All purpose news and politics thread part VI: This Is Not The Time For Posing

[Robotman]

Current EC map looks good for the "flawed" Biden campaign:





Winning all toss-ups would not save trump. He would have to pick up 23 Electors from states that are currently leaning towards Biden. So massive voter suppression in Florida will happen. But if they lose Arizona (which will move to the "likely blue" column with the next one or two polls, even that would not be enough.

A realization that really freaks me out is that we probably won’t have a winner declared on Election Night.

Why We Won’t Have a Clear Winner on Election Night

With so many mail in ballots it could be days before an official winner is declared. Which of course will give Trump ample time to pull some more underhanded crap. It’ll get even uglier if he’s ahead on election night because of in person voting but ends up losing because of mail in voting. He’s definitely not going to concede and will have more drive to protest. I’m really worried about what his cult members will do as well.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Trump can't come to NJ, can't go to his Bedminster Golf Club. If he tried to, he'd have to Quarantine himself for 14 days.

Can you imagine Spongedon Whinepants under quarantine for two weeks? He'd go flat out insane.

A realization that really freaks me out is that we probably won’t have a winner declared on Election Night.

Why We Won’t Have a Clear Winner on Election Night

With so many mail in ballots it could be days before an official winner is declared. Which of course will give Trump ample time to pull some more underhanded crap. It’ll get even uglier if he’s ahead on election night because of in person voting but ends up losing because of mail in voting. He’s definitely not going to concede and will have more drive to protest. I’m really worried about what his cult members will do as well.

I've said it would take the Secret Service to forcefully carry Trump out of the White House because he won't leave voluntarily come January. If he loses by a close margin, he'll contest the results right on up to the Supreme Court, if he gets blown out, he'll scream bloody murder that the election was rigged, a skid he's already started greasing. As for his lemmings, call me crazy, but I'm not all that worried about those losers, I see them as all bark and no bite.

[Malvolio]

A realization that really freaks me out is that we probably won’t have a winner declared on Election Night.

Why We Won’t Have a Clear Winner on Election Night

With so many mail in ballots it could be days before an official winner is declared. Which of course will give Trump ample time to pull some more underhanded crap. It’ll get even uglier if he’s ahead on election night because of in person voting but ends up losing because of mail in voting. He’s definitely not going to concede and will have more drive to protest. I’m really worried about what his cult members will do as well.

We recently had a school board election where it took well past midnight to count all of the absentee ballots. And that's for a town of less than 10,000 people. Imagine how long it will take to count up all of the absentee ballots for a national election!

[WestPhillyPunisher]

We recently had a school board election where it took well past midnight to count all of the absentee ballots. And that's for a town of less than 10,000 people. Imagine how long it will take to count up all of the absentee ballots for a national election!

Sure, that figures to be messy, long and drawn out, but, at least voters will have that option open to them, especially if, god forbid, the coronavirus is still around, making people leery about going to crowded polling places. The alternative is business as usual, but with a desperate Republican party pulling out the stops to curtail, if not prevent people from voting in person by shutting down polling places or putting up administrative roadblocks to keep people from doing their civic duty. Bottom line, the GOP is not going to play fair, we all know it and have to prepare for that.

[Jack Dracula]

A realization that really freaks me out is that we probably won’t have a winner declared on Election Night.

With so many mail in ballots it could be days before an official winner is declared. Which of course will give Trump ample time to pull some more underhanded crap. It’ll get even uglier if he’s ahead on election night because of in person voting but ends up losing because of mail in voting. He’s definitely not going to concede and will have more drive to protest. I’m really worried about what his cult members will do as well.

I'm worried that if there isn't a clear, definitive winner (and maybe even if there is) we'll find ourselves in a situation similar to many third-world countries where the incumbent declares himself the winner and won't vacate the seat while the challenger is forced to prove the validity of his win. If the Republicans won't budge in their support and the Dems do likewise where does that leave us? Does the decision fall to the Supreme Court? Who enforces their decision if it doesn't go Trumps way? **** could get crazy really fast.

[InformationGeek]

Not an elected official I believe, but Jesus Christ this one...

Former Maricopa County Assessor Paul Petersen pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to smuggle illegal aliens for private financial gain in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Arkansas Wednesday.

During the virtual court hearing, Petersen admitted to transporting four pregnant women from the Republic of the Marshall Islands to Arkansas, where he facilitated the adoption of their children to American families.

He faces a maximum of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Under a compact between the United States and the Marshall Islands, Marshallese women cannot travel to the U.S. for adoption purposes. The law was enacted after decades of exploitation of Marshallese women who did not understand the finality of U.S. adoptions.

Petersen's Arkansas plea comes after he pleaded guilty to related charges in Arizona and Utah last week.

In Maricopa County Superior Court, Petersen pleaded guilty to three counts of fraud and one count of forgery for illegally accessing Arizona's medicaid system to pay for medical care of Marshallese birth mothers.

He faces up to 16.5 years in prison on the Arizona charges alone.

[Gray Lensman]

A grim read on how the FOP savaged a good man's career on the flimsiest of pretenses. In some ways, the FOP could be seen as being only a step above the scum cops combat on the streets, what with their blatantly underhanded bully tactics, but now they've got their backs against the wall as cries from coast to coast are demanding reform of police in the aftermath of George Floyd's murder, if not outright abolishment in some cities. Meanwhile, I'm genuinely surprised the FOP hasn't come out in full throated defense of Derek Chauvin, or perhaps he's too radioactive even for them to handle.

