U.S. Politics

[nick76]

6 hours ago, LondonLax said:

At the moment the (Democrat appointed) judges in Colorado are the outlier on this issue

But…..

 

Edited December 20, 2023 by nick76

[nick76]

All in the margin of error though. I’m not convinced by polling these days after recent elections down the card.

[LondonLax]

2 hours ago, nick76 said:

But…..

 

All 7 justices were appointed by democrats and they were still split on their voting 4-3. 

All other jurisdictions have voted the other way. I expect the Supreme Court will also vote it down.

There is a possibility the Supreme Court says it’s a state by state issue, which would also likely help Trump.

 

[nick76]

13 minutes ago, LondonLax said:

All 7 justices were appointed by democrats and they were still split on their voting 4-3. 

All other jurisdictions have voted the other way. I expect the Supreme Court will also vote it down.

There is a possibility the Supreme Court says it’s a state by state issue, which would also likely help Trump.

 

Yeah maybe but the line this is a Democrat action when so many Republicans were involved in bringing the case seems to be missed by Republican commentators.

As for Scotus, I’m certainly not expecting it to hold but the Republicans drafting the case and one of the judges have thought of that and drafted the text in the manner that Originalists adhere to and many of the conservative scotus judges adhere religiously to that type of reading of the constitution.

They’ve also added references from Gorsch’s own interpretation and previous writings.  This with the many Amicus briefs from very respected Conservative legal originalist scholars may make this not a forgone conclusion that Scotus overturns it.  

I ultimately think Scotus take the easy way out with something like the plaintiffs don’t have standings or some other technical point.

[limpid]

8 hours ago, desensitized43 said:

He's not been convicted yet and so they're probably on really shaky ground.

The relevant section doesn't require a conviction, only an involvement. The originalists Trump but on the Supreme Court will have to turn into pretzels to interpret it any other way. Not to say that they won't though.

[LondonLax]

10 minutes ago, nick76 said:

Yeah maybe but the line this is a Democrat action when so many Republicans were involved in bringing the case seems to be missed by Republican commentators.

 

This part may be true but Republican politicians are also a very divided group, between your old school establishment Republicans and the Trump nativists. I don’t know how much sway the Republican establishment still have with the public at large. The Republican voters are Trumps now. 

[nick76]

3 minutes ago, LondonLax said:

This part may be true but Republican politicians are also a very divided group, between your old school establishment Republicans and the Trump nativists. I don’t know how much sway the Republican establishment still have with the public at large. The Republican voters are Trumps now. 

I don’t think all Republican voters are Trump fans.  The majority are of course but there is material percentage of Republican voters that want change from him, don’t think he’s fit, won’t vote for him.  They won’t be voting for Biden of course and while some will vote for Trump because he’s the only conservative choice on the ballot, there will be a percentage that won’t bother voting at the top of the ticket.  With the election likely to be close a couple of %  either way is going to make a massive difference to who wins the election and Trump isn’t trying to get the swing conservative voters on his side, he’s just leaning into his base, which won’t be enough.

[desensitized43]

13 hours ago, limpid said:

The relevant section doesn't require a conviction, only an involvement. The originalists Trump but on the Supreme Court will have to turn into pretzels to interpret it any other way. Not to say that they won't though.

Well to be fair, the clause has never been used this way. There's no legal precendent to follow. Like alot of the constitution and the various amendments to it, it/they are a product of their time. The second amendment was written at a time where the U.S. has no standing army (hence the reference to the militia) and rifles could fire at most 2 rounds in a minute. With the 14th, the union had just fought a bloody civil war for it's survival and 1/3 of the country was in ruins materially and economically, populated by a bunch of angry traitors who'd just rebelled against the government, one of whom had just killed the president and it was designed to keep people like Jefferson Davis out of office.

I think it will very much depend on whether the judges consider January 6th to be an "insurrection" or "rebellion" or indeed whether Trump himself can be considered a part of it, since he undoubtedly incited the crowd but he wasn't "there".

Not trying to defend Trump here. Personally I think what he's done in years past he could be executed for treason, let alone holding high office again, but I really don't think this is going to work.

[maqroll]

Maine just removed Trump from the ballot...

This will stir up the crazies here.

[desensitized43]

8 hours ago, maqroll said:

Maine just removed Trump from the ballot...

This will stir up the crazies here.

It’ll create a bit of noise for sure. I’m certain as things stand the Supreme Court are going to overturn both of these decisions. Both Colorado and Maine are pretty safe democrat states with very few electoral college votes…if California followed then things could take a very serious turn.

[AXD]

9 minutes ago, desensitized43 said:

It’ll create a bit of noise for sure. I’m certain as things stand the Supreme Court are going to overturn both of these decisions. Both Colorado and Maine are pretty safe democrat states with very few electoral college votes…if California followed then things could take a very serious turn.

California is also pretty safe for the democrats. I don’t think Trump expects to win there, even if it holds a lot of electoral votes.

swing states, that would really be interesting to see.

[desensitized43]

1 hour ago, AXD said:

California is also pretty safe for the democrats. I don’t think Trump expects to win there, even if it holds a lot of electoral votes.

swing states, that would really be interesting to see.

