Trump suggests delay in 2020 election

[lady_*nix]

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-53597975

I. Fucking. Told. You. This guy's dictatorial ambitions were obvious from day one.

[Rommie]

I mean did we ever say no?

That said, doesn't mean he has the power to do it. Congress sets the elections, not the president.

[lady_*nix]

@Rommie

You didn't. Some people here did though.

Re: power. It depends on who resists, who rolls over, and who enforces (or not).

e.g.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... ump-troops

The goons were ordered to withdraw... but who both can and will make them? Right now, nobody. So they stay. The only people both willing and able to get rid of these guys are probably the Oregon Army National Guard, they're not going to be called it (at least not yet), because that would literally be insurrection.

Likewise with Congress. The House probably won't roll over (probably), but the Senate has already shown they'll do Trump's bidding even when it's illegal. And as for SCOTUS, if they declare something Trump is doing illegal, who enforces it? Courts ruled many of Trump's abusive immigration policies illegal a while back IIRC, and those are still being carried because nobody has both the power and the desire to enforce the rulings.

[lady_*nix]

As far as elections the refrain I keep seeing is: "But individual states handle their own ballots!"

To which the answer at this point is: so what? How many states have Republican governors? How many Republican governors will follow a demand from Trump to not hold elections? How many police forces will go along with that?

When individual cities and towns hold elections, who keeps the Trumpist state governments from throwing out the ballots? Who keeps the police, who are overwhelmingly loyal to Trump, from harassing voters? Nobody. No enforcement of consequences means no change in behavior. The logic of authoritarians is the logic of a child throwing a tantrum, they'll just keep pushing and pushing until a "no" is not only stated but enforced.

This is what I keep struggling to get across to liberals - everything in this country is about reduction to violence, who can enforce what, who can take whose toys away. Soft power has to be backed by hard power, and right now the forces opposing Trump have a profound lack of hard power. Democrats are great with the velvet glove, but there's no iron gauntlet underneath. No consequences and no enforcement means no change.

[Rommie]

Well, even Moscow Mitch told Trump to STFU on this, so while I'm not saying don't monitor the situation I am saying there's plenty of other tangible threats to democracy maybe more useful to spend one's energy on unless new information comes out.

Interestingly, there are Republican states that currently do all-mail ballots, like that liberal bastion of Utah.

[SciFiFisher]

BBC this morning reported on this. One possible motive Trump has is to distract and keep everyone off balance. If we are screaming about not changing the election we are not focused on how bad the economy is or how many people are dying from COVID thanks to the orange baboon and his goons.

I believe if his enablers and co-conspirators supported him and actually ran with this he would happily assume the mantle of Dictator in Chief. So far the Republicans that have been quoted are saying "that's a no". Of course, we don't know if it is a Susan Collins No, well deeply concerned, maybe, OK, yes Trump dear kind of answer. But, I am sure they are writing a strongly worded letter even now.

[SciFiFisher]

As far as elections the refrain I keep seeing is: "But individual states handle their own ballots!"

To which the answer at this point is: so what? How many states have Republican governors? How many Republican governors will follow a demand from Trump to not hold elections? How many police forces will go along with that?

When individual cities and towns hold elections, who keeps the Trumpist state governments from throwing out the ballots? Who keeps the police, who are overwhelmingly loyal to Trump, from harassing voters? Nobody. No enforcement of consequences means no change in behavior. The logic of authoritarians is the logic of a child throwing a tantrum, they'll just keep pushing and pushing until a "no" is not only stated but enforced.

This is what I keep struggling to get across to liberals - everything in this country is about reduction to violence, who can enforce what, who can take whose toys away. Soft power has to be backed by hard power, and right now the forces opposing Trump have a profound lack of hard power. Democrats are great with the velvet glove, but there's no iron gauntlet underneath. No consequences and no enforcement means no change.

I think that if Trump tries to have a coup over the election and stay in office you will see that the Democrats have more hard power than you believe. Right now some of what is happening is that people are still willing to give the rule of law and over 200 years of tradition a chance to work. And if the Republicans still believed in the rule of law they would have convicted Trump. But, that's a kettle of fish they will have to eat now. I hope and believe that mistake combined with the crashing economy and COVID is going to cost the Republicans dearly for at least the next eight years.

