Biden Thread

[rory_20_uk]

For the posterity of those non-Americans who haven't noticed, the Republican Party as an institution has conclusively committed to rejecting unfavorable electoral outcomes as presumptively illegitimate.

Remember what it's about.

Attachment 24803



Yes. Who said otherwise?

So... What's the big deal about what Russia have done? They are enthusiastically joining in the Great Game where the main loosers are poor people in other countries.

When does the USA taking responsibility - or even acknowledging what they're doing going to start? Aside from the film Team America.

[Montmorency]

So... What's the big deal about what Russia have done? They are enthusiastically joining in the Great Game where the main loosers are poor people in other countries.

It's technically a hostile military action, but in practical terms it doesn't change anything; it just reinforces the current American posture toward Russia (e.g. sanctions regime).

When does the USA taking responsibility - or even acknowledging what they're doing going to start? Aside from the film Team America.

We could change some of our behaviors in order to create more value for everyone.

[Montmorency]

Unless John Roberts is willing and able to persuade one of his colleagues to be more strategic, as he has in the past when there was a 5-4 Republican majority on the Supreme Court (there is now a 6-3 majority), American abortion rights will be liquidated by the end of the year - or at least, barring the worst case, in all but the 20ish most-Democratic states.
https://www.scotusblog.com/case-file...-organization/

Issue: Whether all pre-viability prohibitions on elective abortions are unconstitutional.

EDIT: Incidentally, Mississippi's Supreme Court just struck down all ballot measures passed last year or scheduled, as well as the entire referendum system, because the language of the law mentions five Mississippi districts and Mississippi had four under the 2000 census (the system was put in place in 1990). Thus all ballot measures are invalidated. I mention Mississippi because that state's anti-abortion law is the issue of the Supreme Court case above.

[Hooahguy]

Definitely a low point in this country.

Flashback to all those people saying that Roe v Wade and SCOTUS in general would be just fine even if Trump got elected.

[ReluctantSamurai]

This is as funny as it is sad:

https://www.vice.com/en/article/k78w...an-biden-blame

Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt, who is up for re-election next year, sent an email to supporters Monday pointing the finger at Biden over the chicken restaurant’s supply chain issues, which the company said earlier this month were a result of “industrywide supply chain shortages.”

"Chick-fil-A has a sauce shortage. And you want to know why?" Stitt wrote. "Because of Joe Biden's radical liberal policies."

But wait....it gets better:

Last week, Sen. Ted Cruz tweeted a Breitbart article about Chick-fil-A’s sauce shortage and added: “Joe Biden is destroying America.”

“Is there no limit to how awful Biden’s America can get?” tweeted Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert.

So Sleepy Joe is responsible for limiting not only zesty buffalo, honey mustard, and ranch dips, but ketchup packets and computer chips.....

Meanwhile, back on the ranch:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/14/u...line-hack.html

Let me see.....honey mustard dip, or gasoline?

Other pipeline operators in the United States deploy advanced firewalls between their data and their operations that only allow data to flow one direction, out of the pipeline, and would prevent a ransomware attack from spreading in.

Industry analysts say many critical infrastructure operators say installing such unidirectional gateways along a 5,500-mile pipeline can be complicated or prohibitively expensive. Others say the cost to deploy those safeguards are still cheaper than the losses from potential downtime.

Knock-knock....anyone there?

[Montmorency]

For Capitol defendants’ attorneys, finding mitigating factors will be key in softening potential prison sentences.

Watkins, the “Q Shaman” Jacob Chansley’s attorney, said his client had Asperger’s syndrome and indicated that Chansley’s mental state — and the impact of Trump’s “propaganda” efforts — would play a role in his case.

“A lot of these defendants — and I’m going to use this colloquial term, perhaps disrespectfully — but they’re all fucking short-bus people,” Watkins told TPM. “These are people with brain damage, they’re fucking retarded, they’re on the goddamn spectrum.”

“But they’re our brothers, our sisters, our neighbors, our coworkers — they’re part of our country. These aren’t bad people, they don’t have prior criminal history. Fuck, they were subjected to four-plus years of goddamn propaganda the likes of which the world has not seen since fucking Hitler.”

