Yet another political post...

[sleigh]

I’m increasingly worried about Trump’s refusal to concede and the lack of pushback to Trump's recalcitrance from the Republican leadership. In 2016, Election Day was on Nov. 7 and the election results on the electoral count were close, as the current election has been. The various news outlets called the election for Trump in the early morning hours of Nov. 9. Clinton conceded the election at that point and delivered her concession speech the morning of Nov. 9, with no allegations that the election may have been rigged or fake or illegal and no call for her supporters to continue to fight the results.

This year, the election was finally called by (most) news outlets on Nov. 7 when Pennsylvania was called for Biden: four days after the election. We’re now an additional three days past that and Trump is still tweeting that the election was rigged and he actually won.

In the election of 2000, election day was again Nov. 7, but Gore didn’t concede until Dec. 13, the day after the Supreme Court decision to halt recounting the vote in Florida -- however, that was under very different circumstances from this election: the electoral votes came down to Florida (Gore had already won the popular vote). The vote difference between Gore and Bush was 0.0092% (!) and whomever won Florida would also win the Electoral College. In the end, when the Supreme Court stopped the recounting of ballots, Bush won Florida by a scant 537 votes in state that had cast over 5.8 million votes. By comparison, Pennsylvania (this year's ultimate 'swing state') has Biden ahead by 47,613 votes (49.7% to 49.0%) as of today at 1:30PM, with only about 52,000 votes still to count and Biden currently getting 67% of the votes coming in. That's NOTHING like Florida in 2000.

Bear in mind that, historically, recounts rarely-to-never change the final tally by more than a few hundred votes, and often less.

it’s very clear this year that the votes aren’t anywhere NEAR that close, electoral or popular. In order to claim victory, Trump would need to get the Pennsylvania and Nevada results overturned, and somehow win Arizona and Georgia in recounts. To get Pennsylvania overturned, he’d have to take a lawsuit to the Supreme Court and win -- but even if he managed that feat, Biden STILL wins if he gets Arizona + Nevada, or Nevada + Georgia.

A sitting president stubbornly refusing to concede is truly problematical for several reasons: it stops Biden from starting the transition process (because Trump's head of the GSA refuses to consider the election settled and won't release money for the transition or order it to go ahead); it emboldens the Trump supporters who believe that the election was ‘rigged’ (which could potentially lead to violent protests); it damages the entire concept of American democracy in the broader world; and it presents a true security risk for us as it’s not clear who’s actually in charge here, which might embolden an enemy state.

Trump’s moves in the last two day exacerbate all those issues: he’s fired Mark Esper, which caused the top Pentagon official, James Anderson, to resign in protest. Trump AG William Barr put out a memo telling federal prosecutors that they should examine allegations of voting irregularities before states certify results in the coming weeks, and that prompted Justice’s top election crimes prosecutor, Richard Pilger, to immediately resign. Who knows who the Trump administration will get rid of next: CIA Director Gina Haspel? FBI Director Christopher Wray? The cost of losing long-time staffers and their institutional knowledge and replacing them with temporary Trump-loyal replacements without such knowledge is immense.

This is getting increasingly scary to me. The election is over and Trump throwing a tantrum over his loss is a slap in the face to the our democratic process -- and, as Denise has noted, is a slap in the face to all the Republicans who have won their election contests, since if the presidential election can't be trusted, neither can theirs.

Grow up, Mr. President. You lost. Concede.