All you need to know about Donald Trump has been on display since the presidential election. Yes, I know that the previous three years plus have been pretty bad, but he's gone above himself since November. It's obvious that he doesn't at all understand how our elections work and why, given the characteristics of the vote this year, he could be winning in the PM, but losing come the AM.
And I'm not saying that this is some political ploy by a savvy operator who'e just trying to rile up his supporters. It's clear he's just oblivious to how our system works, how votes are counted, how a democracy operates, why even Republican politicians don't support his lawsuits, and, most important, to the fact that he's just not that popular. Polls consistently put his approval ratings under 50% for almost every day of his presidency. He won 46% of the vote in 2016 and 47% in 2020. So mush has been made of the fact that he's won 74 million votes so far. Joe Biden's won 81 million. He wins.
Even more than that, though, is Trump's sense that all Republicans and conservative judges must be on his side rather than on the side of the Constitution. This is obviously the most dangerous aspect of his actions. It's one thing to be transnational about policy; it's quite another to fervently believe that since you appointed a judge, that the judge will side with you simply because you...appointed them. I was heartened when the Supreme Court ruled rather curtly that Texas had no standing or evidence to prove anything other than the president thinks he's entitled to win. I was also not surprised that the two justices who said the case could go forward were Alito and Thomas. They've been out of the mainstream for as long as they've been on the court.
Then there are the Republican legislators and governors who also backed the president. I understand party unity and making sure you win your next election, but supporting what is essentially a coup by trying to enable state legislatures to appoint Trump electors despite having no evidence of fraud or chicanery, is madness. And dangerous.
If you need to upend an election in order to sate the Republican base, then the problem is the base and all people who believe that Republicans and Democrats, legislators and governors, election workers, all media outlets except the ones you determine to be truthful, technology companies, foreign agents, and government workers worked night and day to deny Donald Trump what he, in fact, lost. The election. The popular vote. Enough states for Joe Biden to win 306 electoral votes.
I am still hoping that the president will invite Joe Biden to the White House sometime next week, after the Electoral College has made Biden's win official, but of course I would not be surprised if it didn't happen. Most likely, Donald Trump will make a graceless exit, not attend the Inauguration, and continue to complain endlessly about how unfairly he was treated. As the ultimate snowflake, who couldn't handle the judgement of the people, he will go down in history as just another impeached one-term president. Let's move on to brighter days.
