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Comment by alkonaut | Hacker News Reader

> I have had people tell me they don't care if there is fraud and cheating

This sounds like you suggest there is/was fraud or cheating, which you shouldn't be doing. Not sure if that was what you intended.

I agree with the rest of your post though. Joe here won because of the division in the democratic party. He would have lost to most Republicans. He gathered the most votes ever for obvious reasons. People didn't exactly stay home this year. There has never been more enthusiasm for voting, whether it was for or against something.

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There is fraud every election. It doesn't typically change any of the results, though, and can (and should) be ignored.

If Trump voters are really upset about it, states can audit the vote and show that fraud was a very small percentage, and didn't change any outcomes. (Both sides commit fraud, so they tend to cancel each other out.)

That‘s not the point (that fraud may happen in any election). Trump asserts that there was systematic fraud in large numbers, in a way that the outcome of the election was changed. And many of his 70mm voters may subscribe to his point of view. This will increase the hostility between the two parties in the US.

When I see Trump talk, I wonder if he really believes what he says or if he knowingly and willfully lies.

What this man has done in four years has put a great damage to the democratic culture in the US, and he badly harmed the reputation of the US around the world, especially when it comes to old allies in Europe.

Edit: If Trump was not a narcisstic egomanianc („I WON THIS ELECTION BY A LOT“?!? Wtf?!), he would have stepped up in dignity, conceded his loss, congratulated Biden and wished him well. The US is confronted with many challenges in the midst of a huge pandemic, the nation is divided, and all he has to say is he won by a lot (in big letters)?!? This is it?

> I wonder if he really believes what he says or if he knowingly and willfully lies.

He will literally say anything it takes, truthful or not, to win the current argument.

Anybody familiar with the church has encountered this sort of "playing both sides of the fence" before.

In both cases, the Holy Man has all the answers, and it sounds like they know what they are talking about-- even if their answers are contradictory.

Questioning that leads to circular logic you can't unravel, and in the end you give up and accept that they know better than you. Institutionalized gaslighting, in both cases.

> There is fraud every election

Of course. Which is why it's really only worth mentioning in the context of fraud actually changing anything significant.

Not sure why either side has anything to do with fraud in this election (I got that undertone from the post).

As always extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

Maybe they should. Something needs to restore faith in the process. If we lose that, we lose everything. And a not-small minority believe that the election was fradulent. There's always a fringe that feels that way, but it seems to be growing.

> Something needs to restore faith in the process. If we lose that, we lose everything.

If the process results in electing white supremacist like Trump, shouldn't that cause people to "lose faith in the process?"

Biden's historic turnout and election is proof the US doesn't want fascism. If that doesn't restore faith in the process, I don't know what would...

This election is about as far from a clear mandate as you can get, with Democrats (barely) winning a presidency but not the senate and losing ground in the house.

They're just believing what their information-circle is saying. They're not looking at things themselves. For instance, in the discussions I've seen of the Right talking about fraud, they've not mentioned the shenanigans of the USPS not delivering mail that arrived on time (WaPo yesterday had a story IIRC).

They need to believe. So they follow those that help them do so.

The reverse of that is likely just as true; people that are happy Biden won, have no concern if there was fraud, just like those that wanted Trump to win would not question him winning.

This is probably the new normal. Republicans have learned a thing or two of after four years of claims about Russia stealing the election. Both sides will work overtime now to delegitimize winners whenever possible.

You're probably right. I'm not a fan of Trump, and I'm not sure how I'd feel if I found out that there was truly fraud and the election belonged to Trump.

But I am in favor of investigating all (legitimate) allegations of fraud, not just the ones that DJT wants to investigate. And counting all ballots.

They're complaining about votes being counted in states run by Republicans when both Republicans and Democrats are watching the count.

Trump formed a committee to find voter fraud and for years it failed. It silently disbanded. The heritage foundation has researched voter fraud too, and it has found little to no evidence.

