The debate over motivation, he said "does not in any way, I think, detract from the basic point that everyone during the election perceived accurately – that in fact what the Russian hack had done was create more problems for the Clinton campaign than it had for the Trump campaign".
But that does not in any way, I think, detract from the basic point that everyone during the election perceived accurately — that in fact what the Russian hack had done was create more problems for the Clinton campaign than it had for the Trump campaign," Obama said.
As an example, most voters on the eve of the election perceived Donald Trump as more trustworthy than Hillary Clinton, despite nonpartisan fact-checkers such as Politifact showing that Trump lies much more often than Clinton.
Reactions to an election perceived to be stolen could be aggressive in some cities controlled by the opposition.
The decision to ban some 500 candidates deemed to have links (in the past) to Saddam Hussein's Baath party was almost certain to cause Sunni boycotts, and yet another election perceived as illegitimate.
Elections perceived as generally free and fair are an important part of the government's political strategy in Kashmir, he added -- and a Pakistani attempt to sabotage them would be seen as provocative.
"That helps us," said Mr. Gaylord, the Republican, arguing that the party controlling the White House could only lose if the election was perceived as a normal, national midterm vote.
The unrest began after the country's election council, perceived to be under the influence of Mr Preval, ruled that populist candidate Michel Martelly had not gained enough votes in the polls to qualify for a second round run-off.
An election widely perceived as having been stolen could deal a serious setback to the Obama administration, which has committed itself to prevailing here in the nearly eight-year-old war against the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
But interestingly we have done some work predicting the electoral success of politicians, and the judgement that is most predictive of who is going to win the election is perceived competence.
