If it's confusing enough, it doesn't have to be true to be an all-time classic pickup line: Hey babe, I'm here from the future.

So, did it work?

John Bolton on ABC’s This Week this morning...

The Trump administration’s argument regarding the vote is: the Democratic fraud was so pervasive and so successful that there’s no evidence of it.

It was nothing but a glitch teeheeheeheehee.

https://mobile.twitter.com/YossiGestetner/status/1327822482640867328

SOOOOOO THIS ALL WENT OUT TO THE POPO. ~ NOTAARYN at November 15, 2020 11:33 AM

"Popo popped Dookie down by the vacants." ~ Liz Lemon (30 Rock)

Can someone please shut this idiot up?

Another comment by Bolton:

“I think it’s very important for leaders of the Republican Party to explain to our voters — who are not as stupid as the Democrats think — that, in fact, Trump has lost the election and that his claims of election fraud are baseless,” Mr. Bolton said.

I don’t think Trump supporters are necessarily “stupid” — although some surely are — but I would say gullible. Many of them will swallow anything Trump feeds them.

Another comment by Bolton ~ JD at November 15, 2020 11:59 AM

Now that he's anti-Trump, Bolton is a darling of the Left. Back when he was a protege of Jesse Helms and a neo-con hawk, the Left hated him and disparaged him endlessly. When he was an "advocate for regime change in Iran, Syria, Libya, Venezuela, Cuba, Yemen, and North Korea," he was a warmonger.

Back when Bolton was NSA who "removed Timothy Ziemer and dissolved the Global Health Security team," the Left criticized Bolton. Then, it found it could blame Donald Trump for the dissolution and use it as a charge against him in the 2020 campaign, so Bolton's name was left out of it.

GW Bush had to use a recess appointment to get Bolton installed as ambassador to the UN over Democratic objections, so strong was the Left's distaste for John Bolton.

But now that Bolton's anti-Trump, he makes so much sense and is being quoted and retweeted by every Leftist in America.

John Bolton is an attention-hog. Admittedly, he was a good pro-America advocate at the UN, where and when we desperately needed one, but his behavior since indicates a serious need for attention.

Trump was not a neo-con and Bolton did not deal well with that. Their policy differences led to Bolton's acrimonious exit from Trump's admin, an exit the circumstances of which Bolton disputed hotly, each party claiming he initiated the exit.

Bolton's book was little more than an anti-Trump screed designed to keep Bolton's name in the spotlight and enable him to disparage the man who, for all Bolton's pretensions otherwise, fired Bolton.

Apologies, Rad, I forgot the link.

Conan, I can’t speak for others on the left but I respect any Republican — whether it’s Bolton or anyone else — who refuses to drink Trump’s Kool-Aid regarding the election.

...but I respect any Republican — whether it’s Bolton or anyone else — who refuses to drink Trump’s Kool-Aid regarding the election. ~ JD at November 15, 2020 1:58 PM

But how did you regard Bolton when he worked for Trump? Did you respect him then? Or is his current snit with Trump the source of your admiration. What if they reconcile? Will you still respect him then?

========================================

If you're wondering why Trump got 71 million votes, this article describes "The Chump Effect."

Progressive policies reward select groups at the expense of other groups. The groups that feel they've played by the rules and are being punished in favor of groups that didn't are angry.

It summed up the frustration many feel over the way progressive policies so often benefit select groups, while subtly undermining others.

[...]

That father was expressing an emotion growing more common these days: he felt like a chump. Feeling like a chump doesn’t just mean being upset that your taxes are rising or annoyed that you’re missing out on some windfall. It’s more visceral than that. People feel like chumps when they believe that they’ve played a game by the rules, only to discover that the game is rigged. Not only are they losing, they realize, but their good sportsmanship is being exploited. The players flouting the rules are the ones who get the trophy.

[...]

