Fixation

   The coming election will be "the greatest disaster in history," the president said today.
   Translation: He knows he will lose, and this is another step in his campaign to discredit the system by calling it "fixed"
   Of course, he also did that four years ago, warning that the fix was in to favor his opponent. But here's another way to look at it. The fix may well have been in, but he did the fixing.
   The current talk follows his suggestion that the election be delayed, ostensibly because of the dangers of the corona virus and a Postal Service overwhelmed by a barrage of fake ballots. Reminder: the current chief of the Postal Service is an ardent Trump supporter.
   Another suspicion that the fix is in.
   Reality check: No election has ever been postponed, and the president has no authority to change the day of the general election. Only Congress can do that, and a president has no veto power over it.
   Second reality check: There is no evidence of substantial voter fraud. Repeated investigations have turned up only a handful of mistaken ballot submissions, usually by people who believed they were fully eligible but for some small reason were not. As for votes cast by undocumented aliens in the country illegally, they're not so stupid as to expose themselves to authorities and risk prison and deportation.
   But the biggest danger facing America later this year is that Trump will refuse to step aside despite an overwhelming loss by both popular vote and electoral vote. He is already warning of widespread fraud, despite there being no evidence that it is likely to happen.
   He could, of course, challenge the results in the courts, but that would require separate lawsuits in a multitude of states. That has already happened, but in only one state -- Florida -- and it involved the electoral count in a close race between George W. Bush and Al Gore in the election of 2000. It was not until Dec. 12 of that year that the U.S. Supreme Court stopped the recount and Gore conceded.
   The presidential election, by law, is held the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November, which this year is November 3. The Electors then meet on the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December, which this year will be December 14. Both dates are set by law, which can be changed only by Congress.
   Therefore, any claim or suggestion that the outcome of the presidential election won't be known for many weeks or even months, as the prez has warned, is nonsense.
   So what will he do if he loses? He will put the blame on someone or something else, as he has done repeatedly throughout his lifetime as his way of "proving" that he never loses. And don't expect him to concede.