GOP Math: When a 4 point loss is a massive win, then a 1.6 win is a landslide

A Guide to Rewriting Reality

Dear readers,

I made a mistake.

I had mistakenly called the 2024 election results not a mandate for the Trump-MAGA-Oligarch party to rule the country as they see fit. But after reviewing past behavior, I now see things differently.

How did I go wrong?

I first saw the presidential race.

A 1.7% popular vote lead that continues to shrink—a lead that was largely created by millions of Biden 2020 voters not showing up. Neither Kamala Harris nor Donald Trump carried half of the voters in 2024; both were below 50%. In contrast, Biden won more than half the country in 2020, securing 51.31%. That was a mandate.

Less than 50 is not a mandate.

Next, I looked at Senate and gubernatorial races in key states. Michigan voted for Trump but also elected a Democrat to the Senate. The same was true in Nevada, Wisconsin, and Arizona. Pennsylvania voted for Trump, but the Senate race was so close it triggered a recount. North Carolina voted for Trump but also elected a Democratic governor. So, the swing states have delivered a split verdict: GOP at the top, Democrats just below.

That certainly didn’t scream "mandate."

Then I looked at the House. When I started writing this story, five races were yet to be called: the GOP was leading in three, and Democrats in two. Republicans have won 218 seats, securing the majority. Democrats have won 212. That means the GOP outperformed the Democrats by just four seats in a 435-member House.

Ain’t no maaaannnndaaaaaaate, my inner voice screamed at me.

Let's recap: a 1.7% margin in the presidential race, +3 in the Senate, and +4 in the House. That did not feel like a mandate, to say the least.

But what I forgot was that you're not supposed to use math as it’s taught in schools. You go to school, say a prayer for Trump, maybe even buy a Trump Bible imported without tariffs from China, go home, and listen to GOP math. You can’t learn it in books. That is why GOP hates books. You need to learn it from foxes and friends.

In that math, a 4-point loss is a win, and a 1-point win is a landslide. That’s how it works. Don’t learn and rise higher—start unlearning and move lower. Truth becomes lies, and lies become truth. Listen to what thousands of MAGA trolls tell you online. You don’t have to search for them; they’ll find you wherever you are and repeat the same lie in so many different ways until the mainstream media starts spreading it further.

And then, it will become the truth.

What are we supposed to do here?

Nothing. Just be aware. They will do our job.

I hope you’re noticing the difference. I’m starting to feel it. Did you notice the "mandate" crowd running around, shouting, "We won, we won, we won"? Why can’t they just absorb the win and move on? They can’t. The system they designed is not fit to govern.

Opposition is easy, folks. Governing is not. It gets even worse when they start explaining it. The troll army could do nothing when the Trump administration was exquisitely managing COVID, could they? All they could come up with was, "Don’t take the vaccine, don’t wear the mask."

The MAGA folks are struggling to adjust to the reality of governance. It’s naturally against their design, and one of the newly minted GOP strategies is already starting to threaten the future of this administration.

Brendan Carr, Donald Trump’s new pick to lead the FCC, wants to take NBC off the air.

Brendon Carr has been one of the biggest champions of Elon Musk for a very long time. Elon Musk has a lot of business interests where he competes with plenty of other billionaires. The Trump administration is veering toward concentrating economic and political power into the hands of a very few—some billionaires over others. That is not how the GOP used to operate. They were very inclusive in their support for the wealthy. It looks like this administration is going to break that inclusive club and become a bit more exclusive.

A significant mistake. They are inadvertently creating a formidable opposition force. Biden made the same error. When he began rallying support for tax increases ahead of the 2022 midterms, I thought it would backfire, and it did. There are things you have to be quiet about. CEO after CEO warned that a recession was imminent and that the economy would crash. Yet, nothing happened. But that’s beside the point. Biden underestimated his opposition, and it hurt him in the 2022 midterms.

The Trump administration is already doing the same. They are starting to play favorites. They are underestimating the power of the billionaires whose feathers they are about to ruffle.

I’m not complaining.

Good for the country.