Hoist by Their Own Petard

Our presidential election seems to be over.  Kamala Harris has conceded, and Donald Trump is now the President Elect.  Thankfully, Mr. Trump won by a large enough margin that contesting the election by demanding recounts or challenging results in court would be futile.  We will need to wait and see if that holds true over the next few weeks. 

There appears to be a few sour grapes on the Democrat side, and a bit too much ebullience on the Republican side.  Let’s hope that doesn’t last long.  In her concession speech Vice President Harris spent a lot of time urging her supporters to continue to “fight” for equality, social justice, opportunity for all, and so forth.  Fine, but the repeated use of the word “fight” was probably not appropriate.  It might be misinterpreted as a call to violence by some, and it certainly was not a call for national unity.  Wait a minute, isn’t that what President Trump was accused of before things got out of hand on 6 January 2021? 

We all need to take a deep breath and resolve to work together for the good of the country.  We are all Americans first and Republicans and Democrats, liberals and conservatives, and any other labels that divide us second.  Let’s be “One nation, under God, indivisible” as we move forward. 

Ironically, the Democrats must take part of the responsibility for Donald Trump’s victory on themselves.  In his play “Hamlet” William Shakespeare uses the phrase “Hoist with his own petard.”  Literally, it refers to a bombmaker who is blown up by his own bomb.  It may be loosely understood to mean someone who gets caught in a trap they set for others.  It’s sort of like the American cartoon in which Wile E. Coyote keeps setting traps to catch the Road Runner. (Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies) The bombs, rockets, and various machines always backfire on the coyote, and then the Road Runner comes speeding by going “beep-beep.” 

The Democrats’ “lawfare” used to persecute Donald Trump only made him more and more popular.  At the start of the Republican primaries President Trump didn’t appear to be a strong candidate.  Each time new charges were filed against him, or the impossibility of a fair trial became obvious, Donald Trump’s popular support increased.  Furthermore, the Democrats just didn’t get it.  The prosecuting attorneys, eager to make a name for themselves, just kept on pursuing their cases before obviously biased judges. 

Now this is a generality, but Americans value fair play and hate a stacked deck.  So, the Democrats ended up getting hoist with their own petard. 

Americans also value perseverance in the face of seemingly overwhelming odds.  The Democrats threw everything but the kitchen sink at Donald Trump, and it seemed to many that their purpose was not to punish any serious wrongdoing, but rather it looked like they were doing it to make it impossible for President Trump to run for president again. 

Americans don’t like it when someone tries to tell them who they can vote for.  Of course, there were a lot of other variables at play, but it is easy to see how this may have contributed to Mr. Trump’s ultimate victory.