Barnabas62Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host, Epiphanies Host
edited November 2020
Arizona update. From AZ Central.
Biden majority down from 12,813 24 hours ago to 11,635, a reduction of 1,178 after processing about 21,000 ballots. Remaining ballots to be processed are less than 25,000.
A personal estimate. In order to just win, Trump needs to win over 18 thousand of the remaining ballots or 72%. In order to bring the majority into recount range he needs to win about 67%. And the situation is worse than that because many of the outstanding ballots are provisional, and about half of the provisional ballots will be rejected.
Mathematically a Trump win is still possible but the odds are very long against it.
If it's an attempted coup it's not a competent one. The only way it's a coup is if it were masterminded by the sort of people who would hold a press conference at a gardening centre thinking it was a hotel.
Erika De Bruin, author of "How to Prevent Coups," says it's not a coup, because Trump would have to get the regular military on board with that, which she says is very unlikely. She says what's happening is "democratic backsliding," the erosion of democratic norms.
An unsuccessful coup attempt is still a bad thing. Just sayin'. It seems like Mitch McConnelt et al. think this coup attempt is likely to fail, but they're okay with it if the coup succeeds. That should tell you all you need to know about them.
One of the bitter lessons of the Trump administration* is that every time someone says "Surely they wouldn't . . . ", Republicans go ahead and do it.
Agreed, but that's usually "are they that evil?" rather than "are they that stupid?"
The stupid/evil conundrum is one that's very difficult to answer, unless you consider that the correct answer might be "both/and" rather than "either/or".
Seems to me Trump's ongoing deceit about the way elections work is a multi tool play. Could be a coup. Could be an attempt to harden his base by showing resolve for "his" sense of America. Could be a grift to get followers to give him cash so he can pay down his debts. Could an impulsive act of egotism.
Could be all of the above.
One of Trump's gifts is his tactical flexibility, although he only seems to exercise this when his personal interest is involved. I think he would take any of those outcomes as a win.
They may be trying for a soft coup; if so they're doing it with all the competence one would expect from Trump. They've left it until after all the mainstream media networks, including Fox, have announced that Biden has won it. When Fox called Florida for Bush in 2000 that took all momentum out of Gore's efforts to get a fair count from then on. A soft coup needs momentum, needs enough people to think that maybe it is a little bit legitimate, to work.
Hmmm. I see it a bit differently. I think T has been broadcasting a possible coup all year, and probably longer.*
It's mostly an "in plain sight" soft coup. It's a coup of keeping what he's got, rather than trying to take power when he has none of his own. ** He wants to be a "strong man" type of leader. He likes to see himself as one of them, but better and smarter. Putin, Duterte, Kim Jong Un (and whatever's going on with their "love letters"! ), maybe Baldonaro of Brazil; and the various examples from when he was young, including the angry one with the funny mustache:
In The Death of Democracy, Benjamin Carter Hett (Henry Holt, First Edition, 2018, pages 38 and 39) writes:
ADOLF HITLER LIED all the time. Yet he also said clearly what he was doing and what he planned to do. This is the essential paradox of Adolf Hitler.
(That's the beginning of a good and strangely familiar excerpt.)
There's a lot of "behind the scenes" action, too, I'm sure. But a huge amount of it has been very public.
He is (trying to be?) a combo of a flim-flam man; a cult leader (Jim Jones, David Koresh); a strong-man brutal dictator; a (former) big-time reality show host; someone his difficult father could love, who could also kick his father's a**; etc.
He's in it for real...for his own understanding of real. What he'll do in the next several months...??
*Definitely longer, if you include comments about being president for life.
**Though 2016 might have been one, too, depending on the truth about Russian interference, etc.
Barnabas62Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host, Epiphanies Host
And there you have it. Al Schmidt, the Republican Commissioner for Philadelphia tells John Berman of CNN that the election process in Philadelphia was the most transparent and secure in the city’s history. Also that he had seen the most fantastic stuff on social media. He was bemused by the hunger for lies. He also told of checking out one of these dead men voting claims involving a number of named individuals and the claim was completely false. Schmidt has apparently had death threats.
Within minutes of the interview Trump tweeted, trashed him as a so-called Republican and claiming he was ignoring a mountain of evidence.