[Sigma_Orionis]

Said it before and will say it again: I don't think Trump has enough people willing to do his bidding in your armed forces. Sure, he might have mercenary troops, sorry: Private Military Contractors doing his dirty work for Homeland Security. But, despite that there should be a number of people in your military who might support Trump, the fact that people like former Secretary of Defense Mattis told him to fuck off (yes he did take his sweet time to do it, still...) leads me to think that if Trump actually tries to pull a stunt like that he's going to find out pretty quickly that as we say here: "La masa no esta para bollos" (literal translation: "This dough ain't good enough to make buns." Basically it means "tolerance for your antics has run out"). I'd like to make it clear that I am not minimizing the threat Trump is, or, even more, the threat him and his supporters are to your country). I find the the fact that a mere three years after this person got elected, we're seriously talking about the US as if it was a Latin American Bannana Republic VERY distressing. Yet, I don't think it's too late, YET.

[SciFiFisher]

The damage that has already been done will take a while to clean up. But, I agree with Sigma's assessment that a military coup is not yet ready for prime time. What is a concern is the way he is convincing his base to consider the election(s) illegitimate. It's going to be fucking hard to fix things if 30-40% of the population are passively opposing it and putting up roadblocks. Potentially, you have the possibility of a civil war, which we are technically already in, escalating to a more open version of violence.

The other concern is if somehow he was able to convince Congress to back his bid to suspend the elections and pass some sort of emergency stay of his leaving office. The only way to do that is to convince the House to go along. And that is not happening as long as the D's are a majority there. And there may be just enough R's in the Senate who would be horrified or ashamed enough not to go along with anything like that. Frankly, though I would not trust the R's to feed and water a gerbil at this point.

That doesn't mean that more damage won't be happening before this is resolved. And we need to keep up the pressure on the Republican party and their flying monkeys. I am hopeful that they have done so much damage to themselves over the last several years that they will be having a hard time getting a Republican elected for dog catcher in most places. Sadly, I suspect that at least 40% of the country will still be voting R locally.

[Rommie]

Also, I didn't think of it but someone pointed out his Tweet magically came like an hour after the worst economic results in a VERY long time. Dude doesn't know much but he does know how to distract and I'd say he did a good job of it.

[Sigma_Orionis]

Also, I didn't think of it but someone pointed out his Tweet magically came like an hour after the worst economic results in a VERY long time. Dude doesn't know much but he does know how to distract and I'd say he did a good job of it.

That's a basic skill you need to be a Con Man

[Rommie]

Yeah, totally.

Also, random, but scene from our house: for whatever reason my dad was complaining last night about charities who don't give much to charity itself, and brought up the Clinton Foundation- "they only give about 10% to charity, and pay Chelsea Clinton $10 million!" I was like wait, as opposed to the Trump children, who actively steal from charities to the point where they can't run it? My dad's brilliant retort to that (after which the subject was changed by someone else) was legit "at least they're not using the charity to bribe others!"

Oh man, so wish I could have brought up some of their bribes, and mention that Trump portrait the "charity" went to. But it's crazy how differently someone else can view the world from you.

[Sigma_Orionis]

Yeah, totally.

Also, random, but scene from our house: for whatever reason my dad was complaining last night about charities who don't give much to charity itself, and brought up the Clinton Foundation- "they only give about 10% to charity, and pay Chelsea Clinton $10 million!" I was like wait, as opposed to the Trump children, who actively steal from charities to the point where they can't run it? My dad's brilliant retort to that (after which the subject was changed by someone else) was legit "at least they're not using the charity to bribe others!"

Oh man, so wish I could have brought up some of their bribes, and mention that Trump portrait the "charity" went to. But it's crazy how differently someone else can view the world from you.

Had the same issues with my old man. He always had a soft spot for Autocrats. So, despite that he leaned right. He made a lot of contortions to justify anything Chavez did. he started to keep his mouth shut after 2015 when the disaster Communists made of my country was impossible to hide.

[SciFiFisher]

Yeah, totally.

Also, random, but scene from our house: for whatever reason my dad was complaining last night about charities who don't give much to charity itself, and brought up the Clinton Foundation- "they only give about 10% to charity, and pay Chelsea Clinton $10 million!" I was like wait, as opposed to the Trump children, who actively steal from charities to the point where they can't run it? My dad's brilliant retort to that (after which the subject was changed by someone else) was legit "at least they're not using the charity to bribe others!"

Oh man, so wish I could have brought up some of their bribes, and mention that Trump portrait the "charity" went to. But it's crazy how differently someone else can view the world from you.

Had the same issues with my old man. He always had a soft spot for Autocrats. So, despite that he leaned right. He made a lot of contortions to justify anything Chavez did. he started to keep his mouth shut after 2015 when the disaster Communists made of my country was impossible to hide.

Yes, it's amazing how people just stop talking after a certain point. They never acknowledge their errors or that they were pig ignorant. They just pretend it was not what you thought it was.