Thousands of norms, rules, and traditions make civilized life possible. Some, like paying taxes or not littering, are enshrined in law. Others are informal. Most of us take pride in adhering to basic standards of etiquette and fairness, to say nothing of following the law. And we have a deep emotional investment in having the people around us follow these norms as well. There’s a reason that we call selfish, disruptive, or criminal behavior “antisocial.” We know that if everyone stopped paying their taxes, or started running red lights and shoplifting, our society would be on its way to collapse.

It’s bad enough when some random jerk makes you feel like a chump; it’s much worse when government policies create entire classes of chumps.

To be clear, having a compassionate safety net for the poor does not, in itself, turn other people into chumps. The problem arises when antipoverty programs make it more attractive to stay on public assistance than to become self-reliant. When poorly structured incentives reward dependence and penalize work, strivers wonder: Why do I bother?

No one wants to feel like a chump, and a large portion of the electorate today feel that way. Politicians do themselves no favors by dismissing them as deplorables or clingers.

Conan, if a left-wing publication or website accused Trump of molesting his son Barron, there was no evidence to support this, and Obama or Hillary went on a talk show to say this was a ridiculous accusation, would you respect them for doing that?

And, if you did, does it logically follow that you’d respect them for anything and everything else they said and did?

...but I respect any Republican — whether it’s Bolton or anyone else — who refuses to drink Trump’s Kool-Aid regarding the election. ~ JD at November 15, 2020 1:58 PM

JD, there are some irregularities in the vote counting that have yet to be explained and dismissing them as Trump Kool-Aid is turning a blind eye to the fact that large portions of our electorate, of either political stripe, no longer trust the election process to be fair and impartial.

Now, are these alleged irregularities evidence of fraud? Who knows, but they should be investigated. Were those irregularities enough to change the projected outcome of the election? Probably not.

My feeling is some shenanigans occurred but proving it will likely not be possible within the time frame available. Determining the scope and effect of these irregularities will be next to impossible due to one side of the electorate dismissing them as "Trump Kool-Aid" and the other side insisting they changed the outcome simply by happening.

Of late, we've had way too many "found" ballots and other irregularities in our elections. Our voting process should be sacrosanct and deserves better than the casual sloppiness with which too many counties, states, voters, and politicians have been treating it.

“My feeling is some shenanigans occurred but proving it will likely not be possible...”

And, of course, these alleged shenanigans only occurred in support of Biden because Republicans would never engage in election shenanigans, would they?

“...large portions of our electorate, of either political stripe, no longer trust the election process to be fair and impartial.

If Trump, instead of Biden, had 306 electoral votes, Trump and his supporters wouldn’t be ranting and whining about the election process not being fair and impartial.

And, if you did, does it logically follow that you’d respect them for anything and everything else they said and did? ~ JD at November 15, 2020 2:50 PM

"Respect them" may be too strong a reaction. I may agree with them on some issues (as I already do), but genuine respect for a person is earned over time and over a body of work. I've always said, even on this blog, that Obama seems to be a good father and husband.

In other considerations, if they had a long-standing bitter feud with this left wing publication and diametrically opposed philosophies, I might wonder at their motivations, as I wonder at Bolton's.

Things are rarely black and white like they are hypothetical situations. People are rarely solely evil or solely good.

If Trump, instead of Biden, had 306 electoral votes, Trump and his supporters wouldn’t be ranting and whining about the election process not being fair and impartial. ~ JD at November 15, 2020 3:36 PM

No, but Biden and his supporters would.

Or have you forgotten the Russian collusion accusations from the 2016 election?

Have you forgotten Hillary urging Joe Biden not to concede if Trump won because Republicans are going to "mess up absentee balloting?"

Both sides are playing way too many games with our election system and it needs to stop.

Trump has served up huge vats of Kool-Aid over the years that his supporters have chugged, and then asked for more.

...if a left-wing publication or website accused Trump of molesting his son Barron, there was no evidence to support this, and Obama or Hillary went on a talk show to say this was a ridiculous accusation, would you respect them for doing that? ~ JD at November 15, 2020 2:50 PM

Do you respect Trump for defending Nancy Pelosi from AOC's accusation that she's racist.

