It stopped one step short

Michael Moore had laid out this scenario:

* Democrats would vote early by mail, not so much for Biden, but, rather, very eagerly against Trump

* Trump would encourage Republicans to vote in-person on sacred Election Day

* the initial returns on Tuesday night would, therefore, reflect the Rep in-person voting, showing Trump with leads in key swing states

* on that basis, around 2am Wednesday morning, Trump would go on TV and declare victory

* around 4am (most people sleeping) Trump would announce reports from “election officials” of highly suspicious voting irregularities accompanied by pleas from those “officials” for federal intervention to assure the integrity of the process; on that basis Trump would issue an executive order to have ballots impounded in certain states for examination and to have the counting thereafter be conducted under the auspices of higher-level officials

* * * *

With Trump’s people controlling the counting the results would, of course, come out as they did in Florida in 2000 when George Bush’s brother oversaw the unbelievably thin margin of Republican victory.

* * * *

I always viewed Trump as an obnoxious, entitled bozo, never thought he was a full-bore authoritarian, but, of course, ya never know. I was up most of the night of Nov. 3–4 waiting to see if Michael Moore’s scenario might, in fact, play out. It stopped one step short.