US election 2020 thread

[JimW]

DC isn't a state and the ultimate power there is Congress & the President. He can do stuff there that he can't in any other part of the US

That did come up as I read on but there was some discussion of the legal in and outs, might be a massive loophole, and apparently there's a mechanism for states to request assistance from each other called the Emergency Management Assistance Compact and a rotating standing force called the National Guard Regional Response

 

[frogwoman]

The trump shenanigans mean that Biden can't ( officially anyway ) get security briefings, and a bunch of other stuff like use a .gov website for his transition website. Usually that stuff is dealt with within a week or so but it looks like trump will be uncooperative throughout even though Biden will be president in January

 

[JTG]

Because it was all going far too quickly until now:

Georgia announces recount by hand
Georgia's secretary of state has announced a full recount of the vote by hand.
Joe Biden leads in the Peach State by around 14,000 votes, Secretary Brad Raffensperger said.
"That'll be what we certify, that'll be the last count," he told reporters. "It's an audit, recanvass and recount all in one. It'll be a process that gets it all."
Raffensperger added that Georgia was in the same part of the election process as other states, like North Carolina and Texas, but those states didn't have such a close margin.
"We understand the national significance," he added. "We're doing this because it's really what makes the most sense... We have to run a statewide audit."

Yeah I'm guessing the SoS has to do this to shut up his critics if nothing else. Certification deadline is nine days away.

 

[Sprocket.]

It could be the first one with booths.

American Presidents are traditionally wary of Booths!

 

[JTG]

That did come up as I read on but there was some discussion of the legal in and outs, might be a massive loophole, and apparently there's a mechanism for states to request assistance from each other called the Emergency Management Assistance Compact and a rotating standing force called the National Guard Regional Response

I'll admit I know nowt about the ins and outs nationwide - just that DC is something of an exception. It has a mayor and city council but Congress can overrule them on anything and the President also has powers there he can't wield very easily anywhere else

 

[frogwoman]

They're quite wary of grassy knolls and theatre trips too

 

[JimW]

I'll admit I know nowt about the ins and outs nationwide - just that DC is something of an exception. It has a mayor and city council but Congress can overrule them on anything and the President also has powers there he can't wield very easily anywhere else

I was going at it from the out of state ops angle and it does seem that bar DC it would only happen in theory at the request of a governor who's just short of troops of his own or whatever.

 

[rutabowa]

I think it's infinitely more sensible to maintain a healthy level of paranoia and think about what ifs than to put your faith in Jeb Bush and the US justice system.

It is totally possible to do neither, and just wait and see, particularly as (most of us) don't live in the country so aren't going to be able to do a single thing whatever happens.

 

[planetgeli]

It is totally possible to do neither, and just wait and see, particularly as (most of us) don't live in the country so aren't going to be able to do a single thing whatever happens.

Where would the Spanish Civil war have been with that attitude?

 

[maomao]

It is totally possible to do neither, and just wait and see, particularly as (most of us) don't live in the country so aren't going to be able to do a single thing whatever happens.

Probably involves not posting about it on the internet though.

 

[Dogsauce]

I meant it's not going to end in terms of trump and an ever diminishing band of well placed GOPers trying to do 'something' to stall or challenge the result. None of it goes anywhere and Biden will be president in January. It's about how much trump shits the bed first, covers his tracks and then afterwards, becomes a rallying point for some kind alt-right/conspiracist/disaffected voters coalition. Daft to predict anything, but my guess is trump will be an irrelevance in 2 years. Whichever hard line populist picks up the torch won't want him sticking his oar in. Maybe he'll remain as a figurehead for these people, who knows.

He’ll remain a figurehead for whatever the American equivalent is of those ringpieces who still go on about Enoch Powell being right sixty years later.

 

[gentlegreen]

I forget where I saw it raised, but some Americans were marvelling that in the UK we vote with pencil

 

[brogdale]

So the GA re-runs are now 'officially' the Senate determinant.

 

[rutabowa]

Where would the Spanish Civil war have been with that attitude?

entirely unaffected.

 

[elbows]

I find this assertion that "the narrative is set" by the tv networks and the newspapers and therefore all else is noise quite bizarre.

Well that is a big chunk of how things work, as is world leaders congratulating someone on their victory.

I am confident that nothing has happened that looks worthy of my serious concern at this stage. I will change my tune if Trump actually manages to create a constitutional crisis worthy of attention. There are some lessons from the last 6 years about not underestimating Trump and not overestimating the power of various system safeguards, but I do not intend to overcompensate as a result and end up in equally ludicrous territory.

I do expect the old certainties to continue to erode as we move through this century, and there is always a chance I wont see an acute moment of change coming. But again I cannot try too hard to compensate for this without ending up making a different sort of error in my expectations. I have to maintain a somewhat relaxed approach to much potential bad news in order to save my energies for the bad stuff of monstrous magnitude that will actually happen this century. I have to resist attaching a sense of immediacy to the doom at all times, since I want to maintain an interest in the systemic issues, climate change, energy and peak oil, with an eye at all times on the long nature of these emergencies. Prematurely declaring that the sky will fall in the immediate future tends to erode the credibility of those who paint their pictures with such pace and sense of imminent climax. Even with a relaxed stance there will still usually be time to correct myself if something momentous and highly unusual really looms.

 

[Idris2002]

OK, this is interesting, given what I said earlier about controlling the power grid to make sure that the enemies of your coup can freeze in the dark:



My guess is that where the leccie and gas is concerned, someone put him up to it. I don't see him coming up with that on his own.

 

[planetgeli]

entirely unaffected.

An interesting, if bizarre, take for the hundreds of thousands of foreigners who fought on both sides.