Trump has served up huge vats of Kool-Aid over the years that his supporters have chugged, and then asked for more. ~ JD at November 15, 2020 3:47 PM

Trump ain't the only one serving up "vats of Kool-Aid," JD.

We've got a whole lot of Kool-Aid drinkers in our electorate right now, and they're not all drinking the same flavor.

Conan, Hillary made a concession speech the day after the 2016 election.

From her speech:

“We have seen that our nation is more deeply divided than we thought. But I still believe in America and I always will. And if you do, then we must accept this result and then look to the future. Donald Trump is going to be our president. We owe him an open mind and the chance to lead.”

“Do you respect Trump for defending Nancy Pelosi from AOC's accusation that she's racist.“

I never heard/read about that but yes, absolutely.

I think the way so many people on the left hurl accusations of “racist!” at people they disagree with is disgusting.

“We've got a whole lot of Kool-Aid drinkers in our electorate right now, and they're not all drinking the same flavor.“

I agree, Conan. On the left, for one example, we have many people guzzling the “cops are racists who love killing black people” flavor.

Conan, Hillary made a concession speech the day after the 2016 election. ~ JD at November 15, 2020 4:07 PM

Yes she did, and it was a good speech. Too bad she didn't live up to the ideals she espoused in it. Almost immediately, she was on board with peddling the Russian collusion hoax.

And, JD, she did advise Joe Biden not to concede because Republicans would "mess up absentee balloting." Her eagerness to get vengeance on Trump was off-putting.

So, whatever goodwill she may have gained from a generous, albeit day late, concession speech, she blew with her conduct after the election.

Unlike Trump, she conceded. Crucial difference.

> Republicans would never engage in
> election shenanigans, would they?

Sarcasm?

> Crucial difference.

What's so crucial?

I agree, Conan. On the left, for one example, we have many people guzzling the “cops are racists who love killing black people” flavor. ~ JD at November 15, 2020 4:43 PM

I was discussing common experiences with someone the other day; how senators Daniel Inouye (D-HI) and Bob Dole (R-KS), both veterans of the Italian campaign in World War II, disagreed politically, but were civil and respectful to each other - having the common experience of having fought for their country. Dole fought with the 10th Mountain and Inouye with the 442nd. Inouye was a Medal of Honor winner and lost his right arm. Dole lost the use of his right arm. Most of our politicians in the '70s and early '80s had experience in the military in World War II. By the Vietnam Era, most kids found ways to avoid the war through service in the Guard or draft deferments, so there was not that common experience uniting them.

We don't have common experiences anymore, we have identity politics in which the other groups cannot possibly know what the one group has been through, and each group competes to be seen as the greater victim.

I watched a Twitter teaser Reason put out for an interview with Shelby Steele on his new film about Michael Brown. In it, Steele puts forth the theory that long-term effects of a welfare culture of victimhood and dependency killed Michael Brown and inflamed passions afterward. The Twitter commenters, however, seemed united in saying the cops killed Michael Brown for no reason but that he was black and that Steele was selling out to white supremacy by saying otherwise.

Steele's theory is that welfare, instead of lifting blacks up, restored illusions of white moral supremacy in the face of having been forced to admit that they'd oppressed blacks for centuries, but that, in accepting the welfare deal, blacks traded individual agency and freedom for security, getting the worst of the deal and creating an angry culture built upon being the victim.

Unlike Trump, she conceded. Crucial difference. ~ JD at November 15, 2020 4:51 PM

Unlike Al Gore, you mean?

Conan, surely you understand the difference between the situation in the 2000 election and the situation in both the 2016 and 2020 elections.

But I understand your need for some kind of a comeback.

> so there was not that
> common experience

See, that's why the word crucialdeserves some attention. Wokies are ready to muffle, condemn and shut those of different beliefs out of every social, economic and institutional loyalty they can imagine. And they can imagine some terrible horrors, because they've never seen real ones. This guy needs more drama in his life than Yale can provide.

