2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumDid we really elect Donald Trump?
Republicans can argue until their last breath that Trump objectors are sore losers, but isnt more at stake than mere politics? This phrase has been rendered quaint by such serious issues as Russian hackers apparently trying to tilt the election toward Donald Trump; the FBIs possibly politically motivated practices; Trumps initial resistance to the conclusions of the U.S. intelligence community; Trumps refusal to release tax records, which might mollify concerns about his relationship with Russia.
These arent partisan issues, or shouldnt be, as evidenced by the Justice Department inspector generals decision to investigate how FBI Director James B. Comey handled the probe of Hillary Clintons email and private server. The focus will be on Comeys statement in July that Clinton and her colleagues were extremely careless with classified information but that he wasnt recommending criminal charges as well as his announcement to Congress just a week and a half before Election Day that, because of new information, he was reopening the investigation.
This fresh look pertained to new emails found on the laptop of Carlos Danger, a.k.a. Anthony Weiner (but, really, why the name change?), estranged husband of top Clinton adviser Huma Abedin. The emails subsequently were found to be inconsequential, but if there were any fence-sitters left at that point, at least many of them probably toppled into Trumps camp, from sheer exhaustion if not outright disgust.
Let me help you: Eleven days to go and the man who had said theres nothing to see here suddenly says, Hey, there might be something after all! And no ones supposed to think this affected the election?
How could it not have? Anecdotally, I can report at least a dozen friends who say, That was it for me. But polling, too, suggests a consequential voter shift in the final days of the campaign.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/did-we-really-elect-donald-trump/2017/01/13/f657a18c-d9d5-11e6-9a36-1d296534b31e_story.html?tid=pm_opinions_pop&utm_term=.af44b4f28477
Dawson Leery
(19,366 posts)bdamomma
(66,263 posts)those who believe we are sore losers are most definitely WRONG. This is about our civil rights and everything else. Our free speech is being squashed, the Free Press is being humiliated and being silenced. We have a man/child who wants the American people to sing him praises, HE IS NOT A FUCKING pResident HE IS NOTHING BUT A FAKE.
just my rant......sigh
NobodyHere
(2,810 posts)JI7
(90,438 posts)And and out dated system which makes some votes worth more than others. And the sc striking down voting rights.
ElementaryPenguin
(7,836 posts)We did not.
Orsino
(37,428 posts)Certified state votes plus an accepted EC result = election.
Rather than only arguing about whether this was "real"--a valid point of contention--we also need to focus on reforming the process that has utterly failed us.