The lies cannot be combatted if people have a hunger for them, a desire to believe fantastical stuff if their Master tells them. Or for the more cynical, if it helps them to win despite the facts. The damage this cult phenomenon has caused is significant and ongoing.
It’s a critical time for US democracy and once again I wish USA Shipmates all the best. This situation is hard on my nerves, I can only imagine what it is doing to yours.
(Late edit. I see that Biden’s majority in Pennsylvania is now over 53 thousand.)
Yes. I have a tendency to assume that Biden is in fact the President-elect and the President's falsehoods are like the flailings of a dying fish on a pier. Our Prime Minister feels the same way, having already congratulated Biden and invited him to Australia to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the ANZUS alliance. I was thinking that I might turn out to cheer him.
My feeling is that talk of a coup, while entirely possible, is improbable. I liken it to the late October possibility that voters would be intimidated physically on election day. Rather, I think the damage is to the legitimacy of the Biden presidency from the Trump - inspired right. But that is something a Democratic President has endured before, and that President's legacy is to be the leader of the administration that got health care reform rolling.
I was trying to imagine a Trump coup, and being pronounced president. I find it hard to stretch that far, but maybe that is how it works, your disbelief helps Trump. I expect some people dismissed Hitler as a jumped up squirt. Are the Dems being too passive?
The Dems carry on as they are - keep their cool and give air of confidence as winners, not looking 'spooked' as though trump might somehow legitimately win. They know the polls tilt convincingly their way when all the votes are counted so keeping their cool they look like the responsible adults here and not like a bunch of lying cheats and whiners the other lot are.
They can point to this stinking pile of blatant attempts at subverting US democracy for years to come to remind the public what the 'right' are like - loathsome and deeply corrupt.
ETA: Get some hats made which say "Biden a winner - not a whiner"
This has been one of the problems American media has had covering Trump's corruption. They make the assumption that since it's all done out in the open it must be legal. They can't wrap their minds around the possibility that Trump and his enablers are simply shameless (and counting on the fact that the media won't be able to see anything done openly as anything other than legitimate).
And there you have it. Al Schmidt, the Republican Commissioner for Philadelphia tells John Berman of CNN that the election process in Philadelphia was the most transparent and secure in the city’s history. Also that he had seen the most fantastic stuff on social media. He was bemused by the hunger for lies. He also told of checking out one of these dead men voting claims involving a number of named individuals and the claim was completely false.
CNN examined 50 of the more than 14,000 names on the list by taking the first 25 names on the list and then 25 more picked at random. We ran the names through Michigan's Voter Information database to see if they requested or returned a ballot. We then checked the names against publicly available records to see if they were indeed dead.
Of the 50, 37 were indeed dead and had not voted, according to the voter information database. Five people out of the 50 had voted -- and they are all still alive, according to public records accessed by CNN. The remaining eight are also alive but didn't vote.
The sample CNN reviewed is not representative, but the trend was clear -- not a single one of the names examined was of a dead person voting.
The version of the list CNN found has since been removed from the site hosting it.
The most common reason for zombie voters is simple clerical errors. (e.g. John Smith, Sr. has died but is still on the voter rolls. John Smith, Jr. is alive, lives at the same address of record as John Smith, Sr., and the voting official simply marks the wrong John Smith as having voted.) Other possibilities involve someone sending in a mail-in ballot (much more common this year) and then dying before election day. That still counts as a valid vote.
Barnabas62Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host, Epiphanies Host
The tactics look pretty clear. The law suits assert issues which they claim may affect large numbers of votes. Checking the validity by reference to ballots will be time consuming if possible. And it interferes with the process of completing the count. The concept is to put States in a position where the count has not been completely resolved by the certification deadline. Thereby transferring the appointment of electors from the vote to elected representatives. And to appeal certifications up to the Supreme Court which they think are improper for any reason.
The other part of the tactic is to stir up public disbelief among the faithful in the integrity of the processes in States they wish to overturn.
It’s an attack on democracy being conducted in plain sight.
It’s an attack on democracy being conducted in plain sight.
Of course it is and it is obvious. But I'm not convinced most people actually care about democracy. They care about their POV and perceived personal advantage.
