Here are the election night vote totals for the top four races in Big Grove Precinct. I will update these numbers, if needed, after the official canvass. It was another Republican night in Big Grove Township, and in Iowa.
Race
Republican
Democrat
President
Trump
Harris
699
598
U.S. House
Miller-Meeks
Bohannan
700
617
State Senator
Driscoll
Chabal
741
526
State Representative
Lawler
Gorsh
716
545
Statewide, Trump won Iowa easily. Miller-Meeks has a 799 vote lead out of 408,337 votes cast, with 20 of 20 counties reporting. That race is too close to call and there will be a recount according to the Cedar Rapids Gazette. District-wide, Dawn Driscoll and Judd Lawler both won their races.
I have reactions to the results, although I will save those until all the counting is done and the results certified.
Tomorrow is election day in the United States. At lunch on Friday, a candidate asked the sheriff if he was coming to the election night party in the county seat. He wouldn’t be, he said. Because of the election they had extra officers on duty to address uncertainties of what might happen when the polls close. His presence was required to command that group.
Our politics changed since I began voting: we need a standby police force to address potential conflict. Hopefully the extra staff won’t be needed. In Iowa’s most liberal county conflict escalating to violence seems unlikely.
For the first time since I can remember, I finished my list of voters to contact on Thursday before election day. We used to go right up to the poll closing with our efforts, yet this cycle we got ahead of the game. I continue to do two or three things each day to contribute to electing Democrats. Unless something dramatic and unprecedented happens, I plan to stay home on election night.
The tension created by this year’s political campaigns is palpable. Regardless of who is elected president, the tension will be real. I recall the reaction among the electorate when the first black man was elected president in 2008. If the first black woman is elected tomorrow, I expect an intensified encore of the drama. If Trump is elected, his chaotic governing will be unrelenting. I’m braced for both possibilities.
In an email sent Nov. 3 at 6 p..m., Jen O’Malley Dillon, Campaign Chair, Harris for President, wrote the following:
We feel very, very good about where we are. More people — and more diverse people — are voting than ever before. We are currently on pace to turn out the voters we need to get to 50%+1 in each battleground state.
We continue to have a few paths to victory: By winning the Blue Wall (Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania), by winning the Sun Belt (Nevada, Arizona, Georgia, and North Carolina), or by winning a combination of the two. We are seeing what we need to see to pull at least one of those paths off.
Volunteers knocking on doors, making calls, and making sure voters have what they need to head to the polls are making a difference in this race. So much so that undecided voters in the last week are breaking for the Vice President by double-digit margins.
We know that, among the remaining pool of undecided voters, more are open to voting for the Vice President than for Trump. Our team on the ground is kicking ass reaching those voters and we have to keep it up in the days to come.
The day before election day, we are standing by to see what happens. I’m confident the best qualities of being an American will prevail.
I can’t get the general election off my mind so I’ll write about it again. This cycle will be my last dance as an activist.
Inevitably, I’ll attend a few events, donate money, and offer counsel when asked in 2026. I would like to see the governor thrown out of office, along with her coterie of Republican lackeys and extremists. At the same time, I plan to scale back my political work going forward. It is time for the next generation to take the reins of this political wagon. In many ways, they already have.
Every political poll I read shows the candidates for president and for our congressional district within the margin of error. There is plenty of anecdotal evidence that some long-time Republicans plan to vote for Kamala Harris because of the sh*t show the Trump campaign has become. Whether they will go beyond the top of the ticket is something not asked by people who discovered hidden Harris-Walz votes. We’ll see how it goes, yet on Sept. 15, Trump’s lead in Iowa shrunk to within the margin of error at 47-43 percent.
I don’t believe Trump is planning to win the old fashioned way by getting the most votes. I don’t see him doing anything to get more votes. It is widely expected Harris will lead in the popular vote.
Regarding the outdated electoral college, it is too close to call in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, North Carolina, Arizona, Nevada, New Hampshire, and Georgia. Trump is believed to have a plan to steal the election by creating so much confusion on and after election day with regard to state level electors that the U.S. House of Representatives will decide who is the next president. Or maybe it will take another form. It’s anyone’s guess today whether that is even possible. I have no doubt Trump has a plan to win any way he can to the detriment of our Democratic Republic. His plans are not about us, they are about him.
Christina Bohannan winning the First District Congressional seat would be a big deal. It would be a return to normalcy after having a congresswomen who keep her lips close to the rear end of Mike Johnson and Donald Trump. The magic eight ball is hazy on that race.