As Washington Examiner's Tim Carney put it the other day, Trump's a grifter, not a tyrant. He has trouble building capable teams to run hotels, sell neckties, mow golf courses or keep his ass out of court. His casinos went bankrupt: This is unfathomable.

How many of these phone numbers do you suppose he's managed to memorize? How many offices are going to take him seriously if he calls tomorrow morning with a boner for big changes?

If every government employee were by law Republican, they'd nonetheless stop answering his calls entirely as these weeks wear on.

I would like for JD to describe the difference he mentions.

Surely.

And, speaking of Bush v. Gore...

The Republican lawyer who won Bush v. Gore, the 2000 Supreme Court case that landed George W. Bush the presidency, said on Thursday he believes the 2020 election is "over" and that Joe Biden has won.

Speaking at an event for the conservative Federalist Society on Thursday, Ted Olson said that he believes "the election is over" and that America has "a new president."

"The Framers, they separated the powers because they knew that individuals would be flawed. They put in lots of checks, and we just experienced one, the election," Olson said.

"To the extent that the citizens of this country did not like the manner in which President Trump spoke, or the manner in which he threatened people or the manner in which he executed the laws, they exercised their franchise."

...

Olson is not the only Bush lawyer who has doubted Trump's attempts to win his legal arguments.

"I have read everything. I have looked at all the claims. None of them raise anything," one of Bush's other lawyers, Barry Richard, told the AP.

Kellyanne Conway's tweet from November 2016, accurately predicting Biden's Trump-thumping:

306. Landslide. Blowout. Historic.

Also, it bears repeating that in 2000, Gore won the popular vote; in 2016, Clinton won the popular vote; and in 2020, Biden won the popular vote along with the landslide blowout historic 306 electoral votes.

Yes, the popular vote does not determine the winner of the presidential election. But the fact is that, of all the Americans who voted, more preferred Gore to Bush in 2000, more preferred Clinton to Trump in 2016 and more preferred Biden to Trump in 2020. (And, of course, more preferred Obama to McCain and Romney in 2008 and 2012.)

The the popular vote does not determine the winner of the presidential election. When you look up their birthdays and compare heritage it seems probable that Hillary knew about the EC six decades before Donald thought to ask about it, or was by necessity told. Someone said she saw "Hamilton" twice in 2016, and at least one of those evening's shoulda been spent in Wisconsin.

I'll always think Trump didn't win that election, but that Hillary lost it. It was a broadly psychedelic gesture of discontent from voters to whom Dems have conceded nothing, certainly not courtesy, in the interim. "Deplorables" is still their operative regard for half the polity. The gesture was ignored, but those voters aren't going away.

Yeah… Trump's team is idiots, and they tweet idiotic things… Everybody's tired of the game show host. But no lessons appear to have been learned by either side.

Some say Obama was the guy who created this problem… Choosing the destructor in the style of the Sta-Puft Marshmallow Man…

…But the irritations which nourished the Orange Ambition will be returning in a tight, loud sequence.

Also, ever'buddies outta money.

Errant apostrophe. I swear to God I'll make it up to you.

(Bass = Jack Bruce)

Also, I haven't checked the numbers, but here's a tweet to Kaus-

if you go by the closest raw margins that put Biden over the victory threshold - AZ, GA, WI and #NE02 - Biden's combined margin of victory is just 66,702 votes right now.

In other words, Biden is winning the Electoral College by a closer raw vote margin than Trump '16.

And a great short essay by Ellis, who, um, knows things and makes things happen. In elections:

The short story of the 2020 election is that Democrats, with unlimited resources and the most favorable political environment imaginable, managed to fall short or cede ground at every level of electoral politics, save one. And they almost managed to lose at that level as well.

Okay, talk about election fraud isn't actually all coming from die-hard Trump people.

Larry Correia asked professionals. He was an accountant and auditor before he became a writer, and the reporting of the vote count bothered him.

Scroll down on his blog for other ideas about vote fraud - and, while you're at it, you might want to describe the collection and counting of votes in this Presidential election, with an emphasis on fraud prevention.

I know you want to be taken seriously if you say everything is just fine.