Re: 'dirty delaying tactics' :- surely as the deadline approaches, either courts will demand sufficient evidence of numerous cases of fraud to take the cases seriously or the Dems will counter-claim it's empty time-wasting and get it thrown out.
Last time I looked all the court cases that have concluded have gone the Democrats' way. Trump and his Republican enablers will not win by legal means.
It seems like someone somewhere has flipped a switch. Lindsey Graham is now calling on the Trump administration* to begin cooperating with the Biden transition team. This happened not long after Senators Susan Collins and John Cornyn started referring to Joe Biden as the president-elect in public. This doesn't mean Trump and his lackeys will cooperate, but apparently the institutional Republican Party has decided that Trump is now a sunk cost.
Barnabas62Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host, Epiphanies Host
Let's remember that her predecessor spent his first weeks on the job trying to convince people that Trump's inauguration drew a larger crowd than Obama's.
Sure, and I figure there'll be a "bigliest" dispute. I'm more concerned about the fact (per cited sites, like Politico) that it's happening, that there are various nasty groups involved, and
A counterprotest called "F--- MAGA" has also been planned by All Out DC to happen nearby.
And that may well involve the equivalent of running with scissors and not playing nicely.
Barnabas62Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host, Epiphanies Host
edited November 2020
Meanwhile, in the continuing count, Joe Biden is now projected to win Arizona by all the news networks. His majority stands at 11,434, exceeding the estimated number of votes still to be counted. It now seems certain that the majority will safely exceed the recount margin of 0.1% and there is no right to call for a recount.
The legal battles continue in Arizona. Facing defeat in the current hearing after an embarrassing day in court, the Arizona Republican Party announced the filing of yet another suit designed to force a hand recount in the county with the largest numbers of votes. The desire to delay certification is now shamelessly in the open.
I'd be very interested in Shipmates' comments on this worrying article from the Guardian newspaper yesterday.
I think he's overlooking one important difference between now and Bush/Gore: Biden has clearly won. I'm not in the US but AIUI all the major mainstream news outlets have called it for him including Fox. The media narrative isn't, are Trump's claims of fraud true (opinions differ), but, is Trump going to go or will he have to be dragged out (opinions differ). That being the case it looks to me that Biden's approach of letting the narrative bed in is the right one.
That's not to say that I wouldn't be planning what to do if some of the courts started to act on the Republican case, but at the moment none of them are doing so.
I'd be very interested in Shipmates' comments on this worrying article from the Guardian newspaper yesterday.
I think he's overlooking one important difference between now and Bush/Gore: Biden has clearly won. I'm not in the US but AIUI all the major mainstream news outlets have called it for him including Fox. The media narrative isn't, are Trump's claims of fraud true (opinions differ), but, is Trump going to go or will he have to be dragged out (opinions differ). That being the case it looks to me that Biden's approach of letting the narrative bed in is the right one.
That's not to say that I wouldn't be planning what to do if some of the courts started to act on the Republican case, but at the moment none of them are doing so.
I'm inclined to think Biden is wise not to interrupt his enemies while they're making a mistake.
I'd be very interested in Shipmates' comments on this worrying article from the Guardian newspaper yesterday.
I think he's overlooking one important difference between now and Bush/Gore: Biden has clearly won. I'm not in the US but AIUI all the major mainstream news outlets have called it for him including Fox. The media narrative isn't, are Trump's claims of fraud true (opinions differ), but, is Trump going to go or will he have to be dragged out (opinions differ). That being the case it looks to me that Biden's approach of letting the narrative bed in is the right one.
That's not to say that I wouldn't be planning what to do if some of the courts started to act on the Republican case, but at the moment none of them are doing so.
I'm inclined to think Biden is wise not to interrupt his enemies while they're making a mistake.
Absolutely. And it's better to be viewed as lackidaisical about re-counts rather than panicked about them.
Barnabas62Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host, Epiphanies Host
edited November 2020
The proposed mass rally is a real problem. Trouble is, sociopaths think differently to the rest of us. And Trump’s current behaviour is the clearest possible indicator that he is a sociopath.
(Late edit. Not that votes matter to Trump or the GOP in Congress apparently, but Biden’s majority in Pennsylvania is now over 58 thousand).