I was the only person on the state park trail Monday morning. It is often like that. I walk at a quick pace to keep my heartbeats per minute above the goal rate. So far I have been able to get in at least five walks per week. It is likely for the best no one was around because I would stop and talk politics with anyone I know, defeating the effort to raise my heartbeats per minute.
A week from the election there are some positive signs. Not enough to lift the tension that keeps us on the edge of our lives. At seven days to go, I’m ready for this thing to be over. So is most everyone I know.
Apple season is winding down with farmers selling from their coolers. In the cycle of local produce, society and nature lay down such markers that winter is near.
There are signs of the change in seasons all around. Yesterday I noticed a gigantic flock of pelicans near the state park trail. They stretched for half a mile along the east-west axis of the center of the lake. As it is for migratory pelicans, it is time for us to refuel and move on.
While at the farm store last week, a woman told me that what I saw was the last of fresh vegetables. I bought a big bunch of kale and three bell peppers. We’re on to pumpkin season now.
Election day is always a sign winter is coming. In the even numbered years we have federal elections and in the odd, state government and school boards. I almost always have some yard signs up and as we approach election day, they become surrounded by the fallen leaves of deciduous trees in our yard.
It’s open enrollment for Medicare. I encourage my readers to ditch any form of Medicare Advantage and get on the real program. As we age, our health care needs increase as do related expenses. There is no reason to give a cut of this cash exchange to insurance companies. It costs significantly less to the government if we choose the real deal.
Due to lower overnight temperatures I added wool blankets for the bed. I am at two presently and a third stands ready for service in the closet. I brought two of them back from military service. Making woolen blankets for soldiers is something the U.S. Government did well. These will continue to serve as long as I have them.
I adjusted my Goodreads reading goal from 56 to 52 books this year. I took on some long books last summer, and am running behind. While the book count is lower compared to last year, the number of pages read is about the same. Last year, I read 69 books. I read more than 50 every year beginning in 2020.
Lastly, I’m going through my winter collection of sweatshirts to see what needs replacing. I’m unlikely to buy anything new this year. As a septuagenarian, my sense of style, or styling an outfit is minimal. I thought about making a series of brief style videos showing my daily outfits for a month or so. Frankly, my style varies little from day to day. It’s a choice of which jeans, which t-shirt and which socks for the most part. I don’t really accessorize at all. Not sure there is a market for that type of video.
Pelicans won’t stay here long. The next big project is to take up the second volume of my memoir after the election. I’m pretty sure the renewal of effort will drag on into December. I have a full year’s work to do to get the book suitable for publishing.
Whatever you do, if you are a U.S. citizen, be sure to make a plan to vote on or before Nov. 5. So much depends upon the outcome of the general election.
The contrast between our major presidential candidates could not be more stark. On one hand a candidate promises to be a dictator on day one of his administration and praises Hitler’s generals, wishing his would be like them. On the other hand, Kamala Harris represents everything good about our imperfect American Democracy.
I continue to do two or three things daily to contribute to Democratic wins on Nov. 5. At the same time, I realize I’m not only working for a particular result from the election, but setting the stage for the future. The relationships built during the next two weeks will strengthen as the winners become known. The election doesn’t end with vote counting, the inauguration, or much else related to process.
Going forward we must build a better America, one that includes everyone, one built on personal relationships. This will be challenging, yet more so if the Republican is elected. It must be done for the benefit of all.
Neither will the work end on election day. What seems clear is we have 13 days until tomorrow. We must ask ourselves what kind of tomorrow we want and work to get there. May the year 2024 be a turning point in American society. One that brings hope for a better life for our country and its people.
Working together, we can make that possibility a reality.
Secretary of State’s office in Cook County, Illinois.
During the period 1987 until 1993, I spent a lot of time in Chicago. We lived in Lake County, Indiana just across the Illinois-Indiana line, yet for a while I worked in the loop for Amoco Oil Company. My work took me often to truck driving schools in Chicago and throughout the upper Midwest, where regular people attempted to work through changes in society originating in the Ronald Reagan administration.
I recently stayed overnight in a working class neighborhood in Cook County. The mostly younger folk who live there can’t afford to buy a home and apartment rent is very high. It takes multiple working people to make ends meet in a single apartment. It is difficult to see how today’s working class can get ahead.
I arrived in late afternoon and everyone in the household gathered in the kitchen as dinner was prepared. While attempting to help, our child told me twice, “I got this.” I stepped back and enjoyed the conversation and studied the meal preparation process. It seemed a very Middle Class experience, which I appreciated.
