American Politics

[Lagie]

Well, when you have a narcissistic sociopath in charge of the nuclear codes...

 

I got a chuckle yesterday about the description 'zombie election' in the news. The orange dude just won't let it die. (And though I chuckled, it's not really all that funny.)

[trystan]

yeah, it's getting old already.

 

(which is also how covid is being perceived also, which, i think, is part of the reason for the spike in cases in the US.... but that's another discussion for another thread.)

[Astreya]

2 hours ago, Lagie said:

Well, when you have a narcissistic sociopath in charge of the nuclear codes...

I would hope the adults originally in charge of the football exchanged it against a fake one with some code like 1-2-3-4-5 or so, just in case.

[Lagie]

Your politics are exhausting. No one seems to be able to reign in the orange dude, but at least he's losing all his election challenge court cases.

[trystan]

3 minutes ago, Lagie said:

Your politics are exhausting.

yes,,, yes they are.  they've been exhausting since January 20, 2016.  hopefully they won't be as exhausting after January 20, 2021.

 

i'm quite glad the Supreme Court denied that appeal that came from the PA Supreme Court.  and now, Maddow has this story where this doofus from Texas has filed a suit on behalf of Texas against GA, PA, MI, and one of the other battleground states that those four states voted wrong. WTF?  and now there's an item that Pennsylvania Rethuglicans are suing the PA Democratic Electors - the ones that vote at the electoral college.  really, WTF is WRONG with these people?

[purplehaze]

Will it ever stop? It seems nearly every Republican has lost their mind! Only, what -- 27? -- Republicans in Congress would admit that Trump lost the election. I'm afraid no magic button will be pushed on January 20 to return sanity to this country.

[trystan]

and trump was demanding a list of names of those republicans who said Biden won. hello dictator! 🙄

yikes.

[JaneMcAsh]

4 hours ago, trystan said:

yes,,, yes they are.  they've been exhausting since January 20, 2016.  hopefully they won't be as exhausting after January 20, 2021.

 

i'm quite glad the Supreme Court denied that appeal that came from the PA Supreme Court.  and now, Maddow has this story where this doofus from Texas has filed a suit on behalf of Texas against GA, PA, MI, and one of the other battleground states that those four states voted wrong. WTF?  and now there's an item that Pennsylvania Rethuglicans are suing the PA Democratic Electors - the ones that vote at the electoral college.  really, WTF is WRONG with these people?

Sigh... I live in Texas, and unfortunately the doofus is our Attorney General Paxton (btw - he has been under indictment since 2015 for felony securities fraud charge & is facing fresh criminal allegations from eight of his top deputies. Opinion piece: https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/08/opinions/texas-attorney-general-ken-paxton-election-lawsuit-moore/index.html 

[trystan]

8 hours ago, JaneMcAsh said:

Sigh... I live in Texas, and unfortunately the doofus is our Attorney General Paxton (btw - he has been under indictment since 2015 for felony securities fraud charge & is facing fresh criminal allegations from eight of his top deputies.

i totally feel you - i'm in Pennsylvania! those republicon idjits in Harrisburg aren't the brightest bulbs in the box... and trump called the PA House Speaker about the state overturning the electoral college votes like TWICE (https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/529165-trump-personally-asked-penn-gop-house-speaker-for-help-changing-election ). who does that?

 

... oh, right.

 

(the PA House Speaker said no, so there's that at least)

 

and FINALLY, our idjit senator Pat Toomey said trump's pressuring for PA to overturn the election is "completely unacceptable" (https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/529256-toomey-completely-unacceptable-for-trump-to-pressure-lawmakers-to-overturn ).  WOW.  sides with trump for FOUR years, and NOW he says this.  (he's retiring when he's done in '22, but sheesh.)

 

so Jane, i totally get it.

 

Edited December 9, 2020 by trystan
to make the links clickable

[Husky51]

Hopefully, today (Dec 14, 2020) is the day when this farce will end...  But, I fear that the orange one will be kicking, screaming and whining to the very end.  Unfortunately, all this has cost me a 20+ friendship (his last email to me was "...because I was in such a hurry (I sent in my mail-in ballot early due to possible postal delay) to vote away his rights and freedoms, with friends like you, who needs enemies"  And that is the last that I've heard from him...  On top of this, both of my sons are supporters of the orange one and this has caused some family ...? well, I can't think of a proper word, but You can understand how I feel about it.... 

 

I am hopeful that tensions will ease off somewhat after today...  But, I'm not holding my breath...

 

Take care all, and above all else, BE SAFE!!!

[trystan]

11 minutes ago, Husky51 said:

I am hopeful that tensions will ease off somewhat after today...  But, I'm not holding my breath...

