2 weeks Ago
Many people believed in the Valencia factor the way others banked on horoscopes and Ouija boards. For those unfamiliar with the term, the Valencia factor was a New Mexico phenomenon with national repercussions. Every winner of the presidency since 1952 had carried Valencia County.
That was the longest streak of any county in America correctly picking the president. Valencia liked Ike — twice. It backed 43-year-old John F.
Kennedy instead of Richard Nixon in 1960. Voters in Valencia switched to Nixon in '68, and he rose from the ashes to defeat Hubert Humphrey and George Wallace. Valencia twice went for Ronald Reagan, George W.
Bush, Barack Obama and Bill Clinton. It rejected Hillary Clinton in favor of Donald Trump. For seven decades, Valencia had the pulse of the country, though not necessarily any insight on who was the more competent or honorable candidate.
Clear-eyed voters in 2020 finally ended Valencia County's standing as the bellwether of presidential elections. Trump carried Valencia by 3,101 votes, but New Mexico and the nation elected Joe Biden by wide margins. All streaks end sometime.
I'd like to think the demise of the Valencia factor was a mandate on character counting. I want to believe it's a good sign for what's ahead this week, but I might as well find a Ouija board for assurance. America's 235-year streak of electing only men as president would screech to a stop if character counted.
Instead, polls paint the race between Kamala Harris and Trump as a toss-up. Harris was a prosecutor. Trump is a convicted felon, 34 counts in all.
A jury this year found Trump maneuvered to illegally influence the 2016 election by paying hush money to a pornographic actor who said she had sex with him. Trump's dealings with the actor, Stormy Daniels, were secretive. His pattern of dishonesty was more blatant when he tried to steal back the presidency after losing to Biden.
Trump browbeat Georgia election officials in a recorded phone call, saying they ought to flip thousands of votes to hand him a win in a state whose election already had been counted, recounted and certified in Biden's favor. A broader attempt at election thievery came in a scheme concocted for Trump by Santa Fe resident John Eastman, then a licensed attorney. The idea was for Trump's vice president, Mike Pence, to maneuver his boss into the winner's circle while presiding over certification of electoral votes in the Senate.
Pence had served for four years as Trump's chief sycophant. Still, Trump understood Pence was no nitwit. The Constitution says the vice president is responsible only for opening the envelopes containing electoral votes.
There's not a word about the vice president being empowered to block the legitimate winner to anoint his boss instead. In Trump's Jan. 6, 2021, speech exhorting a mob of his supporters to march to the Capitol, he offered a rambling, inaccurate rendition of Pence's constitutional authority.
It was based on Eastman's selective and shoddy research. "If Mike Pence does the right thing, we win the election," Trump said. "All he has to do, all this is, this is from the number one, or certainly one of the top, constitutional lawyers in our country.
He has the absolute right to do it. We're supposed to protect our country, support our country, support our Constitution, and protect our Constitution." How Trump's and Eastman's election fraud would protect the Constitution was too fine a point for that captive crowd.
Knowing this, Trump instructed his zealots to "fight like hell." Violence followed as they stormed the Capitol while Trump retreated to the safety of the White House. He watched the attempt to overthrow the government on television.
Rioters committed to doing Trump's dirty work assaulted 140 police officers. In Trump's revisionist history, these criminals were patriots and Jan. 6 was "a day of love.
" Trump finally made a late-breaking statement on video to his vigilantes. “We have to have peace. So go home.
We love you. You’re very special.” Special they were not.
Jan. 6 was all about dishonesty, cruelty and anarchy. Tuesday's election should be an easy decision for anyone who claims to support the rule of law.
The polls say otherwise. So do several of my sources. People I know who were outraged when criminals destroyed the Soldiers' Monument on the Plaza are voting for Trump.
Valencia County picked 17 presidential winners in succession before missing on Trump four years ago. I believed he was finished. Now all that's certain is the last chapter has been written on the Valencia factor.
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