Heading Off Mt Pisagh.

Heading off Mount Pisagh in Bradford County, Penna. near Troy, PA. Dairy farm country, with fog in the distance.

World Looks On With Concern And Alarm At U.S. Election Impasse

World Looks On With Concern And Alarm At U.S. Election Impasse

While the United States is locked in limbo for the outcome of an election that President Trump has already labeled fraudulent and has threatened to challenge in court, the rest of the world is looking on with a mixture of uncertainty, concern and outright alarm.

In America, power is decentralized and messy. But it's the dirt in the gears of democracy that really protects it for the rest of us.

Edison Research and AP VoteCast

It’s fascinating to read about Edison Research and AP VoteCast, the two competing, privately run businesses, that acquire all of the national Presidential Election data from thousands of local boards of elections and provide it to major news services – Edison Research (ABC CBS NBC Reuters wire newspapers) and AP Vote Cast (PBS NPR Fox and AP Wire newspaper).

These companies have enormous power in their ability to call the race and operate in near obscurity. They’ve been around for decades, providing an essential service but fall into obscurity but all for one night every four years. It’s actually fascinating how an important part of democracy is actually a private business. But like all things in our democracy, power is decentralized and consists mostly of local governments often following their own rules based on state and national standards.