The reasons (each with a long explanation at the link):
1. An Uncontrolled PandemicA "volcano," you say?
2. New Technology and New Processes
3. A Drought of Funding
4. Dislocated Voters
5. A Storm of Foreign Attacks
6. Misinformation and Disinformation
7. A Famine of Voter Protections
8. A Volcano in the Oval Office
Sure, incumbents enjoy the advantage of campaigning from Air Force One, and may try to goose the economy to curry votes, but they’ve mostly abided by America’s strong democratic norms and traditions of not weaponizing the office’s powers against your opponent. Trump is different....
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86 comments:
...but they’ve mostly abided by America’s strong democratic norms and traditions of not weaponizing the office’s powers against your opponent...
I know, right? Trump needs to get with the program and weaponize all the other government agencies against his opponents the way the previous administration did.
"America’s strong democratic norms and traditions of not weaponizing the office’s powers against your opponent"
Fuck these lying assholes. Not weaponizing the office's powers against your opponent went out the window with Trump's predecessor. Don't like the new rules, assholes? Shouldn't have changed them, then.
But all signs point to something far, far worse...
Internal polling must look bad for them....
"[T]raditions of not weaponizing the office’s powers against your opponent......" Young people these days apparently use the acronym "AYFKM" to describe statements having such level of dishonesty.
I think they suspect they are losing.
What total BS. Wide and baseless speculation.
Those pricks at Politico better be prepared for a massive Trump win.
"curry votes"
Sounds like it will be a spicy election.
Seriously, is that a legitimate phrase? I can't find any definition that permits it.
Curry favor is closest and even that is pretty distant.
John Henry
Haven't we all had volcanos in our oval orifices after going to Mexico?
I see about 3 reasons repeated with different phrasing to make them seem scarier, plus the standard TDS.
"but they’ve mostly abided by America’s strong democratic norms and traditions of not weaponizing the office’s powers against your opponent."
*snort*
Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, James Comey, Peter Strozk, Lisa Page, Andrew McCabe, John Brennan, and James Clapper could not be reached for comment....
"Trump is different"
As the target of unprecedented sabotage and coup attempts, yes.
Wow, they're not even hiding which side they're on anymore.
I dunno. After the Iowa Democratic primary, I think the list should be longer.
But, we will be done with wearing masks on November 4, so I've got that working for me!!
but they’ve mostly abided by America’s strong democratic norms and traditions of not weaponizing the office’s powers against your opponent. Trump is different
I wonder if whoever wrote this is aware of how ridiculous it reads to anyone who isn't suffering from TDS and has been paying the slightest attention for the past 4 years. We as a nation were dragged through years of a fake investigation initiated by an incumbent using the offices powers against his opponent violating all the "norms and traditions". Good lord, how can they be this dense?
but they’ve mostly abided by America’s strong democratic norms and traditions of not weaponizing the office’s powers against your opponent.
Assumptions like this is how we got here!!
Trump is different....
I would say instead that Trump’s opposition is what’s different from previous elections, at least in recent history. I am trying to determine the last election where the opposition used violence and threats of worse violence to sway an election. Lincoln’s election in 1860? The KKK in the South during Reconstruction and into the 20th century, for certain.
Sure, incumbents enjoy the advantage of campaigning from Air Force One, and may try to goose the economy to curry votes, but they’ve mostly abided by America’s strong democratic norms and traditions of not weaponizing the office’s powers against your opponent.
Is he talking about 2016? Sounds like it.
Re Politico's "volcano in the oval office'---Forget it Jake, it's Politico.
Aside from that the first 7 items they list could make the 2020 Presidential and Congressional elections a wild card that could go either way.
"Trump is different." Finally someone on the Left recognizes the reason Trump is in the White House.
How can Politico fail to include voter fraud in the list of dangers?
arthur curry, I didn't know aquaman was a candidate, sarc,
The whole concept of "Hate Speech" is bullshit. If you accept the idea that people should be censored and deplatformed but NOT IN THIS CASE, sorry I have zero sympathy. That was the Left's plan all along. Get people to accept the principle, then expand the definition of "Hate" to whatever they want to censor and destroy.
not weaponizing the office’s powers against your opponent.
