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U.S. Rep. Beto O'Rourke, a Democrat from El Paso, will visit Pearland Saturday on a statewide tour in his campaign to replace Sen. Ted Cruz.

U.S. Rep. Beto O'Rourke, a Democrat from El Paso, will visit Pearland Saturday on a statewide tour in his campaign to replace Sen. Ted Cruz.

A woman lies on the floor using her phone to capture a speech by Rep. Beto O'Rourke, D-Texas, during an April campaign stop in Houston. ( Brett Coomer / Houston Chronicle )

A woman lies on the floor using her phone to capture a speech by Rep. Beto O'Rourke, D-Texas, during an April campaign stop in Houston. ( Brett Coomer / Houston Chronicle )

Sen. Ted Cruz debates with audience members over health care during a town hall meeting in Austin.

Sen. Ted Cruz debates with audience members over health care during a town hall meeting in Austin.

Houston resident Gaby Dian questions Sen. Ted Cruz and Dan Caldwell, director of policy for Concerned Veterans of America.

Houston resident Gaby Dian questions Sen. Ted Cruz and Dan Caldwell, director of policy for Concerned Veterans of America.

Pearland draws attention of Democrat seeking suburban votes

Texas congressman Beto O'Rourke will bring his statewide campaign tour to Pearland Saturday, hoping to connect with voters in a traditionally Republican area that overwhelmingly supported Ted Cruz - whose job O'Rourke covets - in the 2012 election for the U.S. Senate.

O'Rourke, a three-term Democrat from El Paso, has visited 80 counties about halfway through the 34-day trip. But even the most energetic campaigner cannot visit every town in Texas, and the venues for town halls and meet-and-greets are not chosen at random. So, why Pearland?

One clue lies in the results of Pearland's city election in May and runoff in June. These elections are officially nonpartisan, but the Texas Democratic Party provided assistance to mayoral candidate Quentin Wiltz, who got Republicans' attention when he forced longtime incumbent Tom Reid into a runoff.

A late contribution of more than $30,000 from Republican congressman Pete Olson's campaign helped turn out thousands of additional Republican voters, and Reid, then 91. prevailed. Even in defeat, though, Wiltz and a young City Council candidate who campaigned with him, Dalia Kasseb, received far more votes in the runoff than in the general election, reversing the usual pattern.

The message: There are votes to be had for Democrats in suburbs like Pearland, even though they sit in counties that continue to be GOP strongholds. The changing mix of voters in these communities will be a key factor in Democrats' efforts next year to win statewide office for the first time since 1994.

The high turnout in the runoff election probably figured in O'Rourke's decision to appear in Pearland, according to Wiltz, who has been active in Democratic Party politics in Pearland for years. Wiltz said this was the first time he had seen a statewide candidate campaign in the city some 15 miles south of downtown Houston.

"Prominent figures always go to Houston," he said.

As Jeremy Wallace of the Chronicle's Austin bureau reported in July, O'Rourke and Cruz are both visiting parts of the state where the opposing party is dominant. In this context, the suburbs of the state's biggest cities hold a distinct strategic significance. Cruz also visited a Houston suburb this week, touring the Igloo Products Corp. plant in Katy and chatting with employees about helping businesses grow and create jobs.

"These fast-growth suburban places are some of the places where we think we can make our case to voters," said Manny Garcia, deputy executive director of the Texas Democratic Party.

O'Rourke made the same point in a phone interview this week.

To read this article in one of Houston's most-spoken languages, click on the button below.

"We've been to Sugar Land and Baytown and The Woodlands since our campaign started" on March 31, said O'Rourke, who will appear at the Pearland ISD administrative building at 10 a.m. Saturday. "We're hearing from folks on all sides who are contributing to the changes in the greater Houston area."

The opportunity that O'Rourke and his advisers see in these suburbs lies in their growing diversity - coupled, perhaps, with concerns among some Republican voters about the words and policies of those on their party's extreme right wing.

