2020 US Presidential Election

[Cowley]

We need to focus our diplomatic efforts on the vast majority of the world that is not the EU, US or China.

I mean those are some fairly important parts of the world!

 

[Scotrail314209]

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1325194709443080192?s=20

The man is mad.

Tweet shows Donald Trump proclaiming in all capitals that the election is being stolen and that bad things happened.

 

[yorksrob]

There is no doubt he will concentrate his efforts on the EU over the UK but ultimately it won't make much of a difference. A trade deal with the US would come with too many strings under any party and there is little public support to get involved in another American war should he start one. We need to focus our diplomatic efforts on the vast majority of the world that is not the EU, US or China.

I don't think either ourselves or the US will want to lose what we have already in terms of the trading and diplomatic relationship. The easiest thing will be to put in place something very similar to what we have now.

In terms of Europe, the same would be true, were it not for the sting of divorce. I've no doubt that we will be close allies of both, although I hope we also manage to achieve closer ties with other western, democratic nations.

 

[Cowley]

Bring on the return of the White House Correspondents' Dinner complete with an actual president as the star of the show. Trump didn't bother to attend during his tenure as he was evidently not someone able to laugh at himself as well as others.

Great example here;

Wasn’t that speech one of the reasons that Trump hated Obama so much? Obama shredded him on his love of conspiracy theories and Trump wasn’t a happy bunny from what I remember.

 

[ainsworth74]

Bring on the return of the White House Correspondents' Dinner complete with an actual president as the star of the show. Trump didn't bother to attend during his tenure as he was evidently not someone able to laugh at himself as well as others.

Great example here;

Wasn’t that speech one of the reasons that Trump hated Obama so much? Obama shredded him on his love of conspiracy theories and Trump wasn’t a happy bunny from what I remember.

Someone really should ask Obama if he regrets ripping on Trump as it probably gave us the Trump presidency

 

[GRALISTAIR]

Wasn’t that speech one of the reasons that Trump hated Obama so much? Obama shredded him on his love of conspiracy theories and Trump wasn’t a happy bunny from what I remember.

I have seen elsewhere and will post the source later that allegedly that was the turning point when Trump decided to run and effectively say “ ok I will show you”

Someone really should ask Obama if he regrets ripping on Trump as it probably gave us the Trump presidency

Precisely

 

[hst43102]

Have you see the news?!

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1325099845045071873

"Hope" was the key word in my post!

 

[najaB]

Comforting thought though it maybe the legal position is pretty much no he can't be.

Yes, and no. The Generals can't refuse a lawful order but they have a duty to refuse to follow one that they consider to be illegitimate. "I was just following orders" doesn't work as a defense.

If (or rather when) they refuse to follow the order, the President can relieve them of command and appoint a new person to the position, but I suspect he'd get pretty far down the chain before finding someone willing to commit to a first strike in peacetime.

 

[Cowley]

Yes, and no. The Generals can't refuse a lawful order but they have a duty to refuse to follow one that they consider to be illegitimate. "I was just following orders" doesn't work as a defense.

If (or rather when) they refuse to follow the order, the President can relieve them of command and appoint a new person to the position, but I suspect he'd get pretty far down the chain before finding someone willing to commit to a first strike in peacetime.

Where have you been this last few days @najaB?
There’s been some quite interesting things happening but you’ve been fairly quiet this week.

 

[Tracked]

BoJo and DoTru shall be remembered as harmless buffoons, little hiccups in history

Unfortunately, after coronavirus, not harmless.

 

[jfollows]

(The only real unknown, I suggest, is that Arizona may still go to Trump, although the odds are against this, but it's all noise now)

As of now, 07:38 on 8/11/2020, Biden has a lead of 18,610 in Arizona. Three days ago his lead was 68,390. With (my estimate) ~107,500 votes yet uncounted (CNN says 97% complete also, my estimate comes from their report around mid-day UK time yesterday of 126,000 outstanding votes plus 47,000 provisional votes minus the number of new votes recorded since then), Biden has to win 41% of these to maintain a lead. Over the same 3 day period he has won 43.4% of the new votes counted. So, although it no longer has a bearing on the final result, it's probably the one state remaining in which the result is in some doubt.

