game I played with my friends growing up in Bellingham, WA in the 1970s and 80s. The object of Risk is world domination. Winning involves luck, diplomacy, deception, manipulation, cunning, alliances, betrayals, and smart decision making, essentially, a sociopathic mindset. I loved playing Risk when I was younger and welcomed the intensity, insanity, and emotional thrill of this brutal, exhilarating game of power, chance and warfare. Back then, winning was all that mattered. I was born with the competitive drive to win when it mattered. That drive isn't as strong anymore, but in certain activities it comes back to me, the need to compete and seek victory at all costs. America is a country obsessed with winning. The most perceptive line about America in the entire Hollywood film canon comes from Patton, 1 minute and 46 seconds into this clip:
It explains so much about so many things. It explains Lance Armstrong. It explains the Houston Astros. It explains who we worship, who we pay the most millions to, who we revere and erase from history. It will explain what happens in the next 253 days until November 3, 2020, Election Day.
This line from Patton also explains so much about me. Given the family I come from, the parents I have, and my natural internal hard wiring as a white male Canadian who immigrated to the United States at five and fell in love with chess, checkers, Ants in the Pants, Don't Break the Ice, football, kickball, squareball, the Game of Life, Monopoly, Careers, Stratego, poker, Battleship, Risk and an unusual political board game about presidential elections and electoral voting totals called Landslide, I understand the full meaning of what America loves and will not tolerate. At 56, I still clearly have this essence inside me, together with a fundamental adherence to fairness, facts and the truth.
And so, I'm joining Team Purple against the dreaded Team Orange in this two-team Civic Battle for the future of America. Whichever team wins becomes the writers of history and the deciders of the heroes and villains of our present day drama that has unfolded like the most outrageous made-for-TV fever dream any writer from any era could have imagined. My fiction reading has all but stopped of late because, seriously, how can fiction compete with the utter lunacy of real life as reported in the NY Times and Washington Post since the day after the last big election 39 months ago.
ME: (Testing the comment box) Test, test. One two, one two. Is this thing working?
ReplyDeleteYes, it's working!
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