Happy Failed Insurrection Day!
“Make the lie big, keep it simple, keep saying it and eventually they will believe it.”
Today is the first anniversary of the attack at the US Capital by those intent on stopping the certification of a newly elected President. I remember it well. I sat in my office, watching it live, in shock and utter disbelief. Now, one year later, I am still in shock and disbelief at just how many Americans still believe (and continue to promote the idea) that the 2020 election was stolen via widespread fraud. I really should know better. The fact is, people believe because they WANT to believe. It's really that simple and even though I know this, it still gives me a headache trying to contort my logic in an attempt to at least try to understand this insanity.
A quick look at the Trump Twitter Archive shows that the former president started claiming election fraud long before the election even happened. That's not normal behavior but this shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone. Back in 2016, Hillary Clinton provided a warning to this effect. Like her or not, she wasn't wrong.
Fast forward to the claims of widespread fraud in the 2020 election, Trump and his allies filed 62 lawsuits in state and federal courts. None of the lawsuits successfully proved systemic voter fraud and 61 of the 62 were dismissed. The one "victory" for the Trump team was a small one. A Pennsylvania judge sided with the Trump campaign, ruling that voters could not go back and “cure” their ballots if they failed to provide proper identification three days after the election. The ruling affected few votes and did not change the outcome in Pennsylvania, which Biden won by 81,660 votes. Additionally, The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (part of DHS) and its election partners called the 2020 election "the most secure in American history."
“We won. We won in a landslide. This was a landslide.”
Despite all of this, shockingly, 13 senators and more than 100 Republican lawmakers still planed to object to the certification of Biden's win when Congress met in a joint session. For context, lets put a few things into proper perspective. Trump and his allies want us to believe that election fraud occurred that not only stole the election from him, but was so significant and effective that it was able to overturn a "landslide victory" by Trump. In addition to that, they also want us to believe that this massive, highly coordinated and wildly successful amount of fraud occurred due to the efforts of the notorious "they" AND it happened despite having the following checks and balances in place at the time:
A Republican President
A Republican majority Senate
A Republican Attorney General
A Republican majority Supreme Court
Trump appointed heads of the FBI, DoJ, DHS and all other Intelligence agencies
Republican and Trump appointed Federal judges presiding over lower and appellate courts
Republican majority state governments in hotly contested states like GA and AZ
Republican voting election officials
Republican appointed recounters
So for anyone reading this that still believes that the election was stolen, please consider the following: Voters can’t be trusted, The poll workers can’t be trusted, the voting machines can’t be trusted, the media can’t be trusted, the Attorney General of the United States can’t be trusted, the people in charge of election security can’t be trusted, the lower courts can’t be trusted, the appellate courts can’t be trusted and the Supreme Court can’t be trusted, but Donald Trump CAN be trusted. Roll that around in your head for a minute or so and consider just how incredibly and mindbogglingly stupid that sounds.