At the national level, this concern is focused on President Donald Trump's controversial comments about recent violence at a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Va.

In Austin, it's a response to the continued push for measures like the so-called "bathroom bill," which failed in the recent special session. State business leaders opposed the bill, which would have limited the public bathroom access of transgender Texans.

Cruz sees these shifting dynamics as well, said Robert Stein, a Rice University political science professor.

Stein said he was startled when he saw reports that Cruz had called for a federal civil rights investigation of the Charlottesville episode. Cruz took a far stronger stand than Trump had, denouncing the "lies, bigotry, anti-Semitism and hatred" of the white nationalists involved.

"He (Cruz) has figured out that something is happening in this state," said Stein, adding that his recent polling shows fewer Texans identifying as strong Republicans. "He is smart enough to be where voters are before they know where they are."

Stein and other analysts I spoke with agree that an O'Rourke victory is a long shot. But if the 44-year-old ex-punk rocker gets enough votes to throw a scare into the incumbent, it may boost the party's fortunes in future campaigns.

"I don't think he's going to be senator," Stein said of O'Rourke. "But nobody expected Donald Trump to be president."

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Pearland draws attention of Democrat seeking suburban votes - Houston Chronicle

After President Trump's most recent rhetoric about Charlottesville inflamed even more criticism, a handful of GOP lawmakers, including Sens. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), are criticizing Trump directly, while others stay silent. (Jenny Starrs/The Washington Post)

Once upon a time, there were rumblings in Washington that Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) was under consideration as a potential secretary of state in the administration of President Trump. That didnt pan out and, in the months since Trumps inauguration, its become clear that this was for the best, as Corker has repeatedly criticized Trumps time in office.

In May, after The Post reported that Trump had revealed classified information to Russian officials in the Oval Office, Corker described the White House as being in a downward spiral. When Trump repeatedly bashed his own attorney general, former Alabama senator Jeff Sessions, Corker criticized the presidents behavior. On Thursday, after nearly a week of analysis of Trumps handling of the racial violence in Charlottesville, Corker released a new critique:

This is an unusual rebuke from a senator for a president from his own party. But polling from Quinnipiac University released Thursday makes clear that Corker isnt alone within his party in seeing his views of Trumps performance shift.

The Quinnipiac poll showed a slight improvement for Trump since the beginning of the month, with 39 percent of respondents saying that they view his presidency with approval. Nearly 6 in 10 hold a disapproving view.

Those numbers have increased over the seven months of Trumps presidency, with more than half of the country now strongly disapproving of how Trump is doing. On Jan. 26, Quinnipiac found that only 40 percent of the country strongly disapproved of Trump. The figure was never that low again.

To the point with Corker, that slip has been seen among Republicans as well. In early August, Trump hit two new lows: his lowest approval from Republicans and, interestingly, his lowest strong approval rating from members of his own party. Three-quarters of Republicans still thought he was doing a good job, just less strongly so.

The new poll shows some improvement, but his strong approval numbers from Republicans are the second-lowest in Quinnipiacs polling.

Since he took office, most Americans have been skeptical of Trumps personal characteristics as well. More than half the country views him as a strong person and intelligent, but only a minority agrees with other possible descriptors: that hes honest, that he cares about average Americans, that he shares our values, that hes levelheaded or that hes got good leadership skills.

Its on that last point that Trumps seen the biggest decline since inauguration a drop from about half the country thinking he was a good leader in late January to about 40 percent saying it now.

Among Republicans, the drop has been steeper. Views of his leadership ability rebounded from earlier this month, but theres still been a 13-point decline in how Republicans feel about Trumps ability to lead. On every other metric, too, fewer Republicans now say that they think Trump holds these positive qualities than they did shortly after he took office.

On no characteristic does Trump fare more poorly among Republicans than on whether hes levelheaded. Only 62 percent of members of his own party say that applies, while a third say it doesnt.