The FoP is one of the biggest enablers of the behavior we are seeing on the streets, and one of the biggest obstacles to reform. They might be worse in the bigger picture, and I'm sure they are going to have to go down first.

[PaulBullion]

We recently had a school board election where it took well past midnight to count all of the absentee ballots. And that's for a town of less than 10,000 people. Imagine how long it will take to count up all of the absentee ballots for a national election!

Everybody knows this is coming, so why not hire more people to count? Plenty of folks looking for work.

[Mister Mets]

Are you saying this is not a noose, Mets?

I don't know whether it was or not.

I think the real issue is that there were people who received checks for their dead relatives, and wanted to be honest and return them. But they could never get a straight answer from the IRS on what to do, if they even able to get through to them. I saw a news report on this right after the first checks went out.

I realize that the money had to go out fast, and there were mistakes made. But there should have been some process put in place to address this issue when they were getting ready to send the checks out.

That's probably not the real issue, just because the main complaints are about competence. One explanation for the complaints is the perceived hypocrisy, the idea that Republicans would be screaming if this was how the Hillary Clinton administration handled the stimulus.

I'm worried that if there isn't a clear, definitive winner (and maybe even if there is) we'll find ourselves in a situation similar to many third-world countries where the incumbent declares himself the winner and won't vacate the seat while the challenger is forced to prove the validity of his win. If the Republicans won't budge in their support and the Dems do likewise where does that leave us? Does the decision fall to the Supreme Court? Who enforces their decision if it doesn't go Trumps way? **** could get crazy really fast.

This electoral college has some mechanisms for taking a lot of the power over elections out of the hands of the federal government, which allows states to have procedures for declaring winners. This includes swing states with Democratic Governors (Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina) or state legislative bodies (New Hampshire.)

States aren't legally required to immediately declare a winner, which makes sense if there's a close election involving absentee ballots. There are some advantages to knowing the winner on election day, but that shouldn't be a priority over more important considerations (IE- a system of mail-in ballots.) In Florida circa 2000, state law was that they had to certify the election within a week. Although this was a rare case of a very close election under circumstances where one state made the difference between winning the electoral college and being the also-ran.

Republican legislators and governors do have trifectas (control of the Governor's mansion and two legislative bodies) in a few swing states (Arizona, Georgia, Florida, Ohio, Iowa) so it is conceivable that Trump allies would put their fingers on the scale. But that really would only make a difference if the election is really close in 2020, and Trump has somehow won enough swing states where Democrats have some control (Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, North Carolina, New Hampshire.)

Everybody knows this is coming, so why not hire more people to count? Plenty of folks looking for work.

It's not just about counting ballots, as mail-in ballot regulations could allow for enough ballots to come in after the election to change the results.

[Tami]

Appeals court rules funding for Trump border wall construction 'unlawful'

The Trump administration does not have the authority to use military funding to pay for construction of a border wall, a federal appeals court panel ruled on Friday.

In a 2-1 ruling, a 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel found that diverting $2.5 billion Congress had appropriated for the military violated the Constitution and is unlawful.

The executive branch "lacked independent constitutional authority to authorize the transfer of funds," the ruling said. "These funds were appropriated for other purposes, and the transfer amounted to 'drawing funds from the Treasury without authorization by statute and thus violating the Appropriations Clause.' Therefore, the transfer of funds here was unlawful."

The decision upheld a ruling by a federal judge in California who last year found that the Trump administration's funding scheme was against the law. A coalition of states led by California had filed suit to block the move.

[Kuro no Shinigami]

https://thehill.com/homenews/house/5...n-232-180-vote

House approves statehood for DC in 232-180 vote

So the capital of the USA should be the 51st state? Not going to happen on the senate's watch.

Do any of you support DC's statehood?

[Tami]

Russia Secretly Offered Afghan Militants Bounties to Kill U.S. Troops, Intelligence Says

WASHINGTON — American intelligence officials have concluded that a Russian military intelligence unit secretly offered bounties to Taliban-linked militants for killing coalition forces in Afghanistan — including targeting American troops — amid the peace talks to end the long-running war there, according to officials briefed on the matter.

The United States concluded months ago that the Russian unit, which has been linked to assassination attempts and other covert operations in Europe intended to destabilize the West or take revenge on turncoats, had covertly offered rewards for successful attacks last year.

Islamist militants, or armed criminal elements closely associated with them, are believed to have collected some bounty money, the officials said. Twenty Americans were killed in combat in Afghanistan in 2019, but it was not clear which killings were under suspicion.

The intelligence finding was briefed to President Trump, and the White House’s National Security Council discussed the problem at an interagency meeting in late March, the officials said. Officials developed a menu of potential options — starting with making a diplomatic complaint to Moscow and a demand that it stop, along with an escalating series of sanctions and other possible responses, but the White House has yet to authorize any step, the official

[worstblogever]

https://thehill.com/homenews/house/5...n-232-180-vote

House approves statehood for DC in 232-180 vote

So the capital of the USA should be the 51st state? Not going to happen on the senate's watch.

Do any of you support DC's statehood?

Hell yeah I do. Those people deserve to be represented in Congress and the Senate.

[Surf]

Are you saying this is not a noose, Mets?

I don't know whether it was or not.

Pffftttt damn, haha, look at that move baby. Ain't nothin' like it, I tell ya.

[Tami]

https://thehill.com/homenews/house/5...n-232-180-vote

House approves statehood for DC in 232-180 vote

So the capital of the USA should be the 51st state? Not going to happen on the senate's watch.

Do any of you support DC's statehood?

I do. It'll be good for the country and good fro the people who live there.