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US Elections - The white power-suit vs the white-power suit


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25 minutes ago, Fez said:

What this election has made abundantly clear is that the "checks and balances" of our system are not independent entities that exist above the system and watch over it; they are entirely reliant on people within the system actually acting. Congress could impeach Trump if he went over the line, but would they? That would require Republicans to actually stand up to him, and almost none of them have.

An important theme throughout this election is that, when pressed, most Republicans will not oppose Donald Trump. I don't see why that would change if he were President Trump.

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I must say that this election has been really depressing for a lot of reasons.  And one of the most irritating is that you can pretty much just ask yourself "has Trump said anything horribly offensive in the past week?" and if the answer is no, assume he's going up in the polls.  It's like all he has to do is not be actively sabotaging his campaign and people start to forget how horrible he is. 

The consolation for me is that while his poll position is improving somewhat over a week ago, it isn't happening nearly quickly enough with election day just 13 days off.  Plus, we're already past 20% of total 2012 votes cast in states like NV, FL, NC, IA, AZ, GA.  In general early voting numbers look really good in all those places (save perhaps Iowa). 

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There's no indication yet that Trump has gone up in the polls relative to Clinton. There's that one Bloomberg poll giving him a +2 lead in Florida; but until we see anything else, that can be chalked up as an outlier. There were literally two polls released just yesterday that had Clinton at +3 in Florida.

And the ABC national tracker went from Clinton +12 yesterday to Clinton +9 today. But nothing happened to cause a 3 point drop in one day; if it goes down again tomorrow, then its possibly cause for concern (although it could also be that they just had a very favorable sample from the weekend rolling off). But its more likely to just be margin-of-error float that trackers usually have.

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I voted yesterday in Texas.  Was surprised that even on the second day of early voting there were lines out the door.  Anecdotal, but my neighborhood (Austin in general really) isn't exactly a Trump stronghold so I was encouraged by the number of people showing up.  

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1 minute ago, S John said:

I voted yesterday in Texas.  Was surprised that even on the second day of early voting there were lines out the door.  Anecdotal, but my neighborhood (Austin in general really) isn't exactly a Trump stronghold so I was encouraged by the number of people showing up.  

Last I saw early voting in alot of Texas's more liberal parts are up by a lot. Like double from 2012 or something.

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7 minutes ago, Fez said:

There's no indication yet that Trump has gone up in the polls relative to Clinton.

The RCP national polling average had Clinton's lead peak at +7.1 on October 18.  It is currently at +4.4. 

On 538's adjusted average of national polls had Clinton peak at +6.9 on October 17.  It is currently at Clinton +5.9. 

You may not like the methodologies or polls included in either of those aggregators, but it is simply false to say there is "no indication" that Trump is gaining on Clinton in the past week. 

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2 minutes ago, Shryke said:

Last I saw early voting in alot of Texas's more liberal parts are up by a lot. Like double from 2012 or something.

Not just the more liberal parts, early voting is up across all of Texas by pretty large amounts. The county with the least change still saw something like an 11% increase in early voting; and many counties are at 100% or more. Its not clear why. Although Texas usually has some of the lowest turnout rates in the country, so maybe its just people of all political persuasions wanting to vote and get things over with.

1 minute ago, Maithanet said:

The RCP national polling average had Clinton's lead peak at +7.1 on October 18.  It is currently at +4.4. 

On 538's adjusted average of national polls had Clinton peak at +6.9 on October 17.  It is currently at Clinton +5.9. 

You may not like the methodologies or polls included in either of those aggregators, but it is simply false to say there is "no indication" that Trump is gaining on Clinton in the past week. 

RCP is literal garbage. They roll Democratic-favorable polls out of their averages as quickly as possible and keep Republican-favorable polls in for way too long; and they don't include numerous partisan Democratic polls but include all partisan Republican polls. RCP is literally fixed to produce a narrative favorable to Republicans. And I literally mean literally.

As to 538, yes, I do mean that's no indication,  because there are almost no pollsters who had a national poll last week and a national poll this week and you can't compare trendlines across pollsters. As for the pollsters who DID have a national poll last week and this week; IBD went from Trump +1 to Clinton +1, Reuters went from Clinton +4 to Clinton +5, the Times-Picayune went from Clinton +6 to Clinton +6, the LA Times went from a tie to Trump +1, and Rasmussen went from Trump +2 to Clinton +1. That's an average INCREASE of 1 point in Clinton's favor since last week. Its simply false to say there's any indication Trump has gained on Clinton.

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20 minutes ago, James Arryn said:

Fez, no pressure or anything, but you are becoming my personal canary in the coal mine. If/when you freak out, I'm going full Mosquito Coast.

Word. And on that note, a question related to freaking out:

In the event neither Clinton nor Trump get to 270, which House elects the President? The current house, or newly elected House? Past precendent from 1824 suggests the latter (they met to vote on Feb 9, 1825), but the 12th Amendment says "if no person have such majority...the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President." My guess is that means "immediately upon convening the new Congress" vs. "immediately after no candidate gets a majority of electors," but how settled is this question, really?