One particularly remorseful defendant, Anthony Antonio, was sick with a novel disease, “Foxitis,” when he entered the Capitol through a broken window on Jan. 6, his attorney Joe Hurley argued during an initial appearance earlier this month.

BTW conservatives, remember when I mentioned the importance of attending to people who got things right early and discarding those who never did?

[Montmorency]

Super-elderly liberal Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer watched Ginsburg die last year yet has since January been vocally resisting calls to retire and be replaced.

Should we accept the proposition that public acceptance of judicial decisions is a per se good?” I asked Breyer. I provided a few examples of cases where it might be appropriate to resist the decision, such as if the Supreme Court “so dismantles our voting rights that we cease to have a meaningful ability to elect a government that is not led by the same political party the controls the Supreme Court.”

Breyer’s response to my question was twofold. The first was a warning about what can happen should the public turn away from accepting judicial decisions. “Go turn on the television set,” he warned, “and go look at what happens in countries that try to do without” a rule of law grounded in deference to judicial rulings.

Then he seemed to admit there may be circumstances where such deference should be abandoned, though only if those circumstances were truly extraordinary. “What about Hitler?” Breyer asked rhetorically, before denying that anyone currently on the Court reaches that bar — “We don’t have Hitler.”

Yeah, we're . The 'Quixotic institutionalists' in the Democratic Party will never support a remedy to the collapsing resiliency and prospective overthrow of their precious institutions (and all else), until the very point that the availability/possibility of remedy itself is withdrawn (i.e. when "we have Hitler").

[Hooahguy]

Agreed. I bet Manchin and co. are still a fan of the filibuster despite the filibuster of the 1/6 commission. Dems are going to get crushed in 2022 and to be honest, I will feel little pity. Which of course is coming from a place of privilege but maybe it would shock the institutionalists out of their stupor.

[Montmorency]

Agreed. I bet Manchin and co. are still a fan of the filibuster despite the filibuster of the 1/6 commission. Dems are going to get crushed in 2022 and to be honest, I will feel little pity. Which of course is coming from a place of privilege but maybe it would shock the institutionalists out of their stupor.

Texas Republicans are currently about to vote on an "election integrity" bill, that among other things has the following provision:

Sec.232.063. OVERTURNING ELECTION. [Nb. sic] If the number of votes illegally cast in the election is equal to or greater than the number of votes necessary to change the outcome of an election, the court may declare the election void without attempting to determine how individual voters voted.

One thing I've noticed about Democratic super-partisans, the core establishmentarians (including the hard-left ones such as they are) and can finally phrase pithily is that they have a reflexive Dayenu attitude toward any single achievement under Democrats, when the bigger picture makes it obvious that the only "Dayenu" is the one where we don't all die miserably.

I guess what I'm saying is that the Democrats have been corrupted by Semitic influences.

[Montmorency]

^^^
Texas Democrats are actually doing something about it.

[Hooahguy]

You're referring to the walkout, right? How long can that last though?

[ReluctantSamurai]

You're referring to the walkout, right? How long can that last though?

At least they are showing more cohonees than the chicken-$***'s in Congress and I will include the so-called progressives here, as well...

[Zain]

I am not optimistic about a Biden administration.

I am not even convinced he won the election legitimately.

It will be interesting to see what happens. Fortunately I'm a small town guy with a life that doesn't revolve around Washington D.C.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

I am not optimistic about a Biden administration.

I am not even convinced he won the election legitimately.

It will be interesting to see what happens. Fortunately I'm a small town guy with a life that doesn't revolve around Washington D.C.

Biden did win the election, legitimately, under the extant rules thereof.

You can claim that our system is inherently illegitimate as it is sub-optimal and/or poorly designed (and advocate for a different approach); you can claim that USA voters are poorly equipped to use the system we have thereby rendering it illegitimate; you can claim that the de facto two-party approach that we have had for most of our federal elections undercuts the ideals/goals sought by many of our founders and leaves the system illegitimate. Such arguments have been made in this forum before by divers contributors.

Please refrain, however, from attempting to assert that this election was somehow mis-counted or stolen. No credible evidence whatsoever supports this. The facts are that Biden won a victory in the electoral college, as per the system in place, with no credible support for any meaningful miscount or distortion of the vote having occurred.