Essentially, if he continues to win 43% of the remaining 107,500, Biden's margin will decrease by 14% of 107,500, ~15,000, so he'll end up winning by ~3,500. If he wins 40% of the remaining 107,500, his margin will decrease by 20% of 107,500, ~21,500, and Trump will win by ~3,000. (All these calculations completely ignore other candidates, for sure).

EDIT - although there are significantly more uncounted votes in neighbouring Nevada (~160,000), Biden is winning 60% of them as they come in, so his margin there is increasing slightly, and there's little chance of his losing Nevada to Trump unless this trend changes significantly.

 

[birchesgreen]

Some really odd goings on, Trump's defence team held a press conference in the car park of a company called Four Seasons Landscaping, rumour is they meant to do it at the Four Seasons Hotel but made a mistake.

 

[Whistler40145]

I

Some really odd goings on, Trump's defence team held a press conference in the car park of a company called Four Seasons Landscaping, rumour is they meant to do it at the Four Seasons Hotel but made a mistake.

sounds like what Del Boy Trotter would do

I can't see how reliable his defence team are

 

[OuterDistant]

It was hilarious though, and quite symbolic of Giuliani's fall from grace.

 

[Whistler40145]

It was hilarious though, and quite symbolic of Giuliani's fall from grace.

How on earth did Rudi Giuliani get involved with Donald Trump?

I remember him being the Mayor of New York City for many years

 

[hexagon789]

I believe, on a technicality, there is no automatic recount requirement in Georgia, a margin of <0.5% allows a candidate to request a recount but although this hasn't happened yet the Secretary of State has short-circuited the process by announcing a recount anyway. Which is probably the "safe" option for him, Brad Raffensperger that is.

I also suspect that, given that Trump won't concede, just about everyone in the world will increasingly ignore him, which will just get him more and more annoyed. But it seems like the best tactic - don't force a confrontation with him, deal with legal matters he forces as and when necessary, but otherwise stop talking to him and talk to Joe Biden and his team instead as much as possible.

EDIT - The other thing is that I expect (and hope) that the media will follow the example of MSNBC, ABC, NBC and CBS last night and stop covering Trump in depth; last night these broadcasters cut the tirade feed from Trump after 35 seconds on the basis that what he was saying was baseless and dangerous, and that they had no duty to air what he was saying. As he gets increasingly irrelevant, so the coverage of what he has to say will shrink.

I reread the tweet and yes, it seems to.just be the Georgia SoS has decided they will hold a recount which is fair enough.

The most important thing about the close count is that it gives hope that the Democrats can win both Senate seats (4 and 6 year terms) in the run off vote in January. The Republicans seem to have 50 seats in the bag so if the Democrats win both Georgia runnoffs then the Senate would be tied and Kamala Harris will have the deciding vote. Hopefully that will be sufficient to force through statehood for Puerto Rico and get 2 additional seats in from 2022.

It's difficult to predict exactly how the Senate runoff will go. Perhaps people will decide to cement Biden's election to office or perhaps they will decide to ensure he doesn't have too easy a time of it, who knows.

 

[Bayum]

Fortunately Trump is cunning and self-obsessed but stupid, as in the quote I gave back in #813 . A logical person would go about this differently, he's going at it from the wrong end completely - he wants to remain being President so he concludes that he has to get some or all of the current election reversed. So how to do this? Mount legal challenges all over the place. Make wild accusations in the hope that some of it will stick. What's currently working against him? The late results from postal voting - so get this stopped. And so on.

The problem is that any tactic with even a slight chance needs to start from the bottom and work up, not the other way round. Start with evidence of something real happening, rather than look for evidence to fit his particular desired outcome.