The local newspaper here (electronic version since the pandemic, but paywalled) has it that perhaps if the vote tallies cannot be contested in the Repo/Trump direction, that they want to target state legislatures which actually are the organizations which select the "electors" within the Electoral College. Thus, the popular vote in a Repo-controlled state legislation may have gone Demo, but the Repos who control the state could still make their state vote be for the Trump. Is this too speculative and impossible? That there's the trump-biased supreme court, which would decide what? given that it is a partisan body full of political appointees who favour trump and not a real objective court?
I'd be very interested in Shipmates' comments on this worrying article from the Guardian newspaper yesterday.
I think he's overlooking one important difference between now and Bush/Gore: Biden has clearly won. I'm not in the US but AIUI all the major mainstream news outlets have called it for him including Fox. The media narrative isn't, are Trump's claims of fraud true (opinions differ), but, is Trump going to go or will he have to be dragged out (opinions differ). That being the case it looks to me that Biden's approach of letting the narrative bed in is the right one.
That's not to say that I wouldn't be planning what to do if some of the courts started to act on the Republican case, but at the moment none of them are doing so.
I'm inclined to think Biden is wise not to interrupt his enemies while they're making a mistake.
Trump's narrative is bedding in too. The narrative the Trump supporters are receiving is that the system is unfair to them. There is a load of speculation on Trump's personal strategy, but the strategy of the Republican party as a whole is to spread discontent. And it is effective.
I don't know much about the law, but I do know that someone can eventually label themselves as a vexatious litigant. I wonder when that happens here.
I'd guess that any suits in the same jurisdictions have different names on them. Being named as a vexatious litigant and barred from the courts on this issue would not be detrimental to Trump campaigners.
Let's remember that her predecessor spent his first weeks on the job trying to convince people that Trump's inauguration drew a larger crowd than Obama's.
The differences being that people are more motivated when angry, his campaign has been feeding that anger and angry people create a bigger impact than the same number of happy folks.
So, what happens if some States return EC electors who vote for Trump despite the votes in their State giving a majority for Biden? Do we then end up with a situation where a large number of US citizens, States and other nations recognise Biden as President and swear him in in January, while another large number of US citizens, States and possibly other nations recognise Trump as President and arrange their own swearing in in January? Is that not the ultimate end point of a deeply divided nation, an actual division into two nations? Without the relatively simple division into north and south of the last time the United States became the Disunited States.
The local newspaper here (electronic version since the pandemic, but paywalled) has it that perhaps if the vote tallies cannot be contested in the Repo/Trump direction, that they want to target state legislatures which actually are the organizations which select the "electors" within the Electoral College. Thus, the popular vote in a Repo-controlled state legislation may have gone Demo, but the Repos who control the state could still make their state vote be for the Trump. Is this too speculative and impossible? That there's the trump-biased supreme court, which would decide what? given that it is a partisan body full of political appointees who favour trump and not a real objective court?
The name of the game is to grab the votes currently earmarked for Biden and reduce them below 270. That means they have to turn Pennsylvania and Arizona, and also turn Georgia if, as seems very likely, Biden wins the audit/recount there. Even if Pennsylvania and Arizona get turned, if Georgia does not then Biden still wins.
I can't see that happening myself, but I suppose the probability is not zero.
So, what happens if some States return EC electors who vote for Trump despite the votes in their State giving a majority for Biden? Do we then end up with a situation where a large number of US citizens, States and other nations recognise Biden as President and swear him in in January, while another large number of US citizens, States and possibly other nations recognise Trump as President and arrange their own swearing in in January? Is that not the ultimate end point of a deeply divided nation, an actual division into two nations? Without the relatively simple division into north and south of the last time the United States became the Disunited States.
So, what happens if some States return EC electors who vote for Trump despite the votes in their State giving a majority for Biden? Do we then end up with a situation where a large number of US citizens, States and other nations recognise Biden as President and swear him in in January, while another large number of US citizens, States and possibly other nations recognise Trump as President and arrange their own swearing in in January? Is that not the ultimate end point of a deeply divided nation, an actual division into two nations? Without the relatively simple division into north and south of the last time the United States became the Disunited States.
