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Voting shame doesn’t involve ballot counting
BY DAVID LEIBOWITZ
Tribune Columnist
For years, we have heard a few thousand tales about election theft, conspiracies and fraud. “They,” we are told, handpick certain candidates to win, rigging the balloting to get their preferred outcome.
This conspiracy leverages evil ballotcounting machines, or the pens used to bubble ballots, or “mules,” or ballot harvesting, or human hijinks. Whatever.
I have heard it all, most of it going in one ear and out the other. Until now.
Because now I want to tell you about the real election disgrace, the one that happened last Tuesday – Primary Day – when a handful of us helped determine the future of Arizona for all of us.
You’ve heard about the Big Lie. Now comes the Big Truth.
The American system of choosing who governs us is based not on getting you to vote, but on getting you to stay home. And it’s working incredibly well.
Let me explain.
Arizona is a state of 7.3 million people, with 5.7 million residents age 18 or older. That’s our voting age population. However, as of Primary Day, only 4.2 million had actually registered to vote. The other 1.5 million Arizonans have decided to sit out this civic duty entirely, or have been disqualified for a felony conviction or some other factor.
Then the Democrats and Republicans – I see little difference between the two – really got busy. In Arizona, 1.4 million voters have registered without choosing a party. For this cohort to vote in the primary, each voter had to jump through multiple hoops to choose a party ballot. That further winnowed election participants.
So did the relentless advertising blitz that accompanied this primary. Campaign finance reports for the Arizona governor’s race alone show upwards of $40 million spent before July 15.
It was a hideous noise fest, with vicious allegations of unfitness, lying and lawbreaking. Any rational person consuming these ads could only conclude the primary races were being contested by criminals and morons.
Voters acted accordingly.
When the last ballot is counted – by county elections officials or some cabal or fraudsters -- about 1.4 million Arizonans will have chosen a candidate. The parties will natter on about “record primary turnout,” despite the turnout hovering around 30 percent of registered voters.
Only about one in four Arizona adults will have voted. Count everybody including children and the voting rate sinks to about one in five residents.
Lucky us, we’ll get to do it all again in November.
This electoral system of ours is irrevocably broken, delivering us the least and the slightest, bitter partisans, conspiracy loons and the power-mad.
My proof of this failure?
The best way to judge how well systems work is by how frequently they are adopted. Amazon Prime, launched in 2005, counts 163 million customers nationwide. About 95 percent of American adults go online. When in pursuit of information, about 90 percent choose Google, launched in 1998, as their go-to search engine. These systems work.
Then there’s the election system, founded in 1776. It’s never been easier to vote. The ballot comes by mail, you bubble it in and mail it, postage-free. Or you drive a couple miles one or two Tuesdays a year, and wait in a line that’s typically shorter than the Safeway checkout. You even get a sticker for voting, so you feel like a hero for one day.
Even so, three in four Arizona adults can’t be bothered. That’s the Big Truth underlying the 2022 primaries.
The shame wasn’t how “they” counted who did show up. The shame was the lousy choices and millions of dollars that persuaded 75 percent of us not to bother showing up at all.
‘Jetsons’ underscored more than the future
BY JD HAYWORTH
Somewhere between the promise of our national paternity embodied in George Washington and the perils of dystopian dictatorship described by George Orwell, we encounter the everyday “foibles of the future” through the animated experiences of George Jetson.
While many of us got better acquainted with Washington through our studies of American History, and later encountered Orwell’s compelling fiction in literature class, Baby Boomers got to know George Jetson and family through television.
“The Jetsons” premiered in 1962 and the cartoon classic will celebrate its 60th anniversary next month. As for the fictional father of that 21st century family, series canon proclaims his date of birth as July 31, 2022. Belated happy birthday, George!
Tim Donnelly and The New York Post chose that day to chronicle “What ‘The Jetsons’ predicted right—and wrong— about the future.”
Aside from cataloging the “hits” (videophones—think Skype and Zoom; flat screen televisions—no further explanation required; and robotic maids—not Rosey, but Roomba); the “misses” (still no machines to simultaneously comb your hair and brush your teeth, nor prepare fabulous meals with the touch of a button); and the “maybes” (personal jetpacks do exist, but not for consumers, and flying cars still remain “in development”), the article also notes that the series casts a very long shadow despite a very short run— only 24 episodes over a single season in its original iteration.
So, it’s “Back to the Future” for an even earlier citation to explain the outsized influence of this cartoon series. No less a publication than Smithsonian Magazine put it this way: “The Jetsons’ stands as the single most important piece of 20th Century Futurism.”
It proclaimed that a decade ago, when the show celebrated a half-century.
Why?
Entire books have been written on the subject.
British author and professor Danny Graydon, wrote his book, “Cartoon Classics: ‘The Jetsons’” in 2011.
In observing both his “American Cousins” and the tenor of their times from a safe transatlantic distance, he offered this analysis: “It coincided with this period in American history when there was renewed hope…there was something very attractive about the nuclear family with good honest values thriving well into the future.”
Through the eyes of a certain 4-year old, enthralled with the 1962 orbital flights of John Glenn and Scott Carpenter, the premiere of “The Jetsons” just reaffirmed the reality of the Space Age, but also kindled a form of initial introspection about the concept of age and aging—also known as “growing up.”
For the grown ups raising that 4-year old and seeing their own nuclear family expand – even as a nuclear confrontation between the US and the USSR loomed later that fall – “The Jetsons” provided a form of escape and much needed laughter.
There’s no doubting that the show’s creators, William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, saw “The Jetsons” as a variation on the successful theme they first developed with “The Flintstones.”
After introducing America to the “mod-
ern stone age family,” it only made sense to mine for comedy gold from the other end of History’s timeline. As noted above, those efforts were initially met with limited ratings success.
But to paraphrase Gen. Douglas MacArthur, “Old TV shows never die…they return in reruns.” And the influence of “The Jetsons” shows no signs of fading away.
Etched into the memory of that 1962 4-year-old is the saga of Astro, the Jetsons’ dog.
Six intervening decades have done nothing to diminish the youthful angst experienced when viewing the story of a billionaire who initially owned the canine
THE MESA TRIBUNE | AUGUST 7, 2022 named “Tralfaz” lost him, only to have George and family find the dog and rename him…then the ensuing legal verdict from “Jury-Vac” to award the pet to the man with all that money.
And even now, a feeling of relief returns when recalling the realization of the billionaire that Astro ought to remain with the family who took him in.
But it isn’t the gleaming gadgetry of the future that accounts for the enduring influence of “The Jetsons.” It’s the relationships found within the family.
Like Elroy and Astro…a boy and his dog.
A king of old put it this way in his ancient, sacred text: “There is nothing new under the sun.”
That’s the truth, by George.
Share Your Thoughts: Send your letters on local issues to: pmaryniak@ timespublications.com
