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Culture War Roundup for the week of September 30, 2024

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Of course, much of what I said could be flipped around and also said about Republicans. The difference is that I think Republicans are far less often in a position to do actually do anything, and also much less likely to get away with it if they did. I believe Democrats cheated because, from my perspective, they all but said they would (and will). They had motive, means, and opportunity, meanwhile laws were and are being actively changed to make any kind of foul play harder to prove. It also helped that many of their most outspoken accusers, while correctly intuiting the dishonesty and shenanigans, cast around crude and ridiculous theories about how this kind of thing happens. Trump must be stopped by any means necessary. Democrats are already openly bending and buckling norms and laws of election integrity, often defying the spirit if not the words themselves, so stepping over the line into outright cheating is not a big leap. After all, Democrats are the party of outcomes, not procedure. Democrats frequently target traditional procedures and processes to be dismantled because they do not have the outcomes that Democrats support. I do not expect the side that is most in favor of completely reorganizing how elections are conducted (e.g. abolishing the electoral college) to regard the particulars of the current electoral system to be especially sacrosanct or inviolable.

The idea that the 2020 election is beyond reasonable doubt is absurd, but they have been very effective at tabooing the notion. Somehow, the 2020 election, perhaps the most obviously questionable election in recent history, is the one election that is also uniquely unquestionable. This does not inspire trust. I fully expect Democrats to cheat harder and more successfully than Republicans this coming election, but I don't know whether it will be enough.