Sunday, 20 December 2020 10:13 PM
Donald Trump's late father Fred loved quoting a poem by Edgar Guest, one he kept framed on his desk.
It read, in part, "Success is failure turned inside out – The silver tint of the clouds of doubt, You can never tell how close you are, It may be near when it seems so far; So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit – It's when things seem worst that you must not quit."
For Fred's son, the key to winning was always about never quitting, even to the bitter end.
It's no surprise then that our President is fighting to that very last moment.
His vote challenge has been reasonable after an unusually close race in six states where he differed with Joe Biden by 1% of the vote or less.
A Newsmax poll conducted by McLaughlin & Associates found that 67% of Americans agreed it was fair for the President to seek a recount and challenge in those states.
Newsmax's own position has been consistent since Election Day.
In these very close races we would not call a state for Biden until the results were certified by the state. Biden would become President-elect upon the vote of the Electoral College.
Despite some media claims and even a skit on Saturday Night Live, Newsmax has never denied the official results.
We called all contested states for Biden and described him as President-elect as of December 14th, when the Electoral College voted him so.
However, the major decision, including one made by Fox News, to crown Biden President-elect before the contested results were final, smacks of bias.
All major media stood down in making a call when Al Gore made his vote challenge in 2000. Why did Trump not have the same courtesy?
Trump has been a victim of media malpractice from the start.
A key factor why Biden took the battleground states with razor-thin margins was due to the media's suppression polls. These polls showed Biden winning in a landslide, dampening donor and voter support for Trump.
The Fox News Poll was particularly harmful, whose final polls had Biden winning by 10 points (he won the popular vote by 4.)
Now the great contest is almost played out and will be final on January 6th, 2021 when Congress accepts the Electoral College result.
Despite irregularities with the mail-in ballots in key states, where rejection rates for faulty ballots plummeted this year, the Trump campaign has failed to get a court or state legislature to overturn the results.
The President's appeal Sunday on his Pennsylvania cases to the Supreme Court are justified, but chances of victory seem slim.
So where does Trump go from here?
Well, the answer is upward.
I believe Trump can accept the imperfect Constitutional process while still disputing results. Accepting Joe Biden as the 46th president upon Congress' certification does not mean he believes the election was fair.
Trump could also attend the Inauguration ceremony. By doing so, he will steal the show and put himself foursquare behind the Constitution.
Predictably, buyer's remorse will quickly set in during a new Biden presidency.
Reflection will re-focus Americans on Trump's many achievements as president – from getting the Arabs and Israelis to make peace, to ushering in the strongest economy since World War II, to reforming Washington like never before, among many achievements.
Donald Trump probably fulfilled more promises than any other man to sit in the Oval Office. And in four years, no less.
After his presidency, Trump will also become an unequalled global political and media force.
Trump will be surprised how much influence he has as a former President, without the limitations placed on being the actual President.
My late friend Ed Koch was seriously depressed after leaving New York's mayoralty. He later admitted to me that he became more influential outside of office as a media and political powerhouse.
Trump will do the same, but much more.
John Fund's recent column on Trump's successful presidency quotes David Shribman, a historian at Carnegie Mellon University, who thinks Trump will be "remembered in history as the most consequential president in three-quarters of a century and the most significant one-term president in nearly 175 years."
It's a good judgement for Fred Trump's son, a winner in every sense of the word.
