Editor's Note

Vote, Already!

by Andrew Tonkovich

Your humble editor composed this note for Issue #19 of Orange County's unlikeliest online literary arts journal having satisfactorily completed the online training required to work, once again, for OC Vote at a Vote Center for the upcoming election, a more than stubbornly ironic embrace of the enduring power and possibility of voting, electoral politics, and civic engagement. And insistence on voting rights, civil rights, and defending what remains of our democracy. Yes, it’s an especially weird commitment for a card-carrying democratic socialist who is showing up to affirm the ballots cast not just by liberals and libertarians and Republicans and registered American Independent Party (look it up) and No Party Preference oddballs, but straight-up MAGA fascists, and despite (or only to spite!) all the above people who want to destroy him. These include struggling formerly pro-Trump and lately “bipartisan” Republican incumbent Congresswoman Young Kim, of all people. She specifically named Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) from the floor of the US Congress, doing a reliably sloppy job of summing up the organization’s platform but nonetheless hitting some strong themes, and directing constituents to its website, thank you:

“Today’s proponents of socialism have made their goals clear. Read them for yourself on its DSA website: Abolish the US Senate, replace the presidency, dismantle the Supreme Court, and rewrite our Constitution.” https://dsausa.org

Indeed, since most voters vote by mail (VBM), which thus far survives the fascist gangster clown assault, I’ll mostly be welcoming a whole lot of in-person voters who don’t “trust” the excellent VBM operation run by OC Vote and who will have been instructed by Fox News and Trumpolini to cast their ballots early (likely Saturday, day one at my own assigned four-day Vote Center). The con man prez and his DOJ have given new meaning to the phrase “Get Out the Vote” as in discourage, disenfranchise, diminish and get rid of it.

Meanwhile, local candidates’ signs are up, including this one, helpfully illustrating this issue’s themes of voting anyway and vigorously, embracing ironies galore, reading original work from and about our community, and celebrating the enduring inspiration and legacy of the patron saint of this unlikely online OC quarterly journal of imagination and reimagination. No kidding, only a block from the self-storage facility where are housed a thousand pieces of art by the late OC teacher, artist, writer, and activist Peter Carr (see my essay on a new show at CSULB) I recently delighted in finding a bespoke Mission Viejo streetcorner invitation to “Vote for Peter.”

I will not only vote (by mail) and continue to vote for the teacher and activist who made me the weirdo I am today, but I will apparently once again protect and defend all Californians’ right to cast their ballots too, even and perhaps especially the reactionaries and racists and MAGAs.

Meanwhile, this issue is of course a vote for Citric Acid and its writers, readers, staff, interns, volunteers --- and those who can support it financially, please and thank you. I’m proud to say that Citric Acid recently received a small operations grant from the California Arts Council. Thank you, CAC! Thanks to Jonathan Cohen and Beth Riley for helping write the proposal. And thanks to our fiscal nonprofit sponsor Community Hub de Santa Ana, without whom we couldn’t even apply for it, or accept your donations either.

Citric Acid will continue, as in this issue, to share outstanding OC-themed poetry, short stories, essays, memoir, political commentary, history, art, and essays on Peter Carr (!) if you can continue to support us. Follow the nifty orange donate button to contribute. And please share this issue on social media or otherwise.

In other words, please vote for Citric Acid.