Election Night Thread

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Expand view Topic review: Election Night Thread

Re: Election Night Thread

by Matticus13 » Sun Nov 15, 2020 10:17 pm

Trump's 192 orders are the most in a term since Clinton's first, but modern Presidents are pretty light on executive orders compared to their predecessors of the early to mid 1900s. Teddy made it cool, but his cuz (5th cousin) took it to another level (yes, he had to deal with the Great Depression and WWII, but 3,721 seems excessive [yes, he served 12 years... still the highest average by far]).

https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/statist ... ive-orders

^ fun site to compare different administrations

Re: Election Night Thread

by Randomizer » Sun Nov 15, 2020 9:43 pm

Imperial Presidency goes back to the Nixon era. Although it got worse under Reagan bypassing Congressional spending with Iran-Contra to fund a war without oversight.

Trump administration went past executive orders to officials creating rules without following lawful procedures or even being confirmed to their positions to have the authority to make the new rules.

Re: Election Night Thread

by flash2015 » Sun Nov 15, 2020 7:39 pm

I don't see there is anything especially Trumpian about using executive orders. The main complaints against Trump is not his use of executive orders but his divisiveness.

Remember before Trump, Obama was also a prodigious user of executive orders too (especially when blocked by the House/Senate - DACA was a result of the failure to pass immigration reform)...Republicans at the time complained of the "Imperial Presidency" but then became remarkably silent when Trump used executive orders even more.

Biden should try and avoid executive orders unless he has no other option. Of course he should go and reverse a lot of the Trump stuff immediately.

It would be nice if we could have a proper non-partisan debate on what really should be the limit of executive power...but I won't hold my breath.

Re: Election Night Thread

by Crazy Anglican » Wed Nov 11, 2020 3:05 am

Neither party wants to govern, both want to rule.

Re: Election Night Thread

by Octavious » Tue Nov 10, 2020 9:53 pm

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss

Re: Election Night Thread

by Randomizer » Tue Nov 10, 2020 6:09 pm

McConnell has spent the last 5 years showing his greatest concern is getting judges confirmed that support his viewpoint. The annual budget, emergency spending to help the economy through COVID-19, repairing the nation's infrastructure, the environment, and other important national issues were blocked or delayed.

So getting around the obstacle may require doing as Trump did and pointing out that the Republicans allowed it, even if it was illegal.

Re: Election Night Thread

by Matticus13 » Tue Nov 10, 2020 2:12 pm

The "eye for an eye" mentality has to go. Time to act like grown ups.

Re: Election Night Thread

by Octavious » Tue Nov 10, 2020 8:39 am

Are you saying that you want Biden to adopt Trump's methods and cement them as part of the American system for the foreseeable future?

Re: Election Night Thread

by orathaic » Mon Nov 09, 2020 11:35 pm

Octavious wrote:
Mon Nov 09, 2020 10:06 pm
Randomizer wrote:
Sun Nov 08, 2020 8:31 pm
https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/08/politics ... index.html

Biden campaign has prepared executive orders to overturn much of what Trump has done in the last 4 years with his executive orders. Bypassing the Congress is becoming the normal way to govern. So much for checks and balances.

Congress sole power will be passing funding, but Trump has shown that once there is money available, it can be be shifted for "national emergencies."
Don't be so quick to write off Biden as another Trump. I think he has several flaws, but I don't think a disregard of good governance and being weak willed is one of them. I may be wrong, and we'll see him cementing the Trumpian way of doing things rather than repairing the damage, but I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt until proved otherwise.
Some things the Republicans have done are going to come back and bite them. Biden will of course happily use what he can to bring them to the negotiating table. Whether they believe it is worth reaching across the aisle is another matter entirely.

Re: Election Night Thread

by Octavious » Mon Nov 09, 2020 10:06 pm

Randomizer wrote:
Sun Nov 08, 2020 8:31 pm
https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/08/politics ... index.html

Biden campaign has prepared executive orders to overturn much of what Trump has done in the last 4 years with his executive orders. Bypassing the Congress is becoming the normal way to govern. So much for checks and balances.