^this

 

here's a link where you can see the electoral college votes come in - https://www.cnn.com/politics/live-news/electoral-college-vote-2020-biden-trump/index.html

and here's a link of which states vote when today - https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/14/politics/how-to-watch-electoral-college-voting/index.html

[Husky51]

Thank you for the links, trystan, 

I was hoping that things would settle down, but from the stuff I've already seen and heard, the orange one is still not conceding anything and his backers are still following his lead...  I've seen a couple of posts from my family and they are still fighting mad... Not necessarily with me, but believing the orange one...  sigh, ah well, life goes on,,, 

Cheers and Dragons...

[JaneMcAsh]

15 hours ago, Husky51 said:

Hopefully, today (Dec 14, 2020) is the day when this farce will end...  But, I fear that the orange one will be kicking, screaming and whining to the very end.  Unfortunately, all this has cost me a 20+ friendship (his last email to me was "...because I was in such a hurry (I sent in my mail-in ballot early due to possible postal delay) to vote away his rights and freedoms, with friends like you, who needs enemies"  And that is the last that I've heard from him...  On top of this, both of my sons are supporters of the orange one and this has caused some family ...? well, I can't think of a proper word, but You can understand how I feel about it.... 

My sympathy on the friend/family issues. My brother & I just refuse to discuss anything political with our sister (for unknown reasons she believes the orange one) . No problem with our kids - they are far more liberal than we are! 

[trystan]

7 hours ago, Husky51 said:

Thank you for the links, trystan, 

you're welcome

 

6 hours ago, JaneMcAsh said:

My brother & I just refuse to discuss anything political with our sister (for unknown reasons she believes the orange one) . No problem with our kids - they are far more liberal than we are! 

my hubby is a registered actual Republican, but he voted for Biden this time round. my older daughter... is an enigma.  there's a few .... characteristics she has that say she should NOT have voted for trump but she wouldn't say, and i think we finally figured out she didn't... but did she vote for Biden or Jorgensen?  my younger daughter is Biden all the way. (she even has socks with his sunglasses on them!)  she was saying that the only way she could think to "rebel" would to be a trump supporter   me? i voted for Clinton in 16 and wanted trump to go away for the past 4 years. ugh.  my mom always tells me "oh did you see what trump did today??" accompanied by much laughter and (if i could see it) head shaking in disbelief.  the only ones we can't seem to talk politics with are my older daughter... and my mother-inlaw.  my MIL had been saying all throughout the campaign "i don't know who to pick, it's such a hard choice" - and she was NOT being sarcastic at all

 

is it january 20th yet?

[purplehaze]

No problems in our family.

Daughter and son-in-law are liberal to one degree or another.

Son and daughter-in-law are pretty nonpolitical, but can't stand Trump and voted for Biden. D-I-L regrets not voting in 2016.

Hubby and I are both life-long Republicans and fairly conservative, but definitely Never Trumpers from the get-go! Voted for Hillary in 2016 because she wasn't Trump. Watched in horror the last four years as Trump pretty much wrecked everything. Voted for Biden this year because I genuinely like the guy (AND he's not Trump.)

I may be changing my party affiliation since the Republican Party has gone down a very dark path.

 

On 12/15/2020 at 11:05 AM, trystan said:

is it january 20th yet?

Can't come soon enough!

 

I can't believe there are still so many who will not concede that Trump is DONE!  People who are more interested in saving their necks in the next election than preserving our democracy.

Mitch McConnell finally admitted it and now there are Trump backers who are accusing him of being part of the supposed "deep state" that is against Trump. Are you kidding me?

Trump and his enablers are still stirring things up and his base is getting angrier and more entrenched by the moment. It is a frightening thing to watch.

 

 

Edited December 16, 2020 by purplehaze

[trystan]

9 minutes ago, purplehaze said:

I may be changing my party affiliation since the Republican Party has gone down a very dark path.

you wouldn't be the only one - Justin Amash in the House did it, he's now independent.  and another guy was on CNN last night - don't remember his name, but he was Republican, then Independent, and now he's changing to Democrat.

 

10 minutes ago, purplehaze said:

Mitch McConnell finally admitted it and now there are Trump backers who are accusing him of being part of the supposed "deep state" that is against Trump. Are you kidding me?

Trump and his enablers are still stirring things up and his base is getting angrier and more entrenched by the moment. It is a frightening thing to watch.

you'd have thought that if McConnell accepted it, it might go easier, right?

all the retrumplicans and his base have certainly drank the Kool-Aid.

 

part of me wants to just mention to my boss some of Biden's picks - like Janet Yellen for Treasury - but i kinda don't want to open that can of worms.