The purpose of the trip was to spend time with our child before the election. We didn’t talk politics much, yet I recommended a vote for Jan Schakowski in Illinois’ 9th Congressional District where they live. Schakowski seems like a solid Democrat and a reliable House vote where there is a narrow division between Republicans and Democrats. The rest of the political discussion had to do with the Israel Hamas War and the apparent lack of a spine among most members of government who work in Washington, D.C. Short version: We know where Republicans want to go. What will Democrats do to represent liberal values? Like many, I can’t wait for the election to be over.
Errands included a trip to the Secretary of State’s office in Deerfield. Taking care of business is easy there, from security standing outside the entrance screening arrivals, to an efficient way of processing customers. Richard J. Daley, the last of the big city bosses would have smiled at the efficiency. Of course, changing a voter registration was easy because, “this is Chicago.”
We made a trip to Costco where I paid for a cart mostly full of “protein items.” That means beef, pork, chicken, hummus, and sausages of indeterminate origin and recipe. I added one of the rotisserie chickens for which the chain store is well known. The purpose was to provide options other than simple carbohydrates for meal preparation. When money is tight, folks lean into pasta, rice and bread for meal calories. The shopping trip was designed to create options. One of the first tasks upon returning to the apartment was dividing everything between the refrigerator and freezer to spread out use of the items.
It was a bit weird for a vegetarian to buy so much meat. Our child was raised vegetarian yet became an omnivore upon exposure to the broader world beginning in college. I feel comfortable with the purchase for two reasons: I worked in a meat packing plant and am familiar with where meat comes from. In visiting our child in other apartments, I found meat items in the freezer and was able to prepare a meal for us with them (I know how to cook). I do a lot of meal preparation in our home, where one of us if vegan. Labels like vegetarian, omnivore, and vegan have lost meaning in my life. I should really say, “I am mostly vegetarian” yet that doesn’t really capture it.
From years of driving into and through Chicago, I am comfortable while driving. I continue to use WBBM AM Radio for traffic reports “on the eights,” and Google maps for directions. A driver must be attentive when working the Chicago interstate highways, yet they seem well-organized and efficient. Years of experience, combined with modern communications, makes it easy to find my way. There is value in that.
I expect the Republican nominee for president to declare victory shortly after the polls close in California on Nov. 5, regardless of how many votes are counted. It’s his thing and it will tired us constantly until the next president is sworn into office on Jan. 20. When Trump loses, his malarkey will drag on past inauguration day. Dude may not be able to put two coherent sentences together, yet saying he lost to Kamala Harris is not in his vocabulary.
I’m not saying Harris will win the election. Voters need to speak. I am a reasonable person and attempt to follow logic in seeing the election unfold. What I do know is Republicans swept Big Grove Precinct in 2020. The margin with which Trump won here was small enough we could flip it to Harris with 18 more votes. Whether that will be done is an open question on October 16 as early voting begins in our county.
A lot of balls are in the air three weeks before the election. The main issues are a strong economy, the Hamas-Israel War, Republican efforts to flood the stream with malarkey to discourage voters from voting, and a general inoculation injected into the body politic during the first Trump administration. We became tolerant of lies, extreme hyperbole, and the egregious actions of Republican state government: enough so to let them flow through our hair like warm water from a shower head. Only we never fully cleanse the toxicities.
To say it plainly, my expectations are low.
That doesn’t mean I gave up. Clearly, I didn’t. I also admit it takes more work than expected to help people make a plan to vote. I plan to continue to do that work.
Gibson Les Paul electric guitar. Photo Credit – Wikimedia Commons.
When I played in a band, there were about a half dozen six-string, electric guitars to use. Either a Fender Stratocaster or Telecaster, a Gibson Les Paul or an SG, and maybe, just maybe, a Gretsch, Epiphone or Rickenbacker. There were others, but those are the ball game. In 1974, I bought a Fender Telecaster Thinline.
The purpose of the Telecaster Thinline was to reduce the amount of Ash used in the body. Apparently the wood was in short supply in the 1970s. The guitar served its purpose and years later I sold it to a friend for the same price for which I bought it.
Nothing defined me as a rhythm and blues artist like that Telecaster. It had a distinctive sound, and I looked the part of a musician while playing it. However, when the band broke up and I took off for Europe, I did not return to playing electric guitar in public. My prospects as a professional musician were not bright.
I played it some. It traveled to Lake County, Indiana with the family. Our child enjoyed playing it without an amplifier in the garage. It found a good home in Arizona, delivered by a friend’s parents.
Why didn’t I get a Les Paul? I didn’t think I was cool enough. Most of the excellent local Les Paul players I knew were way above my skill level. It also seems like a guitar for people of short stature. I recognized early on I would not be a Les Paul guy. I am okay with being a Fender man.