Eugene Debs could not be reached for comment.
The Left wants mail in ballots and the ability to let felons and illegal aliens to vote. They also want free reign to commit voter fraud. That's what this is all about.
BTW, I just noticed that back in May 2020, Mitt Romney was supporting Mail-in voting. Of course, he would. This scumbag wants President Biden. "Severely Conservative" my ass. What a liar Mittens is!
"...weaponizing the office’s powers against your opponent..."
This gives me hope that criminal indictments are coming against the Obama Administration and its attempted coup.
This article is a pre-emptive move against the DOJ revealing the full extent of the criminal wrongdoing, I believe.
Also, this is Democratics accusing Republicans of what Democratics have already done.
That gives the press a chance to "on the one hand, but on the other hand" this issue.
Until now, I did not believe there would be criminal indictments.
This article seals it for me.
Boggles the mind, it does.
BTW, whatever happened to the phrase "jackbooted thugs" to describe our Federales?
Narr
Never hear that anymore
Oh boy,ANOTHER way to say Orange Man Bad.
Just what we need.
That hole seems to have no bottom.
" America’s strong democratic norms and traditions of not weaponizing the office’s powers against your opponent"
May I introduce you to Barack Obama? He began weaponizing the IRS against conservatives long before Mitt Romney was even nominated. To say nothing of how he weaponized the national security apparatus against Trump.
This is the outline of how the Democrats will refuse to accept their loss in November.
Have you guys never dealt with Democrats before? They complain about upcoming voter fraud by Republicans even when they are likely to win (2008). They were whining about Diebold right up until Obama won easily.
Wow, they kind of give you a new tag "Trump is different..."
they’ve mostly abided by America’s strong democratic norms and traditions of not weaponizing the office’s powers against your opponent. Trump is different
Under President Obama, the FBI investigated four members of Donald Trump's campaign staff.
In particular, the FBI obtained a FISA warrant to seize and study all the past and current communications of Trump's Russia-policy advisor Carter Page. The FISA warrant enabled the FBI to seize and study all communications in a two-hop scope?
* How many communications were seized?
* From which Trump advisors, supporters and associates were communications seized?
Speaking of weaponizing the office, more evidence today of Barack and Joe spying on the Trump campaign back in August 2016.
Durham better arrest people this month!
Those are not the issues that will make it a shit show. The real ones are:
1) The Dems cheating. They are already setting up the scenario that if you claim the election is not fair then you are trying to violate The Constitution. Thus all the bullshit about Trump not accepting the outcome. It's cheating prep. There have already been thousands mail in fake ballots found, and real ones stolen around the country in recent elections.
2) The fascist anti-fascists will do whatever they can to disrupt the election and destroy it's integrity. I assume with polling place shenanigans reminiscent of the armed Black Panther thugs in Philly in 2008 protecting Obama's 110% voting tallies there.
3) The media will lie about all this and much more so that people on all sides will not trust the result.
The only one thing that will prevent a catastrophe with the election will be a landslide by one side or the other, and a Biden landslide is extremely unlikely.
The only thing that will prevent a catastrophe for the country will be a landslide for Trump. Otherwise the destruction and abandonment of everything truely American, liberal, and exceptional in the nation will be at serious risk, and I don't think the people who want that have any ideas about what to replace it with other than failed experiments and stupidity.
"America’s strong democratic norms and traditions of not weaponizing the office’s powers against your opponent"
I recall that Eisenhower ran a clean re-election campaign. After that, well, not so much.
Is this one of those "Democrats doing it are allowed, Republicans decrying it are pouncing" sort of stories, or is it more, "Democrats don't follow the rules they make for Republicans"? Or both, I suppose?
1-200
If Trump wins, the left will lose their collective hiveminds.
Hope they mention the mail-in chaos like what has happened in the NY primary.
There are (more) large things brewing that are abnormal.
This is, in total, a completely unprecedented situation.
And one must evaluate pieces like these, in the controlled media, as if one were presented with articles in the Chinese media, as smoke-signals loaded with implications as to the thinking of the leadership.
