A YARDSTICK OF FACTS ABOUT 2016

Jerry Harkins

I am thoroughly amazed at the fog that has descended around our collective memory of the 2016 presidential campaign.  So many unimaginable stories have emerged from  the Wonderland on the Potomac recently that the brain has to purge itself of the old outrages every evening.  We tend to (and want to) forget as much as possible.  But you may recall that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton won the election by about three million votes but failed to become President because of a constitutional compromise reached in 1789.  If you believe in one-person-one-vote, which is to say the equality of all voters, the Electoral College was a betrayal of a fundamental democratic principle.  It and the even worse compromise that counted a slave as three-fifths of a human being were essential to getting the constitution adopted.  Nevertheless, however necessary, both were immoral.  Both were necessitated by the worst facets of our collective soul and only one was finally annulled seventy-six years later by the expenditure of vast amounts of blood and treasure.  The annulment was, of course, only theoretical for African Americans.  But the Electoral College compromise was never rescinded and so we arrived at 2016 with California having 68.2 times the population of Alaska but only 18.3 times the votes in the Electoral College.  In other words one Alaskan had 3.7 times more influence than one Californian.  Thus, for the second time in sixteen years, a Republican "won" the presidency with fewer votes than the Democrat who "lost" it.

Actually, it was not the Electoral College that cost Secretary Clinton the election.  What did her in was a conspiracy that cost her at least 107,000 votes, her margin of loss in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. The plot had three and maybe four elements:  

-       The announcement eleven days before the election by FBI Director James B. Comey that the FBI was re-opening the investigation of Secretary Clinton’s use of a private email server while she was Secretary of State.  They had previously exonerated her even while castigating her “carelessness” and even while admitting that no damage was done;

-      The release of unflattering Democratic National Committee emails regarding the primary campaign of Senator Bernie Sanders by Julian Assange of Wikileaks on July 22;

-      The delivery of those same DNC emails to Assange by the Russian government which had hacked them in an effort to influence the election on behalf of Trump; and,

-      The collusion or attempted collusion between the Russian government and the Trump campaign which shared the objective of defeating Clinton.

There can be no reasonable doubt about the last three elements in that list.  Nor can there be any doubt that Director Comey’s unprecedented actions influenced voters in swing states.  He had the motive, means and opportunity to destroy Clinton’s credibility just eleven days before voters went to the poll.  Finally, on Sunday, November 6, Comey admitted that the re-opening had turned up nothing.  He has alleged that both revelations were the most difficult decisions he ever had to make but, in fact, they were both simple.  He knew he was influencing an election without any evidence that the new information had any validity.  He knew it would fuel the chant heard in Trump rallies, “Lock her up!”  Although the source of the newly found emails was not Assange, the FBI had been either careless or complicit in dealing with the earlier ones.  Comey knew this and should have followed the advice of the adage, “Once bitten, twice shy.”  But he did not.  We still do not know whether he was involved in any way with Assange, the Russians and/or the Trump campaign.  It seems unlikely but there is nothing likely about this story.  The Department of Justice, no friend of Comey, has investigated the matter and has concluded that, reprehensible as his actions were, there is no evidence that he acted for political reasons.  He has repeatedly said that he did it to protect the reputation of the FBI and preserve the rule of law.  In fact, his decision predictably made the reputation of the FBI lower than ever among both liberals and conservatives.  The President of the United States recently called it a “den of thieves” but, of course, no one in his or her right mind believes anything he says.

Comey or no Comey, Hillary Clinton was defeated by a conspiracy.  Sure she made mistakes and sure a lot of people didn’t like her, but:

-       There is solid evidence that Julian Assange despised Clinton, even resorting to the Trumpian (i.e., absurd) allegation that she tried to assassinate him using a drone.  

-      There is equally solid evidence that Assange conspired with the Russians to defeat her and elect Trump.  He certainly offered to provide defamatory information about her to the Trump campaign. The offer and the information were accepted.  

-      There is also solid proof that senior members of the Trump campaign sought the same kind of material from the Russians without using Assange.  

So, Comey or no Comey, there was a conspiracy which is defined as. “An agreement between two or more persons to engage jointly in an unlawful or criminal act, or an act that is innocent in itself but becomes unlawful when done by the combination of actors.”  No matter how often Mr. Trump shouts “No collusion” from the rooftops, if it quacks like a duck, it’s a duck. 

There are many aspects of this story that are truly eerie.  For one thing, there are millions of Americans who don’t believe any of it. These are mainly the same people who don’t believe in evolution, the fluoridation of water or climate change but the deniers include Republican office holders and a significant majority of evangelical Christians.  And don’t forget Rudy Giuliani, America’s Mayor, who is given to emitting the most asinine comments as long as they get him fifteen seconds on the six o’clock news.  He must make even his client, Donald Trump, blush.  But the most frightening aspect of it all is the fact that the conspirators were able to dispossess every American of the fundamental right of a free people to freely govern themselves.  We became, in effect, a colony of Russia, stripped of our independence by a cabal of political opportunists, thugs and religious fanatics.  We were reduced to a puppet state with no influence in the world except that which derives from our arsenal of doomsday weapons.

It is conceivable that Trump could be removed from office by either of two constitutional provisions.  It is even possible that we could find relief in the words of our Declaration of Independence:

That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.

But that’s not the way to bet. Barring another Nixonian Saturday Night Massacre, it is probable that he will complete his term of office.  He might even survive pardoning himself given the craven tolerance of so many Republican officeholders.  As he himself has boasted, “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose any voters.” 

Democracy isn’t easy.  Arguably there has never been a pure democratic government of any community larger than a couple of hundred people.  All larger ones have been forced to accept compromises that tend toward either authoritarianism or anarchy.  These tendencies run in cycles that can be driven by sudden events or long term trends.  America today – what we like to call the Great American Experiment – is showing signs of both extremes at the same time.

Subsequent Event

On March 22, 2019, Attorney General William Barr released a letter he sent to Congress which reported the key conclusion of special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation.  He quoted Mueller's 300-page submission as saying that the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."  That it did not establish conspiracy or coordination does not mean that one or the other did not occur, only that the evidence was insufficient to reach a conclusion.  The conspiracy statues rightly establish a high bar for criminality.  However, we may resort to a somewhat lower standard if our only concern is with logic and decency.  

As usual, the Republicans resorted to the Big Lie:  No conspiracy, no collusion, fake news, case closed.  Mr. Barr, who had "redacted" massive amounts of the Mueller report, refused to let Congress see what he had taken out or the evidence for parts he left in.  In other words, anyone who believes a word Barr says might find fellowship in the Flat Earth Society.  As the Psalmist said, "How long, O Lord, shall the wicked triumph?"