The Privilege of Democratic Government

During the third and last debate between Hillary Rodham Clinton and Donald Trump last Wednesday in Las Vegas, the Republican candidate refused to clearly state that he would accept the results of the election on November 8th regardless of whether he wins or loses.

While I have been appalled by many of the statements and proposals made by Trump during the last year, this latest idea, and his campaign claim that the election is “rigged” goes so far beyond the normal give and take of an american election campaign that I felt compelled to dedicate yet another post to the topic.

For her part, Mrs. Clinton was “horrified” by Trump’s answer that he would leave the moderator, and the american people in suspense at what he would or would not do as a result of the election. Perhaps to make matters worse, his campaign manager, Kellyanne Conway, said immediately after the debate that he would abide by the result because he would win the election.

The scariest part of this latest twist is that his repeated claim that the election was rigged against him has actually helped halt his falling poll numbers and re-energized his electoral base which tend to agree with him.

According to this, fortunately narrow, slice of the american electorate, Trump is a plain speaking, regular guy who is being picked on and unfairly attacked by the media and powerful interests. These people believe Trump when he says the 15-20 women who have stepped forward to denounce his inappropriate sexual behavior are all liars and that the real villains are the Clintons.

For Trump supporters, Bill Clinton is guilty of having a series of well publicized affairs and Hillary is guilty of supporting him and “enabling” his own predatory sexual practices. For them, she is also a pathological liar who clearly had deep secrets to hide or would not have had her private email server erased.

One of my daughters referred me to the most eloquent denunciation of Trump’s behavior which came from Michelle Obama who delivered a scathing rebuke while at a campaign rally for Mrs Clinton last week and can be seen in the video above.

The issue of Trump’s attitude toward women is that it gives us all a further look into how he sees himself and the world around him. The man appears to honestly believe that anything goes and his own enjoyment, and privilege are more important than anything else. Such as person has no place in public life and the only good news is that he is likely to face the biggest Republican loss since Barry Goldwater in 1964.

The key is that the true privilege is to live in a country which has a democratic system of government in which the governed are able to choose their leaders in a  peaceful, and clean process which everyone can trust. The American system is far from perfect but it is considered free and fair or at least has been until Donald Trump began to question its integrity.

In the 2000 election is was clear that there were serious problems with the election system in Florida which narrowly gave the election to George W. Bush. While the result went all the way to the Supreme Court, the case showed that the political party which seemed to be ready to rig an election, or at least do what it could to tilt the scales was the Republican Party and the Florida election commissions which were managed by an appointee of Jeb Bush, the candidates Brother.

Despite the facts of that case, the final result was accepted by Vice President Gore and the Democratic Party. Al Gore at least understood what a valuable and privilege it is to have such an electoral process.