“What They Do Next Is Steal an Election”

Show of hands: in light of the events of the past week, who here thinks Trump intends to graciously hand over power should he lose on November 3rd?

It seems almost petty to talk about electoral politics right now while we are grappling with the brutal, state-sponsored murder of George Floyd and the shameful legacy of racism that it represents (and oh yeah, also a historic pandemic and an economic depression). Unfortunately, all three of those nightmares are connected to an impending one.

Because as bad as things are, they could get a whole lot worse come fall.

RETURN OF THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE

A few weeks ago, Franklin Foer published a piece in The Atlantic that was so scary it made The Shining look like Goodnight Moon. It was titled “Putin Is Well on His Way to Stealing the Next Election,” an excellent demonstration of the bottom-line-upfront school of headline writing.

Its premise, in case you still aren’t tracking, is that the Kremlin surprised even itself by how successfully it ratfucked the 2016 US presidential election, and therefore is engaged in an even more ambitious effort to do the same again, especially since the ruling Republican Party has actively refused to do jackshit to stop them. The reason the GOP is not doing anything, equally obviously, is because it…