In other words, Corkers assessment that Trump has not been able to demonstrate the stability nor some of the competence that he needs to be successful is a view thats held by a lot of other people in the Republican Party.

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Sen. Corker isn't the only Republican who's increasingly questioning Trump's stability - Washington Post

BRIDGEWATER, N.J./WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump on Thursday decried the removal of monuments to the pro-slavery Civil War Confederacy, echoing white nationalists and drawing stinging rebukes from fellow Republicans in a controversy that has inflamed racial tensions.

Trump has alienated Republicans, corporate leaders and U.S. allies, rattled markets and prompted speculation about possible White House resignations with his comments since Saturday's violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, during a white nationalist protest against the removal of a Confederate statue.

Republican Senator Bob Corker, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, questioned Trump's capacity to govern.

"The president has not yet been able to demonstrate the ability or the competence that he needs to be successful," said Corker, who Trump had considered for the job of secretary of state. Corker said Trump needed to make "radical changes."

In a series of Twitter posts on Thursday, Trump unleashed attacks on two Republican U.S. senators, Jeff Flake and Lindsey Graham, raising fresh doubts about his ability to work with lawmakers in his own party to win passage of his legislative agenda including tax cuts and infrastructure spending.

Trump took aim at the removal or consideration for removal of Confederate statues and monuments in a long list of cities in California, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, New York, North Carolina, Massachusetts, Missouri, Montana, Tennessee, Virginia and Texas, as well as Washington, D.C.

"Sad to see the history and culture of our great country being ripped apart with the removal of our beautiful statues and monuments. You can't change history, but you can learn from it," Trump wrote on Twitter, refusing to move past the controversy.

"Robert E Lee, Stonewall Jackson - who's next, Washington, Jefferson? So foolish!" Trump added. He was referring to two Confederate generals in the Civil War that ended in 1865, and to early U.S. presidents George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, who owned slaves but whose legacies are overwhelmingly honored.

Opponents call the statues a festering symbol of racism, while supporters say they honor American history. Some of the monuments have become rallying points for white nationalists but also have the support of some people interested in historical preservation.

Trump also denied he had spoken of "moral equivalency" between white supremacists, neo-Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan, and the anti-racism activists who clashed in Charlottesville.

Amid the controversy, the White House knocked down rumors that Trump economic adviser Gary Cohn might resign. An official said Cohn "intends to remain in his position" as National Economic Council director at the White House.

Rumors of Cohn's impending departure had rattled the U.S. stock market and dollar. World equity markets and U.S. bond yields fell while gold rose on Thursday as investors favored safe-haven investments amid growing skepticism that Trump can make good on his economic agenda.

On Wednesday, Trump announced the disbanding of two high-profile business advisory councils after the resignation of several corporate executives over his Charlottesville remarks. On Thursday, a White House official said another planned advisory council on infrastructure issues will not move forward.

In another indication of businesses not wanting to be associated with the president, a world renowned hospital, the Cleveland Clinic, canceled a planned 2018 Florida fundraiser at Trump's Mar-a-Lago Florida resort, where it had held such events for seven straight years. Spokeswoman Eileen Sheil said the Cleveland Clinic considered "a variety of factors" in deciding to cancel an event that typically generates $1 million a year.

The clinic's chief executive, Toby Cosgrove, was a member of a one of the two councils that disbanded on Wednesday.

The Charlottesville violence erupted when white nationalists marched to protest the planned removal of a statue of Robert E. Lee. A 32-year-old woman, Heather Heyer, was killed when a man described as a white nationalist crashed his car into the counter-protesters.

Trump has blamed the Charlottesville violence on not just the white nationalist rally organizers but also the counter-protesters, and said there were "very fine people" among both groups. Trump also expressed distaste for removing Confederate statues in a heated news conference on Tuesday.

After Trump blasted Graham on Twitter, the senator who was one of Trump's rivals for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination fired back.

