Village Idiots

Scott Hardie | April 14, 2022
There are a lot of liberals laughing and joking today about the two Villages residents who voted fraudulently for Trump, since it's usually Republicans (led loudly by Trump) who cite voter fraud with little or no evidence. Look, the other side is the one actually committing the fraud, ha ha! This happens every time a Trump supporter is arrested for voting fraud.

Here's the problem. When conservatives worry about voter fraud, and they do worry quite sincerely, we liberals brush it off as being just a handful of cases, statistically insignificant and not enough to change the outcome of an election. (Which is bad reasoning on its own, because every vote potentially could be the decisive one if the race becomes close, but that's not my point.)

So, which is it? If the pro-Trump voting fraud is significant enough to joke about, how is it not significant enough to warrant changes to secure elections? If the right is correct that any fraud matters and must be prevented, and the left says that's a crazy reaction, why does the left proceed to joke about the very thing that they say doesn't in fact matter?

There is a cynicism that runs so deep as to defy logic here. :-(

Samir Mehta | April 15, 2022
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Scott Hardie | April 15, 2022
Are you talking about GOP politicians, GOP-affiliated outlets like Fox News, or average GOP voters? Because if it's the first two, I agree; most of them are lying through their teeth, just like partisan politicians and partisan media lie about so many things. But I think the average voters really do believe in it, and they are sincere in their fear that electoral integrity is in danger, whether of the tin-foil-hat variety of Soros-funded Illuminati conspiracy nonsense, or just run-of-the-mill Democrats-want-to-cheat-by-registering-felons-and-immigrants-and-migrants-and-other-non-voters stuff. And when liberals are inconsistent in saying that Republican concerns of Democratic cheating are blown out of proportion, and that Democratic concerns of Republican cheating are newsworthy and gloat-worthy, we fuel that fire with our disingenuousness. We need to be better.

Samir Mehta | April 16, 2022
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