No, Seriously, Trump Lost
No, Seriously, Trump Lost
He can't accept it, but you can
When I mentioned the other day that Trump lost the 2020 election, some of his fans got mad at me. Or I should say they stayed mad, because they haven’t stopped being mad at me for the past five years. But this time they were angry at the claim that Trump thinks he actually won. The very idea is preposterous, they explained. I’m a big jerk for saying so, they elucidated.
This ignores the fact that for months after the election, Trump loudly insisted that he had won, and on January 6 he even whipped up a mob at the Capitol Building to try to stop Mike Pence from certifying the Electoral College votes. Reading between the lines, I took these subtle clues to mean that Trump believes he actually won the election. And nothing he’s said or done since then seems to indicate he’s accepted the loss.
But I’m not supposed to believe that he believes he won, because Maggie Haberman of the New York Times says so and she’s bad.
Well, okay, I don’t blame anybody for being skeptical of her or anybody else at the NYT. I’ve spilled oceans of ink over the years about how much they suck. So if you take that report with a grain of salt, okey-doke.
And I assume you won’t believe Charles C. W. Cooke at National Review either, because he’s also saying things you don’t want to hear. He insists Haberman has it right:
“I can attest, from speaking to an array of different sources, that Donald Trump does indeed believe quite genuinely that he — along with former senators David Perdue and Martha McSally — will be ‘reinstated’ to office this summer after ‘audits’ of the 2020 elections in Arizona, Georgia, and a handful of other states have been completed. I can attest, too, that Trump is trying hard to recruit journalists, politicians, and other influential figures to promulgate this belief — not as a fundraising tool or an infantile bit of trolling or a trial balloon, but as a fact.”
Does that sound like Trump to you? It sure sounds like Trump to me.
Now, this is National Review, so I’m not supposed to believe it because… I dunno, because the magazine does annual cruises? That’s very bad, I’m told. And they disagree with Trump sometimes, even though Trump fans don’t like it and it hurts their feelings. Also, that Cooke “bloke” isn’t even from this country anyway, and he talks funny, and probably some other things that prove he’s a liar.
Fine, don’t believe him. Don’t believe any of them. What do you want me to do about it?
As I’ve proven over and over again, I’m not one of those pearl-clutchers who are always so showily aghast about Trump “breaking norms.” Whenever they seethe about something he’s done that’s “unprecedented,” you can be sure there’s a precedent.
“Oh no, how could this ruffian undermine the integrity of our elections?” Uh, well, maybe he’s been paying attention to Hillary Clinton undermining the integrity of the 2016 election since the moment she botched it. And she’s had the eager assistance of the media. They screamed for four years about Putin stealing the election, so I don’t care how outraged they are that Trump can’t accept losing.
But that’s the thing, folks: He cannot accept it. That’s not how he’s wired. I don’t like it, but that’s just how it is. He’s not going to change.
Hate me all you want for saying so, but at least I’m not like this guy or his awful colleagues at CNN:
They miss Trump so much. They don’t know what to do without him. For four years they begged him to go away, and now he’s all they can think about. At least the money is good, I guess? That’s all they care about anyway.
So, What Else Is Going On?
The latest Vanity Fair has a big story on the lab-leak theory. Yes, I said Vanity Fair. A year ago you couldn’t even utter the suggestion that COVID-19 came from that Wuhan lab, or you’d be banned from social media and drummed out of polite society as some sort of alt-right kook. After all, you were agreeing with Bad Orange Man. That’s not #Science!
But now our moral, ethical, and intellectual betters in the press are pretending they never dismissed the idea and tried to destroy anybody who brought it up. They think we’re all as incurious and closed-minded as they are. I’m glad they’re not claiming it’s “debunked” anymore, but I’m not going to pretend they’re being honest about it.
Noah Rothman at Commentary says: “It’s Time for Anthony Fauci to Stop Talking.” I’m not sure I agree, because the more Fauci lies to us and flip-flops on every single stance he’s ever taken, the more everybody realizes what a fraud he is.
But I sure wouldn’t complain if Fauci took his big pile of cash and went away. He can buy a remote island somewhere, and his worshippers can make pilgrimages to touch the hem of his garment. While they’re all wearing at least three masks each, of course.
Speaking of scientists and how much I love hearing from them:
In other news, Americans want researchers to eat 100% more bofa.
Fantasy author and TV producer Neil Gaiman is being lauded for his bravery in the august pages of Entertainment Weekly, after he scolded a troll who doesn’t like some of the casting choices in his upcoming Sandman series for Netflix. A “nonbinary” actor will play the immortal deity Desire, who in the original ‘90s comics was depicted as androgynous, and the character of Death will be played by a black actress even though in the comics she’s white as hell. Whiter than white. Like, Robert-Smith-from-The-Cure white.
And one random person on the Internet doesn’t like it:
So EW got a 500-word story out of a fantasy author chiding exactly one (1) troll.
The press brings up this kind of stuff every time there’s a comic-book adaptation or franchise movie that casts actors who aren’t white or cisnormative or otherwise “problematic,” and it’s usually the stuff that comes out of the south end of a north-bound bull. There’s nothing brave or unusual about casting black and/or nonbinary actors in 2021. Hell, Gaiman would get in more trouble if he didn’t.
I’m not saying Gaiman is only hiring them to be trendy, but it’s not some stunning victory for wokeness either. It’s just business as usual in the entertainment industry now. A few cranks will complain, because a few cranks always complain. But most people aren’t bigots, and they don’t care. Neil Gaiman and his cast are not being oppressed, and you’re not a champion of the downtrodden for watching a TV show starring people who don’t superficially resemble you or behave like you do.
But that truth doesn’t generate any cheap clicks, does it?
I hope the show is good, but I won’t be watching because I refuse to pay for Netflix as long as they’re still showing Cuties. Besides, Gaiman doesn’t have the best track record when it comes to TV. American Gods left me flat, despite the best efforts of Ian McShane, and I can’t even get through a single episode of Good Omens.
At least I still have the original books. You should always read the book instead of watching the show or movie anyway. Yeah, I’m one of those guys.
In other entertainment news, Mission: Impossible - Part Whatever is being delayed yet again because 14 crew members just got COVID-19. Tom Cruise screaming at the crew didn’t scare away the virus, and neither did those robots he bought to “enforce coronavirus safety protocols.” Can’t he get Xenu to do something about this? They started filming that damn thing in February 2020, and by the time they finish, they’ll need CGI to make Cruise look like he’s still in his 50s.
I guess you could say the real impossible mission is filming a blockbuster action movie during a pandemic. But you shouldn’t say that because it’s dumb and annoying.
TikTok is now collecting “biometric identifiers and biometric information” from users. In other words, faceprints and voiceprints and any other kind of prints they can glean from the data you’re giving them because you want to be momentarily famous for making an ass of yourself. And that personal data is going straight to the Chinese Communist Party. I’m sure that’ll work out just great for you, Gen Z!
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I agree that Biden won, in the sense that they counted more votes for him. I just don't believe those votes were legitimate. The Time piece by Molly Ball solidified that for me. They cheated in numerous ways. Do we think Nancy drummed up hysteria about in person voting because she thought mail in was more secure??? C'mon man! It is impossible to know, once mail in votes are separated from the outer envelope, whether they are legit. Too many odd occurrences, too much interference by people not legally able to interfere, too much, all in all to believe the election was either free or fair.
Since you're certain Trump lost, I.assume you're favoring a full forensic to shut him and his loon followers up.