Perhaps some of them are trying to create a consensus for an extra-constitutional act, and are testing rationalizations for it.
They aren't dense.
They just have what the Spanish call a "cara dura".
They will lie to your face, knowing that you cant do anything about it.
"curry votes"
Seriously, is that a legitimate phrase?
Of course he meant to say garnish votes....
"curry votes"
i assume they mean, using a currycomb.
The horse (or, voting public) is rubbed or "curried" to help loosen dirt, hair, and other detritus; such as illegal aliens, dead and multiple voters. Once loosened, the detritus can be swept up and given a postmark that makes them 'appear' legal.
Professor Althouse is saying that she is TOTALLY aware of voter fraud, and it does NOT bother her... As Long As, it is done by the democrats
Sounds like the left is realizing that the "margin of fraud" will be too great to escape detection, so they have to demonize election integrity efforts.
9) Journalists!
Mail in voting is the worst idea in America today. It guarantees fraud, attempted fraud, suspected fraud, false accusations of fraud. It guarantees all of those. So it also guarantees that unless the election is a blow-out that tens of millions will reject it.
And it’s not just one election. There are over 450 distinct federal elections, plus state elections. All of them tainted, suspected, disputed.
You want chaos and violence? This is your best bet.
"Good lord, how can they be this dense?"
They are not dense. They are dishonest. But they are counting on the voters being dense.
Sounds like fear talking. What will they do with 4 more years of Trump?
Trump will have more flexibility after the election.
I'm trying to characterize our current media, or at least political reporting and punditry, but having trouble coming up with an analogy. What's lower than garbage?
People were convinced, absolutely, that Bush 43 would not leave office if not re-elected. This is standard fear-mongering. "Trump is different" they say, but they don't mean it. Trump has not done anything to indicate he wouldn't leave office if he isn't re-elected.
I worry much more about the outlets who keep trying to pretend, though, that a mail-in ballot election would be just fine and Trump is dangerous for speaking against it.
Nonapod: Good Lord, how can they be this dense?
They're not. It's called gaslighting. Or projection, or both.
I also love the way they are pretending Obama didn't have FISA warrants for people on Trump's campaign staff, and were speaking about the LOGAN Act, for God's sake, against the incoming National Security Advisor.
Biggest danger: Florida 2000 being replicated across a dozen states. Any state that comes in at less than 3% win for Trump will be attacked by the Left. There might be rioting as well.
And if riots hit the purple states, The People may decide that they've had enough and they'll take up arms against the rioters.
The Populist Revolution that started during the 2008 financial crisis hasn't stopped, but the Left is now starting to fight back with violence. They're not going to stop on their own. If the DNC can't stop them, the rioters will be met with violence, either from the Feds or from the People. If the People don't believe that their police will protect them, the People will protect themselves.
All eight reasons are subsets of reason number six, if you realize reason number six is not sourced from where they are implying it is sourced.
No other president has had the organs of the executive branch weaponized against them. New rules Ann.
That list is the Resistance Coup's list. As soon as DJT was sworn in as our President following a traditional election of a populist candidate that replaced the plans of a Global Conspiracy with its FBI created "Insurance Policy", that list has been worked by the Global Conspirators using masses of stolen American money laundered through The Ukraine and Communist China and handed out by Soros's fronts.
But there will be a winner and a loser in 2020's election. That is why the panic has set in among the MSM. The Deep State pundits are acting like this campaign will be Hitler's Ardennes Offensive. But it will be just as successful as that last gasp by a maniac was.
How did AA build up a following of Trumpists? This is how.
Be careful what you curry. You just might garner it.
If the DNC and the deep state steal the election, Nov. 4th will be the bloddies day in history. Trump will win 40 states.
Readering is angry that a moderate liberal has used her reasoning powers to see and speak the truth.
Those are the enemies of propagandists.
And they must be attacked.
reminder; send some bucks to your favorite R senator. without them, we are screwed.
The dems cheated in CA - there is no doubt.
They allowed counting to continue 17 days after the election - or after they find just enough votes for the D to win.