 

[StoneRoad]

I forget where I saw it raised, but some Americans were marvelling that in the UK we vote with pencil

We also get our results out rather more quickly and that's with manual counting of thin slips of paper.
(there's no basis in the rumour that some constituencies weigh the ballots)

 

[bimble]

I do get what everyone is saying about calm down it’ll almost certainly be fine. Seeing as we all sort of know each other it feels ok to say I'm probably being like this (paranoid / hyper vigilant) for personal sort of reasons, to do with taking on board way too young the message that political things can get extremely bad quickly and the sooner you panic & pack your bags the better. But yeah twitter is not helping.

 

[Kaka Tim]

without any actual evidence none of these legal challenges are going anywhere - whatever the political leaning of the judge. A case has to have an element that is arguable in law to go anywhere - otherwise its just gets thrown out. The judges in the US are presumably answerable to some sort of regulatory body - so they cant just wave things through (and it would be appealed anyway if they did). So this isnt going to get within a million miles of the supreme court.
Even if there was some sort of possibility of the election being overturned on an obtuse technicality - then can you imagine the shit storm that would engulf the USA? People would take to the streets in their millions. It would be an actual full on civil war. Nobody with any power and influence has any interest in that happening other than a handful of wingnut militia types. Trump - if had any sense of self preservation - would not welcome that as hed very likely end up either fleeing the country, imprisoned or dead.
People and institutions with power and wealth want stability and a continuation of the status quo. They wont get that by backing trump in overturning an election won by the political establishment.

 

[cupid_stunt]

I do get what everyone is saying about calm down it’ll almost certainly be fine. Seeing as we all sort of know each other it feels ok to say I'm probably being like this (paranoid / hyper vigilant) for personal sort of reasons, to do with taking on board way too young the message that political things can get extremely bad quickly and the sooner you panic & pack your bags the better. But yeah twitter is not helping.

Are you following TobyJug on twitter?

 

[JTG]

We also get our results out rather more quickly and that's with manual counting of thin slips of paper.
(there's no basis in the rumour that some constituencies weigh the ballots)

However, we do not have the same generous allowances for postal votes to arrive, provisional ballots for people who encounter some problem with their registration or dozens of votes to record and tabulate on the same ballot paper. Admittedly the necessity for ID in US elections causes many of these delays but it's not really comparing like with like
Edit: also counting at multiple centres for the same vote (ie every single county in a state running their own operation)

 

[mauvais]

OK, this is interesting, given what I said earlier about controlling the power grid to make sure that the enemies of your coup can freeze in the dark:



My guess is that where the leccie and gas is concerned, someone put him up to it. I don't see him coming up with that on his own.

What's the point of it? I don't necessarily mean what is the actual practical outcome of it, I really mean what does anyone think this will achieve?

 

[Idris2002]

I do get what everyone is saying about calm down it’ll almost certainly be fine. Seeing as we all sort of know each other it feels ok to say I'm probably being like this (paranoid / hyper vigilant) for personal sort of reasons, to do with taking on board way too young the message that political things can get extremely bad quickly and the sooner you panic & pack your bags the better. But yeah twitter is not helping.

Oh coup or no coup, it's not going to be fine! But we should calm down anyway.

Not having a go, but maybe you should knock the twitter on the head? I've already been blocked by one ex-friend on there (i.e. I was friends with him in real life, before Facebook put an end to that).

 

[StoneRoad]

However, we do not have the same generous allowances for postal votes to arrive, provisional ballots for people who encounter some problem with their registration or dozens of votes to record and tabulate on the same ballot paper. Admittedly the necessity for ID in US elections causes many of these delays but it's not really comparing like with like

True, but I still think Sunderland Council should offer to do the actual counting ...

 

[elbows]

I do get what everyone is saying about calm down it’ll almost certainly be fine. Seeing as we all sort of know each other it feels ok to say I'm probably being like this (paranoid / hyper vigilant) for personal sort of reasons, to do with taking on board way too young the message that political things can get extremely bad quickly and the sooner you panic & pack your bags the better. But yeah twitter is not helping.

What I try to do is fence off the hypervigilant side of my brain, express skepticism towards this side of myself, and just try to get the timing right as to when to switch that skepticism off and open the gate. The hypervigilant areas are allowed to bubble along in the meantime, but are not allowed out to play with the rest of my sense of wellbeing. Because without a gatekeeper that knows when to restrain those thoughts, there is no inner peace, and little left of me that is worth saving from the doom scenario.

 

[JTG]

People and institutions with power and wealth want stability and a continuation of the status quo. They wont get that by backing trump in overturning an election won by the political establishment.

Capital is quite relaxed about a Biden Presidency and doesn't really consider rocking the boat for the alternative to be worthwhile

 

[Idris2002]

What's the point of it? I don't necessarily mean what is the actual practical outcome of it, I really mean what does anyone think this will achieve?

The point is what does Trump think it will achieve. Maybe he is just avenging himself on those who Wronged Him (as he sees it) and who he can actually fuck up. The head of oversight of electricity and natural gas - does he actually have a big switch in his office? Maybe Trump thinks he does.

 

[kebabking]

Where would the Spanish Civil war have been with that attitude?

In Spain?

 

[elbows]

What's the point of it? I don't necessarily mean what is the actual practical outcome of it, I really mean what does anyone think this will achieve?

Given the vulgar nature of Trumps narcissism, it is tempting to see these firings in the same light as every other firing in the long list of firings Trump has presided over. I would assume that firing people makes Trump feel more complete, something vaguely equivalent to pleasure, except he is such a shell he probably cant feel much real pleasure. Maybe he is trying to pack a whole second terms worth of firings into his last weeks in office.