Basically looking for something to "disallow counting of votes in Pennsylvania but not in Arizona" isn't going to be possible. I think we all know that. The 50% of Republicans who publicly walk away from him today get some respect from me. The 50% who feel no alternative but to stick with him regardless don't.

I actually think someone somewhere in his group is ridiculously intelligent. The way they’ve manipulated the American public into believing what they want them to, how they’ve setup the idea around postal ballots etc. Whether that’s Trump or someone else remains to be seen, but Trump is extremely manipulative.

 

[jfollows]

Georgia winning margin by Biden will end up 10,195 (now) + 40% of 11,800 (number of votes remaining to be counted) so around 15,000. In turn, this represents about 0.3% of the 5,100,000 total votes cast.

 

[Bayum]

Some of her is, yes. Wouldn’t mind betting she leaves him in the next couple of years

Daily Fail has an article on just that this morning!

 

[Tomp94]

Well, chaps, its been a great 4 years. A refreshing four years from a bloke who cannot be purchased by the establishment.
It does appear now, however, that the establishment has won once again. The Banks. Tech. The Corporate Media. They win again.
Biden won because he's not Trump and not Bernie sanders. Bernie Sanders didn't win because he's not Jo Biden, and not part of the establishment.
Harris is VP solely because she's a woman and not white.
Identity politics lives on.

 

[Whistler40145]

Well, chaps, its been a great 4 years. A refreshing four years from a bloke who cannot be purchased by the establishment.
It does appear now, however, that the establishment has won once again. The Banks. Tech. The Corporate Media. They win again.
Biden won because he's not Trump and not Bernie sanders. Bernie Sanders didn't win because he's not Jo Biden, and not part of the establishment.
Harris is VP solely because she's a woman and not white.
Identity politics lives on.

I've never known such a rude and arrogant bag of wind like Donald Trump

 

[birchesgreen]

Well, chaps, its been a great 4 years. A refreshing four years from a bloke who cannot be purchased by the establishment.
It does appear now, however, that the establishment has won once again. The Banks. Tech. The Corporate Media. They win again.
Biden won because he's not Trump and not Bernie sanders. Bernie Sanders didn't win because he's not Jo Biden, and not part of the establishment.
Harris is VP solely because she's a woman and not white.
Identity politics lives on.

What exactly was great about the last four years? The racism, the sexism, the violence, the corruption?

 

[Whistler40145]

What exactly was great about the last four years? The racism, the sexism, the violence, the corruption?

Exactly, not one pleasant word has come out of Donald Trump's mouth in the 4 years of his presidenancy, he's a compulsive liar and the worlds worst looser

 

[RichT54]

Well, chaps, its been a great 4 years. A refreshing four years from a bloke who cannot be purchased by the establishment.
It does appear now, however, that the establishment has won once again. The Banks. Tech. The Corporate Media. They win again.
Biden won because he's not Trump and not Bernie sanders. Bernie Sanders didn't win because he's not Jo Biden, and not part of the establishment.
Harris is VP solely because she's a woman and not white.
Identity politics lives on.

Worst troll, ever.

 

[najaB]

Hopefully that will be sufficient to force through statehood for Puerto Rico and get 2 additional seats in from 2022.

DC is in with a decent shout of statehood as well.

Not really enough of a majority for the referendum to have any legitimacy.

Hmm... 52% to 48% being enough of a majority to be the "will of the people". Now where have I heard that before...?

Presumably Trump can still sack government appointees such as Dr. Fauci and replace them with more of his stooges, in order to create additional mayhem before Biden takes over.

Worse than that. His administration recently made changes to the civil service that will allow them to not only fire existing career staffers, but also to replace them with political appointees who will be almost impossible to remove. See:

Trump signs executive order that critics warn politicizes federal career civil service

President Donald Trump signed an executive order that appears to provide him and his agency appointees more leeway in the hiring and firing of federal employees deemed disloyal, a move that critics say politicizes civil service and could lead to career officials being pushed out for political...

edition.cnn.com

Congratulations to Joe Biden. I really hope Donald Trump will be a good loser

Bwahahahahahahaha. Oh, wait. You were serious?

Where have you been this last few days @najaB?
There’s been some quite interesting things happening but you’ve been fairly quiet this week.

Been anxiously awaiting a result.

Some really odd goings on, Trump's defence team held a press conference in the car park of a company called Four Seasons Landscaping, rumour is they meant to do it at the Four Seasons Hotel but made a mistake.

And ended up in the parking lot of a gardening company, next door to a sex shop. Sounds about right for Rudi.

How on earth did Rudi Giuliani get involved with Donald Trump?

He's always been thoroughly weird. His first wife was his cousin type of weird. And he's been a pretty astute politician, so it's not odd that he got on the Trump train. What is a little strange is that he's decided to stay on board to the end of the line (which has turned out to be a set of buffer stops) rather than getting off at the last station.

A refreshing four years from a bloke who cannot be purchased by the establishment.

Only because the establishment can't outbid Putin.

 

[ainsworth74]

Yes, and no. The Generals can't refuse a lawful order but they have a duty to refuse to follow one that they consider to be illegitimate. "I was just following orders" doesn't work as a defense.

If (or rather when) they refuse to follow the order, the President can relieve them of command and appoint a new person to the position, but I suspect he'd get pretty far down the chain before finding someone willing to commit to a first strike in peacetime.

If it's obviously unlawful sure, that's the reason that Trump can't wake up this morning ring up the Joint Chiefs and say: "Listen fellas, I don't like those stupid Europeans celebrating the false election of Sleepy Joe, I need to you nuke every European capital so they understand who is in charge". The order will be refused as clearly insane and unlawful and before he gets through enough senior military officers trying to find someone who will transmit the order he'll have been 25th Amendmented out of the White House (as I don't think even the Republicans would stand idly by and let this happen). Though personally I think that's just an ever so slightly thin protection against such a thing but it does at least exist.

The "nightmare" scenario is the one in which the order is clearly a bad order but it is not obviously an unlawful one (such as the example given above of using a low yield tactical nuclear device against an underground bunker/complex).

 

[birchesgreen]

Only because the establishment can't outbid Putin.

To be honest i find the idea that a man born into great wealth and who uses that to gain power and influence, and avoid the consequences of his actions, is not establishment baffling. But then again different people have different definitions of such a thing...

 

[najaB]

The "nightmare" scenario is the one in which the order is clearly a bad order but it is not obviously an unlawful one (such as the example given above of using a low yield tactical nuclear device against an underground bunker/complex).

Indeed. But (hopefully) that scenario won't come up between now and January 20th.

 

[SteveM70]

Daily Fail has an article on just that this morning!

Oh God. So me and the Daily Heil agree on something?!

 

[Gloster]

Well, chaps, its been a great 4 years. A refreshing four years from a bloke who cannot be purchased by the establishment.
It does appear now, however, that the establishment has won once again. The Banks. Tech. The Corporate Media. They win again.
Biden won because he's not Trump and not Bernie sanders. Bernie Sanders didn't win because he's not Jo Biden, and not part of the establishment.
Harris is VP solely because she's a woman and not white.
Identity politics lives on.

Presuming that this is written in a satirical/sarcastic tone, I would tend to agree with it. As far as I am concerned, the Democrats and Republicans are usually two sides of the same coin, and there is little to choose between them: both are just arms of big business. However, the last four years have been somewhat different and the world is well rid of Trump, who is really a Trumpist. It is true that he is not really at anybodyelse’s beck and call, as he is working for himself (and his ego) alone. Even if he is doing the bidding of someone else (say, purely hypothetically, Putin), he is ultimately working for himself. We are well rid of him.

The worrying thing is how he may be able to pack the higher echelons of government with devoted acolytes (Donald Trump Jr?) who will sabotage Biden and continue to push Trump’s interest.