Acceptance Of Defeat In Presidential Elections A Norm, Except For Donald Trump!

The American political tradition is that the losers of elections accept defeat in Presidential elections, as well as other elections, and do not act like sore losers!

But we have a “sore loser” President who now says he does not know if he will accept defeat in November!

What does he propose to do? To encourage his supporters to promote violence and bloodshed? To refuse to leave office and barricade himself in the Oval Office?

If any move to promote violence and bloodshed develops as a result of Trump’s bad behavior, it is time to arrest him, even while still President, as a traitor! And were he to refuse to leave office on January 20, 2021, the Secret Service, the Capitol Police, and elements of the military would have to drag him out, maybe in handcuffs and chains, and maybe being ‘rough”, as he suggested to police officers one time on Long Island, New York in 2017!

There is no room for a loser who will not accept loss!

When we look at our history, Samuel Tilden was gracious in defeat in 1876 despite having won the popular vote to Rutherford B. Hayes.

The same happened when President Grover Cleveland lost reelection in 1888 to Benjamin Harrison, despite winning the popular vote.

The same happened when Richard Nixon lost to John F. Kennedy in 1960, in the midst of accusations of fraud in Illinois and Texas.

It also happened in 2000 when Al Gore won the popular vote over George W. Bush, but lost the electoral vote due to Florida voting for Bush by the official count of 537 votes.

And Hillary Clinton also accepted defeat in 2016, despite a massive nearly 3 million popular vote lead over Donald Trump, but in a very close count, lost the Electoral College by small margins in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania.

What was acceptable for Samuel Tilden, Grover Cleveland, Richard Nixon, Al Gore, and Hillary Clinton MUST be good enough for Donald Trump!

8 comments on “Acceptance Of Defeat In Presidential Elections A Norm, Except For Donald Trump!

  1. Jeffrey G Moebus July 20, 2020 7:21 pm

    As i said back in early-to-mid March: That all assumes that there will even be an election in November. And then comes the question of: And what kinds of problems on Election Day will ensure that nobody goes to bed that nite, or week, or even month knowing exactly Who won that election? This has all the potential for a very Wild Ride. “Buckle up Your seatbelt, Dorothy; we ain’t in Kansas any more.”

  2. Former Republican July 20, 2020 8:37 pm

    Drag Trumpty Dumbty out and throw him into prison where he belongs!

  3. D July 20, 2020 10:37 pm

    Ronald writes, “And Hillary Clinton also accepted defeat in 2016….”

    By the stretch of no one’s imagination did Hillary Clinton accept losing Election 2016—and losing to Donald Trump—in a remotely convincing, non-sore-loser manner.

    A glowing example of this was when Hillary Clinton went to Mumbai, India, in March 2018, and delivered a speech which included her insights on the results of Election 2016:

    “If you look at the map of the United States, there’s all that red in the middle where Trump won.

    “I win the coast. I win, you know, Illinois and Minnesota, places like that.

    “But what the map doesn’t show you, is that I won the places that represent two-thirds of America’s gross domestic product.

    “So I won the places that are optimistic, diverse, dynamic, moving forward. And his whole campaign, ‘Make America Great Again,’ was looking backwards.”

    * * * * *

    Source:
    https://www.businessinsider.in/Hillary-Clinton-I-won-the-places-that-are-dynamic-moving-forward-while-Trumps-campaign-was-looking-backwards/articleshow/63276631.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst

    * * * * *

    What was especially offensive was Hillary Clinton running down the United States and its citizens. And she sounded shallow. (“I won the places that represent two-thirds of America’s gross domestic product.”)

    Hillary Clinton dismissed four of the nation’s Top 10 populous states: Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Michigan—with their combined +83 electoral votes plus the 2012-to-2016 Republican holds of 206 electoral votes—they were enough in Republican pickups to elect Donald Trump. So, those four key states were—and they are—“dynamic.” Pennsylvania and Michigan having been willing to flip Republican, for Trump, meant they were willing to not look backward, to go ahead and look forward, and to not let the Democrats assume that they get to always have them be a part of their “Blue wall.”

    That speech told—no, make that showed—everybody Hillary Clinton was never worthy of the presidency of the United States.

  4. Princess Leia July 21, 2020 8:14 am

    Hillary is correct. Trump’s bigoted campaign was, and still is, about moving our country socially backwards. He and his Republican cronies want to get rid of civil rights, gay rights, and women’s rights.

  5. Pragmatic Progressive July 21, 2020 8:21 am

    Exactly, Leia. The people most affected by Trump and his bigotry are anyone who is not a white, straight, “Christian”, male.

  6. Ronald July 21, 2020 8:34 am

    D, I admire and appreciate your commentary, but I strongly disagree on your statements about Hillary Clinton.

    She was worthy of the United States electing her, and since it is clear that Russia intervened in 2016, she had and has a right to be angry about that.

    I do not believe for a minute that Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania voted for Trump, but that was the official result.

    To compare Hillary to Trump in qualifications, there is no comparison.

    Whether you like her or not, she was better qualified to be President, based on her credentials, than many Presidents have been!

    The irony is that if her husband had somehow been eligible to be President again, I think he would have defeated Trump easily.

    I think misogyny had a lot to do with it, as much as Russian collusion, and voter suppression, constantly promoted then and now by Republican state governors and legislatures.

    So while I really appreciate you, D, I am on the other side on the issue of Hillary Clinton, but I know you feel Bernie Sanders would have won, and I totally disagree, then in 2016, and now in 2020!

    But we all have a right to agree or disagree, and still be friends, as you and I, and other commentators on here, are!

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