The Trump Presidency

[JayUtah]

At the very least Trump will just play golf until January 20th. Why would he start doing the job now?

That's what I'd prefer he do.  I shudder to think about what a highly-motivated lame-duck Trump Administration might try to pull off out of spite.

[JayUtah]

But it's okay if their pastors are articulate?

Sure, because that's God putting eloquence and wisdom in the mouth of his chosen vessel, not some atheist leaning to his own understanding.

[Bryanpoprobson]

I must confess I have never followed an American election so avidly. Some of the American commentators are really showing their distain for Trump. As for the Republicans on the various panels trying to justify Trumps actions, you can feel them squirming.

[JayUtah]

We haven't had a President like Donald J. Trump in recent memory.  There have been hated Presidents before (Andrew Johnson), but we relegate them to history and nobody goes through all that journalists and commentators said about them at the time.  And we've had a surge of reporting on politics, both formal and informal, but our recent Presidents have generated comparatively little controversy.  It's a perfect storm of lots of new people having lots to say about a truly odious person.

I would hate to be a Republican politician today.  As a Biden victory looks more in the bag, they're going to have to figure out what role a rampaging Donald J. Trump is going to play in their party moving forward.  I can understand the sycophancy during his actual Presidency, because they have to respect the power of the office to make their lives miserable.  But if he has no actual power except that of tweeting ex officio, some of them might be thinking it's time to publicly jump ship.  For now he's still the President, even if he's way off the rails.  That still holds some sway over the party and its other members.

[Zakalwe]

Indeed, we can cite many past Presidents who were thoughtful, articulate, compassionate, and intelligent.  And it's hard to imagine how anyone could disagree with that.  But in fact a large fraction of America has come to regard such talents as signs of liberal elitism.  Rather than being comforted and inspired by such performances, they're put off by them.  They've been conditioned to regard them as Establishment leadership that's far removed from their everyday problems.

In contrast, there was a guy reviewing The Comey Rule in some ephemeral video who pointed out that Donald Trump has never finished a sentence in his life.  Hyperbole aside, he's not very wrong.  It's something I've always referred to as a "stream of semi-consciousness."  And ironically this appeals to vast numbers of Americans.  Despite his being inarticulate and illiterate, Trump comes across to his base as speaking from the heart directly to them, instead of carefully-prepared, politically-vetted speeches.

They're already talking about running Trump again in 2024.  I honestly don't think he'll live that long.

But it's okay if their pastors are articulate?

Trump can't even manage that mediocre feat....


https://twitter.com/i/status/1324175651515949056

[Peter B]

Saw that last night.

What a nice lady...

 

[JayUtah]

I hate to say it, but that's part of American Fundamentalist vernacular worship.  There are people in American who would take that very seriously, and dutifully vote for Donald Trump as the candidate God has chosen based on little more than such obviously incoherent rants speaking in tongues.  Thankfully not many people, but the poll numbers make me wonder just how many.

[Bryanpoprobson]

[JayUtah]

More religious nonsense.

https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/524794-trump-supporters-pray-outside-of-clark-county-election-department-in

[molesworth]

Aha!  I think we have some evidence of attempted voter fraud :

https://eu.jsonline.com/story/news/politics/elections/2020/11/06/trumps-wisconsin-campaign-asks-pennsylvania-cast-late-ballots/6182506002/

President Donald Trump's campaign helped recruit volunteers in Wisconsin this week to call supporters in Pennsylvania to urge them to mail in absentee ballots by Friday — even as the president rails against late ballots and the ongoing vote count.

Only votes that were cast or postmarked by Tuesday are legal, according to Pennsylvania and federal election laws. Trump has described any effort to vote after Tuesday as clear election fraud.

The speculation is that if any of these late ballots ended up being counted, they could be used as evidence that the counting was incorrect, and that other invalid votes could have been included.  Unfortunately for them, all ballots received after a certain date are being held separately for detailed checking - something they insisted on themselves when trying to reduce the effects of postal votes.

Their success rate with legal challenges is also impressive, with some scathing comments by various judges about the competence of those involved.  Although achieving new levels of incompetence does seem to have been a recurring theme throughout this presidency 

[gillianren]

Last night, a friend expressed the wish that he would wake up in the morning to finalized news and then joked that he would wake up this morning, check the results, and say, "What the--how did Sy Ableman* reach 270?"  I told him that would not be weirder than anything else about this year.

*Sy Ableman is a character from the 2009 Coen Brothers comedy A Serious Man.

[Peter B]

My first chance to check the news this morning (it's 8.20am here).

I'm willing to admit I have tears in my eyes.

[grmcdorman]

Even Fox has called it for Biden. Trump must be very annoyed with them (and he, predictably, has not conceded; apparently one of his tweets - that got hidden - said he has an overwhelming majority of the votes).

[JayUtah]

I've had a bottle of Moët 2009 in the studio refrigerator for four years waiting to celebrate this day.

And yes, the States are well aware of when they need to segregate late-arriving absentee ballots, and the tally systems are ever so capable of segregating the tallies for ballots that may be in dispute for one reason or another.  And the operation of these systems is, and has always been, overseen by previously selected inspectors from all interested political parties.

And yes, the few lawsuits I have been able to read, questioning the votes or tallies, are comically inept.  And I read many of Orly Taitz's filings during the Birther era.

[Peter B]

I've had a bottle of Moët 2009 in the studio refrigerator for four years waiting to celebrate this day.

And yes, the States are well aware of when they need to segregate late-arriving absentee ballots, and the tally systems are ever so capable of segregating the tallies for ballots that may be in dispute for one reason or another.  And the operation of these systems is, and has always been, overseen by previously selected inspectors from all interested political parties.

And yes, the few lawsuits I have been able to read, questioning the votes or tallies, are comically inept.  And I read many of Orly Taitz's filings during the Birther era.

I'm surprised by this. I thought he would have been able to afford skilled lawyers who could present a challenging case. Like the way Alan Dershowitz was part of his team for the impeachment trial.