2020 US Election - Page 290
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Zambrah
United States7393 Posts
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Neneu
Norway492 Posts
On November 11 2020 05:50 Biff The Understudy wrote: What are the chances that it ends up really badly in you guy's opinions? I thought the whole thing was just a joke and Trump's latest tantrum until i wandered on twitter. I'm not so sure anymore. I think it is a possible black swan event and people should treat it as it is. Even if it is only lets say a 2% chance, that is still extremely significant when it has such major and far reaching consequences. I also don't think a lot of people realize that during the time until Biden is officially the president, and if Trump continues to resist and dispute the election, it opens up an attention vacuum in international politics when combined with the current weakened and introverted state of Europe (regarding covid19). It will be uncertain if US or Europe are willing/able to engage/react to or even recognize international controversies. Historically international attention vacuums have been abused by countries (especially by those which have a significant power), to do things that they usually wouldn't be able to do. Many would argue that the China's move with Hong Kong earlier this year were a minor example of a such move. One should watch closely what happens the following weeks in international politics. 6-8 weeks is a long time and gives ample opportunity for a fait accompli by e.g. China or Russia. | ||
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Sermokala
United States14116 Posts
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Nevuk
United States16280 Posts
Overall democrats nationwide agree with the stated DNC platform, which is pretty progressive. The exception that I'm most familiar with are the Appalachian trail democrats, who were pro democrat before LBJ, and stayed that way even after him due to the war on poverty (which helped them more than anyone else) overriding their racist tendencies. Fun fact - did you know people from this region are considered a minority? They still live in extreme poverty and speak with an accent considered less attractive than ebonics according to polling. (I think texas is somewhat the reverse where many people register as GOP to vote in primaries). Almost all democrats in WV are from this lineage. It is a low population, mountainous state. I would call it extra rural - you can't even farm most of the land. So Manchin's ulta conservative (for a democrat) schtick serves him really well there. McGrath ran a campaign that almost certainly hurt Biden in the state of KY- not that it mattered, since it still wasn't close. Democrats in central and western KY are the exact same as democrats elsewhere in the US, and are generally appalled by McConnell. Her campaign and was explicitly targeted at pro Trump democrats in Eastern KY and any Republicans who generally felt ashamed by McConnell but not Trump. People keep calling the governor, Beshear, an outlier, but he ran as a pretty normal democrat, compared to McGrath. It doesn't turn off people in the state to hear that. Could a democrat win a federal level race statewide in kentucky? Unlikely, but McGrath's way of doing it (depress her base's turnout) was the least likely way to work. | ||
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Shingi11
290 Posts
Biden not getting intelligence reports because Trump officials won't recognize him as president-elect Mike Pompeo says there will be a smooth transition to second Trump administration I think this is really going to test our government. Have we ever had candidate resist this much. If I remember correctly I think Jackson hated his replacement but I dont know if it was to this level. | ||
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Neneu
Norway492 Posts
On November 11 2020 09:08 Sermokala wrote: We already have those events with Belarus and the rumors of Putin having parkinsons and stepping down next year. China doesnt do short term plays so anything they do they've already done. No I am speaking of events on the scale of Ukraine and Crimea. Exactly because China doesn't do short term play is why they are very opportune to do fait accompli. It serves a long term goal where the result typically becomes permanent. And international attention/power vacuums gives a lot of freedom and variety to do such moves. | ||
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Nevuk
United States16280 Posts
On November 11 2020 09:21 Shingi11 wrote: So about that peaceful transition of power I think this is really going to test our government. Have we ever had candidate resist this much. If I remember correctly I think Jackson hated his replacement but I dont know if it was to this level. Well, Jefferson Davis, for one. For the non-joke answer, John Adams is the closest parallel, in 1801. He expanded a lot of courts and then rammed through shit tons of lame duck court appointees, three days before inauguration, purely out of spite to fuck with Jefferson's agenda (this was the origins of Marbury v Madison, where the SC decided it could overturn laws). Adams was also something of paranoid, fanatical nationalist, so there are lots of apt comparisons there. | ||
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Deleted User 173346
16169 Posts
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Acrofales
Spain18290 Posts
On November 11 2020 09:03 Neneu wrote: I think it is a possible black swan event and people should treat it as it is. Even if it is only lets say a 2% chance, that is still extremely significant when it has such major and far reaching consequences. I also don't think a lot of people realize that during the time until Biden is officially the president, and if Trump continues to resist and dispute the election, it opens up an attention vacuum in international politics when combined with the current weakened and introverted state of Europe (regarding covid19). It will be uncertain if US or Europe are willing/able to engage/react to or even recognize international controversies. Historically international attention vacuums have been abused by countries (especially by those which have a significant power), to do things that they usually wouldn't be able to do. Many would argue that the China's move with Hong Kong earlier this year were a minor example of a such move. One should watch closely what happens the following weeks in international politics. 6-8 weeks is a long time and gives ample opportunity for a fait accompli by e.g. China or Russia. You could make a case that Azerbaijan's adventures in Nagorno-Karabakh are already that. Not that the US or Western Europe were ever very interested in the squabbles of 2 former Soviet states deep in Russia's sphere of influence, but they were really just entirely ignored. With the peace deal, it's over, and Armenia (or rather, the Armenian allied autonomous region) lost a whole chunk of land. Whether anybody outside of Azerbaijan, Armenia, Russia and Turkey cares at all about this redistribution, I don't know, but it may well serve as an example of the kind of things other adventurous nations might try to get away with. | ||
