OPINION

OPINION | JENNIFER RUBIN: Believing utter rubbish

A spate of surveys shows a significant majority of Americans (maybe 60 percent, a couple of polls report) thinks President-elect Joe Biden won the election. (This is akin to “What color is George Washington’s white horse?”)

That means 40 percent or so of Americans are utterly deluded. And with a new appreciation for the inexactitude of polling, it’s possible the portion of Americans who accept Biden’s victory is anywhere from 70 percent to only 50. (Republicans could simply be out to annoy pollsters; on the other hand, pollsters have proved themselves ineffective at sampling enough of the MAGA crowd.)

In all likelihood, millions upon millions of people also believe in something as silly as the idea that UFOs are stored at Area 51.

The consequences are grave. It gives Republicans license to continue to break norms and even the law (like threaten election officials). It promotes irrational obstructionist politics and increases the divide between Americans. Biden voters, I would guess, have never been more contemptuous of Trump voters as they are now, especially as the MAGA crowd spouts nonsense about a “Kraken.”

Conduct from Republican House and Senate members shows the pernicious effects of this cult of absurdity. Victimology and self-pity (we were denied a second Trump term!) mixed with arrogance (only we know what really happened in those ballot-counting rooms!) do not make people amenable to compromise or empathy.

Instead, it turns seemingly capable and sane public figures into raving lunatics, uninterested in solving real problems. When you’re chasing ghosts in the Dominion Voting Systems, there is little time for real legislation.

And sadly, what we learned in the Trump era is that once you are ready to believe utter nonsense in one arena because Trump says so, you’re willing to believe—in fact, compelled to believe—utter nonsense about a lot of things. Coronavirus is overblown. Masks are not needed.

The Republican Party, ironically the party that used to defend objective reality and scorn victim-mongering, now thrives as an institution in which people, as Trump said at a recent rally, think “we’re all victims” and accept Trump’s alternative reality.

Maybe one day an American Lech Walesa will arrive in the Trump heartland and revive the spirit of democracy. Until then, the GOP remains the 2 plus 2 equals 5 party.

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