To me, it's all about preventing political anarchy

To The Daily Sun,

Let me start by stating that I do not object to people disagreeing with what I write. If they choose to offer a better argument on a topic I have written about, I’m fine with that. And, if they make a better argument, I'll applaud them. However, I do take issue when someone writes letter attacking my character and, in doing so, completely misrepresents what I have written.

Case in point is the recent letter by Robert Miller of Alton.

In his letter, Miller wrote: “Once again, Mr. Meade chooses party over country. In his latest column, he makes unfounded attacks on Democrats/liberals by raising the specter of voter fraud and corruption in Florida, Georgia and Arizona. This undermining of the electoral system is either reckless, or very diabolical, and certainly not good for voter confidence in the 2020 elections. These conspiracy theories may portend things to come — people coming to believe that the voting system is really somehow compromised. These toxic attacks by Meade, in our current environment, appear to be meant to create division and rancor.”

However, in my column, I had written: “Mid-term elections happened, but they’re not yet over. As of this writing, the courts have ruled that the entire state of Florida’s votes must be recounted. It appears that some highly Democrat counties in Florida simply did not follow the law in a number of ways. Vote tallies were not conducted and submitted in the required times, and in highly Democrat Broward county 87,000 ballots were 'found' a few days after the election had closed, it appears that there may have been votes cast by non-citizens, and administrators were found rewriting and resubmitting ballots that had not passed muster, and there’s more. While most of the attention has been focused on the governor and Senate races in Florida, and for good reason, other irregularities have been popping up in Arizona and Illinois. While these irregularities are being investigated and (hopefully) corrected, it does not appear that there will be a material change in the national scheme of things . . . the Democrats won the majority in the House of Representative and the Republicans won a slight increase in their majority in the Senate. But that’s not the news, that’s what had been anticipated. The news is that the Democrats have already begun their strategy to transition from their 'resistance' to their intent to 'resist and destroy.' The Democrats who take over various House committee leadership roles have been blatant in their commentary on how they will do everything within their power to bring down the president and to prevent any progress towards working together to solve problems for we the people. In short, the citizens of all political persuasions lost.”

What I wrote was fact and was reported by a variety of national news sources. I never used the word “fraud” and I certainly don’t believe my writing was “toxic” in any way. However, it should be noted that the Democrats in Florida and Georgia who lost in the voting, also lost in the courts but didn’t want to accept the results. The Democrat candidate for the governor’s position in Georgia wouldn’t “concede” the election to the Republican, even after all the tallies were completed; she continues to blame him for “voter suppression.”

Another interesting point that Mr. Miller doesn’t acknowledge is that in the Arizona election, the recount turned the election from a Republican to a Democrat winner. And how did the Republican respond to that turn-around? She conceded and congratulated the Democrat. Hopefully some of the resisting Democrats can emulate that graciousness.

I think Mr. Miller should ask himself if he is satisfied with corruption in the highest levels of government. With unauthorized “leaking" of classified information? With government records being destroyed? With laws and rules being enforced based on party affiliation? With government officials engaging in “pay for play” activities?

For me, it isn’t party before country, it’s how do we prevent the budding political anarchy from coming into full bloom.

Bob Meade

Laconia