If you thought all of the whining about Russian hacking, urgent recounts, voter fraud, an alt-right movement, unfaithful electors and crazy Cabinet picks would end after the Electoral College vote Monday, you’d be wrong.
It won’t end Dec. 28 when state and federal officials must have the certificates of vote, it won’t end Jan. 6 when a joint session of Congress counts the electoral votes, and it won’t end Jan. 20 when President-elect Donald Trump takes office at the 45th president of the United States.
This is meant to be a four-year-long delegitimization of the New York businessman by the Democrats and the political left.
Despite protests around the country by actual concerned citizens and by people likely paid to be present (as has become de regueur for 2016 protests), enough electors cast their votes on Monday for Trump to become president.
The Electoral College functioned as it has for more than 200 years, serving as a curb on large-state domination of a popular vote election. This year’s election, indeed, was a primary example of why the Founding Fathers instituted such a system. One state, California, alone, where Democrat Hillary Clinton rolled up a more than 4 million vote majority, accounted for the difference – and then some – in her popular vote majority over Trump.
For all of the talk of a possible coup of electoral voters choosing Clinton or another Republican candidate, it was much ado about nothing.
Nevertheless, because the left believes it owns the arena of ideas and none but its own are reasonable, the battle against Trump will continue.
Consider the allegations of Russian hacking for a moment. Before the election, when President Barack Obama and other Democrats were sure Clinton would win in a landslide, such allegations were dismissed. Both Obama and Clinton assured the nation the election couldn’t be more secure, and she agreed she would abide by the results.
When the will of the people was made known, with virtually no ballot box fraud evident, both Obama and Clinton began making statements about the seriousness of possible Russian involvement in the election.
And, if that doesn’t stick, Obama recently called the Electoral College a “vestige” and a “carryover” of another era, and a recent poll – as if most people don’t know by now that all polls can be skewed – showed 45 percent of voters want a constitutional amendment to end the Electoral College.
So all of that rhetoric about the president, in his initial meeting with Trump, pledging “to do everything we can to help you succeed,” was hogwash.
And Obama doesn’t plan to back down when he leaves offices, having said he’ll stay in Washington, and undoubtedly will be a vocal critic – along with the rest of the left – as the Affordable Care Act, various regulations and numerous executive orders are undone.
We can’t say we’ll appreciate everything Trump, a fair-weather conservative at best, will do, but we know the left won’t let up – and wouldn’t have even if Trump had won 2.6 million more votes than Clinton.
To the left, it’s as simple as “we’re right and they’re wrong,” and nothing as complicated as a presidency is going to get in their way. Not desire for change. Not the nation’s mood uptick. Not electoral votes.
Don’t say we didn’t warn you.