The states do no inaugurate the President. The CHief Justice of the US supreme Court does, as directed by the outcome of the Electoral College vote.
They should have just let the South secede in 1861, then none of this bullshit would be happening today.
IME, this is a rural v urban, right v left problem. The US Civil War certainly has an effect, but the divide is bigger than that.
Take Texas. Both Confederate and heavily invested in States "Rights". If one isolated populations centres, from the rural, the picture of the state changes dramatically. This is why the Republican shenanigans were targeted against population centres.
Here is a map of Texas red and blue* areas and here is a map of Texas population density. You'll notice they align pretty well.
*In the US, red is on the right and blue indicates lefties
Barnabas62Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host, Epiphanies Host
edited November 2020
Faithless EC voters are a different kind of risk to that of State legislators grabbing the authority to appoint them. I can imagine Trump asking the question. If Biden gets 306 EC votes how many do I need to turn faithless? The answer is 37 to bribe or blackmail.
But suppose he could reduce Biden’s EC vote to just 270? Which happens if he turns Pennsylvania and Georgia but not Arizona. Then he only needs to bribe or blackmail one EC voter.
It’s all fantasy territory for anyone who isn’t a sociopath.
So, what happens if some States return EC electors who vote for Trump despite the votes in their State giving a majority for Biden?
There could be an even stickier situation, like two different slates of electoral votes from the same state as happened in 1876. I'd like to say that in such a situation the typical answer would be that Congress decides which slate of electoral votes to count, but nothing about such a situation could be considered "typical".
The states do no inaugurate the President. The Chief Justice of the US supreme Court does, as directed by the outcome of the Electoral College vote.
That's by custom rather than Constitutional dictate, and not all presidents have been sworn in by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. At his first inauguration George Washington's oath of office was administered by the Chancellor of New York (i.e. the head of the New York Court of Chancery). You can appreciate logical trap there. There could be no Justices of the Supreme Court until a president appointed them, and there could be no president until one was inaugurated.
The last president to be sworn in by someone other than the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court was Lyndon Johnson in 1963. He was sworn in by Sarah Hughes, a U.S. District Court Judge for the Northern District of Texas. Judge Hughes remains the only woman (so far) to have administered the presidential oath of office.
Meanwhile, in the continuing count, Joe Biden is now projected to win Arizona by all the news networks. His majority stands at 11,434, exceeding the estimated number of votes still to be counted. It now seems certain that the majority will safely exceed the recount margin of 0.1% and there is no right to call for a recount.
The legal battles continue in Arizona. Facing defeat in the current hearing after an embarrassing day in court, the Arizona Republican Party announced the filing of yet another suit designed to force a hand recount in the county with the largest numbers of votes. The desire to delay certification is now shamelessly in the open.
Didn't Bush v Gore put paid to recounts that were county-specific and not statewide?
Well, even without the electoral situation you mention, there will be people--possibly a lot--who believe either that he's the true president; or that he should be, but isn't.
As far as an alt swearing in: AFAIK, that has to be done by a current Supreme. (The Chief Justice, I think.) I don't know if there are any official alternatives, in case the CJ is incapacitated. If another Supreme could substitute in some circumstance, and some people could be convinced that this circumstance qualified, AND an appropriate Supreme would do it, that might happen.
Given the Republican-appointed justices on the court, and/or that 3 (?) of them were there for Bush v. Gore, *maybe* that might happen--if a Supreme were so convinced that they were prepared for their career possibly ending, and maybe some legal consequences.
OTOH, Supremes sometimes vote/act differently than expected. So, even if everything seemed lined up for this theoretical alt swearing-in...there might not be anyone who would do it.
Barnabas62Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host, Epiphanies Host
I don’t think they are that bothered about credibility before a judge. Provided it adds delay and also fuels the sceptical narrative.
I note that another firm of lawyers has dropped out from presenting one of these cases. This time in Pennsylvania. Doubt whether it will stop the nonsense.
Given the Republican-appointed justices on the court, and/or that 3 (?) of them were there for Bush v. Gore, . . .
Only two currently serving Justices were on the Court when it excreted Bush v. Gore, Bush I appointee Clarence Thomas (who concurred with Rehnquist's decision) and Clinton appointee Stephen Breyer (who dissented).