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Nevuk
United States16280 Posts
On November 11 2020 09:31 plasmidghost wrote: So uh, I'm pretty fucking terrified of Trump purging the Pentagon to get his sycophants in charge Wouldn't work, even if he got them in charge. At least, it wouldn't work how Trump envisages it: He may be a wanna-be dictator (at this point, there's no way anyone can doubt this), but he's one with extremely narrow military support in the officer corps. The only way he can retain power is if he gets the military to literally go and start arresting any politicians who disagree with him or refuse to do his bidding. He's flatly not popular enough for that. His popularity among the enlisted has also radically fallen. I posted a poll a while back from Military Times that noted Biden was four points ahead of Trump in their polls of the military from all ranks (ie, it's a randomized poll of both officers and enlisted across all ranks). If Trump declares martial law, he has to have the military willing to back it with force. There are no absolutely no signs that they are. He'd need a full purge of the officer corps, not just the people in charge, and there isn't the time or the will for that. They won't kill or arrest US citizens, on US soil, just because Trump says to do it: these aren't the US police. Each US state also has its own military in the form of the national guard, which makes it even harder to do. (Even a plurality republicans already acknowledge that this result isn't going to be changed) | ||
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Gorsameth
Netherlands22353 Posts
And if he could do it then America is lost anyway regardless of what you do, so why worry about it. | ||
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Nevuk
United States16280 Posts
Trump was apparently (and may still be ) convinced he was going to win, which meant that he didn't really plan for a loss. I think the hyperbolic predictions that he was going to get dragged out of the white house, literally kicking and screaming, are no longer seeming that hyperbolic. Some ... positive? news. The law offices that have been backing Trump's lawsuits are apparently getting really uncomfortable going with his strategy. At least one lawyer has quit over the matter. And they've had some notorious clients in the past (including the bin Laden family and big tobacco. So we may have finally found something that even the least moral lawyers in america may not do. Per NYT Like many big law firms, Jones Day, whose roots go back to Cleveland in the late 1800s, has prided itself on representing controversial clients. There was Big Tobacco. There was the Bin Laden family. There was even the hated owner of the Cleveland Browns football team as he moved the franchise to Baltimore. Now Jones Day is the most prominent firm representing President Trump and the Republican Party as they prepare to wage a legal war challenging the results of the election. The work is intensifying concerns inside the firm about the propriety and wisdom of working for Mr. Trump, according to lawyers at the firm. Doing business with Mr. Trump — with his history of inflammatory rhetoric, meritless lawsuits and refusal to pay what he owes — has long induced heartburn among lawyers, contractors, suppliers and lenders. But the concerns are taking on new urgency as the president seeks to raise doubts about the election results. Some senior lawyers at Jones Day, one of the country’s largest law firms, are worried that it is advancing arguments that lack evidence and may be helping Mr. Trump and his allies undermine the integrity of American elections, according to interviews with nine partners and associates, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to protect their jobs. At another large firm, Porter Wright Morris & Arthur, based in Columbus, Ohio, lawyers have held internal meetings to voice similar concerns about their firm’s election-related work for Mr. Trump and the Republican Party, according to people at the firm. At least one lawyer quit in protest. [...] In recent days, two Jones Day lawyers said they had faced heckling from friends and others on social media about working at a firm that is supporting Mr. Trump’s efforts. A lawyer in Jones Day’s Washington office felt that the firm risked hurting itself by taking on work that undermined the rule of law. “To me, it seems extremely shortsighted,” the lawyer said. [...] The outcry at Porter Wright, which like Jones Day was founded in the 1800s in Ohio, appears more intense. In the past week, the firm has filed multiple lawsuits in Pennsylvania, trying to poke holes in the reliability of the election results on behalf of the Trump campaign and the R.N.C., among others. Porter Wright has received at least $727,000 in fees this year from the Trump campaign and R.N.C., according to federal records. Over the summer, some lawyers at Porter Wright were dismayed to learn that the firm would be representing the Trump campaign in Pennsylvania, according to three current and former employees. Chief among their concerns: How could lawyers, whose profession is based on the rule of law, represent someone who they felt had frequently tried to flout it? One lawyer said he was concerned that the firm might be asked to try to delay the election. Another said he quit in response to the decision to represent Mr. Trump in Pennsylvania. At two meetings, associates at Porter Wright told the firm’s partners that they objected to the work for the Trump campaign, according to the three current and former employees. They were told that the assignment was limited to the election in Pennsylvania. That assurance struck some attendees as hollow, since the state might decide the election. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/09/business/jones-day-trump-election-lawsuits.html?smtyp=cur&smid=tw-nytimes In something that will please conservatives, Twitter took down a post from the Lincoln Project where they named and shamed a couple of the lawyers working for Trump on this effort. | ||