[Zain]

Biden did win the election, legitimately, under the extant rules thereof.

You can claim that our system is inherently illegitimate as it is sub-optimal and/or poorly designed (and advocate for a different approach); you can claim that USA voters are poorly equipped to use the system we have thereby rendering it illegitimate; you can claim that the de facto two-party approach that we have had for most of our federal elections undercuts the ideals/goals sought by many of our founders and leaves the system illegitimate. Such arguments have been made in this forum before by divers contributors.

Please refrain, however, from attempting to assert that this election was somehow mis-counted or stolen. No credible evidence whatsoever supports this. The facts are that Biden won a victory in the electoral college, as per the system in place, with no credible support for any meaningful miscount or distortion of the vote having occurred.

I genuinely hope you're right, but I'm not convinced that our electoral system is 100% safe from fraud. I suppose the audits will show us more in the coming weeks/months.

[Pannonian]

I genuinely hope you're right, but I'm not convinced that our electoral system is 100% safe from fraud. I suppose the audits will show us more in the coming weeks/months.

Er, what do you mean by 100%? The UK electoral system isn't 100% proof against fraud, and the government is introducing measures to act against it. Except that the amount of fraud is so small that the independent Electoral Commission deems it insignificant on anything but an academic level, and that measures being proposed by the government (officially since the Queen has spoken on it) do far more to shape voting. These measures, incidentally, being known to shape voting because they've been used in the US to aid Republicans in elections, and the effects are well known.

[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.

[Montmorency]

Er, what do you mean by 100%? The UK electoral system isn't 100% proof against fraud, and the government is introducing measures to act against it.

Why? Not to pile on, but for there to be a question about the presidential electoral process in these terms, the system would have to be about 0% proof against fraud.

I think there's a high likelihood of electoral fraud at scale being caught in this country.

[Pannonian]

Why? Not to pile on, but for there to be a question about the presidential electoral process in these terms, the system would have to be about 0% proof against fraud.

I think there's a high likelihood of electoral fraud at scale being caught in this country.

That's the point made by the Electoral Commission. They estimate maybe low double figures of fraudulent votes out of umpteen million votes in any election, which is statistically insignificant, and practically all catchable. Whereas the requirement for ID has, from the evidence of its use in the US, shown that it discourages voting by poorer sections of the population in numbers that are rather higher than low double figures. By pointing to practically non-existent electoral fraud that only exists as a bogeyman, the right gerrymander elections by discouraging votes from sections of the electorate that are expected to vote mostly left.

If you reckon this is paranoia, let me point you to a Tory-run council that used to keep public housing unoccupied because they were likely to be occupied by people who would be expected to vote Labour. The courts decided that this was misuse of public funds for the purpose of gerrymandering, and the Tory leaders of that council were ordered to repay the costs.

[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.

[Zain]

Why? Not to pile on, but for there to be a question about the presidential electoral process in these terms, the system would have to be about 0% proof against fraud.

I think there's a high likelihood of electoral fraud at scale being caught in this country.

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.

[Zain]

Whereas the requirement for ID has, from the evidence of its use in the US, shown that it discourages voting by poorer sections of the population in numbers that are rather higher than low double figures. By pointing to practically non-existent electoral fraud that only exists as a bogeyman, the right gerrymander elections by discouraging votes from sections of the electorate that are expected to vote mostly left.

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.

[Pannonian]

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.

I had to deal with some government stuff recently. It required n forms of ID, which I couldn't fulfill (since my passport expired during lockdown). So I had to chase up several different departments to get one to vouch for another, with one passing me onto the next and so on.

Since voting isn't a legal requirement, how much of this would put off someone until they decided this wasn't for them? Especially since the Electoral Commission, which is party-independent, says that electoral fraud is statistically insignificant. Hang on, I'll just look up the actual figures.

2019 general election
Votes cast: 47,568,611
Fraudulent votes cast: 164

Those are the concrete facts. Vague claims of electoral fraud to bring in measures that discourage voters are a right wing trope to gerrymander elections. See homes for votes, the Tory-run Westminster council's effort to keep probable Labour voters out of their area.

[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.