Donald Trump’s supporters, like the man himself, are not what you’d call gracious losers, so it comes as no surprise that they’re taking The Donald’s second-place finish in Iowa hard. And given Trump’s own forays into conspiracy theory (all that birther stuff), it’s also not exactly a shock to see his fans claiming that the Iowa caucuses were rigged.
What is a little surprising is who they’ve picked as the supervillain in the alleged plot against Trump. Not the winner of the Iowa caucuses, Ted Cruz, but Marco Rubio — the guy who came in third, after Trump. With a little help from the dastardly computer whizzes at Microsoft.
Their peculiar theory, first spread on 8chan and then picked up by such highly reputable publications as Breitbart and Infowars and Return of Kings, is that Microsoft, which provided free software used to count the votes in the caucuses, rigged the vote to make sure that Trump came in second and that Rubio won.
Oh, sorry, I forgot. Rubio didn’t win. He came in third place. After Trump.
But hey, the conspiracy theorists claim, he got more votes than people thought he would! And Trump didn’t win. Therefore skullduggery.
The “proof?” First, Trump lost, which his fans can’t imagine could have happened without vote rigging behind the scenes. Second, Microsoft was the second biggest donor in Rubio’s last Senate campaign. CHECKMATE.
But as Philip Bump of the Washington Post points out, Microsoft is only “sort of Rubio’s second-biggest donor.” The $33,000 that the Center for Responsive Politics reported as coming from Microsoft did not all or even mostly come from the company itself. As Bump explains, “most of that money came from various people working at Microsoft.”
Naturally, Trump’s fans — including a number of people familiar to readers of this blog — aren’t buying this debunking. On the Twitter hashtag #MicrosoftRubioFraud, the accusations are flying. As is the racism and homophobia.
https://twitter.com/basedmattforney/status/694366883676622848
https://twitter.com/genophilia/status/694365183276224513
https://twitter.com/genophilia/status/694375549360189440?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
https://twitter.com/genophilia/status/694569313244557312
https://twitter.com/brelly1978/status/694612090506600448
https://twitter.com/thpuzzler2/status/694603418690834432
https://twitter.com/AidanTierian/status/694376320873144320
https://twitter.com/JihadTheJews/status/694615181385568256
@deutsche_physik @Ricky_Vaughn99 I am against Rubio but Microsoft isnt doing this to protect illegal Mexian programmers. its #WhiteGenocide
— ProWhitesUnite (@prowhitesunite) February 2, 2016
https://twitter.com/Krauserpua/status/694489309030780928
But a few managed to find a silver lining:
https://twitter.com/arierhase/status/694380385635962880
And yes, he did refer to the Iowa caucuses as the Iowa CUCKus.
One Tweeter managed to find some humor in it all:
https://twitter.com/Marmel/status/694438587836690432
Clippy is one sneaky bastard, huh?
My god, Uncle Douglas sounds exactly like him even from that little description – I can picture him hopping down the bookcase, walking over with his head tilted, “Nyef nyef nyef, it looks like a little house, but what is it for? You can’t expect a dog to live in a house. Nyef nyef nyef.”
@ moggie
Wow, yeah, your analysis of Ivor the Engine makes perfect sense!
Who knew that Oliver was subliminally conditioning the minds of a generation?
@guest
Everybody loves Fingie. :p
My other cat is very beautiful when you meet her in person, but she just can’t look good in pictures. Sadly.
Preferential voting is incredibly straightforward, but the one thing the two major parties reliably agree on is that they don’t want three major parties.
dhag: Your dad’s cat has excellent ear floof.
@katz
Quite excellent! Sadly I’ve only seen this kitty in person two or three times since I rarely travel to see my parents these days. She looks like a perfect cuddle cat!
And Trump is blaming Cruz and accusing HIM of fraud. *shrug*
@sbel
Yeah, you’re right. I should have said “extremists” instead. Sorry.
Yes, of course Microsoft hates Trump because they need those cheap Hispanic workers picking Nokia phones in California orchards.
Hoooo-lyyyyy crap. Alright, point taken, voting machines seem like the only option for the US.
Here in Canada, sometimes the municipal elections will have more than one race on the ballot. Where I am it’s usually mayor, alderman and school board rep. But it still fits on a single piece of paper, and most people don’t vote for school board rep anyway. I don’t think we would ever see more than one race on a provincial or federal ballot (though I might be wrong about that.)
Be good, Ohlmann.
I just went to look at the list of elected offices for my address in California (I actually went to the website to see if a sample ballot/voter info pack was available to download, but apparently not):
federal:
President and VP
two senators
one congress person
state:
governor
lt governor
secretary of state
controller
treasurer
attorney general
insurance commissioner
superintendant of public instruction
board of equalisation
state senator
state assemblyperson
county:
board of supervisors representative
assessor
auditor/controller
district attorney
sheriff/coroner
treasurer/tax collector
superintendent of schools
city:
mayor
city councilmember (at large)
city councilmember (my district)
auditor
attorney
special district:
3 AC transit directors
BART director
EBMUD director
East Bay Regional Park District director
school district:
Oakland Unified School District member
Peralta Community College Trustee
Alameda County Board of Education Trustee
Maybe not every single office is up for grabs every single election, but most are. Some only have one or two candidates running, some have lots of people you’ve never heard of. Some have party affiliations, so if you’re a member of, or trust, a certain party you can just wing it and vote by party; some others are just random names (often the only thing you know about them is their occupation, which is listed on the ballot).
