[continued from previous message]   
      
   triumph. Trump himself boasted that “America has given us an   
   unprecedented and powerful mandate.” Though that isn’t true, some   
   publications came undone with superlatives.   
      
   “A stunning victory has crowned Donald Trump the most consequential   
   American president since Franklin Delano Roosevelt,” hyperventilated The   
   Economist magazine. “In what was supposed to be a knife-edge election,   
   he has won a mandate … The world lies at Trump’s feet.”   
      
   Please. At least wait to see whether he can pass a bill. (Remember   
   Obamacare repeal?)   
      
   The reality is this was a knife-edge election. Trump’s going to win far   
   fewer total votes as well as a lower vote percentage than Joe Biden did   
   against him in 2020. Nobody gushed about that being a landslide. Trump   
   pretended it didn’t even count.   
      
   Take the Midwest battleground states. Biden won Wisconsin, Michigan and   
   Pennsylvania by a combined total of just 256,000 votes — a squeaker.   
   Through midday Friday, Trump was winning them by slightly less, 250,000   
   — about 1.5 percentage points.   
      
   After the pokey West Coast states count all their ballots, Trump will   
   have lodged roughly a 2 percentage point national win. That’s equal to 1   
   out of every 50 voters changing their minds. It’s half the margin Biden won.   
      
   In politics, close doesn’t count with respect to who gets power, so all   
   this is symbolic. But it matters, because we didn’t just crown a king.   
   The 49% still gets a say in whatever direction the country takes. It   
   needn’t be cowed or silent, just as the losing side wasn’t after it   
   swung slightly the other way the last time.   
      
   So if you’re out there angsting about what kind of country you’re living   
   in, the nonhyperbolic answer is: One still divided. One unsettled, one   
   still in the middle of a pitched democratic debate.   
      
   And one not at anybody’s feet.   
      
   Danny Westneat: dwestneat@seattletimes.com; Danny Westneat takes an   
   opinionated look at the Puget Sound region's news, people and politics.   
      
   --- SoupGate-DOS v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)