New Rules, New Tactics

Democrats have changed the rules of voting. Republicans need to play by the new rules.

Straight up, Republican voters need to stop complaining about all the novelties introduced into the voting and start exploiting the new rules to their advantage.

The Designated Hitter Is Bad for Baseball

I happen to despise the designated hitter rule. Every kid who ever strapped on the cleats learned this simple lesson: if you want to hit, you have to play the field. A baseball player must master (or, at least, achieve competency) at both offense and defense. It’s how the game is played.

When the American League introduced the designated hitter rule in the 1970s, it violated a long-standing principle of fairness by allowing players to play only one side of the ball. Pitchers could skip batting practice; some hitters could skip infield-outfield practice.

But I would never argue that a team should refuse to exploit the DH rule. That would be suicide with no upside. Yes, the team would have demonstrated its love of tradition and fairness, but it would have done so in last place before empty stadiums.

If the rules change, change with the rules.

What Happened in Arizona

Arizona instituted vote-by-mail in 2020. Every registered received a ballot unsolicited. Some voters received several ballots. Some household received many ballots for people who never lived at their address.

The mass-issuance of ballots was intentional. The Democrats wanted to get into circulation as many ballots as possible. They also wanted those ballots returned as early as possible. Here’s why.

The more ballots in circulation, the greater temptation to cast them. Since Democrat voters and young people are more likely to commit voting crimes than Republicans and older voters, littering the state with ballots increased the number of Democrat votes cast, legitimately or illegitimately.

The reason Democrats wanted ballots returned early is simple planning. First, every mailed-in ballot has better than a 70 percent chance of being a Democrat vote. Every mailed-in ballot from a heavily Democrat zip code county has an even greater chance of being a Democrat vote. With even mediocre statistics skills, one could accurately estimate the total Democrat vote through election day. In other words, more than a week before the election, the Democrats who run Maricopa and Pima counties had an accurate estimate of the number of votes Republican candidates would need to win.

With that forecast in hand, Democrats have multiple ways to prevent Republicans from overcoming the early-vote leads of Democrats. For example, implementing a computer “glitch” in the voting systems in heavily Republican areas would suppress total Republican votes. For that matter, implementing glitches anywhere would suppress Republican votes because almost 80 percent of election-day voters vote Republican.

And that’s exactly what the Maricopa County election monsters did. They broke the machines after they knew how many Democrats had already voted.

The result was chaos. Four-hour or longer voting lines forced Republicans with work or family obligations to give up. Poll workers told voters in affected voting centers find a different voting center; voters who followed this advice learned quickly that, by leaving their voting center, they forfeited their right to vote. An estimate 8 percent of Arizona voters who attempted to vote on November 8 were denied the right to vote by poll workers and coordinated “glitches” in the system.

This is the second consecutive election in which Arizona election boards stole an election by exploiting the new rules of voting. It is also the second consecutive election in which Republicans were caught flat-footed.

Learn and Exploit the Rules

Universal mail-in voting will not go away because you or I gripe about it. It’s going to spread. Even establishment Republicans quietly push mail-in voting because they can use it to control primary elections. The only way to get rid of mail-in voting (and other novelties) is to win in big numbers. And the only way to win is to play according to the rules.

As much as conservatives like to complain about Democrats cheating, it’s actually the conservatives who refuse to play by the new rules of voting. Refusing to vote early makes it easy for Democrats to manufacture the exact number of votes they need to win. But the Democrats’ scheme has an Achille’s Heel.

Republicans can upend Democrat plans simply by voting early, either in-person or by mail. Democrats have amassed two elections of data on who votes early and who doesn’t. They will rely on this data in 2024. If Republicans vote early in large numbers, those well-trained models will prove as useless as the Covid models from March 2020.

Republicans who vote by mail should postmark their ballot in a heavily Democrat area. Democrats expect 70 percent or more of mail-in ballots to come from Democrat zip codes. If large numbers of mail-ins originate from deep red areas, the Democrat bean counters will adjust their models accordingly.

Take Control, Then Change the Rules

Until non-establishment Republicans take control of state and county governments, nothing will improve. And winning requires that we play by the new rules no matter how much detest those rules. If the rules of a sport change, it does no good for one team to refuse to adopt the new rule. Imagine if the Cardinals had decided not to take advantage of the designated hitter rule and, instead, made their pitcher bat for themselves. Not only would Cardinals fans been denied the pleasure of seeing Albert Pujols’s final year, the Cardinals would not have made the playoffs.

When rules change, your tactics change. Instead of complaining about the change, exploit the rules, take power, and change the rules again.