Not disappointing that he's retiring - heck, the moment he's no longer tainting our common sense of reality by normalizing teh rightwing crazie, we'll all be better off for it. No, I mean the column itself is disappointing even for Jack.
Let's start:
After thousands of unhinged leftists browbeat electors from states Donald Trump won to vote for someone else, he expanded his lead over Hillary Clinton.After his initial throat clearing, the next two paragraphs quote...the Associated Press, right?
“Most of the pleas to reject Trump are coordinated, automated, professionally generated, and, for those reasons, none too persuasive,” noted The Associated Press.
“We got a stack of letters from idiots,” said Arizona elector Edward Robson. “They don’t seek to understand or persuade — just to insist,” said Kansas elector Ashley McMillan Hutchinson. “As a mother of two small children, I know how to handle that.” Some electors reported death threats. Pennsylvania electors got police protection.
Not exactly. Everything leading up to Robson IS from the AP.
But that second part? That's from The WSJ:
I noticed another theme in the thousands of missives I’ve received. They don’t seek to understand or persuade—only to insist. Most of these people want it their way and they want it now. As a mother of two small children, I know how to handle that.I realize it's a small point but the mistake is clear: by not writing clearly, Jack Kelly is allowing his readers to mis-attribute his source material. Isn't that kinda Journalism 101?
Why would someone at the P-G let him get away with such a simple minor mistake?
Then there's this:
The recount of votes in Rust Belt states backfired too. Mr. Trump gained votes in Wisconsin. “Irregularities” benefiting Ms. Clinton were uncovered in Wayne County, Mich. (Detroit), giving Attorney General-designate Jeff Sessions more reason to make vote fraud a priority.So how many votes DID Trump gain in Wisconsin? From the AP:
The numbers barely budged in Wisconsin after nearly 3 million votes were recounted. Trump, a billionaire New York real estate mogul, picked up 162 votes and still won by more than 22,000 votes. The final results changed just 0.06 percent.That's 162 votes out of about 2.8 million cast.
Some backfire.
And Jack gets Wayne County wrong, too. About two weeks ago (more than enough time for Jack Kelly to find it) The Detroit Free Press reported:
“We don’t have any suspicion of fraud. We generally approach this as human error," [Chris Thomas, Michigan Director of Elections] said.In any case:
But since it was stopped before it was completed, the election results certified by the Board of Canvassers on Nov. 28, which showed Trump winning by 10,704 votes over Hillary Clinton, stand.Elsewhere The Detroit Free Press reported:
Whether the result of machine malfunction, human error or even fraud, the unexplained voting discrepancies in Detroit last month were not sizable enough to affect the outcome in Michigan of the presidential election, according to a new Free Press analysis of voting precinct records.Now go back and look at how Jack Kelly characterized Wisconsin and Michigan and compare it to how it was reported. See Jack taint our collective sense of reality. Bad Jack. Very bad.
And as far as any reasons to make Jeff Sessions see "vote fraud a priority." We have this bit of reality to show to Jack - there isn't any. From the NY Times:
After all the allegations of rampant voter fraud and claims that millions had voted illegally, the people who supervised the general election last month in states around the nation have been adding up how many credible reports of fraud they actually received. The overwhelming consensus: next to none.There's reality and then there's the "reality" that Jack Kelly wants us to see. The two rarely have anything to do with each other.
In an election in which more than 137.7 million Americans cast ballots, election and law enforcement officials in 26 states and the District of Columbia — Democratic-leaning, Republican-leaning and in-between — said that so far they knew of no credible allegations of fraudulent voting. Officials in another eight states said they knew of only one allegation.
Then there's this:
Mr. Trump’s bromance with Vladimir Putin is a legitimate concern. But Mr. Trump’s plans to develop America’s energy resources and to rebuild our military are not in Russia’s interest.We already know that "the sale of 20 percent of our uranium reserves to the Russkies" is BS.
Ms. Clinton figured to be as soft a touch as the supine Mr. Obama. (After a big donation to the Clinton Foundation, Ms. Clinton as secretary of state approved the sale of 20 percent of our uranium reserves to the Russkies. After more donations, she approved the transfer of dual-use technologies (military and civilian) to Russia’s Silicon Valley.)
Jack brought it up last July. Jack wrote back then:
Rosatom, the Russian nuclear agency, bought a Canadian mining company. “The deal made Rosatom one of the world’s largest uranium producers and brought Mr. Putin closer to his goal of controlling much of the global uranium supply chain,” reported The New York Times in April 2015.This story is still bogus - it's bunk. And it's almost two years since factcheck.org showed us the bogus bullshitting bunkitude:
The deal, which gave Rosatom control of 20 percent of U.S. uranium production, had to be approved by the State Department, because of the national security implications. The shareholders of Uranium One contributed $145 million to the Clinton Foundation. The deal went through.
The author of “Clinton Cash” falsely claimed Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State had “veto power” and “could have stopped” Russia from buying a company with extensive uranium mining operations in the U.S. In fact, only the president has such power.Why would the P-G let Jack Kelly get away with insulting his (and their) audience with this? TWICE?
At the time of the sale, Clinton was a member of the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States, which is required by law to investigate all U.S. transactions that involve a company owned or controlled by a foreign government. Federal guidelines say any one of nine voting members of the committee can object to such a foreign transaction, but the final decision then rests with the president.
“Only the President has the authority to suspend or prohibit a covered transaction,” the guidelines say.
But the very very interesting thing about that Jack Kelly column from July is that it contains this:
Trumpkins will applaud whatever [Trump] says. Republican “leaders” are too ethically compromised to complain.Do you still believe this Jack?
After outlining well in his acceptance speech why America is in crisis, Mr. Trump said: “I am your voice. I alone can fix it.”
This is Chavismo, Caesarism. Only megalomaniacs say such a thing. Only morons believe it.
Do you still believe that Donald J Trump, the next guy to take the presidential oath of office, the next Commander-in-Chief of the greatest military force the world has ever known, is a dictatorial megalomaniac? And that his millions of supporters are morons?
Oh, Jack. If I could get just one column from you explaining that last part, it would be like finding Zuzu's petals in my pocket.
Jack, if it's true that you are retiring and that this was your last column, do want to wish you the best of luck - this is honest and sincere. These columns of yours that I've deconstructed over the last decade or so have been more educational to me than you can possibly imagine.