Readering: "How did AA build up a following of Trumpists? This is how."
LOL
"On Wednesday, Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Ill.), a co-founder of the Illinois Black Panthers who has since left the group, compared President Donald Trump’s dispatching of federal law enforcement to Portland to a Ku Klux Klan lynching."
AA calling out this leftist/LLR-leftists stupidity is how AA built up a following of Trump supporters.
Also readerings 5 straight years of lying and running with one hoax after another is how Althouse built up a following of Trump supporters and AA calling BS on the transparent lies is another reason for why AA built up a following of Trump supporters.
Lets just call this what it is: readering is very very upset that his/her/xer riot/burn it all down/institute marxist govt/impeachment hoax ploys don't seem to be moving the polls in the dems direction, even with the few dozen of FakeCon LLR-leftists posing as conservatives on his/her/xer side.
Pianoman said...
Biggest danger: Florida 2000 being replicated across a dozen states. Any state that comes in at less than 3% win for Trump will be attacked by the Left. There might be rioting as well.
I think that comment hits the nail on the head.
There will be chaos this November and the media will blame it on Trump.
USA Today headline: Coronavirus updates: Health experts call for country to shut down again; Fauci says he has security after getting threats
"It's time to hit the reset button: Shut it down and restart. That's what more than 150 health professionals are urging government leaders in an open letter published earlier this week."
"'Tell the American people the truth about the virus, even when it’s hard. Take bold action to save lives — even when it means shutting down again,' the letter, spearheaded by the nonprofit U.S. Public Interest Research Group, says."
Shut down until Biden wins; or shut down in perpetuity if Trump wins.
Wow, such an unbiased article from Politico! Reading it, you could hardly discern which side they were on.
/sarcasm
Readering said...
How did AA build up a following of Trumpists? This is how.
The definition of "Trumpists" is "Normals" to most of us. The wild left is not normal, except perhaps in sick societies. The sane people who are behind the crazies of the left know Socialism doesn't work, let along communism. Communism was a way for a small elite to gain control over a larger but naive population. Hugo Chavez daughter is the richest woman in South America. Yasser Arafat had billions in Swiss bank accounts. I assume Jeff Bezos learned very well the lesson that Bill Gates learned the hard way when he did not set up a lobby operation in DC after Microsoft took off. The politicians, and their minions in the bureaucracy, must be paid tribute if you want to be left alone.
The politicians don't even matter much anymore as the staffs have taken over. The Democrats once used the KKK as shock troops. Now it is this subset of poorly educated kids who know no history and can be mobilized by meaningless slogans.
J. R. R. Tolkien knew what he was describing as "Orcs."
Richard Fagin said...
"[T]raditions of not weaponizing the office’s powers against your opponent......" Young people these days apparently use the acronym "AYFKM" to describe statements having such level of dishonesty.
7/24/20, 9:09 AM
-----
actually, it's "RUFKM", and I'm pretty sure it@apos;s been around for awhile... but I agree with the sentiment...
"America’s strong democratic norms and traditions of not weaponizing the office’s powers against your opponent"
An em-pathetic appeal to Obama's waning days in office preparing for a transition that was deemed politically incongruent to his axis of special, peculiar, and foreign interests.
Republican norms. America is not democratic. Ironically, neither are Democrats.
How did AA build up a following of Trumpists? This is how.
Some of us have been here since Trump was a Democrat and was getting civil rights awards from them.
Blogger Dave Begley said...
Durham better arrest people this month!
If you mean August, I agree. If you mean July, no.
I don't think anyone should be arrested until after the Demmie convention when Biden is locked in place.
Do it now and they might nominate someone else.
John Henry
The three things I most dislike about Trump are the way he violated America’s strong democratic norms and traditions of not weaponizing the office’s powers against his opponent, the fact that he chose a clearly unqualified stooge as his VP, and the way he consistently, cynically, and arrogantly insinuates that the only reason anyone is ever opposed to anything he wants to do is that he's black.
Blogger buwaya said...
They just have what the Spanish call a "cara dura".
