VOTER FRAUD: THE SOCIALLY ACCEPTABLE CONSPIRACY THEORY

On Face the Nation this morning, Chris Christie and CBS's John Dickerson discussed voter fraud:

[Christie] went after Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, who last week accused him and other Republican governors of trying to depress turnout at the polls among young and minority voters.

"In New Jersey, we have early voting that are available to people. I don't want to expand it and increase the opportunities for fraud. And maybe that's what Mrs. Clinton wants to do," he said.

There were so many opportunities for Dickerson to ask a strong follow-up here, or several follow-ups. He could have asked: Governor, are you saying that early voting leads directly to voter fraud? In which case, why aren't you trying to eliminate it in your state? Or are you saying that you have just the right number of days of early voting in your state in order to prevent voter fraud, but if you had any more, suddenly there'd be voter fraud? In which case, what's the magic formula? At what point does early voting inevitably lead to voter fraud? Are you aware of any cases of voter fraud that have arisen in your state as a result of early voting? Are you aware of any voter fraud in your state at all?

Dickerson doesn't ask any of that. He does ask, referring to Hillary Clinton, "She says it's fearmongering, this idea that there's a lot of election fraud going on." Christie replies, "Yeah, well, she's never been to New Jersey, I guess."

Meaning what? If she knew my state, she'd know what a fraud-ridden hellhole it is? Is he actually bragging about the level of voter fraud in New Jersey?

Shouldn't Dickerson have asked him to elaborate on this? Shouldn't he have tried to make the factual point that voter fraud essentially doesn't exist in this country, rather than treating the nonexistence of voter fraud as Hillary Clinton's opinion?

No, that's not how it works. The Republican Party is all in on the notion of widespread voter fraud, so the mainstream media allows it to be discussed as if skeptics are just expressing an opinion rather than reporting a fact. In the view of the mainstream press, it's perfectly OK for Christie to assert that the mythical voter-fraud problem is real and to make the utterly unsubstantiated assertion that too much early voting leads to voter fraud. You can't challenge these assertions as utterly contrary to the facts -- it would be considered biased and rude.

(Video via Huffington Post.)