Politics 20/20 now with extra hindsight!

[Bartimaeus]

There's unlikely to be a call tonight after all, since Nevada changed its mind (again!) and decided to wait until tomorrow to finalize its results rather than release them in two batches. Arizona, which was called for Biden early by Fox, is tightening up and looks likely to get close, although it's difficult to say how exactly, so no final call there tonight either. Georgia looks increasingly likely to go to Biden (but ever so narrowly, possibly within a similar or even slimmer margin as Wisconsin did), while the analysts seem fairly certain Trump has lost Pennsylvania.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

I'm not convinced about Georgia or Pennsylvania, if they do go Biden it will be by razor thin margins. I guess we'll know by Friday.

[Gorth]

From the BBC:

 

There has been no official comment from the Russian government, but the pro-Kremlin politician Vyacheslav Nikonov was unafraid to revel in the uncertainty surrounding the result.

"Whoever wins the legal battles half of Americans will not consider them the lawful president," he wrote on Facebook. "Let's stock up on large quantities of popcorn."

 

Not going to bother putting a picture of a smirking Putin here, but I'm almost certain he's busy congratulating himself on a job well done in 2016

[BruceVC]

There have been 3 types of votes in this election, the normal "walk-in " votes, the early votes and the mail votes

Basically the mail votes are outstanding and this is what is taking time to count. We dont know for certain which supporters represent the mail voters but ostensibly its Democrat supporters which is why we see Democrats slowing gaining the lead in the swing states

Its still to early to call this election but Trump has done very well and whatever the final results its evident his 2016 victory was not a one-off  victory and his support base  and message needs to be recognized going forward 

[Deadly_Nightshade]

1 hour ago, BruceVC said:

...and his support base  and message needs to be recognized going forward 

I think we might not really know that until the midterm elections or 2024 when, most likely, we'll see people running on the Trump platform of nationalistic populism mixed with a bit of xenophobia but without Trump in the White House to directly rally around (unless Trump ends up winning, although that is looking less and less likely as the counting process draws to a close).

There is a good possibility that, without the demagogue directly on the ballot, people might not be as supportive as they were when he was up for election.

[BruceVC]

4 minutes ago, Deadly_Nightshade said:

I think we might not really know that until the midterm elections or 2024 when, most likely, we'll see people running on the Trump platform of nationalistic populism mixed with a bit of xenophobia but without Trump in the White House to directly rally around (unless Trump ends up winning, although that is looking less and less likely as the counting process draws to a close).

There is a good possibility that, without the demagogue directly on the ballot, people might not be as supportive as they were when he was up for election.

I tend to agree, you cannot ignore the overall " Trump "  factor in his support and without him in the WH what would the real support for his type of populism ?

[Raithe]

[Darkpriest]

There will be calls for recounts and fight over mail-ins legitimacy. Ground is prepped. 

 

[majestic]

Project "Veritas" is as much about the actual truth as Pravda. Not entirely sure why Sky News Australia is even giving... oh, wait. Australia. Yeah, figures.

[Zoraptor]

Sky News Australia == Uncle Rupert's Australian mouthpiece, much as Faux News is his US one.

[Raithe]

 

Edited November 5, 2020 by Raithe

[Darkpriest]

1 hour ago, Zoraptor said:

Sky News Australia == Uncle Rupert's Australian mouthpiece, much as Faux News is his US one.

Might be, but I'm sure there will be a lot of information flying around election fruads on mail in ballots, missing ballots, invalidated ballots, dumped/destroyed ballots and there will be examples of those. Even if the scale will be not evidenced, the examples of actions that took place amd were evidenced will be enough of  a message to one or the other side of the voters. 

 

Expect a long session of recounts, lawsuits and accusations going both ways. 

 

All of which could have been avoided by a long period of in person voting (early votes plus election day votes) 

Edited November 5, 2020 by Darkpriest

[Hurlshort]

The only way you are going to avoid the current situation with the voting in the US is to standardize the system across the states and districts. This is a terrible idea though, because it opens up the election to WIDESPREAD fraud. Nothing that is happening right now is evidence of WIDESPREAD fraud. It is evidence of certain districts not running as smoothly as others. After a legitimate investigation is done (and not the twitter detective agency) it may even be evidence of localized fraud. That would be shocking, as the amount of moving parts needed to pull that off is staggering, but I suppose it is possible. 

 

[Darkpriest]

10 minutes ago, Hurlshot said:

The only way you are going to avoid the current situation with the voting in the US is to standardize the system across the states and districts. This is a terrible idea though, because it opens up the election to WIDESPREAD fraud. Nothing that is happening right now is evidence of WIDESPREAD fraud. It is evidence of certain districts not running as smoothly as others. After a legitimate investigation is done (and not the twitter detective agency) it may even be evidence of localized fraud. That would be shocking, as the amount of moving parts needed to pull that off is staggering, but I suppose it is possible. 

 

It is true that its difficult to that widespread, however it usually takes a few key states, with differences that usually margin within a 2% window, and that's not more than a 100k votes. 

