By DR. KAREN BLACK

This seems to be a good time to address the many questions that have arisen from this month’s unprecedented election. It was unique in American history for many reasons, but let’s try to clear up a few things.

First, the tension started building early in the season with the President asserting, in the complete absence of evidence, that mighty efforts were underway to rig the election against him — by the foul leftist commie Democrats, whose goal is to force all Republicans into Stalinist labor camps. Come on, people. Get a grip.

The situation was complicated by a nasty pandemic, and this in turn led to efforts to make voting easier, especially for those who preferred to vote without risking death.

Now voting by mail is settled practice in a number of states. In Utah, for example, they’ve been doing it comfortably for years. For us here in Warren County there was some confusion about how and why it was to work, because there were some adjustments in the process, but there’s no reason it can’t go smoothly another time.

Let it be mentioned that the president told his base early on that they shouldn’t trUst mail-in voting. Many voters, ignoring this, went happily for vote-by-mail. The result was a mass of Democratic voters who used it, and many fewer Republicans. Result: Preponderance of Democratic mail-in votes. It doesn’t therefore follow that there was cheating. The count was what it was.

Another complicating factor this year was the appointment of an unqualified business crony to be Postmaster General. Now why in the name of all honest voters was he set loose to do maximal damage to the U.S. Postal Service six months before a major election?

Assuming that such a move was necessary, could it not wait until next year? But no. We were all witness to what followed, with slowdowns, overloads, and deliberate destruction of speed sorters.

The voting public was unnerved and confused, and many wondered if they could trust the Postal Service. The Democrats can’t be blamed for that move. The USPS is a service, not a business. Ben Franklin put it in the Constitution. It’s not a tool to whack political opponents with. Let’s have no more of that.

Suppose you want to vote by mail. (Why should you have to produce an excuse? If you’re a registered voter you should be able to use any legal means.) You request a vote-by-mail application.

Your request is checked by the Big Book just as it would be if you were voting in person. You are then sent ONE ballot — not a handful that you can pass out to your friends. You follow the directions carefully and send or hand it in. Having spent my life teaching undergraduates, I know that there is a subsection of any population that is absolutely incapable of reading simple directions and following them, but that’s humanity. That is why, in sifting mail-in ballots for acceptable and non-acceptable variants, the bipartisan Elections Board does its best to decide each otherwise acceptable ballot that may have slight variations.

Some cite “millions of dead voters.” That Big Book that you sign when you vote in person is maintained carefully to remove the deceased as deaths are recorded locally or in the news.

It could be that your old Uncle Charlie, who went off to live in South Dakota and died there in obscurity, may not have had relatives who would think to contact the Warren Voter Office and have his name removed.

And to be fair, that’s not high on anyone’s list of post-funeral duties. But the number of such cases is far too low to affect an election. One who is in the book but hasn’t voted for a certain number of years must provide identification.

When it comes to address changes: It’s not uncommon for a person to have a different address because, again, they have moved within the precinct and just never got around to notifying the Courthouse. We have a procedure: That person may vote ONE TIME under the old address, but it will be noted in the Big Book and cannot be done a second time without formal address change.

Anyhow: We have the best election system in the world, and it must be guarded. Those who worry about election fraud this year just have no idea how hard we– and election workers everywhere– labor to be sure that every particle of the voting laws is observed. Our County Director, Lisa Rivett, is a treasure. We are told flat out: Everything has to be perfect. And you will have observed that every vote fraud challenge that Trump lawyers have brought to the courts this week has been met with a judicial reaction something like “Surely you’re not serious! Did you actually go to law school?”

Dr. Karen L. Black is an Election Judge for Warren Central and a Warren resident.