Congress sole power will be passing funding, but Trump has shown that once there is money available, it can be be shifted for "national emergencies."
Don't be so quick to write off Biden as another Trump. I think he has several flaws, but I don't think a disregard of good governance and being weak willed is one of them. I may be wrong, and we'll see him cementing the Trumpian way of doing things rather than repairing the damage, but I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt until proved otherwise.

Re: Election Night Thread

by Fluminator » Mon Nov 09, 2020 9:42 pm

trump is just playing 5d chess! He was intentionally corrupt to draw out the evil corrupt democrats / clinton and her shills into rigging the election so he can catch them red handed along with their pedo network. trump is a stable genius and do you really think he didn't see this election rigging coming? He will still end up victorious and he will have the reciets to prove it.Just wait and see

Re: Election Night Thread

by Randomizer » Sun Nov 08, 2020 8:31 pm

https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/08/politics ... index.html

Biden campaign has prepared executive orders to overturn much of what Trump has done in the last 4 years with his executive orders. Bypassing the Congress is becoming the normal way to govern. So much for checks and balances.

Congress sole power will be passing funding, but Trump has shown that once there is money available, it can be be shifted for "national emergencies."

Re: Election Night Thread

by flash2015 » Sun Nov 08, 2020 8:22 pm

Octavious wrote:
Sat Nov 07, 2020 5:12 pm
This one was over a couple of days ago when it became obvious both that the direction of the count was favoring Biden and that there was no appetite from the powers that be to support Trump's legal campaign. The only thing that can save Trump now is if one of the automatic recounts finds a few thousand Trump votes that had mysteriously been missed, and that seems highly unlikely.
Most reasonable people agree that the election was won a couple of days ago (even GWB today congratulated Biden)...but can you tell Trump and his hard-core cult-like supporters that yet? Trump tweeted yesterday that not only did he win...but he won by A LOT. He continues to spread more nonsense today:

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/sta ... 5045071873

An official statement from Trump after the result was announced:

https://www.donaldjtrump.com/media/stat ... d-j.-trump

Donald Trump Jr calling for "total war":

https://nypost.com/2020/11/05/terrified ... -election/

Giuliani is keeping on claiming all sorts of nonsense:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pk8nZcKlE1I

Just to remember from 2016 Hillary gave a gracious concession speech even though the results were just as close there too and Hillary was up in the popular vote:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khK9fIgoNjQ

Obama said something similar to calm nerves the same day Hillary conceded:

"We have to remember that we're actually all on one team…We’re not Democrats first, we're not Republicans first, we are Americans first. We're patriots first. We all want what’s best for this country."

https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/bl ... s-election
What we have now are four years of a man several decades past his prime leading the US through an unprecedented health crisis and the inevitable financial crisis that follows, with the addition of a now openly hostile superpower rival in China overseas and a hostile Republican party at home with millions of very angry people believing the Trump line that he's illegitimate. God help him if the Republicans keep the senate.

This would be an extremely tough challenge for the greatest US presidents at their peak. Biden seems a decent man, but he's neither great nor at his peak. He will spend a lot of his political capital doing necessary but unpopular (in certain circles at least) things like rejoining WHO and rejoining the fight against climate change. I don't think he's up to it, and there will be an inevitable backlash when it starts to go wrong. That's when things have the potential to become dangerous.
We have had four years of a complete and utter nutcase as president that spent much of his time watching fox news and tweeting nonsense and conspiracy theories. For example the whole hydroxycloroquine saga occurred because Trump watched Tucker Carlson the night before interview a quack claiming that hydroxycloroquine was "the 100% cure" so he repeated it. Trump undermines his own government's response to coronavirus forcing people like Fauci to require 24 hour security which is nuts. The bar is very low for improvement on this.

You are right that it is going to be a tough four years. The coronavirus response has been a disaster...and Biden has to bring it back on track. We have had four years on conspiracy BS tearing the country apart...Biden has to find a way to turn down the temperature on the partisanship and push the conspiracy nonsense (on either side of politics) back to the fringes which is what he already appears to be trying to do in his speeches so far. If he can do just these two things, that is a win in my book.