"Because of the manner in which you have handled the Charlottesville tragedy you are now receiving praise from some of the most racist and hate-filled individuals and groups in our country. For the sake of our Nation - as our President - please fix this," Graham said. "History is watching us all."

Another Republican senator, Dan Sullivan, added on Twitter, "Anything less than complete & unambiguous condemnation of white supremacists, neo-Nazis, and the KKK by (Trump) is unacceptable. Period."

Graham on Wednesday had said Trump's remarks at Tuesday's news conference had suggested "moral equivalency" between the white nationalists and anti-racism demonstrators and called on the president to use his words to heal Americans.

"Publicity seeking Lindsey Graham falsely stated that I said there is moral equivalency between the KKK, neo-Nazis & white supremacists and people like Ms. Heyer. Such a disgusting lie. He just can't forget his election trouncing. The people of South Carolina will remember!" Trump wrote.

In a separate tweet, Trump called Flake "WEAK on borders, crime and a non-factor in Senate. He's toxic!" and appeared to endorse Kelli Ward, Flake's Republican challenger in his 2018 re-election race.

Nancy Pelosi, the top Democrat in the U.S. House of Representatives, called for the immediate removal of Confederate statues from the U.S. Capitol. U.S. Senator Cory Booker, also a Democrat, said he would introduce legislation so that could be done.

"There is no room for celebrating the violent bigotry of the men of the Confederacy in the hallowed halls of the United States Capitol or in places of honor across the country," Pelosi said in a statement.

A spokesman for Republican U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan said it was up to U.S. states to determine which statues were displayed on their behalf in the Capitol building.

Reporting by Steve Holland and Susan Heavey; Additional reporting by Makini Brice, Richard Cowan, Caroline Valetkevitch, Deena Beasley and Gina Cherelus; Writing by Will Dunham; Editing by Frances Kerry and Howard Goller

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Fellow Republicans assail Trump after he defends Confederate monuments - Reuters

Joshua Wong (L) and Alex Chow, leaders of Hong Kongs Umbrella Movement, before their court appearance Photograph: Anthony Wallace/AFP/Getty Images

Hong Kongs democracy movement has suffered the latest setback in what has been a punishing year after three of its most influential young leaders were jailed for their roles in a protest at the start of a 79-day anti-government occupation known as the umbrella movement.

Alex Chow, Nathan Law, and Joshua Wong, the bespectacled student dubbed Hong Kongs face of protest were sentenced to between six and eight months imprisonment each.

The trio, aged 26, 24 and 20 respectively, had avoided jail a year ago after being convicted of taking part in or inciting an illegal assembly that helped spark the umbrella protests, in late September 2014. But this month Hong Kongs department of justice called for those sentences to be reconsidered, with one senior prosecutor attacking the rather dangerous leniency he claimed had been shown to the activists.

Judge Wally Yeung argued the sentences were a necessary deterrent to what he called a sick trend of anti-government protest. Such arrogant and self-righteous thinking [has] unfortunately affected some young people, and led them to damage public order and peace during protests, he said, according to the Hong Kong broadcaster RTHK.

See you soon, Wong tweeted shortly after the verdict was announced.

In another message he wrote: Imprisoning us will not extinguish Hongkongers desire for universal suffrage. We are stronger, more determined, and we will win.

You can lock up our bodies, but not our minds! We want democracy in Hong Kong. And we will not give up.

The decision to increase the activists punishments sparked outrage among supporters and campaigners who condemned what they called the latest example of Beijings bid to snuff out peaceful challenges to its rule.

It smacks of political imprisonment, plain and simple, said Jason Ng, the author of Umbrellas in Bloom, a book about Hong Kongs youth protest movement.

Mabel Au, Amnesty Internationals director in Hong Kong, said: The relentless and vindictive pursuit of student leaders using vague charges smacks of political payback by the authorities.