[Sigma_Orionis]

Yeah, totally.

Also, random, but scene from our house: for whatever reason my dad was complaining last night about charities who don't give much to charity itself, and brought up the Clinton Foundation- "they only give about 10% to charity, and pay Chelsea Clinton $10 million!" I was like wait, as opposed to the Trump children, who actively steal from charities to the point where they can't run it? My dad's brilliant retort to that (after which the subject was changed by someone else) was legit "at least they're not using the charity to bribe others!"

Oh man, so wish I could have brought up some of their bribes, and mention that Trump portrait the "charity" went to. But it's crazy how differently someone else can view the world from you.

Had the same issues with my old man. He always had a soft spot for Autocrats. So, despite that he leaned right. He made a lot of contortions to justify anything Chavez did. he started to keep his mouth shut after 2015 when the disaster Communists made of my country was impossible to hide.

Yes, it's amazing how people just stop talking after a certain point. They never acknowledge their errors or that they were pig ignorant. They just pretend it was not what you thought it was.

Oh yeah, he was overjoyed when Trump got elected too. The main reason seemed to be because "Everyone would now know what the US really thought of the rest of the world"

[code monkey]

Oh yeah, he was overjoyed when Trump got elected too. The main reason seemed to be because "Everyone would now know what the US really thought of the rest of the world"

now I wonder exactly what he meant by that.

[Sigma_Orionis]

Oh yeah, he was overjoyed when Trump got elected too. The main reason seemed to be because "Everyone would now know what the US really thought of the rest of the world"

now I wonder exactly what he meant by that.

My father hated the US with a passion. He considered the US to be hypocritical beyond repair. One of the things that he considered the US to be hypocritical about was in how it regarded foreigners. To him, the average US citizen considered foreigners (particularly from Latin America) to be "undesirable". He always gave an example of something he saw in Texas in the early 80s . Yes, I know you will ask me to tell you about it. So, here it goes:

Back in in the early 80s My father owned a small company that was an authorized representative of a US computer company called "Four Phase Systems". And, since he was also the tech guy. He went to the US to receive some required training at a Four Phase Systems facility in Texas (don't remember the name of the town). This training lasted for a couple of months. In that time my father went to a pizza place for supper. This pizza place looked like the stereotypical Italian restaurant, complete with wooden tables and red/white tablecloths, the owner behaved in a stereotypical Italian manner to the delight of the older female patrons (or so my old man said). Anyways. when my old man finished his pizza it was past closing time. Then my father heard the people who ran the restaurant (family owned it seems) speaking Spanish. So, he went to owner and asked him in Spanish where he was from. Turns out that he was Argentinian (like my dad). My father then asked him why all the "Italian Show", the owner answered that "The locals don't like Latin Americans". It's important to keep in mind that most Argentinians are of Spanish/Italian descent. So, they're mostly Caucasian.

[lady_*nix]

If they can't delay the election wholesale, well, they can at least try to throw out mail-in ballots by executive fiat:

https://twitter.com/anitakumar01/status ... 6292681728

IDK if Trump has the legal authority to do this, but again, legal authority doesn't matter; what matters is who will follow his instructions and who won't, regardless of which option is illegal. This is a problem of the nation's conscience, not the nation's laws, and I'm hoping like hell that a majority of Americans are not going to be Good Germans.

[code monkey]

Oh yeah, he was overjoyed when Trump got elected too. The main reason seemed to be because "Everyone would now know what the US really thought of the rest of the world"

now I wonder exactly what he meant by that.

My father hated the US with a passion. ...

now i'm certain that he meant the government and not individuals.

would it be easier for you to emigrate from argentina?

[Sigma_Orionis]

Oh yeah, he was overjoyed when Trump got elected too. The main reason seemed to be because "Everyone would now know what the US really thought of the rest of the world"

now I wonder exactly what he meant by that.

My father hated the US with a passion. ...

now i'm certain that he meant the government and not individuals.

He always said that too. OTOH, he always said that had been born in the US, he'd be a Republican

would it be easier for you to emigrate from argentina?

Probably, but the rest of Latin America is pretty much the same, we're just the latest to go through this. Argentina might yet end up the same way we are right now AGAIN. They're not doing well currently. And, Argentina in the 70s and 80s was pretty much in the same place we are right now.

[lady_*nix]

Liberals: "but he can't legally interfere with the election!"

Watch him doing so, and getting away with it.

https://mobile.twitter.com/Will_Bunch/s ... 6208278531

https://mobile.twitter.com/tedlieu/stat ... 5888361472

Edit: actually lemme just start a separate thread for this.