Politics

The results aren't final yet and the race is still officially "too close to call," but sometime very early this morning, I'm told around 5:00 am, the  total number of votes counted for Democrat Joe Biden finally crept past those of our so-called Republican "president," and if that lead holds (it's already been announced that there will be a recount), the State of Georgia will officially award its 16 Electoral votes to a Democrat for the first time since Bill Clinton's first campaign back in 1992.  

We did it - we flipped Georgia.

Actually, that may not be totally accurate.  Georgia has probably already been a "blue state" for many years now, at least more center or left-of-center than conservative, but a combination of voter suppression and gerrymandering has effectively silenced the true will of the people for at least a decade now.  The state is younger, less white, and more progressive than its representation would lead you to believe.

Georgia politicians have had literally centuries of experience overruling the majority.  There has been something resembling the current system of voter suppression and gerrymandering going back to the 1950s, a century of Jim Crow laws before that going back to the end of slavery in the 1860s, and then, of course, slavery itself going all the way back to 1619.

Depending which state races are called when - in addition to Georgia, the races in Pennsylvania, Arizona, Nevada, and North Carolina are all still officially "too close to call" - Georgia may or may not be the state to put Biden over the 270 Electoral votes he needs.  Doesn't matter, as long as he gets there, but it would feel good if Georgia were the state to carry him across the transom.

But wait, there's more - Georgia has two Senate races this year, and both of them are heading to run-off elections (Georgia law requires the winning candidate to get over 50% of the vote, and with third-party candidates on the ballots this year, no one passed the 50% threshold).  The Senate is currently tied at 48 Republicans and 48 Democrats, and if Georgia's two Democratic candidates win (which admittedly is a long shot), that would be 50 Democratic Senators.  Then, even if the  two remaining out-of-state races go to the Republicans, the Senate would at worst be tied at 50 each, with Vice President Kamala Harris casting the tie-breaker votes.

So, the real story here is that if things go well, former "red state" Georgia has not only flipped blue, but  it may be the state to give the presidency to Joe Biden nd control of the Senate to the Democrats.  Wouldn't that be something?