Local political activists writing postcards for state senate candidate Ed Chabal (center).
My cohort of septuagenarian and octogenarian political activist friends organized an event before the primary. (Some nonagenarians are still around, yet are taking a well-deserved break. Their work beginning with the Adlai Stevenson campaign is appreciated, they earned their spurs). We held a “meet the candidates” event for local voters, something not often done these days. All five primary candidates for county supervisor showed up to speak briefly and to shake hands and chat for a couple of hours.
In August, we fired the engines for the fall campaign to put on another meet the candidate event, which also served as our kick-off event. First Congressional District candidate Christina Bohannan was our keynote speaker. We had eight candidates in all and more than 65 attendees. It was good turnout for a small, rural city.
After kicking off the campaign we began planning and doing: we finished our third postcard party with seven people writing postcards to voters for our house and state senate candidates; planned a meet and greet event for a state representative who is not well known after redistricting; deployed a sign crew to get out the word about our candidates; and are deploying a door knocking crew to the far western part of our new state house district, where one of our members was raised. I started a special newsletter to facilitate communication, although most of our planning is done in person and via email. Phone calls? Only when we have to. Text messages? No. I would describe this as off grid organizing.
What does off grid organizing mean? Barack Obama described it as well as anyone could last night: “It was great to be back in Pennsylvania today. If this election is making you feel excited or scared or hopeful or frustrated or anything in between, don’t just sit back and hope for the best. Vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. Vote for Democrats up and down the ballot who will fight for you. Then help your friends, family members, neighbors and coworkers register and make a plan to vote.”
With the demise of the coordinated campaign, we feel left on our own. The county party was able to hire a couple of organizers that work out of the First Congressional District campaign office in the county seat, yet we rely on them only when we have to. We know what we need to do and just do it. If there is a bill for advertising, we split it up and pay it. To promote our local races, we reach out directly to the state house candidates and find they are very willing to have us support them. In any case, a state house campaign is separate and different from a district wide or statewide campaign. Down ballot races are very important, so a cookie-cutter campaign doesn’t work well.
The county organizers telephone us to ask for our help. We do what we can. What hinders us, especially door knocking, is the large number of our group that have trouble moving around and are in the midst of cataract surgery, hip or knee replacement, diabetes, arthritis, or other ailments of aging. We had a conversation this week about door knocking and to a person felt it is not the kind of campaign that is needed. The number of doors a campaign knocks is no longer a meaningful metric. How deeply we penetrate social networks matters so much more. When the campaign office calls us, we politely decline.
The 2022 election cycle was my last experience door knocking and it was an eye opener. I tried to make it to every door knocking event that was in my county and my state house district. To a person, people contacted required no additional information about the election or candidates. They knew the candidates, had a plan to vote, and did it mostly on their own. If they were not going to vote, no entreaties from a stranger would change their minds. People yelled at me from behind closed doors, “Go away!” The world has changed since I re-activated in politics during the 2004 campaign.
So what do we do to get Democrats out to vote? We talk to people, in person or via the telephone. We talk to people we have known for years, and in some cases, for decades. We make sure they plan to vote. We don’t take this for granted. We ask if they need a ride to the polls. We share information and discuss issues in the campaign.These are normal conversations between rational voters. We need more of that.
Eventually my cohort and I are going to die or move to a home. Until we do, at least this campaign, we are activated.
With all the education talk before the Nov. 5 election, Ed Chabal should be a shoo-in to be elected to the Iowa state senate in District 46 (located in Iowa, Washington, and parts of Johnson counties). He served as director of business and finance for the Mount Pleasant Community School District from 1997 until this summer. He knows school finance inside and out, and education is the largest part of the state’s annual budget. Do the math and district voters should vote for Chabal because of this expertise.
When last April the Iowa City Community School District announced closure of Hills Elementary School, local residents were taken aback by the speed at which things moved. Chabal’s opponent, incumbent state senator Dawn Driscoll, was johnny on the spot to devise a solution, one that included consolidating Hills with Lone Tree elementary schools.
My bone of contention is that had Driscoll been doing a better job of funding rural public schools while in the legislature, the whole thing may have been averted. Hills may have retained its school. Driscoll’s April “solutions” discussion with city council and the community is duplicitous insofar as she was helping solve a problem she created by under-funding public education. Ed Chabal knows better than this.
Why do citizens vote against their best interests? Education received in the K-12 system contributes to this. Let’s make Iowa’s K-12 education system the best in the nation again, beginning by electing Ed Chabal to the state senate in District 46 on Nov. 5.
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