The Trump Presidency

[JayUtah]

The lawsuits ... are a PR strategy primarily to soak as many rubes for as many dollars as possible...

An excellent point.  The "legal defense" fund is up to $170 million as of this writing.  75% goes to Trump's political campaign.  25% goes to the Republican National Committee.  It's unclear how much of it is actually going to be used to litigate lawsuits.

[Peter B]

The lawsuits ... are a PR strategy primarily to soak as many rubes for as many dollars as possible...

An excellent point.  The "legal defense" fund is up to $170 million as of this writing.  75% goes to Trump's political campaign.  25% goes to the Republican National Committee.  It's unclear how much of it is actually going to be used to litigate lawsuits.

So, pretty similar to the legal strategy Trump has pursued through his private life...?

[Obviousman]

It's amazing, really. I've disagreed with who gets elected, and maybe even strongly objected to them. We even had traitors as politicians (I'm looking at you, 'Shanghai Sam' Dastyari) but I have never felt that a politician has been a worthless human who would be better off dead... until Trump. It really would be for the greater good if he no longer walked the Earth.

For what little - if any - good that he does, it is terribly out-weighed by the damage he has done to so many sectors of the population.

[molesworth]

Well, Trump's options seem to be narrowing rapidly, as his Attorney General, Barr, has now made a public statement that the DoJ hasn't found any signs of major fraud :

https://apnews.com/article/barr-no-widespread-election-fraud-b1f1488796c9a98c4b1a9061a6c7f49d

I expect a Twitter tantrum any time soon... :-)

[JayUtah]

AG Barr's statement is mostly a red herring.  The entities over which he has control can investigate only violations of federal law.  And there is precious little federal law governing how elections can be run in states.  Voter misconduct is invariably a state-law violation.  So it's up to the state attorneys general to investigate and prosecute those.  Even widespread election fraud is still mostly out of AG Barr's jurisdiction.

[raven]

True, though the fact he's willing to go against His Cheese Nibs's word and decree says something.

[jfb]

Again, the problem isn't Trump.  He's just a symptom of the problem. 

The problem is that the GOP is a wholly-owned subsidiary of right-wing media.  The RNC doesn't call the shots, FOX/Newsmax/OANN calls the shots.  The Republican Party has effectively ceased to exist as an independent entity.

Why haven't Republican leadership in Congress said anything about Trump's unhinged conspiracy theories?  Why haven't they pushed back?  Why is it state-level Republican officials are the ones having to do the heavy lifting here and beat back the crazy?  Why are they allowing this nonsense to continue? 

Because they're not the ones with the power.  Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson are the ones with the power.  Hannity is Prothero from "V for Vendetta." 

Trump could drop dead tomorrow, the entire Trump family could fade into the depths of Eastern Europe away from any extradition treaties, but the problem doesn't go away.  The problem is still there, and it's getting worse, and I don't know how to stop it.  I don't know that it can be stopped. 

[raven]

I agree. Like with the riots, it may be bubbling now, but the pot's been on the stove a long time. While not actually an 'Ancient Chinese curse', we do indeed 'live in interesting times'.

[Obviousman]

The entities over which he has control can investigate only violations of federal law.  And there is precious little federal law governing how elections can be run in states.

That is something that still amazes me - no Federal electoral agency. Sure, for state election have states run the electoral process but on the national scale? There shouldn't be different rules for different states. It's a national event, and there should be national rules.

[Obviousman]

Again, the problem isn't Trump.  He's just a symptom of the problem. 

The problem is that the GOP is a wholly-owned subsidiary of right-wing media.  The RNC doesn't call the shots, FOX/Newsmax/OANN calls the shots.  The Republican Party has effectively ceased to exist as an independent entity.

Why haven't Republican leadership in Congress said anything about Trump's unhinged conspiracy theories?  Why haven't they pushed back?  Why is it state-level Republican officials are the ones having to do the heavy lifting here and beat back the crazy?  Why are they allowing this nonsense to continue? 

Because they're not the ones with the power.  Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson are the ones with the power.  Hannity is Prothero from "V for Vendetta." 

Trump could drop dead tomorrow, the entire Trump family could fade into the depths of Eastern Europe away from any extradition treaties, but the problem doesn't go away.  The problem is still there, and it's getting worse, and I don't know how to stop it.  I don't know that it can be stopped. 

Yeah, good points.

[gillianren]

That is something that still amazes me - no Federal electoral agency. Sure, for state election have states run the electoral process but on the national scale? There shouldn't be different rules for different states. It's a national event, and there should be national rules.

The problem is our perpetual uncertainty about how many countries we really are.  I've long said that one of the most interesting changes resulting from the Civil War was grammatical--the United States went from being a plural noun to being a singular one.  But our entire system is built on a premise that the states not only have the right to a lot of self-governance, but that they should have that right.  Even though Alexander Hamilton believed in abolishing state borders entirely.  The federal government was set up with the structure that it only gets to step in when one state's rights influence those of another state.  And while goodness knows that's better than the Articles of Confederation--where each state had total veto over any federal law--it's still caused a lot of problems over our country's history.

[raven]

Human rights should not be a state matter, in my opinion. People should not have to worry if they can have their actual identity be legally changed from what it was assumed to be upon birth just because they happen to have been born in a certain state. The fact that many states technically still have 'Anti-Sodomy' laws on the books is an absolute travesty. Sure, they're not enforced, but they could be.

[JayUtah]

Human rights should not be a state matter, in my opinion. People should not have to worry if they can have their actual identity be legally changed from what it was assumed to be upon birth just because they happen to have been born in a certain state.

Sadly all that diversity among states, regions, social groups, and so forth creates disagreement over what constitutes a human right.  To some it's obvious that things like gender identity should be respected as a human right and protected under law.  And others argue it's a "new" right that never existed before, so it can't be a basic human right.  The real problem with America is that not everyone in it wants to be progressive.  They don't want to change.  And the federal system allows pockets of progressive and conservative government, which makes quite a lot of people ultimately unhappy.

The fact that many states technically still have 'Anti-Sodomy' laws on the books is an absolute travesty. Sure, they're not enforced, but they could be.

Lawrence v. Texas  declared all such laws unconstitutional.  So as long as that ruling holds, it bars bringing charges under anti-sodomy laws anywhere in the United States.

[gillianren]

Hell, we're the only country that hasn't signed the UN Declaration of Rights of the Child, as I recall.

[Allan F]