The name of the game is to grab the votes currently earmarked for Biden and reduce them below 270. ...
I'd like to draw attention to this, as it points up something hopeful that may calm y'all's nerves.
They are trying to win within the rules of the U.S. system. They are spending considerable money and effort to fuck around within the rules of the U.S. system. They have not, so far, said: "Chuck it all, who cares about 270, who cares about the voters, I have a big glorious nuclear bomb" or even "I have all these idiot militia brainwashees".
That's not to say they won't get there, or that the extremist of the extremists aren't there already. But it shows the hold that American norms still have, even on Trump and his ilk, even after four years of destruction.
I think the inertia of 290 years of history, and 330 million people, is going to carry it.
And there's the fact that each day that goes by without significant change, like a major win in the courts, or a state flipping to Trump, or a city torn down by MAGAs--each day that slides boringly, quietly, toward January 20 is bringing more and more people to resignation on the matter. To "this is how it's going to be," even if they personally think it should be otherwise. It's hard for most people to sustain white-hot rage for very long, and there are months between Election Day and Inauguration Day. Sure, there will be a few here and there, because there always are. But I think Biden is right to wait them out.
(I can't find any news about this march, and it's past noon in DC. Is it a real thing? It's all about "we're preparing," but I haven't seen anything about people actually gathering, which I would have thought there'd be something by now. Will keep looking. In the meantime, enjoy this article https://www.washingtonian.com/2020/11/11/million-maga-march-organizers-still-dont-have-a-permit/, which suggests that we might have a replay of the Four Seasons hotel/Total Landscaping disaster. )
An entire series of faithless states would require a lot of narrative, or blatant corruption, and you wouldn't want to try for that and fail.
I'm sure someone's asked the question, (and I'm sure it's a feature of the court cases, that they facilitate it).
A last minute victory in Arizona, overuled count in Georgia and a few "well the evil dems tried stealing our legitimate electors in 2016, so they have to accept those voting with their conscience now" would possibly have been realistically feasible series of events.
As it is they'll need something more, but who knows they may get it or just go for it anyway.
Comments
Biden majority down from 12,813 24 hours ago to 11,635, a reduction of 1,178 after processing about 21,000 ballots. Remaining ballots to be processed are less than 25,000.
A personal estimate. In order to just win, Trump needs to win over 18 thousand of the remaining ballots or 72%. In order to bring the majority into recount range he needs to win about 67%. And the situation is worse than that because many of the outstanding ballots are provisional, and about half of the provisional ballots will be rejected.
Mathematically a Trump win is still possible but the odds are very long against it.
An unsuccessful coup attempt is still a bad thing. Just sayin'. It seems like Mitch McConnelt et al. think this coup attempt is likely to fail, but they're okay with it if the coup succeeds. That should tell you all you need to know about them.
The stupid/evil conundrum is one that's very difficult to answer, unless you consider that the correct answer might be "both/and" rather than "either/or".
One of Trump's gifts is his tactical flexibility, although he only seems to exercise this when his personal interest is involved. I think he would take any of those outcomes as a win.
Hmmm. I see it a bit differently. I think T has been broadcasting a possible coup all year, and probably longer.*
It's mostly an "in plain sight" soft coup. It's a coup of keeping what he's got, rather than trying to take power when he has none of his own. ** He wants to be a "strong man" type of leader. He likes to see himself as one of them, but better and smarter. Putin, Duterte, Kim Jong Un (and whatever's going on with their "love letters"! ), maybe Baldonaro of Brazil; and the various examples from when he was young, including the angry one with the funny mustache:
(That's the beginning of a good and strangely familiar excerpt.)
There's a lot of "behind the scenes" action, too, I'm sure. But a huge amount of it has been very public.
He is (trying to be?) a combo of a flim-flam man; a cult leader (Jim Jones, David Koresh); a strong-man brutal dictator; a (former) big-time reality show host; someone his difficult father could love, who could also kick his father's a**; etc.
He's in it for real...for his own understanding of real. What he'll do in the next several months...??
*Definitely longer, if you include comments about being president for life.
**Though 2016 might have been one, too, depending on the truth about Russian interference, etc.
Within minutes of the interview Trump tweeted, trashed him as a so-called Republican and claiming he was ignoring a mountain of evidence.