If that doesn't satisfy them, what will? You're basically saying we have to convince a group of people that fucking unicorns and dragons don't exist.

Faith is eroding in the American electoral process because the Republican party has been working very hard both to undermine the process and to spread propaganda to the effect that the process is untrustworthy.

People could have more faith in the process without more legal cases like Florida 2000 (which kept Gore out of the White House despite him winning the vote in Florida), the Brooks Brothers Riot[0] and its 2020 replicas, the 2019 Georgia governors race (where the Republican candidate was also the secretary of state responsible for counting the votes; needless to say, there were 'irregularities.'), pervasive efforts to prevent demographics that historically do not vote Republican from voting[1], manipulation of the postal service to disenfranchise likely Biden voters[2], the continuing myth of 'voter fraud' that the GOP spreads[3] to justify disenfranchisement, and the constant drumbeat of 'it's rigged if I don't win' emerging from Trump's Twitter account and replicated by Facebook and other right-wing media outlets.

There's no clear way to restore faith in the electoral process without removing disdain for democracy from the Republican Party's DNA.

[0] https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/what-is-the-brooks-b...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_suppression_in_the_Unite...

[2] https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/11/05/usps-late...

[3] https://www.cnbc.com/2020/09/24/fbi-has-not-seen-evidence-of...

Is there a way for the Supreme Court to censure the Republican Party for the damage they've caused? Serious question…

No, this is not in the constitution. But regardless, two-thirds of the supreme court are Republican appointees.

The Republican party was under a consent decree to prohibit it from attempting to prevent minorities from voting, but once enough Republican justices were installed on the supreme court the consent decree was terminated. The court also voided the most effective parts of the voting rights act, which further allowed the GOP to suppress voter turnout among demographics likely to vote Democratic.

The preponderance of partisan, Republican, judges on the supreme court is very much part of the problem.

Faith is eroding in the American electoral process because the Democratic party has been working very hard both to undermine the process and to spread propaganda to the effect that the process is untrustworthy. [See the Russia hoax that was propagated and still believed to this day].

Take a step back, take a deep breath, and remember that issues are more complicated than "my team good, your team bad."

Co-ordinated Russian election interference was investigated by Trump's own Justice Department. They didn't find any. That sounds like democracy working to me.

Or perhaps we shouldn't investigate foreign election interference?

> Russian election interference was investigated by Trump's own Justice Department. They didn't find any.

The DoJ very much found signs of Russian election interference. They just couldn't prove that the Trump campaign actively conspired with Russia.

Wrong.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mueller_report

At least read the Wikpiedia summary of the Mueller Report[0] if you don't have the time to read the whole document.

The 'Russia hoax' produced multiple criminal charges, both of Russians for interfering in the 2016 election, and of several Americans for obstructing the DoJ's attempts to investigate the possibility of people in the Trump orbit conspiring with the Russian government.

It has been factually established that Russia interfered with the 2016 election. The only question -- which cannot be answered because people in the Trump orbit lied to investigators and concealed evidence -- is whether the Trump campaign actively conspired with Russian entities beyond Trump openly asking for their help to access H. Clinton's 'emails.'

Take a step back, take a deep breath, and remember that some issues are a lot clearer than intentionally obfuscatory Republican narratives make them out to be.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mueller_report

It shouldn't be ignored, it should be prosecuted when found. We just shouldn't waste tens of thousands of dollars searching for the handful of people in the country who are going to bother doing it. But if we find it, they should go to prison.

Contrarian take: Republicans should be allowed to waste as much of their own money as possible searching for irrelevant "fraud." Might be a useful lesson.

How is "people can spend money on whatever they want" a contrarian take?

I didn't even know there were claims of fraud or cheating but as I was watching this video of Biden talk of how the president gets elected and smirk about the counting taking place[1], I immediately felt something offputting.

Now as someone who makes judgement not completely off facts but from what I see and feel, my eyes squint and my mouth pouts discerningly because I feel we are not much better off.

[1] https://youtu.be/XUnuLFIXWv4?t=267

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