LETTER: Stolen elections and false equivalencies
Your Jan. 14 editorial (“Stolen election?”) is a perfect example of a straw man argument topped by a false equivalency.
You write the idea that “ ‘Russian meddling’ flipped the election was a fantasy” which “devolved into a bludgeon used to pummel Mr. Trump.” This is a misstatement of the legitimate concerns about Russian interference in the 2016 election, confirmed by the New York University study.
The Mueller report found evidence to indict multiple Russian intelligence officers and businesses and — although not enough evidence to indict the Trump campaign — it did not “exonerate” the campaign regardless of Donald Trump’s mischaracterization.
Somehow equating this concern with “Democrats … railing about election denialism as an existential threat to democracy” is editorial sophistry. Comparing overwrought individual responses to a candidate accepting foreign interference in an American election (“Russia, please find the missing emails”) to a concerted nationwide conspiracy involving militias and elected officials trying to overturn a litigated, audited and certified election based on lies and actual conspiracy theories led by Mr. Trump is disingenuous at best.
Perhaps a little more introspection is in order for the RJ editorial board.