2020 Election Results Part 7: Biden Starts Working While Trump Tries To Blow Up The World

[GreyhoundFan]

"Georgia’s recount revealed no fraud — and just how unfit Loeffler and Perdue really are"

Quote

GEORGIA OFFICIALS have concluded a painstaking audit and recount of the nearly 5 million ballots cast in this month’s presidential election. They have found errors, but no fraud and nothing that comes close to changing the results: Democratic candidate Joe Biden was the winner of the state’s 16 electoral votes. That makes all the more unforgivable the conduct of Georgia’s two Republican senators in making reckless charges about the integrity of the vote. Their attempts to undermine the election, falling in line with President Trump’s dishonest and anti-democratic machinations, should not be forgotten by Georgia voters when they go to the polls in January for two critical U.S. Senate runoff elections.

“Sens. Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue have assaulted Georgia’s election system,” the Atlanta Journal-Constitution wrote in an editorial after the two senators called on Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to resign, alleging he had mismanaged the election. They had not a shred of evidence of misconduct on his part. What they had was a fear that Mr. Trump would go after them and submarine their chances for reelection if they didn’t fall in line with his absurd — and dangerous — pretense that Mr. Biden “stole” the election. “If the president is tweeting bad things, the base is not coming out,” Rusty Paul, a former chairman of the Georgia GOP, said of the senators’ decision to scapegoat Mr. Raffensperger, a fellow Republican who called himself a Trump supporter but has courageously refused to let partisanship influence his conduct of the election.

Ms. Loeffler and Mr. Perdue are trying to fend off challenges from Democratic candidates in a dual runoff whose outcome will determine which party controls the Senate. Mr. Perdue is facing Jon Ossoff, a documentary producer, and Ms. Loeffler is facing the Rev. Raphael Warnock, pastor of the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta.

The Republican incumbents have joined forces, presenting themselves as a “firewall” against what they claim would be a radical Democratic agenda that would doom the country to socialism. Just as their claims about Mr. Raffensperger were specious, so are their depictions of what would happen if Democrats were to win control of the Senate along with the White House and the House of Representatives. Mr. Ossoff and Mr. Warnock espouse positions — such as protecting affordable health care, defeating the coronavirus, criminal justice reform and safeguarding voting rights — that are in line with those of Mr. Biden. Some of the most overheated Republican fear-mongering centers on Democratic hopes to give representation in Congress to the District of Columbia’s 700,000 residents. That is not radical or socialist; it is a question of basic civil rights.

Some of the most important legislation in this country’s history, including Social Security and early civil rights legislation, emerged when one party controlled both Congress and the White House. Georgia voters have an opportunity to enable another period of tangible progress. Their alternative is to reward two politicians conspiring to groundlessly undermine faith in American democracy.

 

[HerNameIsBuffy]

42 minutes ago, Cartmann99 said:

Copy of their statement under the spoiler:

  Hide contents

 

This is awesome.  Telling him to get bent on stealing the election but “oh while we’re here how about you do your fucking job so fewer of our people will die soon.”

[onekidanddone]

12 minutes ago, HerNameIsBuffy said:

This is awesome.  Telling him to get bent on stealing the election but “oh while we’re here how about you do your fucking job so fewer of our people will die soon.”

Not what I expected at all. I figured they would cave like the two electors in Wayne County 

[NotQuiteMotY]

1 hour ago, Cartmann99 said:

Grifting grifters who grift.

 

 

1 hour ago, JenniferJuniper said:

I think he's suing so he can pretend to his crazy ass base that he really won in a landslide and that the Deep State Communist Chinese Pizza Pedophile Demoncrat Libtards stole the election with the help of Venezuela, the late Fidel Castro, and of course, Obama. 

He knows he lost, but he's only too happy to get half of America to question the validity of our entire system just as long as they don't see him as a Loser.

Why not both?

[Xan]

If anyone wants to read about the court filings, they're all here:

Spoiler

https://www.democracydocket.com/case_type/post-election/

This link was actually posted by a rightwing site.  I try to read different things so I won't just be in an echo chamber.  Not all of the rightwing sites are still pro-Trump.  Breitbart is always a lost cause and so is RedState but some of the others are peeling away.

[Cartmann99]

2 hours ago, JenniferJuniper said:

Does he to get a pardon for federal crimes before all this plays out?  Does he escalate talk of second amendment "solutions" to his base?  Does he get indicted for tax fraud?  Does he start a new network for ex-Fox viewers where he broadcasts his four weekly post-election rallies and roundtable talk shows where each guest goes around the non-socially distanced circle telling him all about how amazing he is?  And what about Melania?   How soon does she divorce him and from which former Soviet Union country does he order his new bride?

Your questions gave me a television flashback:

 

[fraurosena]

 

[fraurosena]

That the judge was appointed by Trump is simply delicious.

Spoiler

 

 

[Xan]

I imagine Trump is very confused about why this legal tactic isn't working.  It always worked before for him.  All he had to do was sue someone (or threaten to sue) and it eventually went away.  He could pay lawyers to keep things in court until the plaintiff ran out of legal funds.  And he put people on the Supreme Court!  Surely they'll save him...

He's never really paid for top legal talent.  He's paid for legal pit bulls and that type isn't smart enough to save him now.

........................

Good opinion piece up by Jonah Goldberg.  He's a conservative but has had enough of Trump.  Link to article in first spoiler and full article in second.  It's about Trump's plan to steal the election.

Spoiler

https://gfile.thedispatch.com/p/this-was-always-the-plan

Spoiler

This Was Always the Plan

President Trump telegraphed that he would try to steal the election if he didn’t win.

Jonah Goldberg

16 hr ago164456

Dear Reader (including those of you who are starting to layer up like Steve Bannon to deal with the cold),

I rather enjoy not writing about Donald Trump. My column today is on why I think forgiving student debt is a bad idea. On Wednesday, I wrote a pithy and fun G-File that barely mentioned the sitting president. It was nice.

I’d like more of this. But I feel like I need to vent some rage. If you don’t want to read it, fine, skip ahead to the Canine Update. Or stop reading entirely. Or unsubscribe. Or eat an enormous wheel of industrial grade salad bar cheese. Do whatever you want—I’m not the boss of you, nor you of me.

The thing is, I am very angry.

The president of the United States is trying to steal an election he clearly and unequivocally lost.

Even liberals frame this fact wrong. They keep saying that Trump is undermining the legitimacy of the election. He is certainly doing that. But the undermining isn’t the end he most desires—it’s the means to that end. The man is literally trying to steal an election.

He may not think—anymore—that this is the most likely outcome. But he certainly thinks it’s one of the possible outcomes, and one of the few things we know about Trump is that he likes to keep his options open. From the reporting, he’s pursuing a bunch of goals, many of which reinforce each other.

Claiming the election was stolen lets him pretend—to himself or the country—that he’s not a loser. Claiming the election was stolen and pretending that he’s not a loser keeps his hardcore fan base with him, which will be good for him no matter what happens. It’s good prep work for some kind of “Trump TV” and/or for a potential bid to run again in 2024—at least in his mind. But he surely also thinks there’s a chance, however slim, that he will actually get to steal the presidency. If this was all just a show, he wouldn’t need to invite Michigan pols to the White House, presumably to strong arm them.

Think about it this way: Let’s say there’s a 99 percent chance he won’t be able to do any of the things that could result in him staying in power. He won’t be able to flip various state electors, get the courts to invalidate millions of votes, or get this sent to the House. But odds are good that in his head he thinks he’s got a maybe a 5 percent or 10 percent chance. Maybe even better than that.

As outrageous as his effort to delegitimize the election is—and it is very outrageous—that outrage pales like a lit candle next to the noonday summer sun when you compare it to an effort to literally overturn the popular and Electoral College vote and steal the election. But because that outcome is so unlikely, and Trump’s effort to pull it off is so comically inept, people are focusing on the more likely outrage rather than the more outrageous outrage.

This was the plan.

It’s pretty clear now—as I think Matt Grossman pretty accurately predicted—that his goal was always to steal the election if he didn’t win fairly. He was pretty transparent about this long before the election. He spent months saying that mail-in or early ballots were rife with fraud. He told all of his voters to vote on Election Day. He expected this would give him a “mirage” lead that night, and then, because he had already established the illegitimacy of mail-in ballots, he could pretend to be justified in proclaiming victory on Election Night.

Sure, there would be lawsuits and the like later, but Trump would have momentum on his side. He even telegraphed over and over that he expected the Supreme Court to come to his rescue amid the chaos. That was his primary explanation for why he thought it was important to get Amy Coney Barrett confirmed. 

But as Grossman points out, there was just one problem: Trump wasn’t actually leading on Election Night. It’s one thing to declare victory prematurely when the tally on the scoreboard on your side is tied—it’s another to claim that you won when even the scoreboard clearly says you didn’t.

This, by the way, explains why Trump World was so very, very, very, angry about Fox’s decision to call Arizona. I’ll admit, I thought the anger at Fox was simply stupid, not evil. I wrote of the people screaming at Fox:

[They] … are the political equivalent of Kathy Bates in Misery. They think the Fox News Decision Desk is James Caan, and their collective sin is not writing the story the way the MAGA Kathys wanted. And they’re ignoring the fact that even if Fox banged out precisely the story the Kathys wanted on their metaphorical manual typewriters, it wouldn’t change the fact that the story they want is fiction.  Trump lost because more Americans—in total and in the necessary states—voted against him. Grow up and deal with it.  

But it turns out that the Arizona call ruined the pretext. If Pennsylvania had been the tipping point, they thought they could get the election thrown to the court. But the Arizona call combined with the undeclared result in Georgia preempted that.

So now the Trump team is falling back on sheer gall, breathtaking dishonesty, and gobsmacking insanity. Noah Rothman laid out the naked idiocy of what they’re trying to do. Sadly, he wrote his piece before Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell said, “Hold our beers.” The theory—theories? —they laid out yesterday made Billy Madison’s speech seem like the Gettysburg Address and Demosthenes’ Third Philippic rolled into one.

I’m not going to spend a lot of time explaining why any theory that hinges on the cutting-edge computer know-how of Hugo Chavez’s Venezuela is going to have problems (see our fact checks here). I’ll just note that even if you sat there watching that thing and said, “This sounds plausible,” it doesn’t change the fact they offered no proof of what they were alleging. Nor have any of their lawyers when they have stood before a judge. On Twitter and in press conferences, Trump (and Trump World) are alleging world-historic crimes. In front of judges, their lawyers are muttering about Sharpies.

Tucker’s indictment.

Tucker Carlson’s getting a lot of praise for calling B.S. on Powell’s allegations. I’m glad he’s doing it, even if I have problems with his late conversion to Trump-skepticism. I also have issues with acting like Powell is just freelancing here. She and Giuliani are doing Trump’s bidding, so this isn’t just Powell’s deranged theory—it’s the sitting president’s theory, too. We can all laugh or shake our head as Rudy Giuliani spews nonsense to the point where someone would be forgiven for thinking his leaking hair dye was literally bullshit seeping out of his head. That doesn’t change what he’s trying to do.

So Tucker is right when he says, “What Powell was describing would amount to the single greatest crime in American history.” And he’s right that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

But he doesn’t close the circle. If our political system were sufficiently sclerotic and decadent that Powell’s con yielded the results she desires, it would be the greatest crime in American history, too. I don’t see the moral difference between stealing the election using cutting-edge Venezuelan algorithms and stealing the election by peddling deranged nonsense about Venezuelan algorithms.

I understand that everyone is tired of being angry. But this whole spectacle is infuriating. At least some of the people pushing Trump’s effort have to know it’s a colossal fraud, but they’re just doing it anyway. They are trying to pull off monumental election fraud by claiming that Democrats—and the Venezuelans, Cubans, and perhaps the Lizard People (but not the Lizard People you’re thinking of)—are guilty of monumental election fraud.

And spare me the anti-anti-Trump bloviating about how Trump’s scheme, however “overstated” or “problematic,” is still valuable because it’s shining a light on the very real issue of election fraud. This is like forgiving an attempted bank robbery because it exposed the flaws in bank security.

I don’t like “lying for justice” arguments from the left or the right. I don’t give a rat’s ass that Trump’s failing effort to steal an election or his already successful effort to delegitimize an election and a duly elected president is “raising awareness” or “shining a light on important issues.” And, as I strongly suspect, neither do the people hiding behind this irrelevant rhetoric.

The GOP’s cowardice.

I know I’m a broken record about how the weakness of our political parties is poisoning our politics. But look, political parties are supposed to be patriotic institutions. Unlike the Boy Scouts or Major League Baseball, however, they have a deep interest in protecting the sanctity of our electoral system. Their interest in preserving the legitimacy of our political system is total, in the same way the New York Yankees’ interest in the health of baseball is total. And yet, the RNC hosted that hate crime against democratic legitimacy yesterday. The GOP’s social media account spewed soundbites from Powell and Giuliani out into the country like a firehose attached to a sewage tank.

A serious party that cared about its long-term credibility, never mind the long-term credibility of our political system, would walk away from this burning septic tank en masse. Instead it spends its days lobbing Molotov cocktails of flaming B.S. from its windows.

And I don’t care if “the Republican base” believes this bilge or wants to believe it. The party has a higher obligation to the country, to future Republicans, and—as quaint as it sounds—to its principles than to a lame duck president.

None of these hacks are getting Wales out of this, and it wouldn’t be worth it if they were.

While we're at it, spare me the hosannas for the newfound courage of people like Joni Ernst. When the Trump campaign was merely claiming that the presidency was stolen, she stayed quiet. It was only when Powell claimed that other Republican politicians stole their races, too, that she suddenly took offense.

As for the conservative “leaders” who think it’s their job to tell their readers, viewers, and listeners what they want to hear rather than what they need to hear for the good of the country, my contempt is total. In a system with weak parties, it is incumbent on the ideological allies of the party to explain to the rank-and-file what is true and right. Pandering to them is not only wrong, it’s dangerous. The whole point of the conservative movement is to protect and preserve the legitimacy of the constitutional order and the blessings of liberty such an order was intended to secure. Indulging feelings—no matter how sincerely felt—when they don’t align with the actual facts undermines that project.

What if they won?

Which brings me to my final complaint and what really stews my bowels. What’s the end game? Again, I doubt Trump or his criminal accomplices actually believe they’ll succeed. But that’s very different from saying they don’t hold out hope that they still might pull off this caper. What if they did? What if instead of being the incompetent bungling demagogue we know Trump to be, he actually managed to bribe, blackmail, or otherwise cajole enough of the legislators, judges, justices, electors, and various officials required to hand him the presidency despite losing both the electoral college and the popular vote?

What would the country look like in Trump’s purloined second term?

Look, I think “What if this were Obama?” is one of the lowest forms of punditry. But if Barack Obama tried something like this, after losing fair and square to Mitt Romney, we’d be hearing lots of conservatives talking about “Second Amendment remedies.” And as loath as I am to hint, even for rhetorical purposes, that violence is justified, they’d have a point.

If Obama actually succeeded in stealing the election in 2012, there would be riots. There would very likely be open rebellion in the military. And when the dust settled, Congress would likely vote to impeach and remove him (or at least I hope it would). What is your principled argument for why it should be any different with Trump?

The likely scenario for how this all plays out is bad enough. But if Trump actually succeeded, it would wreck the country. But, yes, it’s true: He would own the libs. And apparently doing that is even better than getting to be Attorney General of Wales.

 

[fraurosena]

Weird that this should even be reported. Weirder still that it makes me giggle.

 

[fraurosena]

Judge tosses last election lawsuit in Arizona

Quote

An Arizona judge on Friday dismissed a lawsuit from two voters alleging mishandled ballots, the final election-related case pending in the state that voted for a Democratic presidential candidate for the first time in more than 20 years. 

Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Margaret Mahoney ruled that the case, involving only two ballots, would not have altered the outcome of the election. 

Mahoney did not provide any further details on the ruling, but said she would eventually issue an order in writing, according to The Arizona Republic. 

The lawsuit involved Laurie Aguilera and Donovan Drobina. Aguilera previously filed in the since-dropped suit against the county over the use of Sharpies on ballots. 

Friday’s suit alleged that Aguilera attempted to cast her ballot along with her husband on Election Day. 

According to Aguilera, the tabulator did not display a confirmation as it had for her husband. She claimed that Arizona poll workers then refused to honor her request for a new ballot. 

She then claimed that the county’s election website did not indicate she had voted, while it showed that her husband did. 

Meanwhile, Drobina said that a tabulator rejected his ballot when he tried to insert it on Election Day, after which a poll worker suggested he put it in a slot for ballots tabulated by individual election workers. 

Alexander Kolodin, the lawyer representing the two plaintiffs, argued that Drobina’s ballot should not have been reviewed by election officials, adding that state law requires machines — when operating properly — to "record correctly and count accurately every vote cast."

The lawsuit comes amid several legal challenges by President Trumpand his allies in an attempt to halt the certification of votes in key battleground states lost to President-elect Joe Biden. 

On Thursday, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge John Hannah dismissed a lawsuit from the Arizona Republican Party that alleged the county violated state law by allowing voters to cast their ballots at any polling center in the county as opposed to one in a particular district within the county. 

Hannah ruled against the state GOP’s request for an audit of the county's results, which would likely have delayed its certification of the vote tallies.

With 100 percent of Arizona's precincts reporting results, Biden won by about 0.3 percent, a margin of slightly more than 10,000 votes.

Arizona has a Nov. 30 deadline for certifying election results.

Does anyone have a tally of how many lawsuits are still pending right now?

[Xan]

58 minutes ago, fraurosena said:

Judge tosses last election lawsuit in Arizona

Does anyone have a tally of how many lawsuits are still pending right now?

The figures vary from website to website.  It looks as if there were originally 30 legal challenges made.  By Thursday, 19 had been denied, dismissed, settled, or withdrawn.  A Fox News website shows that the cases still pending are:  2 in Arizona, 1 in Georgia, 1 in Michigan, 1 in Nevada, 1 in Pennsylvania, and 1 in Wisconsin.  This doesn't count the lawsuits filed by citizens.  (Yeah.  I'm sure they had backing from Trump and/or the Republicans but I don't know how to track those.)

Best I can guess is that there are at least 7 cases still not settled.  

 

Spoiler

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/nov/19/trump-election-result-biden-legal-challenges

https://www.fox21news.com/top-stories/where-the-trump-campaign-election-lawsuits-stand/

https://www.factcheck.org/2020/11/the-facts-on-trumps-post-election-legal-challenges/

 

ETA:  Just found a Wikipedia page about the lawsuits.  I understand that Wiki is not always reliable but this looks pretty solid.  They say that there are 8 ongoing cases and there are 4 decisions that have been appealed.  There have been 25 suits that were decided or dropped totally.  Full info on the cases at the link.

Spoiler

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawsuits_related_to_the_2020_United_States_presidential_election

 

Edited November 21, 2020 by Xan

[AmazonGrace]

 

[fraurosena]

Huh. If true this would explain a lot. 

 

[AmazonGrace]

Coincidentally

 

[fraurosena]

They are so stupid. How could any self-respecting judge take them seriously?

Thread:

Spoiler

 

 

 

[thoughtful]

On top of everything else that is bizarre and offensive about all of these lawsuits, I keep thinking about what it is doing to the courts hearing them, and the other people who were scheduled to bring something before those courts.

For the sake of all of us, our blood pressure, our country and the world, I'm glad they are being dealt with quickly. But courts are busy, they have dockets - we've all heard about the long, slow process between an occurrence that inspires legal actions, whether civil or criminal, and the final decisions.

I don't know exactly how they decide to change dockets for something like this, but I assume that whatever was originally scheduled must have been put aside, and people who may have legitimate issues that need to be solved got bumped to another date so judges could watch Rudy melt as he rants insanely.

Yet another waste of time, talent and money, fucking up still more Americans, from Trump and his goons.

[AmazonGrace]

 

[AmazonGrace]

 

[Cartmann99]

Dear Rufus,

I've been sorta-good this year, so please??

 

[Cartmann99]

Spoiler

 

 

 

[Marmion]

Well this is sure rich .    

Quote

Another day went by and so the dead-end Trump 2020 campaign’s legal team suffered yet another self-induced legal mishap.

On Wednesday, Rudy Giuliani submitted a proposed order with the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania. Oddly enough, Trump’s erstwhile friend and attorney also affixed the signature of U.S. District Judge Matthew Brann.

In the U.S. legal system, various parties often submit proposed orders which outline their preferred form(s) of relief in any given legal case or controversy. Judges can then accept or reject such proposals in whole or in part. Legal experts quickly cried foul over the bizarre addition of Brann’s own name by the plaintiffs–criticizing the Trump campaign for effectively adding in the judge’s signature before he even had a chance to sign off on, bin or even review the order.

https://lawandcrime.com/awkward/trump-campaigns-jenna-ellis-mocked-election-law-expert-for-being-right-then-the-trump-campaign-proved-him-right/?fb  

[Cartmann99]

I'm reading a  Twitter thread  from a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter about the recount that is currently going on.

Spoiler

 

[Dandruff]

2 hours ago, thoughtful said:

On top of everything else that is bizarre and offensive about all of these lawsuits, I keep thinking about what it is doing to the courts hearing them, and the other people who were scheduled to bring something before those courts.

For the sake of all of us, our blood pressure, our country and the world, I'm glad they are being dealt with quickly. But courts are busy, they have dockets - we've all heard about the long, slow process between an occurrence that inspires legal actions, whether civil or criminal, and the final decisions.

I don't know exactly how they decide to change dockets for something like this, but I assume that whatever was originally scheduled must have been put aside, and people who may have legitimate issues that need to be solved got bumped to another date so judges could watch Rudy melt as he rants insanely.

Yet another waste of time, talent and money, fucking up still more Americans, from Trump and his goons.

They're clogging up the arteries of justice (forgive my mental imagery here) like wads of bad cholesterol.  Maybe they're hoping to induce a figurative heart attack?  Slow things to a trickle or even a halt?  At the least they're creating more distraction and delays, while encouraging doubts in our legal system...the same one that will - hopefully - be used to bring Trump misdeeds to light starting in late January.

[Ozlsn]

5 hours ago, fraurosena said:

Huh. If true this would explain a lot. 

Lie down in Trump's kennels, get up with incriminating videos. Does anyone else just think "how are these guys in power when they are just this dumb?" Or is that just me?

4 hours ago, thoughtful said:

On top of everything else that is bizarre and offensive about all of these lawsuits, I keep thinking about what it is doing to the courts hearing them, and the other people who were scheduled to bring something before those courts.

For the sake of all of us, our blood pressure, our country and the world, I'm glad they are being dealt with quickly. But courts are busy, they have dockets - we've all heard about the long, slow process between an occurrence that inspires legal actions, whether civil or criminal, and the final decisions.

I don't know exactly how they decide to change dockets for something like this, but I assume that whatever was originally scheduled must have been put aside, and people who may have legitimate issues that need to be solved got bumped to another date so judges could watch Rudy melt as he rants insanely.

Yet another waste of time, talent and money, fucking up still more Americans, from Trump and his goons.

I hope someone writes an article pointing this out. That all the small claims etc were delayed because Trump is pathologically unable to accept losing. Yet again Trump screws over the people he doesn't care about, which is everyone.

3 hours ago, Cartmann99 said:

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Ok, so I was looking at their logo and going "well I understand the elephant, but why the shark and chimpanzee?" before I realised it was an outline of Michigan. Too early in the morning.