It may even be a blessing in disguise if Democrats don't win the Senate. The last two times the democrats had both the House and the Senate after winning the presidency (Clinton in 1992 and Obama in 2008) they couldn't get their act together and lost the House two years later. To get anything done, Biden is likely going to need to triangulate like Clinton did in the 90s. Note that Clinton became even more popular after Democrats lost the House. It could be possible that Biden is able to achieve a similar outcome.

Re: Election Night Thread

by taylor4 » Sun Nov 08, 2020 2:26 pm

RE: Appointments to be confirmed by US Senate (if GOP controlled):
"Centrist ... " WELL, Merrick Garland, the former chief judge of the D.C. circuit - the federal appellate court -, WELL, Garland was President Obama's (most) centrist nomination. How'd that go ?

Re: Election Night Thread

by Randomizer » Sun Nov 08, 2020 3:52 am

There are always a few votes where they want to appease voters back home to get re-elected and know in advance that their votes aren't needed to change to outcome.

Re: Election Night Thread

by Matticus13 » Sun Nov 08, 2020 3:10 am

orathaic wrote:
Sun Nov 08, 2020 1:02 am
One republican out of 53 didn't vote for Amy Cohen Barret, right? And 2 didn't vote for impeachment. Otherwise it has been fairly solid party lines for everything.
Not exactly. If they know they will have defections, they either modify the legislation until they have the votes, or they simply avoid bringing it to the floor for a vote.

If Dems were to gain both Georgia seats for a 50-50, there are some moderate Democrats from conservative states that could still cause problems, depending on what is being legislated.

Re: Election Night Thread

by orathaic » Sun Nov 08, 2020 1:02 am

One republican out of 53 didn't vote for Amy Cohen Barret, right? And 2 didn't vote for impeachment. Otherwise it has been fairly solid party lines for everything.

Re: Election Night Thread

by TrPrado » Sat Nov 07, 2020 11:39 pm

Octavious wrote:
Sat Nov 07, 2020 10:35 pm
In practice how strong would a 51-49 or 52-48 majority be? Has American politics reached the stage where people vote along party lines so reliably that even a razor thin majority is pretty solid, or is there scope for a fair few Democrat victories? In the UK Parliament, for example, the Conservative 80 seat majority is unusually hefty, but even so there will be times when it is in danger of being defeated due to rebellions and the like.
The Republican majority is already razor thin, to the point that Mitch McConnell had to change the rules on confirming Supreme Court justices to only require a simple majority of the Senate (otherwise Kavanaugh and Barrett would not currently be members of the Court).

Re: Election Night Thread

by Randomizer » Sat Nov 07, 2020 11:27 pm

Octavious wrote:
Sat Nov 07, 2020 8:26 pm
Randomizer wrote:
Sat Nov 07, 2020 6:16 pm
It depends upon how many Pence will promise to pardon. All those rats have to worry about crimes that will be investigated under the new administration.

Trump and the Republican party have given Biden a road map on how to avoid Congressional approval and oversight. Except for judicial appointments, Biden can use temporary appointments to offices, executive orders for laws, and stonewall Republicans in Congress and tie it up in the courts.
Are you saying you want Biden to be a new Trump? If you think that the Democrats should start their period in power by adopting Trumpian methods then Trump has truly won.
McConnell already announced he would block hearings for all Biden appointments that are not centrist in his opinion. It's very rare that an incoming president's choices are rejected automatically.

Re: Election Night Thread

by Octavious » Sat Nov 07, 2020 10:35 pm

In practice how strong would a 51-49 or 52-48 majority be? Has American politics reached the stage where people vote along party lines so reliably that even a razor thin majority is pretty solid, or is there scope for a fair few Democrat victories? In the UK Parliament, for example, the Conservative 80 seat majority is unusually hefty, but even so there will be times when it is in danger of being defeated due to rebellions and the like.

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