The swing states wouldn’t do this as It’d cause so much uproar that they’d be risking civil unrest. It’s a relatively safe thing to do in Maine but if they tried in Ohio or something it would undoubtedly lead to deaths.

It would be much easier if the republicans could just pick someone who wasn’t openly a fascist.

[El Zen]

1 hour ago, desensitized43 said:

The swing states wouldn’t do this as It’d cause so much uproar that they’d be risking civil unrest. It’s a relatively safe thing to do in Maine but if they tried in Ohio or something it would undoubtedly lead to deaths.

It would be much easier if the republicans could just pick someone who wasn’t openly a fascist.

That doesn’t sound very easy at all, considering they have to pick from a field of, y’know, Republicans. 

[nick76]

Great idea 

 

[TheAuthority]

2 hours ago, nick76 said:

Great idea 

 

I actually think this is where all the craziness started.

People were just so pissed off that a Black man won the Presidency and was loved by a lot of people (whatever you think of his presidency)

[maqroll]

4 hours ago, TheAuthority said:

I actually think this is where all the craziness started.

People were just so pissed off that a Black man won the Presidency and was loved by a lot of people (whatever you think of his presidency)

The night Obama humiliated Trump to his face at the Correspondent's Dinner was the moment that Trump decided to run for President, I'm truly convinced of that. 

Trump ran on revenge the first time, and his followers wanted him to get it, for himself, and for themselves through him. It's the same exact scenario now as it was in 2015.

He wants revenge again, and so do his mouth-breathing fanatics. For them it never had anything to do with governance or policy, it was always very tribal, very primitive, and purely based on negative emotions.

They need him as a psychological salve, to protect them from a more assertive and visible non-white and non-hetero population, and they depend on Trump to throw punches for them at the coastal liberals in media, tech and education.

His victory was like winning the World Cup for them. And they want that feeling again, and if it means voting to completely abandon American democracy for a conman who will install himself as dictator, they'll happily do it. And their enthusiastic accommodation of fascism renders their so-called patriotism and love of the Constitution utterly false, and it renders their self-professed Christian piety just as illusory.

[TheAuthority]

I agree with everything you say @maqroll apart from the last few words. Their Christian piety isn’t just illusory it’s far, far more sinister than that IMO.

[maqroll]

29 minutes ago, TheAuthority said:

I agree with everything you say @maqroll apart from the last few words. Their Christian piety isn’t just illusory it’s far, far more sinister than that IMO.

Absolutely, that's why I said "self professed piety". Their embrace of the degenerate Trump manifestly invalidates their advertised moral principles and exposes what they actually are. They are, in fact, the anti-Christ.

The Evangelical American community was once fairly apolitical if you can believe it. But now, in their thirst for power and dominance in the political sphere, they've anointed a prophet one of the most vile, wretched and contemptible public figures this country has ever produced.

[TheAuthority]

7 minutes ago, maqroll said:

The Evangelical American community was once fairly apolitical if you can believe it. But now, in their thirst for power and dominance in the political sphere, they've anointed a prophet one of the most vile, wretched and contemptible public figures this country has ever produced.

What do you think about the oft quoted statement that "Trump is a symptom" or a consequence of something deeper that is wrong with the US?

A fairly benign example: I was telling my American wife last night that where I grew up in the W Mids, I could walk to the end of my street and catch a bus to the local train station, and from there straight to London. From London I could travel to anywhere in Europe.

There are huge areas of the USA where it is impossible to leave. Unless you have a car you are essentially trapped. What does this do to the psychology of a population? One population sees public transport as an equalizing factor, open to all, and a shared commodity (also see trams etc.) The other sees a barrier that without wealth, options are limited and you are "lesser" unless you possess necessary wealth.

This conversation ultimately fell into the oil conglomerates lobbying for the Federal Interstate system which killed a robust national rail transport system. But the more interesting question for me is about how the limited options effect the psyche.

[maqroll]

@TheAuthority Rural Trump supporters are a huge segment of the population that has been crippled by the collapse of domestic manufacturing and completely left behind by the information economy. They see a younger and more ethnically diverse population outpacing them and thriving with skills they can't access. So I think that's where a lot of the resentment factors in. Their default status in the society as white people is waning and it terrifies them. Obama embodied all their fear and paranoia. Obama becoming President was like a slave revolt to them. 

A lot of these rural communities are disconnected from one another, or at least they were disconnected. The internet has changed all that. They've created a vast online community, and harnessed a bit of power as a kind of social movement, with real world impact like Q-anon and January 6th, etc. Although they might be isolated in small towns, they are now part of a massive network of disaffected people, creating an echo chamber of resentment, paranoia and propaganda fed to them by Fox News and Right Wing radio.

I should note that obviously there are plenty of rural Americans who haven't joined the Trump cult and who get unfairly stereotyped as ignorant rednecks. It must be extra lonely out there for people who despise Trumpism. 

To answer the question you asked, it was definitely our sick society that shaped Trump and it was our dysfunctional body politic that allowed a degenerate sociopath like him to become President, and incredibly, might actually allow it again which shows you just how broken the whole system is and how nihilistic half the population is that they will follow Trump straight into the abyss and pull the entire country right down with them.

Edited December 30, 2023 by maqroll