So How Is Democracy Doing These Days?

Lannis Waters/The Palm Beach Post via ZUMA

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

I don’t remember who made this point a few days ago, but it’s worth repeating: Every Republican who yelled and screamed about Donald Trump being robbed was someone with no responsibility over election administration. Among those who did have responsibility for the counting of votes and the declaring of winners, every single one acted properly. That includes governors, secretaries of state, county clerks, registrars, election commissioners, judges (most of them, anyway), and the Supreme Court.

This is, needless to say, not a defense of the jackasses who kowtowed to Donald Trump and Rush Limbaugh by going on Fox News every day to whip the Republican rank and file into a frenzy over a “stolen” election. They did real damage, and they deserve to be shunned. That said, even direct, personal pressure from Trump himself failed to move any of the Republican officials who actually had the power to aid his doomed cause.

I’m not entirely sure what lesson to take from this, but at the very least it suggests that democracy in the United States is a little stronger than we might be giving it credit for.

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And the essential ingredient that makes all this possible? Readers like you.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to devote the time and resources to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And the essential ingredient that makes all this possible? Readers like you.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to devote the time and resources to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate