Biden Thread

[ReluctantSamurai]

I suppose the audits will show us more in the coming weeks/months.

Not a single audit to date has turned up any evidence of vote tampering...not a SINGLE ONE. Some states like Georgia and Wisconsin, recounted---by hand---twice. I hope by the "audits [...] in the coming weeks/months" you are not referring to ones like the ongoing sham in Arizona:

https://www.azcentral.com/story/news...-election/5212

A distinguishing mark of an auditor, the book says, is acceptance of responsibility to serve the public interest. The book talks at length about integrity, including performing work "with an attitude that is objective, fact-based, nonpartisan, and nonideological with regard to the entity being audited."

This witchhunt is anything but objective, and resembles the absurd allegations of "The Kraaken". Every one of Trump's cases thrown out of court...86 of them. The Maricopa Co "audit" will find nothing worth mentioning, despite it being a totally partisan gig.

I am not even convinced he won the election legitimately.

By that reasoning then, every GOP legislator elected in the five "swing" states should resign because their legitimacy can be called into question, yes? And why stop there? If there is widespread voter fraud, why limit the audits to blue states and to the presidency only? Let's investigate every single state, at every level, because surely it isn't just Democrats who cheat?!? Oh wait, the majority of cases where voter fraud was actually proven was for GOP candidates...

https://www.heritage.org/voterfraud/search

And lastly this:

https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign...d-myth-to-rest

One hundred forty-three cases of fraud using mailed ballots over the course of 20 years comes out to seven to eight cases per year, nationally. It also means that across the 50 states, there has been an average of three cases per state over the 20-year span. That is just one case per state every six or seven years. We are talking about an occurrence that translates to about 0.00006 percent of total votes cast.

[Zain]

Not a single audit to date has turned up any evidence of vote tampering...not a SINGLE ONE. Some states like Georgia and Wisconsin, recounted---by hand---twice. I hope by the "audits [...] in the coming weeks/months" you are not referring to ones like the ongoing sham in Arizona

There is a VAST difference between a recount and a forensic audit. No audits have been conducted until now.

And if the election was fraud-free, then shouldn't everyone welcome an audit to put an end to the questions? What are they trying to hide?

Yes, audit every election 100%. Transparency leads to election-confidence.

[Hooahguy]

There is a VAST difference between a recount and a forensic audit. No audits have been conducted until now.

And if the election was fraud-free, then shouldn't everyone welcome an audit to put an end to the questions? What are they trying to hide?

Yes, audit every election 100%. Transparency leads to election-confidence.

Because the audits like in Arizona are being run by conspiracy theorists who already think the election was stolen. They arent doing a nonpartisan audit, they are trying to confirm their conspiracy theories. Its all feeding into the Big Lie, undermining faith in the electoral process thats entirely without merit- time and time again those claiming the election was stolen have been asked to show proof. They have not. All they have are "people are saying its stolen" which to me is akin to saying "well people are saying that the Earth is flat."

And when you have Trumpists clamoring for a military coup, you know we are in deep trouble as a country.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

I think it is overkill in terms of money usage, but a complete audit by an accredited accounting firm or the like would not bother me.

[Pannonian]

Because the audits like in Arizona are being run by conspiracy theorists who already think the election was stolen. They arent doing a nonpartisan audit, they are trying to confirm their conspiracy theories. Its all feeding into the Big Lie, undermining faith in the electoral process thats entirely without merit- time and time again those claiming the election was stolen have been asked to show proof. They have not. All they have are "people are saying its stolen" which to me is akin to saying "well people are saying that the Earth is flat."

And when you have Trumpists clamoring for a military coup, you know we are in deep trouble as a country.

IIRC there was a news item about these auditors refusing to make their auditing process transparent.

[ReluctantSamurai]

Voter ID protects the citizen by assuring them that they and everyone else get 1 vote, not less than 1 by dilution of additional fraudulent votes. ALL real voters should WANT that type of voter security.

First of all, you have to believe there's fraud so rampant that it changes the election results. That is not the case. States have been running mail-in voting for years with great success. Every non-partisan study done on election security shows that fraud is at an extremely low level. Of course there's bound to be those who try to cheat, but most of the time they are caught which speaks well for the current system. Is the current system perfect? No. Can there be improvements? Yes. And I'm not referring to the Electoral College which is a topic unto itself. Funny how election security/fraud has become such an issue since the arrival of Trump back in 2016. The issue is so front and center now, that states are using up a lot of time and resources drafting this, and drafting that, instead of paying attention to the real problems this country faces...

Voter ID is a blatant attempt by Republicans to make it harder for ethnic groups, and people of color to vote...for obvious reasons. ---Full Stop---

[Pannonian]

First of all, you have to believe there's fraud so rampant that it changes the election results. That is not the case. States have been running mail-in voting for years with great success. Every non-partisan study done on election security shows that fraud is at an extremely low level. Of course there's bound to be those who try to cheat, but most of the time they are caught which speaks well for the current system. Is the current system perfect? No. Can there be improvements? Yes. And I'm not referring to the Electoral College which is a topic unto itself. Funny how election security/fraud has become such an issue since the arrival of Trump back in 2016. The issue is so front and center now, that states are using up a lot of time and resources drafting this, and drafting that, instead of paying attention to the real problems this country faces...

Voter ID is a blatant attempt by Republicans to make it harder for ethnic groups, and people of color to vote...for obvious reasons. ---Full Stop---

In the 2019 UK election, there were 164 fraudulent votes out of 47,568,611 votes cast. The Electoral Commission, an independent body that oversees elections, says that electoral fraud is insignificant. Yet the UK government, using the argument that electoral fraud is a problem, is proposing measures against this nebulous issue that are known to discourage poorer people. To address those 164 fraudulent votes, the right proposes to effectively disenfranchise thousands who are likely to tend left.

[Montmorency]

Biden's calling out Manchin and Sinema. I think he's serious.
https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1399830599871827968 [VIDEO]


@Pann It's kind of awkward to be talking about UK electoralism here. Threads aren't *that* omnibus yet.
Edit: Ah, whatever. Have at it, especially if you can make a connection to American politics.

Yes, audit every election 100%. Transparency leads to election-confidence.

AFAIK every state automatically audits federal elections prior to or shortly after certification, making the presidential election fully audited...

https://www.eac.gov/sites/default/fi...ion_Audits.pdf

I'm an independent. Party politics blinds us to half of the lies in this country, because both parties are guilty. Let's stop making this a red vs blue issue and see it as an American issue.

What is the evidence that both parties are guilty? Seems like a naive mindset.

If voter ID is just a sham to suppress the oppressed, then so is every other form of ID. Tell that to a bank which requires ID to open an account, the Department of Transportation for requiring an ID to drive a car legally, airlines for requiring an ID to buy a ticket to fly anywhere, oh and the ID required to get into any Democratic or Republican National Convention.

Voter ID protects the citizen by assuring them that they and everyone else get 1 vote, not less than 1 by dilution of additional fraudulent votes. ALL real voters should WANT that type of voter security.

Voter registration is the identification, and the baseline of security. Voter ID (documents) at the polling both is not what prevents fraudulent votes. Never has. In reality there has never been such a thing as widespread "voter" fraud in this country's history, though we've had plenty of electoral fraud from the top.

But if you believe strongly in a special ID only for voting and nothing else for some reason, you should want it delivered to everyone automatically, like the information cards (polling place and table) that my city mails me before every election.

[Pannonian]

Biden's calling out Manchin and Sinema. I think he's serious.
https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1399830599871827968 [VIDEO]


@Pann It's kind of awkward to be talking about UK electoralism here. Threads aren't *that* omnibus yet.
Edit: Ah, whatever. Have at it, especially if you can make a connection to American politics.

I'm pointing to the common thread in populist politics, which is exclusively pursued by the right, which you can see here too. The method is to disregard experts and evidence-based arguments, and push instead some nebulous principle-based argument that would justify measures with wide-ranging effects but where the degree and range of those effects are always justified by referring back to the nebulous principle-based argument.

Even disregarding the issue I talk most about, and confining ourselves to the current discussion of electoral fraud, you can see this method in Zain's posts 230 and 232. Call for an ideal that can never be met (230), and then justify wide-ranging measures that crosses way more than the original problem (232). I cited the UK side because that's the current issue that I'm most familiar with. But the methodology of right wing populism can be seen in the arguments cited by Zain.

Looking at the same methodology, but applied in a different field, see the arguments for pushing creationism. Make the assumption that science has to be 100% satisfactory or not satisfactory at all, point to inevitable gaps in scientific knowledge, and say that since science does not 100% satisfy, it means that creationist arguments must therefore have substance. You can see this in many different issues, but with the same rhetorical method. And because we live in a free democratic society, this method is very effective, as all votes are equal, whether arrived at through weighing evidence or arrived at through the populist method.

[rory_20_uk]

Populist politics is certainly not the exclusive domain of the right - as we can see by the speed being anti Trans / Gay / [insert thing] occurs with it now reaching the level of "thought crimes" on both extremes - the terms Right and Left does rather over simplify things.

Accusations are as good as proof and lead to people being as far as possible edited out of a group for Intolerance. Gender? Utterly subjective and up to the person; race? Utterly subjective and up to the person (unless you are too white it seems then you're just "white") and if you disagree you are wrong. Probably Evil. And ideally should be sacked and ostracised. With some very odd boundaries: each person is individual and themselves and should be valued for them being themselves at all times and so on and so forth. But if they so much as looked at a (generally) female under 18 then they are still a monster who is preying on innocent children. End of story.

Another good one is the Thought Crime of being Silent (or even just too quiet) - in something that Stalin would be proud of, not declaiming your approval of the current thought is itself evidence of a Crime. So you can't just not be racist - you should be "anti-racist", or more generally an Ally - whilst still not being overbearing of course. If you are a non white and hold a view that is wrong, then you are a Coconut or a Banana or to be less subtle a race traitor since inclusion for some means choosing to hold the correct views.

Clearly there is a massive power disparity between the two "sides" with persons on one (in the USA at least) able to kill people with relative impunity with the other mainly having the ability to hurl a torrent of abuse. But I personally think that there is an equal will to enforce the power if it was there.

Frankly, apart from on here I mainly find myself not risking holding an opinion since whilst it is highly likely no one cares what I think or say why take the risk?

[ReluctantSamurai]

"Mitch McConnell" 2.0 is at it again:

https://www.wvgazettemail.com/opinio...2d0af870f.html

The right to vote is fundamental to our American democracy and protecting that right should not be about party or politics. Least of all, protecting this right, which is a value I share, should never be done in a partisan manner.

Unfortunately, we now are witnessing that the fundamental right to vote has itself become overtly politicized. Today’s debate about how to best protect our right to vote and to hold elections, however, is not about finding common ground, but seeking partisan advantage. Whether it is state laws that seek to needlessly restrict voting or politicians who ignore the need to secure our elections, partisan policymaking won’t instill confidence in our democracy — it will destroy it.

While partisan politics is indeed destroying democracy here in the States, Manchin is most certainly helping that along.

So what might be another reason that Sen Manchin is so dedicated to the BS line of bi-partisanship, his resistance to so much of what Democrats want to get done, and this latest thumbs down to the For The People Act?

This could be a good reason:

https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-...half-a-century

A recording obtained by The New Yorker of a private conference call on January 8th, between a policy adviser to Senator Mitch McConnell and the leaders of several prominent conservative groups—including one run by the Koch brothers’ network—reveals the participants’ worry that the proposed election reforms garner wide support not just from liberals but from conservative voters, too. The speakers on the call expressed alarm at the broad popularity of the bill’s provision calling for more public disclosure about secret political donors. The participants conceded that the bill, which would stem the flow of dark money from such political donors as the billionaire oil magnate Charles Koch, was so popular that it wasn’t worth trying to mount a public-advocacy campaign to shift opinion. Instead, a senior Koch operative said that opponents would be better off ignoring the will of American voters and trying to kill the bill in Congress.

With so little public support, the bill’s opponents have already begun pressuring individual senators. On March 20th, several major conservative groups, including Heritage Action, Tea Party Patriots Action, Freedom Works, and the local and national branches of the Family Research Council, organized a rally in West Virginia to get Senator Joe Manchin, the conservative Democrat, to come out against the legislation. They also pushed Manchin to oppose any efforts by Democrats to abolish the Senate’s filibuster rule, a tactical step that the Party would probably need to take in order to pass the bill. “The filibuster is really the only thing standing in the way of progressive far-left policies like H.R. 1, which is Pelosi’s campaign to take over America’s elections,” Noah Weinrich, the press secretary at Heritage Action, declared during a West Virginia radio interview. On Thursday, Manchin issued a statement warning Democrats that forcing the measure through the Senate would “only exacerbate the distrust that millions of Americans harbor against the U.S. government.”

So it appears that Manchin CAN be pressured---but fellow Democrats just are choosing not to---because many of them are taking the same millions from corporate/industry donors, which, surprise, is part of what HR 1/SB 1 is attempting to address.

Even Fox News shredded Manchin:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6Vz3OXIavo

“You said you oppose scrapping the filibuster,” Wallace said. “The question I have is whether or not—and you say that you hope that will bring the parties together—the question I have is whether or not you’re doing it exactly the wrong way?” Wallace questioned whether it wouldn’t be a smarter strategy for Manchin to say he might consider getting rid of the filibuster because it could “give Republicans an incentive to actually negotiate.” Instead, the anchor said, “by taking it off the table, haven’t you empowered Republicans to be obstructionists?”

Manchin said he doesn’t agree with Wallace’s point of view because there are “seven brave Republicans that continue to vote for what they know is right and the facts as they see them, not worrying about the political consequences.” Seven Republicans voted to convict former President Donald Trump. Manchin went on say that he was “very hopeful” and that he sees “good signs.”

Even when pressed by Wallace (yes Fox News actually doing real journalism!) Manchin continued his line of bi-partisan BS which is fooling noone anymore:

But Wallace again pushed back, pointing out that Republicans blocked the independent commission to investigate the Capitol riot and that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has outright said he wants to block President Joe Biden’s agenda. “Question,” asked Wallace. “Aren’t you being naive about this continuing talk about bipartisan cooperation?” Manchin responded by saying he wasn’t naïve and criticized McConnell for “trying to block all the good things that we’re trying to do for America,” but he insisted he will “continue working with my bipartisan friends” and expressed optimism that “hopefully we can get more of them.”

Except that Republicans haven't given squat since the elections, and not a single one voted to pass a "must-pass" COVID relief bill, they want the 6 Jan assault on democracy to just go away without digging into it, and will most certainly vote to defeat HR1/SB1 and the Infrastructure Bill...

I'm going to be curious how Manchin's response to the GOP assault on democracy is going to be viewed when our current governmental debacle is a part of history...

[Montmorency]

@Seamus

It's been pointed out that we basically no longer accept racial discrimination as religious practice with any religion or denomination, yet continue to tolerate (legally and socially) formal restrictions on women in clergy and the like, or anti-abortion and anti-contraceptive policies in religiously-aligned institutions. If mainstream society has already agreed to reject racism in religion, is there any logical justification against targeting sexism in the same spaces? To put it one way, why doesn't anyone care that Biden attends a gender-segregated church?


This person estimates around a third of all homicides by stranger in the United States are by police officer. It's probably in the ballpark given that most murders are done by friends, family, colleagues, or other non-strangers, but to really make it work you would have to categorically exclude most sorts of manslaughter (such as killing by traffic collision).


Responsive to the earlier discussion of the regulation of voting (Herblock):




One of the great flaws of the Democratic leadership remains, in practical terms, their lack of expressive urgency. It isn't to say that they must be constantly screaming into the media in the most intemperate language - they have, after all, failed up to this point to work themselves into that stance organically - but if nothing else then...



Last I heard the Congress has confirmed like one federal judge so far. Many ways for this session to turn out as 'The Tragedy of Senator Manchin the Blowhard.'

Populist politics is certainly not the exclusive domain of the right - as we can see by the speed being anti Trans / Gay / [insert thing] occurs with it now reaching the level of "thought crimes" on both extremes - the terms Right and Left does rather over simplify things.

Accusations are as good as proof and lead to people being as far as possible edited out of a group for Intolerance. Gender? Utterly subjective and up to the person; race? Utterly subjective and up to the person (unless you are too white it seems then you're just "white") and if you disagree you are wrong. Probably Evil. And ideally should be sacked and ostracised. With some very odd boundaries: each person is individual and themselves and should be valued for them being themselves at all times and so on and so forth. But if they so much as looked at a (generally) female under 18 then they are still a monster who is preying on innocent children. End of story.

Another good one is the Thought Crime of being Silent (or even just too quiet) - in something that Stalin would be proud of, not declaiming your approval of the current thought is itself evidence of a Crime. So you can't just not be racist - you should be "anti-racist", or more generally an Ally - whilst still not being overbearing of course. If you are a non white and hold a view that is wrong, then you are a Coconut or a Banana or to be less subtle a race traitor since inclusion for some means choosing to hold the correct views.

Clearly there is a massive power disparity between the two "sides" with persons on one (in the USA at least) able to kill people with relative impunity with the other mainly having the ability to hurl a torrent of abuse. But I personally think that there is an equal will to enforce the power if it was there.

Frankly, apart from on here I mainly find myself not risking holding an opinion since whilst it is highly likely no one cares what I think or say why take the risk?

You sound hysterical. Take a step back. No one is coming for you.

Just apply rationality and empathy.

So it appears that Manchin CAN be pressured---but fellow Democrats just are choosing not to---because many of them are taking the same millions from corporate/industry donors, which, surprise, is part of what HR 1/SB 1 is attempting to address.

I'm pretty confident Manchin isn't in this for the donations, not to mention that it's not credible that conservative lobbyists have something to offer him that liberal ones, or the DSCC, or the White House, don't. The likelier scenario is he's a true believer in what he's propounding, the ideology of the status quo. (It doesn't hurt that he is now the most-sought and most-valuable Senator in the country.)

If Manchin had a pecuniary motive from any angle (for himself, for his office/campaign, for his state, what-have-you), and Sinema along with him, then legislation would already have been signed by Biden.

[Pannonian]

@Seamus

It's been pointed out that we basically no longer accept racial discrimination as religious practice with any religion or denomination, yet continue to tolerate (legally and socially) formal restrictions on women in clergy and the like, or anti-abortion and anti-contraceptive policies in religiously-aligned institutions. If mainstream society has already agreed to reject racism in religion, is there any logical justification against targeting sexism in the same spaces? To put it one way, why doesn't anyone care that Biden attends a gender-segregated church?

Don't know how different it is in the US, but here in the UK it would be because religion is seen as irrelevant, so no one gives a toss what the churches do. The impression I get of religion in the US is that it's not very organised, but is centred around the individual and their local church.

[Viking]

You sound hysterical. Take a step back. No one is coming for you.

Just apply rationality and empathy.

This appeal to trust the program is not an appeal to rationality, but an appeal to faith disguised as an appeal to rationality.