Democrats are Lucy.  Republicans are Linus.  The football is honor and decency.  Democrats are ruthless in their willingness to cheat, obfuscate, confuse, deceive, and play dirty.  This isn't news.

Republicans, having a moral code that relies upon a Judeo-Christian ethic, can be relied upon to always do what is right.  (Exceptions exist: Liz Cheney and Mitch McConnell, for example.)  Democrats take advantage of the GOP's fealty to doing what is honorable, a word far removed from a Democrat's worldview. 

So what is to be done when one side plays by the rules and the other side doesn't?  A good example of this is the Democrats' profligate cheating while counting votes.  Or should I say creating votes?  Republicans seem only recently to have figured out that voters don't matter nearly as much as vote-counters do.  Why so late figuring this out, when almost every recount, against all statistical probability, or vote-counting delay favors Democrats?  There is no legitimate reason to delay vote-counting beyond midnight of voting day.  Claiming malfunctioning printers or tabulators is no excuse, but they are convenient excuses so long as electronic voting is being used, which is why going back to paper ballots is a garlic-laden crucifix to Democrats: paper ballots cannot be tampered with to any significant degree.

Republicans had two years to fix this — longer, actually — and they did nothing except for Obi-Ron DeSantis, who somehow managed to avoid all the problems other states had.  Why can he do it and other states can't?  Or won't?

Democrats rightly count on Republicans to not stand up for themselves when they are cheated.  Like a battered wife, the GOP wrings its hands and blubbers about getting out the vote, while few Republicans actually do something about it.  The GOP must secure governorships in order to bring honor and reliability back to our elections.  Up until now, Republicans can reliably be depended upon to fold rather than do a little bullying of their own.  Democrats know this and rely on it to keep them in power.

This voter is sick to death of linguine-spined Republicans who won't do the dirty work, who won't get nasty, who won't play dirty.  Would that it were otherwise, but you don't win a race hopping on one leg.  Much as it is distasteful to play dirty, playing a clean game has given us little.  America cannot survive as a free nation when the doors to our treasure and our liberty are flung wide open and the gatekeepers let in only thieves.

One final note: Trump has rapidly made himself a liability to the Republican Party, like it or not.  He is tied to the GOP, and until he cuts himself loose and sacrifices his ego to potential future wins for the GOP, he will drag us down like an albatross around our necks.  He is not the solution.  We have enough internal problems with the GOP without having to worry about how much (not if) damage will be done to conservatism by Trump.  I hate that I have to even think this, but his time has been and gone.  I supported and voted for him twice.  He was a great POTUS.  Now he must go away for all our sakes.

Image: Otterbein University Theatre & Dance from USA, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons, unaltered.