Sorta kinda OT because kitties:
I’ve been admiring the cats available for adoption whose pictures are on display at the county animal shelter website, and looking for ‘the one’ that feels right for me. Since my last kitty passed in July 2014 I hadn’t been ready to look again until recently, but now that I am I decided to use the same process by which I found my dog seeing as it was successful without putting me in the position of wanting to adopt them all like going right to seeing them in person would certainly do. When the picture of my dog showed up on the webpage I just knew she was ‘the one’. Hopefully that feeling will come through with the right kitty as well.
Trump is a blustering fool with all kinds of BAD ideas. He can move to Alaska and hang out with Palin. I’d say he should go to another country but I don’t hate even one nation enough to wish Trump upon them. (Actually I don’t hate any country at all…) – so to model the behavior I would like to see from Canada with Justin Bieber, it’s only fair that the U.S. keeps Trump and puts him someplace he’ll cause the least amount of damage. Like Alaska. (Sorry in advance for any Mammotheers who live in Alaska.)
msexceptiontotherule: Good luck and I hope you find the perfect kitty!
FYI. Our wannabe Dash-enforcer, Judgy B, is still going strong with her attacks on women’s right to vote, with her # WhyWomenShouldNotVote hashtag. I think she’s trying to get it to trend (mostly on her own).
Honestly, I assume she’s salty over Trump getting paddled – she’s dragging out every possible action (other) women do that she dislikes or disagrees with, as “why women should not vote”. I guess if women wont’t vote for HER candidate, they should not vote at all 🙂
It’s actually kinda funny to watch, IF you’re in the right mood for it.
kat
Plus, how do you get the extraterrestrials to pay for the wall to begin with??
msexceptiontotherule: Trump may as well come to the very conservative and religious piece of California where I live. There’s not too much mischief he can get up to if he’s confined to this county. Meanwhile, husbeast and I can move to the next (and way more liberal) county over.
If the #MicrosoftRubioFraud is true, elites are coming ever closer to declaring civil war on millions of armed patriots. Won’t end well.
Not being familiar with US politics, I’ve always been confused by who, exactly, these “elites” are. Trump is a billionaire born into wealth, but is apparently some kind of regular guy cos he was on the TV before he moved into politics?
“Not being familiar with US politics, I’ve always been confused by who, exactly, these “elites” are. Trump is a billionaire born into wealth, but is apparently some kind of regular guy cos he was on the TV before he moved into politics?”
Well, in right-wing populist politics, “elites” (aka “liberal elites”) are those who oppose right-wing policies.
Some neo-Nazis sit around and make up sh*t.
Some neo-Nazis (maybe the same ones?) try to take matters into their own hands:
@Pie
Sometimes the Illuminati, sometimes the Reptilians, sometimes Obama’s Islamocommunist black FEMAcopters, and sometimes, as in this case… THE JOOOZ. *dramatic organ chord*
No, seriously.
@Hambeast SJB
As long as it’s not L.A. county or the sliver of O.C. just over a wall from my house (hah, wall. Not today Trump, not any day.) I’m ok with the plan, but there’s one more caveat – he’s not allowed to travel freely throughout the state. Because, Trump.
@Katz
Thanks! It’s all about being patient, the right cat will be revealed when it’s time. It sounds like a lot of ‘woo’, but it’s about the gut feeling.
NPR also debunked the coin toss BS. If you ask me, the Bernie bros are acting no different than the Republicans when it comes to Hillary.
I was really undecided, leaning towards HRC slightly, and now I’m supporting her because (1) the sexism really turns me off and (2) I think while I’d love to have what Bernie’s promising, the promises are empty and people are being taken in.
Trump didn’t win and his followers immediately made up a narrative about how it wasn’t fair. Bernie didn’t win and his followers immediately made up a narrative about how it wasn’t fair. There’s definitely a shared narrative that their candidates are too special to simply lose by a fair vote.
But there’s that additional gender element where when men earn things but women get things handed to them.
msexceptiontotherule – Nah. Riverside county. That’d keep him out of L.A. county and barred from Hollywood. I’ve been wanting to move back to North San Diego county, I was born/raised in the San Fernando Valley, though.
Personally, I wouldn’t be surprised if Trump himself rigged the system so he would lose. He must realize that he can’t just march into Congress or the Senate and go “You’re Fired!”.
Bit like Ron Paul and his Ayn-Randian Gold Standard bullshit. As long as he’s on the sidelines he can shout “Conspiracy” all he wants and his followers will lick his boots. But he would shit his underoos if he actually had to carry out the magic formulas he boast about.
Trump only wants publicity. If he loses he can cry that Americans don’t appreciate his godlike superiority and win more support and make more money. If he gets elected even he would have to abide by the rules.