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Notes -
I think this might be a just so story. There was no serious investigation, no evidence presented, no experts testified in congress. So it’s sort of an odd proposition to suggest that a thing nobody even attempted to do could not have possibly changed anyone’s mind.
The position became very entrenched by now because every cathedral organ was screaming at them that “there was no fraud”, telling them that these were either stupid or bigoted for daring to think that, and telling them there was no reason to bother to ask questions, let alone investigate anything. At the same time the alternative press is reporting on reports of anomalies, there’s the president talking about fraud and filing lawsuits. Those lawsuits were not taken seriously and were dismissed on standing. In short the public was very loudly told nothing to see here, and no investigations happened.
Imagine the opposite. There are claims of fraud. And instead of being summarily dismissed, the attorney general of the states involved open investigations. Now there’s going to be evidence presented. If a pipe is supposed to have burst, then there’s going to be evidence that someone actually called a plumber who fixed that pipe. If ballots are showing up people are going to investigate where they came from. Computer experts would examine the voting machines and even publicly test them. Now there’s at least the sense that the system is looking at the claims. And whatever they find is publicly available. People can look at the data on the voting machine and decide, but at minimum it’s not summary dismissal. If you do that when Trump claims fraud, you can point to sworn testimony in court, a witness cracking on cross examination, or at least some evidence that he’s wrong.
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