Articles point out that Clinton and Trump did periodically narrow the gap to nothing.
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There are no large swings happening this year at all, so for one to hit Biden at the end, that's just gotta come out of the blue completely.
With it being on the edge, then, it would be wise (if you could) to keep nudging to keep it like that. Hone things. Especially if (assuming you subscribe to this idea) the point behind the effort was to make
either end-result inconclusive enough for your own purposes, possibly even favouring/expecting a lame-Hillary to pop out at the other end, but the coin fell on the other side...
The same could not happen this time. With Trump apparently happy to keep digging just so he can fling dirt out at anyone staring down at him in his strange little hole, such nudges would go to waste. Neither would they bring him back to balance nor could they look extraordinary enough against what
is happening.
I don't credit Trump for any grand plans, here, even if they do exist. I imagine he'd have hardly mentioned TikTok bans if it weren't for the users making him look stupid (and, though he wouldn't credit them for it, possibly saving a lot of lives as a side-effect). (And I'm also convinced that TikTok is not a significant (if at all) intelligence resource for China, or they wouldn't be so passive about it.). I think he just hasn't noticed/admitted that the dealer in his card-game is no longer giving him better hands than he'd get by pure chance and so now he's left with his rather low and chaotic 'skill' at the game. (He obviously hates any successful person who isn't propping up his own success. Deep, deep envy, only tempered when they do him a favour.)
Data points =1? I'm going by 2000, 2004, perhaps 2008, not sure about 2012... So 2016 was just the latest iteration and I think didn't even go to plan (which was more an opportunistic retweak according to circumstance, than a continuation of a monolithic scheme left unchanged since its divine inception) but leaves the possibility that lessons have been learnt and possibilities explored that might be explored again if they seem to fit.
But that's just wild speculation on my part, I know. I doubt any Big Conspiracy would be effable enough for me to crack its ultimate nature so easily. I lean more towards it being a lot of Political Griefing by rando players who do not have so much direct interest in this game arena, but join in just to troll those who do.