American election

March 2024 Forums General discussion American election

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  • #208170
    alanjjohnstone
    Keymaster

    More than 9.4m people have already voted early.

    In Georgia, voters waited hours to cast their ballot

    Confirming James Connolly’s remark to the IWW when it rebuffed political action in 1908 – Just try and stop workers from using their vote

    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/oct/13/more-than-10-hour-wait-and-long-lines-as-early-voting-starts-in-georgia

     

    #208181
    LeonTrotsky
    Participant

    That’s the good news.  The bad news … Trump will dismiss the results and send the decision to the packed Republican held SCOTUS.  It’s a fais de compli.

    #208184
    alanjjohnstone
    Keymaster

    LT. He may well do but if the SCOTUS does do his bidding, just what political ramifications will this have for the Democrat supporters if not only does Biden win the popular vote again but also the Electoral College and that Trump’s claim on victory is based only on alleged fraud?

    I don’t think we are talking about a coup but actual possibility of civil war.

    So would Wall St insist for the sake of the stock-market stability, that Biden swallows it and accept a SCOTUS verdict that he lost.

    Or would Wall St refuse to accept the legitimacy of a Trump Presidency if the protesters filled the streets only to be met by the armed militias.

    Once again, i think it is the result of the Electoral College which will determine who wins regardless of Trump blaming defeat on fraud.

    He’ll save that for his guaranteed best-seller ghost-written memoirs and as the future political platform for one of his children to stand against Harris in 2024.

    SCOTUS will fall in line regardless of their Republican bias. The alternative is too stark even for them.

    If Trump loses the popular vote again but wins the Electoral College again, Democrats will whine but won’t reject the outcome of another 4 more years of Trump.

    Any idea of abolishing the Electoral College is moonshine. Do you know that despite Congress approval, the women’s ERA Amendment is still not passed after half a century? What chance getting rid of the Electoral College.

    #208186
    alanjjohnstone
    Keymaster

    Obviously not read it but this new book seems to make an interesting point.

    Psychology professor Bob Altemeyer and former Nixon White House lawyer John Dean write in their new book, ‘Authoritarian Nightmare,’ that “Even if Donald Trump disappeared tomorrow the millions of people who made him president would be ready to make someone else similar president instead.”

    They explain that many Trump supporters]are submissive, fearful, and longing for a mighty leader who will protect them from life’s threats …They divide the world into friend and foe, with the latter greatly outnumbering the former.”

    https://www.alternet.org/2020/10/submissive-fearful-and-l/
    (original story behind Washington Post’s paywall)

    Reminds me of Wilhelm’s Reich “Listen Little Man”

    With all this vote Biden the lesser evil from the Left, what is always missing is just why Trump got such a solid support in the first place that has remained fairly steady and how Biden is going to offer solutions to them to placate their anger at the system.

    #208188

    It doesn’t require a constitutional amendment to get rid of the electoral college.

    An interstate compact can do the job.

    Currently,

    “The National Popular Vote bill will take effect when enacted into law by states possessing 270 electoral votes (a majority of the 538 electoral votes).  As of July 2020, it has been enacted into law in 16 jurisdictions possessing 196 electoral votes, including 4 small states (DE, HI, RI, VT), 8 medium-sized states (CO, CT, MD, MA, NJ, NM, OR, WA), 3 big states (CA, IL, NY), and the District of Columbia.

    The bill will take effect when enacted by states possessing an additional 74 electoral votes.”

    https://www.nationalpopularvote.com/state-status

    If Trump wins, it’s likely he’ll have lost the Senate, which will mean some of the tricks he’s used up till now won’t work (they’ll start demanding he fills the vacant posts).

    #208189
    alanjjohnstone
    Keymaster

    Thanks for the info

    This explains it further

    https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R43823.pdf

    Since the project begun in 2006 as you say 15 states and the District of
    Columbia, controlling 196 electoral votes, have joined. Can Republican controlled states be persuaded to join? Will the opponents succeed in reversing the decision of those who have signed up?

     

    #208198

    Well, if this is to be believed:

    https://www.electoral-vote.com/evp2020/Pres/Maps/Oct14.html#item-4

    Big business will give the Dems a huge war chest to take enough states to make the compact real.