Conan, surely you understand the difference between the situation in the 2000 election and the situation in both the 2016 and 2020 elections. ~ JD at November 15, 2020 7:48 PM

I understand the differences, JD.

Gore was trying to change the way votes were counted in one county in Florida, a Democrat-leaning county with a history of corrupt and/or incompetent supervisors of elections. He wanted the counters to "determine the intent of the voters" with hanging chads, dimpled chads, and any ballots that were not direct votes for Bush going to him. He did not want a state-wide recount in which the same chad considerations went to Bush in Republican-leaning counties (i.e., Duval).

Gore lost the election on November 7, 2000, but did not finally concede until December 13, 2000. The Electoral College met on December 18, 2000. So, Gore went to the wire with his challenges, conceding only 5 days before the Electoral College voted.

The Democrats demanded that the Broward County counters "count every vote" and the Florida Supreme Court rewrote the Florida election laws, a job it is not supposed to do, in favor of Gore. The media pushed the narrative that Gore only wanted an accurate count and insisted that he be given time.

With the repeated recounts, the Bush transition was delayed several weeks. It was also marked by accusations of malicious pranks by the outgoing Clinton team - graffiti, missing doorknobs, missing computer keys, etc. - with damages estimated at $13,000 to $14,000 by the GAO.

Trump has said his campaign sees chicanery in the vote counts - boxes of ballots arriving in the middle of the night, GOP observers being evicted from watching the count when Biden surges occur, boxes of ballots with no down ballot votes cast, postmark dates changed on boxes of ballots, and statistically impossible trends. Trump is not asking for a new vote count method with each recount, but that the existing legislature-created (not court-created) counting rules be followed.

Yet the Democrats and the media are excoriating Trump for not conceding long before the December 14 Electoral College vote. To give Trump the same consideration that Gore got, he would not need to formally concede until December 9, 2020.

Both the 2000 and 2016 elections were about a new president replacing a lame duck administration term-limited out of office. The 2020 election is about an incumbent president being defeated, a fairly rare occurrence in American politics. The last sitting president to attempt and fail to win a second term was George HW Bush in 1992. That was 28 years ago.

So yes, JD, I understand the differences "between the situation in the 2000 election and the situation in both the 2016 and 2020 elections." I understand them all too well.

Conan, I love that you remember the way the Clintonians trashed the place on the way out. I remember that—

1. The W keys were popped off the desktop computer keyboards, as if replacing them wasn't going to be a taxpayer problem.
   
   
2. Some of the family members, including either Bill himself or his brother-in-law, was interrupted by staff when trying to pack away historical furnishings for the move.
   
   
3. Dubya instructed his incoming staff to move forward without making a big deal about this misconduct.

Conan, I knew you understood the difference. There was a very good reason for Gore to not concede right away in 2000. And, if the situation had been reversed, there would have been a very good reason for Bush to not concede right away.

This was not the case in 2016 with Clinton and it is not the case now with Trump.

Trump has said his campaign sees chicanery in the vote counts...

Well gosh, if Trump says his campaign sees chicanery in the vote counts then, by God (or Allah), that chicanery must exist!
Allegations = evidence.

You don't seem to grasp that the only outcome that Trump would not claim was "rigged" or "stolen" was the outcome where he won. Because he has consistently demonstrated such disdain and contempt for "losers", he is fundamentally incapable of accepting that he's a loser. He will be ranting and whining until the day he dies that the he actually won and that the election was "rigged", or "stolen" from him.

You don't seem to grasp that the only outcome that Trump would not claim was "rigged" or "stolen" was the outcome where he won. ~ JD at November 16, 2020 8:54 AM

It's not just that Trump says it is so. It's that there are serious questions being raised across the board about some of the conduct in the vote counts.

Now, is that questionable conduct enough to change the vote count? Probably not. Some of it will turn out to be partisan nonsense; it always does. However, Trump's temper tantrum notwithstanding, he has as much right as Al Gore did to raise questions about vote count shenanigans where such questions are appropriate. And they seem to be, given most states' casual sloppiness in handling vote counting.