[purplehaze]

For an interesting look at the current and future state of the Republican party, read this opinion piece from The Guardian.

Quote

...when it comes to the republic’s longer-term survival, the outcome remains far from certain. Because even the Republican officials who most bravely and patriotically stood up to Trump still don’t get it. The greatest threat to the American experiment isn’t the would-be autocrat on his way out the door. It’s the political party he continues to both lead and personify.

The problem begins with the Republican establishment’s relationship to reality itself. Since at least the 1980s, mainstream conservatives have embraced theories that are not well-supported by evidence. (It’s hard to make a compelling argument, for example, that tax cuts for the rich pay for themselves.) But in recent years, as Republicans went from being the party of Reagan to the party of Mitch McConnell, the Republican party has gone from spinning facts to rejecting them entirely.

Today, to be an aspiring Republican politician in good standing, one must espouse a set of core beliefs that are either entirely baseless or provably untrue: the climate crisis isn’t real; gun safety laws don’t reduce gun violence; masks don’t reduce the spread of Covid-19. To many observers, embracing a conspiracy theory about corrupted voting machines or late-night “ballot dumps” would represent a break with reality. But for much of the Republican elite, that’s not a problem. They broke with reality long ago.

The Republican establishment is also increasingly willing to disenfranchise eligible voters if it helps them win. Between 2008 and 2016, America lost 10% of its polling places, with cuts falling hardest on minority communities. Ever-broader voter purges have kicked millions of eligible, registered voters off red-state voting rolls. In Florida, the Republican state legislature rammed through a new law designed to disenfranchise former felons from voting – despite a 2018 ballot measure in which an overwhelming majority of Floridians voted to restore ex-felons’ rights.

These examples barely scrape the surface of the war on voting that Republican politicians, not just Trump, have waged in recent years. The president’s wild attempt to steal an election is a first in American history. But it didn’t come from nowhere. Trump simply absorbed his party establishment’s prevailing view – that it is acceptable to win elections through whatever means possible, including by throwing out large numbers of votes on technicalities, hoping conservative judges put ideology over country, or stoking fears about nonexistent fraud – and took that approach to its logical conclusion.

 

 

 

Edited December 16, 2020 by purplehaze

[trystan]

^those are what we now call "Retrumplicans"

[purplehaze]

8 minutes ago, trystan said:

^those are what we now call "Retrumplicans"

True, but sadly it goes beyond Trump. He is more a symptom, not the disease.

[trystan]

1 hour ago, purplehaze said:

True, but sadly it goes beyond Trump. He is more a symptom, not the disease.

this is true too.  he's the product of what the 80s rethuglicans morphed into

(but i wasn't paying attention in the 80s.  i was in jr and sr high school)

[purplehaze]

1 hour ago, trystan said:

this is true too.  he's the product of what the 80s rethuglicans morphed into

(but i wasn't paying attention in the 80s.  i was in jr and sr high school)

Yeah, I was raising my kids and not too concerned with national politics and the Republicans are not really a force in our local and state government for the most part. Our current gov is a Republican, but he has been calling out Trump throughout the course of this pandemic and was never pro-Trump, so he is not really typical of today's Republicans.

Rethuglicans is a good descriptive word for what they have become.

Edited December 16, 2020 by purplehaze

[Lagie]

5 hours ago, purplehaze said:

Mitch McConnell finally admitted it and ...

Putin congratulated Biden before McConnell did.

Jan 20th cannot come soon enough.

[trystan]

1 hour ago, purplehaze said:

Our current gov is a Republican, but he has been calling out Trump throughout the course of this pandemic and was never pro-Trump, so he is not really typical of today's Republicans.

there are a few of these actually!

 

42 minutes ago, Lagie said:

Putin congratulated Biden before McConnell did.

i know, right??

i was quite impressed that McConnell finally acknowledged it, too. it's about time!

[Bigbite]

My prayers were answered when Ole Orange lost to Biden. How so many Americans believe anything about this wannabe dictator makes me ill. All I can do is pray the next four years we can heal from this do nothing admiration, that turned a blind eye to Covid-19.

[trystan]

20 minutes ago, Bigbite said:

My prayers were answered when Ole Orange lost to Biden. How so many Americans believe anything about this wannabe dictator makes me ill. All I can do is pray the next four years we can heal from this do nothing admiration, that turned a blind eye to Covid-19.

yes!  i don't get trump's base either, tbh.

 

Biden needs to do things like rejoin the Paris Accord, undo the muslim ban (if that's still a thing), allow trans people back in the military....

and as i'm typing that ^ the guy on MSBNC was saying the same exact thing, that Biden plans to undo as much as he can.  he can't undo all of trump's hateful, spiteful, and deadly lies though