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FlaShFTW
United States10398 Posts
not sure how many of yall have seen this. how can the sitting secretary of state say this shit. fuck republicans at this point, if you're a republican/conservative who isnt calling this shit out, shame on you. | ||
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Starlightsun
United States1405 Posts
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TheTenthDoc
United States9561 Posts
On November 11 2020 10:33 Starlightsun wrote: Guess we're going to have two months of even less federal government response to coronavirus. On the bright side, I think if Trump had won we would have had negative, rather than no, federal government response to coronavirus. And a Trump who lost and accepted his loss probably would have been even more actively negative, specifically retaliating against states who didn't vote for him (there's still time for this, of course). I suspect, for example, Utah and North Carolina's new (milquetoast) restrictions would be getting the full blast from a Trump White House not on the same quixotic quest for 6 million fake votes. | ||
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Starlightsun
United States1405 Posts
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StarStruck
25339 Posts
On November 11 2020 09:21 Shingi11 wrote: So about that peaceful transition of power I think this is really going to test our government. Have we ever had candidate resist this much. If I remember correctly I think Jackson hated his replacement but I dont know if it was to this level. Never this level. I think people are going to lose their patience with shit like this because 80% of Americans agree that this is even next level bullshit. It's the 20% blowhards who are making the noise. This might actually help in the Senate race to kick the red team out of the majority when they thought it could work in their favor lol.. Maybe Mitch and Lindsay were right about Trump being the last Republican president if they don't reform the party lol.. wishful thinking. They will get what they deserve a special place in fucking Hell and I wish someone would just make their lives Hell like the bullshit they put Americans through. There really needs to be consequences for spreading such lies. Maybe cut off their tongues. We need to old school, medieval on their asses. Squeal little piggy. Squeal for me. | ||
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Nevuk
United States16280 Posts
Richard Hopkins’s claim that a postmaster in Erie, Pa., instructed postal workers to backdate ballots mailed after Election Day was cited by Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) in a letter to the Justice Department calling for a federal investigation. Attorney General William P. Barr subsequently authorized federal prosecutors to open probes into credible allegations of voting irregularities and fraud before results are certified, a reversal of long-standing Justice Department policy. But on Monday, Hopkins, 32, told investigators from the U.S. Postal Service’s Office of Inspector General that the allegations were not true, and he signed an affidavit recanting his claims, according to officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe an ongoing investigation. Democrats on the House Oversight Committee tweeted late Tuesday that the “whistleblower completely RECANTED.” [...] The Postal Service inspector general’s office informed members of Congress in a briefing on Tuesday that Hopkins had recanted his allegations, according to a congressional aide. The investigators first interviewed Hopkins on Friday, the aide said. Hopkins’s allegations, without his name, were first aired last week by Project Veritas, an organization that uses deceptive tactics to expose what it says is bias and corruption in the mainstream media. Hopkins agreed to attach his name to the allegations late last week. He was instantly celebrated by Trump supporters. Project Veritas founder James O’Keefe on Saturday hailed Hopkins as “an American hero” on Twitter. A GoFundMe page created under Hopkins’s name had raised more than $136,000 by Tuesday evening, with donors praising him as a patriot and whistleblower. The fundraising page was removed by GoFundMe after this story was published Tuesday, a spokesman for the platform said. https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/postal-worker-fabricated-ballot-pennsylvania/2020/11/10/99269a7c-2364-11eb-8599-406466ad1b8e_story.html | ||
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GoTuNk!
Chile4591 Posts
On November 11 2020 09:54 Gorsameth wrote: Yeah I don't think there is any reason to fear Trump would organise a military coup, which is what will be needed to stay in power if he loses the electoral vote. And if he could do it then America is lost anyway regardless of what you do, so why worry about it. They actually believe this non sense stuff. I don't understand why he can't claim election fraud while presenting legal challenges. It's petty at worst but not illegal. There are 100's of affidavits at this point and at least one case of alleged software "glitch" that flipped thousands of votes https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8923165/GOP-claims-software-glitch-Michigan-incorrectly-gave-6000-votes-Biden.html The courts will review this stuff and rule adequatately. Like they did when Al Gore didn't concede until December 14. That's it, that's how it works. If/when the court's discount Trump's legal claims and the EC declares Biden winner, and Trump calls supporters to take the streets on arms, then that's a coup. Filling legal claims is not. An historical number of mail in ballots was issued, waiting for official results and review sketchy looking stuff is not a coup, despite "resistance porn" wishes. I'm 99% sure Biden will eventually win this election, but there are no mandatory pre emptive concession requirements. | ||
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GreenHorizons
United States23933 Posts
On November 11 2020 08:45 Zambrah wrote: Is a platform of "I want to enable Donald Trump" not pro-Trump? Of course it is. That's why the local Louisville paper titled the article "Kentucky makeover: Amy McGrath challenges Mitch McConnell as a pro-Trump Democrat" | ||
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