The lies cannot be combatted if people have a hunger for them, a desire to believe fantastical stuff if their Master tells them. Or for the more cynical, if it helps them to win despite the facts. The damage this cult phenomenon has caused is significant and ongoing.
It’s a critical time for US democracy and once again I wish USA Shipmates all the best. This situation is hard on my nerves, I can only imagine what it is doing to yours.
(Late edit. I see that Biden’s majority in Pennsylvania is now over 53 thousand.)
My feeling is that talk of a coup, while entirely possible, is improbable. I liken it to the late October possibility that voters would be intimidated physically on election day. Rather, I think the damage is to the legitimacy of the Biden presidency from the Trump - inspired right. But that is something a Democratic President has endured before, and that President's legacy is to be the leader of the administration that got health care reform rolling.
I must be feeling positive today...
They can point to this stinking pile of blatant attempts at subverting US democracy for years to come to remind the public what the 'right' are like - loathsome and deeply corrupt.
ETA: Get some hats made which say "Biden a winner - not a whiner"
This has been one of the problems American media has had covering Trump's corruption. They make the assumption that since it's all done out in the open it must be legal. They can't wrap their minds around the possibility that Trump and his enablers are simply shameless (and counting on the fact that the media won't be able to see anything done openly as anything other than legitimate).
CNN checked out a viral list of 14,000 supposedly dead people who allegedly voted in Michigan.
The most common reason for zombie voters is simple clerical errors. (e.g. John Smith, Sr. has died but is still on the voter rolls. John Smith, Jr. is alive, lives at the same address of record as John Smith, Sr., and the voting official simply marks the wrong John Smith as having voted.) Other possibilities involve someone sending in a mail-in ballot (much more common this year) and then dying before election day. That still counts as a valid vote.
The other part of the tactic is to stir up public disbelief among the faithful in the integrity of the processes in States they wish to overturn.
It’s an attack on democracy being conducted in plain sight.
I don't see how it has a chance of winning.
"McEnany predicts 'quite large' turnout at 'Million MAGA March' in DC" (The Hill).
...why doesn't this seem like a good thing...?
{Prays for rain in DC and any place else involved.}
*Common line from certain TV ads.
Let's remember that her predecessor spent his first weeks on the job trying to convince people that Trump's inauguration drew a larger crowd than Obama's.
And that may well involve the equivalent of running with scissors and not playing nicely.
The legal battles continue in Arizona. Facing defeat in the current hearing after an embarrassing day in court, the Arizona Republican Party announced the filing of yet another suit designed to force a hand recount in the county with the largest numbers of votes. The desire to delay certification is now shamelessly in the open.
That's not to say that I wouldn't be planning what to do if some of the courts started to act on the Republican case, but at the moment none of them are doing so.
I'm inclined to think Biden is wise not to interrupt his enemies while they're making a mistake.
Absolutely. And it's better to be viewed as lackidaisical about re-counts rather than panicked about them.
(Late edit. Not that votes matter to Trump or the GOP in Congress apparently, but Biden’s majority in Pennsylvania is now over 58 thousand).
That's one of the issues already under discussion here. See Croesos' post and links.
The name of the game is to grab the votes currently earmarked for Biden and reduce them below 270. That means they have to turn Pennsylvania and Arizona, and also turn Georgia if, as seems very likely, Biden wins the audit/recount there. Even if Pennsylvania and Arizona get turned, if Georgia does not then Biden still wins.
I can't see that happening myself, but I suppose the probability is not zero.
Yes, this is my question also, from above your's.
I wonder when slavery would have been abolished if they had? About 1960 is my guess.
Take Texas. Both Confederate and heavily invested in States "Rights". If one isolated populations centres, from the rural, the picture of the state changes dramatically. This is why the Republican shenanigans were targeted against population centres.
Here is a map of Texas red and blue* areas and here is a map of Texas population density. You'll notice they align pretty well.
*In the US, red is on the right and blue indicates lefties
But suppose he could reduce Biden’s EC vote to just 270? Which happens if he turns Pennsylvania and Georgia but not Arizona. Then he only needs to bribe or blackmail one EC voter.
It’s all fantasy territory for anyone who isn’t a sociopath.
