It is the middle of November 2016, let’s say.
The election has ended in a quandary worse than in 2000, because there are now three states with unacceptably warped results: Ohio, Arizona, Florida.
The Supreme Court still has four Republicans and four Justices. The Secretaries of State of Ohio and Florida and Arizona are guests of Jeb Bush in Miami.
What standard will prevail then? What force of law, what tradition will prevail?
It is time, now when it will cost so little to your campaign to get all the votes voted, to establish that the right to vote is not some smaller right to run a gamut and then maybe vote, provided your records have not been molested by paid consultants and the ballot has not been designed by professional click-bait artists.
It is time to ensure the legitimate transfer of power.
This is the standard: Systematically depriving citizens of the opportunity to vote prevents every candidate from winning.
Yesterday’s results from Arizona are unacceptable, in the solid meaning of that term. This is not the occasion for consoling commentary and a blue-ribbon committee. Not a call to handwringing and ceremony.
The Repubicans are not just in a crisis now. They are planning a crisis. You know them.
Now suppose the Republicans have left Donald Trump with one ream of official stationery and then decamped with all their money and apparatus to a third party, running, say, Chris Christie for President with Kasich for Vice President. Something like that is in the works.
The fury of Trump unleashes, and riots explode where the police empathize with that particular flavor of rioters.
What principle will the country clench to save us?
That principle must be democratic elections. No compromise. High standards.
If we start now, we can rise above that crisis and all the inevitable recurrences of such crises until the Republic ends or some future generation has the guts to fix it.
If not, some Republican thugs will again take over and stay over by means of the careful application of sneakiness and the extortionate terrorization of the electorate.
On the other hand, imagine how much respect you could capture all around the world by saying, “Thanks but no thanks. We need a real election in Arizona.” You have nothing to lose.