Oye! Yo soy Cariduro.
Residents of Fajardo PR are nicknamed "Cariduros", literally hard faces. The name comes from the resistance shown by Fajardeños to various foreign invasions during the Spanish colonial times.
Nothing to do with dishonesty that I've ever heard in my nearly 50 years as a proud Cariduro.
But then, as in English words that are perfectly acceptable in one country, for example "cunt" in England have a very different meaning in another. Cunt being unacceptable in the US. At least among the snowflake class.
John Henry
“In particular, the FBI obtained a FISA warrant to seize and study all the past and current communications of Trump's Russia-policy advisor Carter Page. The FISA warrant enabled the FBI to seize and study all communications in a two-hop scope?”
The pieces are coming together. Yesterday, we found out that the FBI used their first defensive briefing of soon-to-be Republican candidate Trump, and his top national security team, including Gen Flynn, in mid summer of 2016, was by Peter Strzok, Kevin Clinesmith, and Joe Pientka. For those not keeping score, Strzok and Pientka were the ones who interviewed Flynn in the White House six months later, and Clinesmith was the FBI lawyer fired last year after the IG found that he had intentionally submitted fraudulent evidence (that he had personally fabricated by editing an email from another agency (likely CIA) that claimed Carter Page as an asset) in the latter two FISA application renewals. The “Defensive Briefing” was a day or two after Strzok had guaranteed his lover, Lisa Page, that he had an insurance policy against Trump being elected. Instead of actually defensively briefing Trump, etc, on the threat of Russian interference, instead, Pientka used it to get a baseline reading on Flynn, for use in the perjury trap they set six months later.
Durham better arrest people this month!
This month or next, I wouldn't count on it....
As others have noted the most likely cause of political mayhem will be vote by mail which judging by the few larger elections that have used this method, when expanded to the entire country will result in vote counts dragged out for 6-8 weeks, possibly longer. The USPS has already sent signals suggesting they are concerned about handling the volume and the address/
voter correlation is sketchy for many people, and if the economy deteriorates and housing goes to dung, that problem will only worsen. A scenario where 2021 rolls over and they are still hand counting and recounting mail in ballots with cubic yards of boxes stacked up yet to be counted could clearly occur. That assumes no concern over validity....
I suspect this is why Trump is hedging about accepting "the results" when they might not be clear if the election is at all close in the popular count in the above scenario.
Internal polling must look bad for them....
I have suspected that this is what all the rioting and White Privilege crap is about. A Trump win has seemed all but certain after the impeachment and Russian hoax and Mueller investigation fiascos. Something had to happen. Anything to get folks to crawl into the closet under a pile of blankets. A dental technician told me this morning that she is worried that folks might decide not to vote for Trump or not vote at all because if he wins, it seems likely that all fiery hell will break loose.
- Krumhorn
Writes Dave Begley: "Speaking of weaponizing the office, more evidence today of Barack and Joe spying on the Trump campaign back in August 2016. Durham better arrest people this month!"
Sorry, won't happen. Durham is just running out the clock. If he was going to seek indictments, they would have happened before May 1. Now it's election season. Indictments now are too political. That's the excuse for taking no action, anyway. Would like to be wrong about this prediction.
I think one thing people may be missing about the BLM rioting is that, the Dem's are acutely aware of Trump's massive increase in approval among Black Americans, and that many of them are sick of the lies and leaving the Democrat party forever.
If Trump is able translate this surge of approval into even 10% more vote share, it could crush the Democrat's electoral chances for the next 20 years.
Thus we have this non-stop onslaught of riots and ever louder screams of Racism, in a desperate attempt to slow or stop the exodus.
second on Rotator said at 3:45. It will be Bush-Gore on steroids with appeals to the Supreme Court to count votes received after election day and votes of unregistered voters and votes of felons contrary to state law and votes of homeless and undocumented. If Kagan and Ginsberg love this country and I think they do, they will do an enormous service by publicly saying they won't play.
Interesting
https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2020/07/24/meet_steele_dossiers_primary_subsource_fabulist_russian_at_us_think_tank_whose_boozy_past_the_fbi_ignored_124601.html
Fearless forecast:
No indictments now. A clear DS win.
