Maybe this is reassuring, and maybe it isn't: Harvard Law professor Lawrence Lessig, a renowned constitutional scholar, has undertaken a detailed analysis of all the vaguely plausible methods for stealing an American presidential election. One of his conclusions is that the method actually attempted by Donald Trump and his allies in 2020 — with the slates of fake electors and the nonexistent magical powers of the vice president and all that — was, in Lessig's words, the "stupidest possible" way of doing it.
That plot had virtually no chance of success, in Lessig's judgment. Like the rest of us, he was shocked by the dramatic spectacle of Trump's followers storming the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 — but in constitutional terms, spectacle was all it was. Votes had been counted and certified in every state; the presidential electors had voted and sent their certificates to Congress. The outcome was settled, and nothing that could have happened on Jan. 6 — even if things had gone a whole lot worse than they did, Lessig argues — could possibly have led to a second term for Donald Trump. Or at least nothing short of a full-on Bolshevik Revolution seizure of power, which is not a scenario Lessig and co-author Matthew Seligman entertain in their new book "How to Steal a Presidential Election." (I'm sure the Oath Keepers fantasized about that. But they were about three eggs short of a two-egg omelet, in terms of logistics, planning, hardware and literally everything else.)