We gave Al Gore a month to resolve his claims of miscounts. We spent four years investigating Hillary and Nancy's allegations of criminal misconduct and Russian collusion. We can at least spend a few days checking out claims of late-night ballot drops, postmark date changes, and other shenanigans.

In any given election we have half the electorate questioning the legitimacy of the vote count. If half your electorate has no faith in the election process, you don't have a democracy, you have a banana republic (and not the store). Sure, some of the questions and allegations in any given election are wing-nut conspiracy theories, but not always.

We have too many election boards and politicians treating our election process with a casual sloppiness that borders on criminal neglect and that needs to change before more than half of the electorate loses faith in the election process and we start choosing a presidente-for-life by violence.

And you know perfectly well, JD, that had Trump won, the Democrats would be claiming shenanigans and foreign collusion - just like they did in 2016. Hillary laid that groundwork before the 2020 election, telling Biden not to concede if he lost. This is a ridiculous way to conduct an election.

We need to implement a system that is not susceptible to casual claims of malfeasance - no more ballot box stuffing, ballot harvesting, post-dated ballots, late-night deliveries of ballot boxes, "found" ballot boxes, etc. Chain-of-evidence rules for ballot boxes need to be in effect. If FedEx can keep track of millions of packages in near-constant motion across the globe, the government should be able to keep track of a few thousand ballot boxes in one state.

To secure our elections, we will need both parties to commit to a secure election procedure with no room for claims of shenanigans later. That's unlikely to happen as both parties want room to declare themselves the real winners and the other party cheaters.

This nonsense is not good for the long-term health of our democracy.

Conan is good at blog comment.

It's so easy to regard Dems as bubble-dwellers— They seem never to have heard anyone suggest that their people — Pelosi! Hillary! Biden! — have ever been anything but virgin figures draped in sheer, blowy fabrics & bathed in bluest light in the darkest cosmos. ("Hunter who?") If anyone doubts that Republicans have come to grips with the Dark Side of the Force in human nature, four years of Trump should answer the matter.

I mean, fucking Chicago? California? Pennsylvania? I spent some time in the Keystone state a couple years ago, and the wretchedness in government is almost unfathomably bad.

So, yeah, re what Conan said about Russiagate etc., right on. But in a contest which seems to have come down to

But Trumpsters aren't focused/wherewithal types.

I grieved the 2020 election four years before the polls opened… No tears left for it now.

That thing where you forget that the less-than character initiates formatting. Ahem—

But in a contest which seems to have come down to less than 70K votes, it would be great if conservatives had the wherewithal and focus to dig into these troubled political machines and tidy things up.

But Trumpsters aren't focused/wherewithal types.

I grieved the 2020 election four years before the polls opened… No tears left for it now.

And Coney — or any other sane parties who might be reading — This thread from McArdle deserves some consideration. She talked a lot about this idea on her book tour.

This thread from McArdle deserves some consideration. She talked a lot about this idea on her book tour. ~ Crid at November 16, 2020 4:30 PM

McArdle's right. You'll never eliminate vote fraud 100%. Nor should that be your goal. The cost in freedom and money would be too high. However, you can eliminate the casual sloppiness with which states are treating the elections right now.

Likewise, you can never get 100% voter participation. Even if you show up at each individual voter's house with a pizza and a ballot. For some people, registering to vote and actually deciding on a slew of candidates are going to be more work than they want to put in. It's not voter suppression, it's their indolence or indifference.

Some of those single vote ballots - presidential race only - are likely legitimate ballots. That's a much as the voter knew of the race and wanted to participate. But a whole box of them from a single polling station? That's a red flag.

It seems to me that, simplistically put, in voting, welfare, etc. liberals want to make sure no one is left out and conservatives focus on eliminating fraud. As such, liberals loosen the rules and conservatives tighten them. Under liberals, we get some amount of waste and fraud. Under conservatives, we get some number of deserving people excluded. Both concerns are legitimate and have their place in the debate.