There could be an even stickier situation, like two different slates of electoral votes from the same state as happened in 1876. I'd like to say that in such a situation the typical answer would be that Congress decides which slate of electoral votes to count, but nothing about such a situation could be considered "typical".
That's by custom rather than Constitutional dictate, and not all presidents have been sworn in by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. At his first inauguration George Washington's oath of office was administered by the Chancellor of New York (i.e. the head of the New York Court of Chancery). You can appreciate logical trap there. There could be no Justices of the Supreme Court until a president appointed them, and there could be no president until one was inaugurated.
The last president to be sworn in by someone other than the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court was Lyndon Johnson in 1963. He was sworn in by Sarah Hughes, a U.S. District Court Judge for the Northern District of Texas. Judge Hughes remains the only woman (so far) to have administered the presidential oath of office.
Didn't Bush v Gore put paid to recounts that were county-specific and not statewide?
Bush v. Gore also rather dubiously claimed that it shouldn't be used as a precedent, which is pretty remarkable for a Supreme Court decision.
It's almost like they knew they were out of bounds.
Alan--
Well, even without the electoral situation you mention, there will be people--possibly a lot--who believe either that he's the true president; or that he should be, but isn't.
As far as an alt swearing in: AFAIK, that has to be done by a current Supreme. (The Chief Justice, I think.) I don't know if there are any official alternatives, in case the CJ is incapacitated. If another Supreme could substitute in some circumstance, and some people could be convinced that this circumstance qualified, AND an appropriate Supreme would do it, that might happen.
Given the Republican-appointed justices on the court, and/or that 3 (?) of them were there for Bush v. Gore, *maybe* that might happen--if a Supreme were so convinced that they were prepared for their career possibly ending, and maybe some legal consequences.
OTOH, Supremes sometimes vote/act differently than expected. So, even if everything seemed lined up for this theoretical alt swearing-in...there might not be anyone who would do it.
I note that another firm of lawyers has dropped out from presenting one of these cases. This time in Pennsylvania. Doubt whether it will stop the nonsense.
And/or they didn't want it used against a future candidate that *they* supported.
If then.
Only two currently serving Justices were on the Court when it excreted Bush v. Gore, Bush I appointee Clarence Thomas (who concurred with Rehnquist's decision) and Clinton appointee Stephen Breyer (who dissented).
I'd like to draw attention to this, as it points up something hopeful that may calm y'all's nerves.
They are trying to win within the rules of the U.S. system. They are spending considerable money and effort to fuck around within the rules of the U.S. system. They have not, so far, said: "Chuck it all, who cares about 270, who cares about the voters, I have a big glorious nuclear bomb" or even "I have all these idiot militia brainwashees".
That's not to say they won't get there, or that the extremist of the extremists aren't there already. But it shows the hold that American norms still have, even on Trump and his ilk, even after four years of destruction.
I think the inertia of 290 years of history, and 330 million people, is going to carry it.
And there's the fact that each day that goes by without significant change, like a major win in the courts, or a state flipping to Trump, or a city torn down by MAGAs--each day that slides boringly, quietly, toward January 20 is bringing more and more people to resignation on the matter. To "this is how it's going to be," even if they personally think it should be otherwise. It's hard for most people to sustain white-hot rage for very long, and there are months between Election Day and Inauguration Day. Sure, there will be a few here and there, because there always are. But I think Biden is right to wait them out.
(I can't find any news about this march, and it's past noon in DC. Is it a real thing? It's all about "we're preparing," but I haven't seen anything about people actually gathering, which I would have thought there'd be something by now. Will keep looking. In the meantime, enjoy this article https://www.washingtonian.com/2020/11/11/million-maga-march-organizers-still-dont-have-a-permit/, which suggests that we might have a replay of the Four Seasons hotel/Total Landscaping disaster. )
I'm sure someone's asked the question, (and I'm sure it's a feature of the court cases, that they facilitate it).
A last minute victory in Arizona, overuled count in Georgia and a few "well the evil dems tried stealing our legitimate electors in 2016, so they have to accept those voting with their conscience now" would possibly have been realistically feasible series of events.
As it is they'll need something more, but who knows they may get it or just go for it anyway.