Poor Choice of Words -- Trial by Combat

I'm looking at one of the places where the rally for Trump last week took a turn for the worse.

Giuliani was talking about getting access to the ballot boxes that were mentioned in some of the complaints the courts refused to consider. The words "trial by combat" appears to me to be expressing his intent to have experts other than the ballot box companies' experts and the state election commissions' experts examine them.

It only makes sense to find experts who would not have a conflict of interest. If you think there might be something to be found, you should not want the experts hiding it. And if you think there is nothing to be found, you should not want to leave Trump room to continue complaining.

True?

In what scenario would you want to hide flaws in the system?

In what scenario would you want Trump to continue complaining about nothing? 

Whichever side you're on, under what scenario(s) would you not want an independent expert to do the examination?

Back to the really unfortunate choice of words. I can only assume that Giuliani would not have considered the effect such words would have an a crowd that included rough-and-ready types who were not experienced with some of the metaphors lawyers use.

Why should I assume that?

Giuliani is a lawyer. He is smart, even if he misses a few things. If he were intending to incite a riot, he would not use words like that with the C-SPAN cameras rolling.

It's clear why politicians tend to want speech writers to prepare their words for them. Too many of those who spoke at the rally spoke off-the-cuff. Too many poor choices of words were used.

Was Trump's failure to more vigorously point out that the metaphors were metaphors was because he thought foolishly that a small mob could somehow take sufficient control of the Senate proceedings to force a declaration that would not have been immediately canceled once the insignificant threat was gone?

Or was it because he was not aware that there would be a few there eager for a riot, just enough to drag a few of the more impressionable participants along in storming the Congressional chambers?

Well, you make up your own mind.

The question I have is still, why did all the courts to which the evidence was submitted, in all the states where it was submitted, fail to even give the evidence Trump's team gathered the dignity of a "Here's why this is not a valid complaint." 

It was all blanket rejected with no explanation other than "It wouldn't effect the outcome."

Sure, giving each of the complaints time for examination would have made it hard to keep the schedule for the Electoral College's vote. Is that enough reason to refuse to even properly examine the evidence?

Sure, Trump says and does things that appear foolish at too many times. Does a bad habit of shooting off at the mouth earn even a foolish president so much scorn as to refuse to take his legal team's work seriously?

Did they expect Trump to turn tail like a dog used to being beaten and slink off? What were they expecting?

The only way to resolve the question in a way even remotely compatible with the traditional interpretations of the Constitution was to deal with it when it was presented.

So we are left with the questions unresolved. Biden and Kamala are left to fight a severe deficit in public perception, perhaps as severe as the deficit Trump faced. So is the Congress that will now be nominally of the same party as the president.

I'm not sure this is a bad thing. It may motivate more Americans to stand up and demand good behavior of the people they elect to represent them -- and demand better behavior of the members of the media, but that's for another post. 

I hope it so motivates everyone who reads this, of whatever political persuasion you are.

 

I also hope that it motivates people to demand that the various state election commissions return to verifiable voting, enough people that those commissions will have a sudden attack of common sense and return to verifiable voting.