Attorney General William Barr has a strategy:
Grab the lead.
Claim victory.
Make the opponent try to reverse the public impression.
Call them sore losers and cheats.
We have seen this before.
It is dishonest and manipulative, but it works. The media and the public fall for it.
Remember November, 2000. Florida's electoral votes were in question in a dead heat election. Which counties needed a recount? Which absentee ballots should be counted? Which punch card holes were unmistakably punched? What is the deadline for counting ballots?
Each of these questions, and more, created recount results far greater than the 537 votes that decided the presidential election.
The Florida GOP took a position early and loudly. We won. Game over. You are trying to reverse the score.
They labeled Gore and Leiberman "Sore Loserman."
So when we had a moment of public disorder, the so-called "Brooks Brothers Riot," when an organized group of Republican lawyers and campaign employees overwhelmed a Miami-Dade County elections office, demanding the recount be stopped, it seemed less like mob rule obstruction of orderly government and, perhaps, an assertion of fair play. After all, Bush had already won, right?
Meanwhile, the clock was ticking. Bush was ahead. The GOP presented and stuck to a story: we had already won. Done deal. Democrats had their story: we want to count the votes to see who won.
Meanwhile, the clock was ticking. Bush was ahead. The GOP presented and stuck to a story: we had already won. Done deal. Democrats had their story: we want to count the votes to see who won.
Delays ran out the clock.
 |
| Demanded the Florida recount stop. |
We are seeing a repeat of the 2000 playbook.
William Barr took whatever is in the Mueller report and summarized it in a way that allowed headlines saying Trump is not indictable. That was enough to grab the lead in the public understanding of the legality of Trump's behavior.
Trump then used that lead to claim victory. "Total EXONERATION!" Trump is seizing the moment. Trump tweets, tells Sean Hannity, and speaks at rallies. I won. The media calls it a "Victory lap" as he tells rallies he was totally and completely vindicated.
Meanwhile, Democrats and the mainstream media have the weak position of catch-up and indecision and reversal. Trump claims he is certain he won. Democrats say we don't know what is in the Mueller report, they say.
"Read the report" is the modern version of "count the ballots."
Trump now calls for the investigation and prosecution of the people who had dared to investigate him. After all, he was obviously, completely, totally innocent, he says, so they couldn't simply have been doing their jobs; they were sore losers doing treason.
Trump is cementing this perch of power. He is acting like a man with a mandate to govern boldly. He directed the Justice Department to change the government position on a court case on the ACA. Now the government favors full repeal of it. We don't fix Obamacare or defend the popular parts of it. We obliterate it. Winners sow salt in the fields of losers.
William Barr will now make Democrats beg and wait, beg and wait, and then--like the slow drip of results from ballot counting in Florida, the information will come out. The longer it takes, the longer the Trump declaration of victory will settle in as the status quo.
The frame has been set: Trump won. Shocking revelations, if they appear, will be understood as Democrats trying to change the result of a game already in the record books.
The GOP had the votes in the Senate to confirm Barr, and the GOP played hardball with Barr in the role of team-mate, not umpire. Democrats got rolled, again.
The frame has been set: Trump won. Shocking revelations, if they appear, will be understood as Democrats trying to change the result of a game already in the record books.
The GOP had the votes in the Senate to confirm Barr, and the GOP played hardball with Barr in the role of team-mate, not umpire. Democrats got rolled, again.
4 comments:
Well said...ah, yes the Senate...
In the era of Foxtrumconnell Senate Republicans have been exposed as fundamentally unprincipled, no shocker there, but it's a lot clearer and worse than one believed. Senate Democrats, led by Schumer (sort of) keep playing the "long game", sitting on their hands and hoping to be rescued by externals and resorting to tactics over substance.
The Regressive vision of society is one of "winners and losers" as you point out. In a representative government if no one represents those without money and power the society disintegrates. It's a sad commentary on the state of affairs when demonizing the poor and disadvantaged is how prosperity is measured. Without McCain or someone like him in the Senate they may well be able to repeal the ACA, which is no less than a form of genocide.
Well said, Peter and Rick. Peter, your Sage (LOL) comment in an earlier post suggested that every time a Democrat is asked to talk about the Mueller investigation, they should turn the conversation to the Democrats' platform issues and make use of any media time offered on the issues. I quite agree.
Regarding a regressive society, you both, and others, may be interested in this recent article:
https://eand.co/the-age-of-the-sociopath-847cc5646b70
Andy Seles
Trump actually did win no matter what dirty details are in the Mueller report. When a special prosecutor says "I'm done, no more indictments, I'm closing shop", and actually goes home, that is called an actual win, not a claimed one. For the Democratic establishment and their media allies, this is called and actual loss, not a claimed one.
Journalism elites are filling the podcast sphere (Open Source, The Atlantic, Rolling Stone, Intercept) with calls for "an investigation of the investigation" based on the uncontroverted evidence that the intelligence state (Brennan, Clapper, Comey) initiated and fed the investigation. Not since the fake Iraq WMD scandal had we seen such a disinformation campaign waged by current and recently retired intelligence officials who appeared on television night after night. These officials and the media they duped or rewarded, and both parties including Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, got away with the WMD hoax. A united bipartisan Congress largely refused to investigate it to protect themselves.
But this hoax involves only Democrats, and the GOP Senate is going to investigate, and make criminal referrals to the GOP DOJ, ikely with the support of these journalism elites and scholars. The Democrats will likely refuse to participate in an investigation they can't stop. House committee chairs like Adam Schiff will obstruct investigation into his and his fellow chairs promotion of the hoax.
Damage to Democrats seeking to unseat Trump may be profound as the investigation of the investigation proceeds with perfect 2020 timing. That will be an actual not perceived loss for Democrats forced onto the defensive by GOP subpoena power and Pulitzer winning investigative journalists distracting from our "progressive messaging". .
Exaggerate much, Rick?
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