By Stephen Macaulay
If Kamala Harris loses the presidential election, then the next day — if not election night, depending on the numbers — the talking heads on MSNBC that haven’t exploded will be breaking down what went wrong with the campaign.
There will be a number of reasons offered as to why this happened. Some will say it was because she gave an insufficient number of interviews. Others will suggest it is because the messaging about the economy (which is actually in good shape) wasn’t forcefully articulated. And so on.
Then there will be those who blame it on Biden. The reasons for that will range from his waiting too long to absent himself from the process to his — there he goes again — bollixed “garbage” comment. One thing you can say about Uncle Joe for most of his career: He evidently likes the taste of his own foot.
These commentators will go on and on, trying to come up with a reason why she lost.
If Donald Trump loses the presidential election, then the next day — but probably the night of — he will claim that (1) he won and (2) that it was stolen from him.
Commentators on Fox will parrot at least 50% of those claims.
There will not be any discussion of Trump not trying to appeal to people who weren’t already his voters or the Leni Riefenstahl-ready Madison Square Garden event’s vitriol.
Remember: He still claims he won the 2020 election despite his profound inability to show any evidence of that happening.
And because he says he won, then people who have bought into him claim the same.
Meanwhile, if it happens on the other side, then there will be analysis of varying levels of rationale. But even a little bit of rationale is a whole lot better than none.
This is the difference that people need to consider when they cast their ballots.
For all of their faults, when the Democrats lose they, eventually, accept the outcome.
When Republicans prior to Donald Trump lose, they did the same. Now they claim the loss can only be attributed to a “rigged election.”
The amusing — if it wasn’t so pathetic, sad and dangerous — part about this is that in the case of the 2020 election, the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (think about the name of that committee in the context of Trump’s claims about all of the crime that he maintains is occurring and think about how some of those people, who he characterizes as “political prisoners,” rubbed their feces on the walls of the Capitol) found that Team Trump’s planning months before the election was engineered for loss, not victory.
And even though he won the 2016 election, Trump created the Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity in 2017 to root out fraud — which wasn’t found, a precursor to what his Cyber Ninjas didn’t find in Maricopa County after the 2020 election.
While on the subject of Maricopa County. . . John McCain, who served six terms as a Republican senator from Arizona, died in 2018. Among those who presented eulogies were former presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama. Among the pallbearers were former vice president Joe Biden and former senator Gary Hart.
President Donald Trump didn’t attend. McCain’s wife, Cindy, explained she didn’t invite him because she wanted the ceremony to occur “with dignity,” that she wanted it to be “respectful and calm.”
In 2015, when running for president, Trump had said of McCain, who served with honor in the military and as a senator, “He’s not a war hero. He was a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren’t captured.”
McCain, a naval pilot, was on his 23rd bombing mission over Hanoi when his plane was shot down. He spent 5 ½ years in a North Vietnamese prisoner of war camp, where he was tortured.
Trump avoided the military.
McCain was a Republican who was a stalwart for his party, but he was a greater supporter of his country and what it stands for.
In 2017 McCain voted against repeal of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Trump wanted the act to be repealed.
Trump, after all of his years being against the ACA, now says “I have concepts of a plan” to replace it.
Not “I have a plan.” Just some ideas. You would think that someone who began campaigning in 2015, served in office for four years, and has been running ever since would have more than some concepts about something that is important to some 21.3-million Americans.
But it doesn’t seem to matter to him or to his supporters.
Which brings us back to the rationalizing Democrats and the reckless Republicans.
If Kamala Harris loses, there will be a comprehensive autopsy.
If Donald Trump loses, there will be an array of lies.
Facts versus falsehoods.
One is hard. The other is whatever you want them to be — until the truth emerges, which it will. But possibly too late.