It is not a surprise but it is a shock. It is another blow for basic freedoms and the rule of law in Hong Kong, said Benedict Rogers, the deputy chair of the conservative human rights commission.

There was also criticism from the United States where Republican senator Marco Rubio attacked the decision as shameful and further evidence that Hong Kongs cherished autonomy is precipitously eroding.

Joshua Wong, Nathan Law, Alex Chow and other umbrella movement protesters are pro-democracy champions worthy of admiration, not criminals deserving jail time, said Rubio, who heads the congressional-executive commission on China.

Beijings heavy hand is on display for all to see.

Beijings heavy hand is on display for all to see as they attempt to crush the next generation of Hong Kongs pro-democracy movement, he added.

Speaking before the verdict, Wong told the Guardian he was sure he would be jailed since the decision to seek stiffer punishments was driven by politics, not legal arguments. Its a political prosecution, he said. It is the darkest era for Hong Kong because we are the first generation of umbrella movement leaders being sent to prison.

Wong claimed the decision to use the courts to crack down on umbrella activists showed Chinas one-party rulers had managed to transform the former British colony, once a rule-of-law society, into a place of authoritarian rule by law.

No one would like to go to prison but I have to use this as a chance to show the commitment of Hong Kongs young activists, he said. It is really a cold winter for Hong Kongs democracy movement but things that cannot defeat us will make us stronger.

Thursdays controversial ruling caps a torrid year for the pro-democracy camp of this semi-autonomous Chinese city, which returned to Beijings control on 1 July 1997 after 156 years of colonial rule.

During a June visit marking the 20th anniversary of handover, Chinese president Xi Jinping oversaw a tub-thumping military parade which observers said underscored the increasingly hardline posture Beijing was now taking towards Hong Kong amid an upsurge in support for independence. The implication is: We will come out in the streets and put you down if we have to, the political blogger Suzanne Pepper said at the time.

A fortnight later, the democracy movement suffered a body blow when four pro-democracy lawmakers, including Law, were ejected from Hong Kongs parliament for using their oath-taking ceremonies to thumb their noses at Beijing. That decision robbed the pro-democracy camp of its veto power over major legislation.

In an interview with the Guardian, Law, who had been the youngest person elected to Hong Kongs legislature, said the disqualifications were an attempt by Beijing to suppress the more progressive voices in Hong Kong.

I wont give up fighting. If Liu Xiaobo can persist under much harsher circumstances, so can we, Law vowed, referring to the late democracy icon who died in Chinese custody last month, becoming the first Nobel peace prize winner to perish in custody since German pacifist Carl von Ossietzky, who died in 1938 after years in Nazi concentration camps.

On Tuesday, 13 umbrella activists were jailed for storming Hong Kongs parliament in 2014, a decision Human Rights Watch condemned as part of a surge in politically motivated prosecutions.

Ng, the author, said he believed the decision to jail Wong and Law was deliberately designed to stop them running for office later this year in local byelections. Their imprisonment was not intended to deter violence or social disorder but to crack down on the willingness of young, idealistic people to engage politically.

[These sentences] significantly increase the cost of dissent in Hong Kong, Ng warned. From now on, protesters will need to think about the possibility of getting locked up for months or even years.

It has an enormous chilling effect especially on young people, and sends a strong message to them that they should shut up or else.

Speaking on Wednesday night, Wong said he would not be silenced, even behind bars where he planned to spend his time reading novels, studying and writing columns about politics.

Wong also used his final hours of freedom to send a message to Xi: Please respect the desires of Hong Kong people. The people are united and they will never stop.

Read the original here:
Hong Kong democracy campaigners jailed over anti-China protests - The Guardian

Last Tuesday, Nairobi felt like a city awaiting the apocalypse. Streets normally clogged with traffic were eerily quiet. Grocery-store shelves had been largely emptied of supplies. Anxious wealthy residents booked flights out of town, conveniently scheduling their summer vacations to avoid the chaos of a Kenyan national election. The Chinese government, Western private-sector companies, and other foreign investors braced as well. A peaceful vote in Kenya, which is regarded as the most vibrant economic and democratic power in East Africa, could unleash billions of dollars in infrastructure and development contracts.