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19 minutes ago, Ariadne23 said:

Word. And on that note, a question related to freaking out:

In the event neither Clinton nor Trump get to 270, which House elects the President? The current house, or newly elected House? Past precendent from 1824 suggests the latter (they met to vote on Feb 9, 1825), but the 12th Amendment says "if no person have such majority...the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President." My guess is that means "immediately upon convening the new Congress" vs. "immediately after no candidate gets a majority of electors," but how settled is this question, really?

Well, there's a  court that can make that interpretation.  Oh wait.  There are only 8 of them.  

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Its the new House. The electoral college votes on December 19, the college officially reports the vote tally to the President of the Senate and the Archivist of the United States on December 28, they officially report the vote tally to the Secretary of the Senate and the Clerk of the House on January 3, and finally Congress sits in joint session on January 6 to count the reported votes.

The 12th amendment says that the House votes if no candidate has a majority after that vote count. The new House is seated on January 3, so they'll be the ones doing it.

Congress can change any of those dates, but it would take a change in law and Obama is still President until January 20; he wouldn't sign the bill to help Republicans.

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2 hours ago, Fez said:

What this election has made abundantly clear is that the "checks and balances" of our system are not independent entities that exist above the system and watch over it; they are entirely reliant on people within the system actually acting. Congress could impeach Trump if he went over the line, but would they? That would require Republicans to actually stand up to him, and almost none of them have. The Supreme Court could strike down executive orders from Trump, but what happens if Trump announces that he does not recognize the authority of the Supreme Court on this issue? Hell, he even has some precedent there thanks to Andrew Jackson.

The US system of governance is far more fragile than most people thought just a few years ago (the debt ceiling crisis in 2011 started showing the cracks), and that is the lasting takeaway from this election. It only works when people agree it works, and if there's ever a nominee like Trump again and that nominee wins; there's no telling what will happen.

I've been saying this for several years, and it's not just this election. Our system is too reliant on people in office acting in good faith. The takeaway for US politics in the post-W era is that many of the cornerstones of the system are merely customs, not rules, and that there are no real consequences to flouting them. The refusal to hold SCOTUS nominee hearings is the most obvious example, but it infests all of our politics.

The electorate is sufficiently polarized that legislators can do basically whatever they want to stick it to the other party, and the base is unlikely to punish them. Hell, most of the base will probably give its full-throated approval. But even if it doesn't, most of its constituents still won't throw them out of office, because that would mean the other guy gets in. Nowhere is that clearer than Donald fucking Trump.

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50 minutes ago, Mlle. Zabzie said:

Well, there's a  court that can make that interpretation.  Oh wait.  There are only 8 of them.  

Some author of some article somewhere suggested that if any issue goes to the Court, Trump would press for Ginsberg to recuse herself because the "nasty comments" she made. I doubt she would, but there a handle for insurrectionists to grab on to. (Plus, judicial integrity aside, would Roberts ever allow Trump to be President if there was any arguable ambiguity in the question before the Court?)

37 minutes ago, Fez said:

Its the new House. The electoral college votes on December 19, the college officially reports the vote tally to the President of the Senate and the Archivist of the United States on December 28, they officially report the vote tally to the Secretary of the Senate and the Clerk of the House on January 3, and finally Congress sits in joint session on January 6 to count the reported votes.

The 12th amendment says that the House votes if no candidate has a majority after that vote count. The new House is seated on January 3, so they'll be the ones doing it.

Awesome explanation, thank you.

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4 hours ago, Jaxom 1974 said:

Dear lord...because I have friends supporting Trump (I need to seriously look at that...), I sometimes see when they post in the comments at Breitbart, or the other tin foil hat sites, and one individual, stated that, "We're made Kelley, so maybe it's time to break her, folks.  Accusing someone of being a sexual predator without proof..." and so on, because of this flap with Newt on air last night.  Meghan Kelly, so far as I can see, did nothing wrong and actually was working as a journalist with actual follow up.  It's horrific.

Trump and his campaign members are basically Breitbart commenters. Like this guy:

That sounds a bit like a threat.

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4 hours ago, Ariadne23 said:

Word. And on that note, a question related to freaking out:

In the event neither Clinton nor Trump get to 270, which House elects the President? The current house, or newly elected House? Past precendent from 1824 suggests the latter (they met to vote on Feb 9, 1825), but the 12th Amendment says "if no person have such majority...the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President." My guess is that means "immediately upon convening the new Congress" vs. "immediately after no candidate gets a majority of electors," but how settled is this question, really?

 

4 hours ago, Mlle. Zabzie said:

Well, there's a  court that can make that interpretation.  Oh wait.  There are only 8 of them.  

 

4 hours ago, Fez said:

Its the new House. The electoral college votes on December 19, the college officially reports the vote tally to the President of the Senate and the Archivist of the United States on December 28, they officially report the vote tally to the Secretary of the Senate and the Clerk of the House on January 3, and finally Congress sits in joint session on January 6 to count the reported votes.

The 12th amendment says that the House votes if no candidate has a majority after that vote count. The new House is seated on January 3, so they'll be the ones doing it.

Congress can change any of those dates, but it would take a change in law and Obama is still President until January 20; he wouldn't sign the bill to help Republicans.

If Hillary fails to get past 270 then Republicans will almost certainly still hold a majority in the House. So it won't really matter whether it's the outgoing House or the incoming House that decides, because the Republicans will decide the next president.

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