No indictments ever (of DSers) if Trump loses.
Narr
Barr's out even if Trump wins
Too many of you here have too much faith and confidence in the American electorate, as if this is the 1980s.
After people totally eff the country in November, including effing themselves and turning everything to sh*t, do you think they will wise up? Will they admit their regrets? Will they rue the day? Or will they just sink us further and further?
Frankly, I think we're screwed. Totally. Permanently.
The end had to come some time.
" Mail across the system has slowed as more than 60 postal workers have been killed by the virus.... "
Not to diminish 60 deaths, but the death of one worker per state shouldn't slow the postal gears.
They had 497,000 workers in 2018.
The "good" Mark is full of shit because he lives in NoVa. All the people he sees every day are jack ass big government jerks. And those people are scared as hell that their respective artificial worlds are going to crash around them.
Fuck those people.
Take no counsel of your fears Mark. Those people deserve what is coming.
The fact that we can no longer merely disagree, but need to express it in profane insulting ad hominem ways is itself proof of the depths to which American society has sunk into the cesspool.
A "disaster"? That's usually Hivespeak for "the State-fuckers we wanted to win, lost."
Trumps greatest sin has been the interruption of the flow of graft. This has upset the _always for sale- democrats and republicans. In return they convince their street performers, the Ingas, the ARMs, the Howards that Trump is an outrage and because they never question the left narrative they can be counted on to carry the message everywhere they are permitted to speak.As evidence I give you BLM. A money gathering organization for the democrat party.
Birkel said...
Also, this is Democratics accusing Republicans of what Democratics have already done.
That gives the press a chance to "on the one hand, but on the other hand" this issue.
IKR? What a powerful weapon is "tu quoque" when you are the first to accuse the other of what you are doing. Like a nuclear first strike is better than a second strike. More golden wisdom from Himmler.
Dave Begley said...
Speaking of weaponizing the office, more evidence today of Barack and Joe spying on the Trump campaign back in August 2016.
Durham better arrest people this month!
Or else? Don't hold your breath.
buwaya said...
They aren't dense.
They just have what the Spanish call a "cara dura".
They will lie to your face, knowing that you cant do anything about it.
7/24/20, 10:31 AM
Another powerful weapon-to say what you like (also to do what you like) with a straight face, which might be our idiom, and dare you to disbelieve or disprove or react. Very powerful on such as Ann, who will always take at face value.
Readering said...
How did AA build up a following of Trumpists? This is how.
By not relentlessly quashing the truth as you would have it.
Leora said...
If Kagan and Ginsberg love this country and I think they do, they will do an enormous service by publicly saying they won't play.
7/24/20, 4:51 PM
No, Leora.
They don't love THIS country.
They love THEIR country.
If it is not theirs, they do not love it.
Don't cry for them, they're convinced they are the good guys.
Mark said...
Frankly, I think we're screwed. Totally. Permanently.
The end had to come some time.
7/24/20, 7:34 PM
[Patton slap] Snap out of it! You have a duty and you will do it. So will tim in vermont and all the others who know the score.
Is it hard? Sure it's hard. As Orwell said:
Nevertheless the high sentiments always win in the end, leaders who offer “blood, toil, tears and sweat” [Churchill’s words in 1940] always get more out of their followers than those who offer safety and a good time. When it comes to the pinch, human beings are heroic. Women face childbed and the scrubbing brush, revolutionaries keep their mouths shut in the torture chamber, battleships go down with their guns still firing when their decks are awash. It is only that the other element in man, the lazy, cowardly, debt-bilking adulterer who is inside us all, can never be suppressed altogether and needs a hearing occasionally.
It's pinch time. Time to be heroic. But it's ok to squeal a little. Let out your inner Sancho Panza by all means. But then put him away. As Q says to 007: Never let 'em see you bleed.
No time for despair till after we lose. That's how we win. Nil desperandum, boys and girls. If you can do nothing more, strike your blow for freedom in November, don't hold yourself aloof, and see what dreams may come!
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