Kenya has had a long and calamitous history of political violence and corruption since it gained independence from British colonial rule, in 1963. Much of this conflict is rooted in ethnic tensions between different tribes, which many historians attribute, in part, to decades of British colonial rule that intentionally played major tribes against one another. Rich and poor Kenyans alike feared a repeat of the 2007 post-election violence between two of the countrys largest tribes, the Luo and Kikuyu, which killed more than twelve hundred people and displaced more than half a million.

In this years Presidential election, the Kikuyus and Luos were once again competing for the highest office in the land. Uhuru Kenyatta, the incumbent President, is a member of Kenyas largest, and arguably most powerful, ethnic group, the Kikuyu. His opponent, Raila Odinga, is a member of the Luo, who live predominantly in western Kenya. This years race was Odingas fourth bid for Presidency. After each past loss, he has accused his victorious opponents of corruption and fraud. After his loss in 2013, he unsuccessfully challenged the final results in Kenyas Supreme Court, citing the widespread failure of the countrys electronic voting system.

In an effort to insure fairness and prevent renewed violence, Kenyas nonpartisan Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission, known as the I.E.B.C., was tasked with overseeing the countrys voting and tallying processes. But, just a week before the election, the police discovered the tortured and mutilated body of the I.E.B.C.s head of information technology, Chris Msando, on the outskirts of Nairobi.

On election day, throngs of voters across the country waited patiently to fill out their ballots. As I made my way through the crowds, I spoke to people who had woken up as early as 4 A.M. to beat the long lines. Many were fresh-faced young voters, such as Rafael Nyunge, a twenty-three-year-old who hoped that his generation could use their vote to end Kenyas legacy of entrenched tribal politics.

When Im voting, Im expecting change in our country, Nyunge told me. Im not concerned about tribalism. We dont encourage tribalism in Kenya. Right now were voting on how the quality of that leader is and how he or she is good to us.

Election day ended auspiciously, with no reports of major violence and only a handful of irregularities at polling stations. International observers, including former Secretary of State John Kerry and hundreds of others from the United States, European Union, and African Union, hailed the day as a success and said that the voting had run smoothly.

Over all, things went very well, Owora Richard Othieno, a Ugandan observer with the East African Community Election Observer Mission, said. He has observed the past three Kenyan elections and noted that this one had the highest voter turnout. Peaceful. No confrontations.

When the initial results began appearing on Kenyan televisions that evening, showing President Kenyatta in the lead, the mood began to shift. Overnight, Odingas National Super Alliance coalition ( NASA ) released a statement alleging election fraud and hacking of the election commissions electronic system, sowing doubt in the minds of his supporters. NASA claimed that the initial results being sent electronically to the election commission were incorrect, and could be verified only by comparing them with the hand-counted paper tallies coming in from polling stations. The I.E.B.C. rushed to post images of the hand-written forms online as proof.

On Wednesday night, small riots began breaking out in areas with high concentrations of Odinga supporters, in Western Kenya and in slums across Nairobi, with protesters chanting, No Raila, no peace. Kenyan police and government officials cracked down. On the Friday after the election, undercover police officers raided NASA s alternative tallying station and shut it down. Government actions just before the election had also fuelled doubt. Days before the vote, Kenyan officials deported several international analysts working on Mr. Odingas campaign. And the unsolved murder of Msando, the election-board chairman, stoked suspicion of election fraud as well.

I would say the real troubling issues in this election were the death of Chris Msando suspiciously close to the election, given how sensitive that position is, and the harassment of the NASA people, particularly at their tallying centers, a Kenyan human-rights expert told me, speaking on the condition of anonymity. These secret-police goons are seen to operate as though theyre above the law. There is a danger of the country going backwards in terms of political harassment.

