Election Deniers are suddenly facing an unfamiliar
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The total evaporation of any Red Wave (outside of Florida) has them completely off balance. If election results had been more uneven, with MAGA candidates performing well in some states and not in others, then their play book was simple and straight forward: FRAUD FRAUD FRAUD wherever they lost, and power to the people everywhere else.
But their showing was almost uniformly dismal. Trump's high profile picks under performed virtually everywhere, often disastrously so. Even the Florida results are a slap in the face to Trump's most hard core base. Trump's image emerged battered from Tuesday's election. So suddenly, closely identifying with Trump's "the elections are rigged" brand of politics is starting to look like a losing proposition. Who really wants to be the ones hoisting that banner into battle now behind an increasingly discredited leader?
Meanwhile the red mirage ploy that Trump's band used to great effect in 2020 has failed them this time. In PA most notably, Fetterman didn't need days of ballot counting after Election Day to pull off a victory. He won outright on Election Day.
Meanwhile in the high profile races in Arizona, Republicans have to pin all of their hopes on votes being counted days after the polls closed to deliver them electoral wins. The favored narrative of election deniers is almost hopefully scrambled. No more cries to stop the counting are being heard.
Of course no one needs facts to be on their side in order to promote a lie. But if the act of promoting a specific lie now seems to work to the disfavor of those who do, the motivation behind pushing those lies starts to vanish.
There will no doubt be election deniers out there for many years to come, but the winds have shifted. They no longer are at their back, they now are blowing cold and hard in their face.
https://www.democraticunderground.com/100217345815
5. It will be like a scarlet letter
That any one political party was dumb enough to buy into such an insipid strategy is something that they must wear around their neck for every day they are on the public payroll.
It stands for everything that is anathema to a freedom loving American, to decent human beings. Its dishonest stance precludes:
Independence of thought
Creativity in problem solving
Professionalism
The integrity involved in acting on behalf of one’s fellow human being
And those are just a few.
I realized this on election day, when I took several additional hours to research the candidates for our mayoral and town council races. As I read about the backgrounds of the people running (I live in a very Democratic town, but our candidates are all non-partisan), I was extremely impressed with the backgrounds of our candidates. These people had public service in their hearts. All their lives they have worked to improve the town and the public good. Many of them had high level jobs in addition to families.
I just could not believe the stark contrast between them and people like MTG, Josh Hawley, Donald Trump, Kevin McCarthy, et al.
Does anyone remember the best selling book People of the Lie? I think the author was M. Scott Peck. That is what we have here in people like Kari Lake: people of the lie.