    #208203
    alanjjohnstone
    Keymaster

    But they haven’t so far, have they?

     

    #208206

    No, but they control enough states to make it happen if they wanted…

    #208209
    LeonTrotsky
    Participant

    Alan … there will be no civil war.  Any civil dissent from the democrat supporters will play into the hands of Trump and the Trump crime syndicate, who will immediately call out the National Guard to crush any dissent before it starts.  The 20th century has many examples of how the far right can maintain power with as little as 30% support: Germany, Spain, Italy, Iraq, Iran, S.A. etc.  The far right in the US are engineering a complete take over and they’ve got the right man for the job, Trump, who does not stop at red lights.

    #208213
    alanjjohnstone
    Keymaster

    All we are doing is playing a pub thought game, speculating about future possible scenarios.

    The president cannot call out the National Guard. That is  the prerogative of a state governor. Recall that Trump in Oregon had to deploy federal law enforcement, that is, units of ICE, the border immigration control and they are not in sufficient numbers – nationwide. Senior officers in the actual military have already publicly signalled that in a constitutional dispute it would stay on the side-lines and not intervene. I have no doubt some police departments and various state-troopers may be sympathetic to a possible Trump coup.

    I actually think all talk of a coup is Democrat scare-mongering.  It is an example of what Malcom X said…liberals need to create the fear of a wolf so that the fox can succeed.

    More worrisome is what i said elsewhere…a defeated Trump will run the country into the ground in the 2-3 month transfer period but the Democratic Party are already complicit in that strategy.

    A stimulus package is vital but Pelosi is refusing to compromise to stop any campaign credit going to Trump. When he is defeated on November 3, Trump has no incentive whatsoever to bail out working people with pay and rent. And it will be almost February, three long Winter months, before Biden can even start his policy.

    That may well be the most likely source of the spark of unrest and discontent, not a coup.

    #208219
    alanjjohnstone
    Keymaster

    14 million Americans have already voted in the general election

    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/oct/14/us-election-record-turnout-early-voting

    #208221
    alanjjohnstone
    Keymaster

    https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/oct/14/joe-biden-win-us-stock-investment-patterns

    According to online bookmakers, the chances of a Biden victory have improved since the beginning of the year, and have increased from 65.8% to 69.2% two weeks on from the first presidential debate. Trump’s chances of winning have decreased from 34.8% to 32.3% over the same two-week period.

    On Monday, Betfair said: “A huge shift in the US election betting on the exchange over the weekend means Joe Biden is now rated twice as likely as Donald Trump to win.”

    #208225
    LeonTrotsky
    Participant

    Alan … the president has the authority under the Insurrection Act to send in troops into the states.  Don’t be surprised if Trump does this selectively, sending in the troops to quell any civil unrest in Republican held states but largely ignore the civil unrest in Democratic held states while he ridicules them.

    After the election, he will continue to do what he does best, divide and pilfer the country at an accelerated rate.  But he has to be careful not to hurt his base of useful idiots.  So he will feed them crumbs with a “stimulus package” that really transfers trillions on top of the trillions he has already transferred to the fascist corporate class who are funding the Trump crime syndicate.  It’s a quid pro quo agreement.

    #208226
    alanjjohnstone
    Keymaster

    Interesting  but in the end i think it will be all an anti-climax.

    Biden will win both the popular vote and the Electoral College with a comfortable margin that won’t be disputable.

    Trump  will retire to  a golf-course to write his guaranteed to be lucrative revisionist history of his presidential term, describing how the “deep state” conspired against him, reinforcing the resurrection of a tea-party movement that has been reinforced by the armed militias. Maybe a few acts of lone-wolf domestic terrorism.

    And he’ll need the cash because perhaps he will also be engaged in a series of legal cases draining his over-estimated wealth. Biden won’t be interested in polarising the moderate Republicans with an anti-Trump witchhunt

    I think he will try to set up his dynasty to challenge in 2024.

    But as others will confirm, LT, my predictive powers are rather unreliable. I always believe the British entry to the Eurovision Song Contest is the best and sure to win. I also was certain that Scotland would win the 1978 World Cup in Argentina.

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