The final spark for Mr. Odingas supporters came late on Friday. The election board officially declared President Kenyatta the winner. Violence erupted in Odinga strongholds across the country, and police, heavily armed with tear gas, water cannons, and live ammunition, battled protesters.

In a step that exacerbated suspicion and anger among Odinga supporters, many Kenyan television stations that night aired only footage of jubilant celebrations across the nation. And, the following day, police arrested and harassed international and local journalists covering the protests. The total number of dead remains unknown, but at least twenty-four people, including a young girl, have been killed since election day, according to the nonpartisan Kenya National Commission on Human Rights. The Kenyan Red Cross said that a hundred and eight people had been injured. Kenya, poised to move past ethnic divides and emerge as one of Africas most promising democracies, was behaving like some of its more dictatorial neighbors.

But some signs emerged that electoral reforms, namely devolution, are succeeding. In 2010, Kenya revised its constitution to allocate more power and development funding to local governments. The hope was to place checks and balances on central-government power, and to reduce corruption and encourage voters to consider competence over ethnic affiliation in local races, according to Kenyan political experts.

In Makueni County, in southern Kenya, Governor Kivutha Kibwana gained public attention when he gave local communities the power and funding to implement their own development projects. Kibwana is a prominent human-rights activist and a Harvard graduate. During his last term, he refused to bribe local members of the county assembly for support, an expert told me, and unsuccessfully called for the assembly to be dissolved. Kibwana switched parties this year and ran as an outsider, but he still won, with nearly eighty-eight per cent of the vote. Many of the members of the county assembly who had opposed him were voted out.

During the first devolution cycle, we laid the foundation. On this second cycle of devolution, we will emphasize on development, Kibwana tweeted two days after his election win. One of his supporters responded, We also made sure that you have 100% new faces who we think will support you. But, in other parts of the country, candidates who ran campaigns that did not rely heavily on ethnic affiliation or traditional political parties, including Boniface Mwangi , a photojournalist turned activist who is the countrys best-known critic of established political machines, could not capture enough votes to win.

Nic Cheeseman, a professor of democracy and international development at the University of Birmingham, who was in Kenya for the vote, told me that it was unrealistic to expect an overnight shift in Kenyan politics. Its very difficult to break out of this cycle of mistrust and a cycle of violence, he said. That kind of memory exerts a strong hold. Its going to take incrementally better elections, and Kenyas going to eke up there slowly. Maybe over twenty years it can do it. On Sunday, Odinga addressed huge crowds of supporters. He pledged to remove the government of Kenyatta and encouraged his supporters to skip work on Monday to observe a day of mourning for the dead.

But some Kenyans ignored Odinga and returned to work. Weve [been] resting at home and the little money we have is depleted, Joseph Kirui, a fifty-nine-year-old Uber driver in Nairobi, who decided to work on Monday, told me. He said it was very irresponsible for Odinga to encourage a strike. Because we, the voters, have done our part, so its [up to] them, the politicians, to sort out their issues.

On Wednesday, Odinga held a press conference and announced that he would, in fact, take his challenge to Kenyas Supreme Court, after initially stating that he would not use the legal system. He referred to this years post-election violence and the recent crackdown on civil-society organizations in the days after the vote as evidence of the current governments unfitness to rule. Odinga encouraged Kenyans to keep resisting, albeit peacefully, and to not become sheep who will willingly go along with democracys slaughter.

Cheeseman said that Kenyas traditional politicians were squandering a chance to use the election to move the country forward. I think this is Kenyas wasted opportunity, Cheeseman told me. Because, in contrast to all those other elections, less seems to have gone wrong this time. The question here is why? Why, even when the process is right, can Kenya not seize the opportunity to build public confidence in the state? And thats the Kenyan conundrum.

More here:
Kenyan Democracy's Missed Opportunity - The New Yorker