 

Some old story on the subject

https://www.usatoday.com/in-depth/news/investigations/2020/10/08/rejected-mail-ballots-projected-major-factor-2020-election/3576714001/

 

Now imagine some of the mail ins accepted, should be rejected, but they were not? Or the other way around? 

At this point, no matter the outcome, USA lost, rich are becoming richer due to stocks going wild in anticipation of more free money, and the price will be paid by those peasants below, who will now keep clashing, and will be blaming all the bad effects on decisions and actions of other peasants and not the class who directs the anger and opinion getting richer by the minute. 

 

I decided to sit this election out with my cash, as a natural bet on a political uncertaintiny and turmoil would be indexes going down, but then I forgot that in such a case FED will print even more money. 

[Guard Dog]

Mississippi chose a new flag. It’s not the one I liked the best but it’s pretty good. I believe that’s it. I believe the “Confederate Flag” (don’t get me started) is gone from all state flags now. 
 

https://www.fox5ny.com/news/mississippi-voters-replace-confederate-themed-flag-with-new-design-featuring-magnolia-flower

[Hurlshort]

5 minutes ago, Guard Dog said:

Mississippi chose a new flag. It’s not the one I liked the best but it’s pretty good. I believe that’s it. I believe the “Confederate Flag” (don’t get me started) is gone from all state flags now. 
 

https://www.fox5ny.com/news/mississippi-voters-replace-confederate-themed-flag-with-new-design-featuring-magnolia-flower

That is about a million times better than the generic confederate one they had before. Nice.

[Malcador]

13 minutes ago, Guard Dog said:

Mississippi chose a new flag. It’s not the one I liked the best but it’s pretty good. I believe that’s it. I believe the “Confederate Flag” (don’t get me started) is gone from all state flags now. 
 

https://www.fox5ny.com/news/mississippi-voters-replace-confederate-themed-flag-with-new-design-featuring-magnolia-flower

Are they going to burn all the old ones ? That'd be a nice touch (and proper way to dispose of flag)

[HoonDing]

WHERES HUNTER

[Guard Dog]

At noon Eastern US time today Nevada is supposed to announce the results of its election. If Biden has won, it is essentially over. Barring some unforeseen reversal in Arizona Joe Biden will be the next president. Assuming Trump will win Georgia North Carolina and Pennsylvania it won’t matter. So the Democrats lost seats in the House of Representatives, the Republicans held the Senate, and Joe Biden was elected. It is the best case scenario that I outlined a few pages ago.
 

At the end of the day the Libertarian candidate got a little over 1.5M votes. I certainly wish she had done better. 
 

The rural and urban divide in the United States is now deeper and more firmly entrenched than ever. In my opinion this is the natural outcome of the continued expansion of federal government power usurping the influence of state governmentsIn my opinion this is the natural outcome of the continued expansion of federal government power usurping the influence of state governments. The United States is too large and too diverse for one size fits all top down federal management. But it is a lesson the country refuses to learn. 
 

Distrust and misunderstanding is deeply entrenched. Joe Biden has said some of the right things but in the end I don’t think he has the wherewithal to be any kind of a uniter. And I’m not sure this is a country that wants to be united anymore. At least not right now. But a great deal of this will be determined by who gets cabinet positions. If Biden turns to the left wingers as he is expected to do it will only infuriate his political opponents, make the Senate even more intransigent, and ensure that the 2022 election will be every bit as acrimonious as this one was.

But... Nothing we can do about all that

 

[Hurlshort]

Day 3 and this thing is still pretty messy. These mail in ballots sure take a long time to count.

[Skarpen]

9 minutes ago, Hurlshot said:

Day 3 and this thing is still pretty messy. These mail in ballots sure take a long time to count.

Give them a break. They have to print them, fill them up and then count. It takes time.

[Darkpriest]

Ric Grenell, the former acting Director of National Intelligence, is slated to hold a Thursday morning press conference in Las Vegas to announce the Trump campaign is filing a lawsuit that seeks to count every "legal" vote. The Trump campaign is alleging that at least 10,000 people voted in the state, despite no longer living there

[Guard Dog]

2 minutes ago, Skarpen said:

Give them a break. They have to print them, fill them up and then count. It takes time.

No kidding! Elections don't steal themselves! People should appreciate the effort going into this!

[Guard Dog]

French Bulldog elected Mayor of Kentucky community

 

[213374U]

1 hour ago, Hurlshot said:

The only way you are going to avoid the current situation with the voting in the US is to standardize the system across the states and districts. This is a terrible idea though, because it opens up the election to WIDESPREAD fraud. Nothing that is happening right now is evidence of WIDESPREAD fraud. It is evidence of certain districts not running as smoothly as others. After a legitimate investigation is done (and not the twitter detective agency) it may even be evidence of localized fraud. That would be shocking, as the amount of moving parts needed to pull that off is staggering, but I suppose it is possible. 

I get what you're saying but... that kinda runs in the face of process standardization practices. Inefficiency and obsolescence aren't generally considered factors contributing to a system's security -- rather the opposite.

Further, and I may be wrong, it looks to me that you wouldn't need to run a massive nation-wide fraud campaign to disrupt the election anyway. Seems that targeting a few select districts would be enough.