They waited until the next morning. But both Hillary Clinton in 2016 and Kamala Harris in 2024 conceded defeat when they ran for President against Donald Trump.

This is brought up because in between those two elections, Trump himself graciously conceded the 2020 election to Joe Biden. He called the President-elect and wished him, Vice President-elect Harris and the incoming administration well, offering whatever cooperation he could.

Just checking to see if you were awake.

Of course, Trump didn’t do that on November 7, 2020, when the networks declared Biden the winner.. Even as his limo tried to navigate Washington streets clogged with celebrants, Trump stewed like the orange prune he is. And within hours, he was claiming that there was something fraudulent about Biden’s win.

And he has continued to more than 5-1/2 years.

In fact, last week, he asked the networks for time to address the nation on a crucial subject. The logical potential topics for this address included::

1. The ongoing war with Iran,  which he have decimated multiple times  – a problem because it’s hard to decimate anyplace more than one unless they’re really fast rebuilders.

2. The cyclosporiasis outbreak that has sickened thousands around the nation. A little presidential reassurance about the nation’s food supply would have been nice. But as long as McDonald’s can make Big Macs – even if they’re san s lettuce – the food chain won’t be much concern to Trump.

3. The Epstein Files. Finally, the truth!

Again just checking to see if you’re awake.

No, Trump addressed the nation about his obsession with the 2020 election. In this particular instance, he claimed that China hacked into the voter records of 18 states in an effort to influence the election in favor of Biden.

He released documents he claims prove the point, all of them heavily redacted and nothing anyone hasn’t seen before. That anyone includes the nation’s security agencies, who continue to deny that any foreign government influenced the 2020 vote.

This is Trump’s scratched record – that despite all evidence that nearly 8 million more Americans voted for Joe Biden than voted for him. That a nation reeling from the ravages of Trump’s mishandling of COVID-19 – wonder if anyone actually drank bleach as he recommended – wasn’t prone to turn to someone to end the. mess.

You would think that his victory in 2024 would get him to shut up about 2020, to put whatever embarrassment he felt behind him. The American people gave him a plurality of its votes this time, unlike in 2016, as he swept back into the Oval Office,

Supposedly.

I’ve never bought into what a lot of my fellow liberals and Democrats believe – that Trump somehow cheated to win two years ago. I don’t see how any entity could do that – I don’t care how sophisticated the Russians, the Saudis and anyone else who would want Trump in office could be.

Except that Trump keeps bringing up this idea that someone stole the 2020 election. By an even bigger Electoral College margin than Trump won four years earlier .

I’m reminded of the line from Hamlet that’s paraphrased in the title of this. It’s a variation of what I learned in my high school psychology class – projection, the idea of attributing to someone else behavior that you practice.

Maybe the constant harping on the past is Trump’s way of saying he’s done it before. Maybe even twice. Maybe Kamala Harris really was 4 percentage points ahead of Trump when all the votes were counted, as she was in the. final polls before the election.

I mean I still it hard to believe that anyone could have watched the debate between Trump and Harris and not seen how much more suitable she was for the presidency than the guy who spouted “They’re eating the dogs, they’re eating the cats.”

Did his buddy Elon Musk spend enough money to rig the voting somehow? Was he joined by some of his other tech pals,, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, Peter Thiell? These men have a lot of influence in social media. Maybe they found a way to turn that into raw electoral power.

I don’t believe that. But I might not be a bad idea for Democrats to say it a little more loudly.

Trump’s election lies and his lack of grace have poisoned the American political atmosphere for far too long. Accusing him of stealing the 2024 election might make his head spin a la Linda Blair in “The Exorcist.”

IN any event, I think claiming the 2024 election was stolen has as much validity as claiming the 2020 election was stolen. And putting Trump and his minions on notice is one of the many ways to fight back as a crucial 2026 midterm election draws closer.

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