The 2020 Presidential General Election thread

Ok, that's just too close to call by any reasonable standard.

By law, there will be a recount after the first count is done as it's so close.

Trump's people are pushing to have it begin before they've finished the first count. And they want it done without any mechanical/electronic means.

GA's agreed to do the recount by hand immediately.

"The Squad" won because their tiny, deep blue districts are almost impossible for a democrat to lose in a General due to gerrymandering. You could run Mickey Mouse as a democrat and still win those seats. That's not saying much.

Yes, they wouldn't win anywhere that was competitive.

Senate just went 49-48 Republicans maintaining the majority so far.

Decision Desk HQ has called Arizona for Biden, making it the 3rd org to do so after Fox and the AP last week.

Apparently a stunning number of the "irregularities" in Detroit are really just white Republicans whimpering "I saw a Black person and got scared."

Split ticket voting happens all the time, hard as that is for hard core partisans to believe . Not everyone is brainwashed into the red/blu team mentality.

Also the prime reason why America has been so fucked in the ass for the last century.

Here’s an American explaining to the French.

New from Arizona:

Judge in Trump lawsuit over Maricopa County votes won't accept claims gathered from website
https://www.azcentral.com/story/new...p-team-case-maricopa-county-votes/6260414002/

Can't find the link, but CNN is also reporting that more than half of all counties in Arizona have conducted post-election audits and found no discrepancies or indications of widespread fraud. They did, however, find two ballots (out of millions) that were miscounted. In other words, a typical election.

"We are unique among militaries. We do not take an oath to a king or a queen, a tyrant or a dictator. We do not take an oath to an individual. No, we do not take an oath to a country, a tribe or religion. We take an oath to the Constitution. And every soldier that is represented in this museum, every sailor, airman, Marine, Coast Guardsman, each of us will protect and defend that document, regardless of personal price," - Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley (USA) 11/11/2020 at the opening of a US Army museum.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/12/politics/mark-milley-pentagon-turmoil/index.html

Hooah.

How fucked up is the Electoral College?
Shift 0.75% (or less) in WI, AZ, and GA and the guy who lost by over 5 million votes would still be handed the job after this happened:

Networks are all calling Arizona for Biden now.

Arizonianicans voting DemocRAT? Looks like fraud to me!

#stopthesteal

So, I missed a few days, being busy.

The GOP is now very clearly a post-democracy party, I see.
Trump continues to openly plot a coup and they continue to go with him on it. This should be taken very seriously. What Biden is doing by not giving him the attention he craves may backfire.

And even in a best-case scenario, I fear what may happen in 2024 if the entire process is discredited to many, if Biden's tenure is more of the same and if Trump or someone worse runs against him.

Oh, and Democrats deserve their share of blame for this - having worked so hard to discredit the result of the 2016 election with all of the guff about the Russians.

There's a big difference between saying the Russians were using social media to influence voters and drive up some turnout and suppress others on the one hand and that actual electoral fraud was committed on the other.

For one thing, there is actual evidence of the former and there is no credible evidence of the latter to date.

But even if we were to treat them as equal possibilities, no one said that the Russians manipulated actual votes in the way of hacking voting machines or delivering phony ballots or destroying real ones before they could be counted. The notion of Russian cyberspace mindgames has nothing to do with giving credibility to a conspiracy in the real world that would be much harder to carry out.

Rand Paul tries to copy other kid's homework, is reminded he and his pals bullied the kid for being a nerd:

I think Biden is doing exactly what he should. The fact that he is not publicly taking on Trump is smart, as he's not riling up the Trumpistas. More importantly, even if Biden isn't saying anything publicly, it's almost certain he and his team are working on it in the background.

Further, your concerns about the military are, I believe, premature and likely unfounded. Several senior Pentagon leaders, including the Chair of the Joint Chiefs himself, have publicly reiterated the military's oath to the Constitution. That's about as blatant a rebuke of Trump as you can get, under the circumstances.

Biden is emailing me personally for funds to help with his legal expenses. Does anyone have access to @oldfella1962's WF password? I'm sure he uses it on his credit union account too.

It's also how you treat a toddler who is acting out to get attention.

Also, there's probably any number of people who are familiar with how things are supposed to work and are prepping to lend a hand, even if they haven't been asked to help yet.

Save for the fact that any number of banana republics have been taken over by someone with a military rank below that of general. The real issues will be are how the top brass reacts if Trump actually does try to retain power, and how much of the military Trump has alienated with his "losers and suckers" comments. If the brass reacts swiftly and decisively when Trump attempts to pull something, that'll shut things down immediately. If they don't, and Trump has alienated enough of the military, then things will fizzle out fairly quickly. But it's akin to when India and Pakistan start shooting at one another. It probably won't lead to a nuclear exchange, but you still want to keep a close eye on everything in case one of them actually does decide to pop off a nuke.

GA recount underway. GOP observers mostly no show.

Yay Marietta!!!!!

Networks now calling Georgia for Biden.

I was just about to post that poor little Georgia has been literally counting votes one at a time. When I logged on this morning, Biden was up 14,163. Just now he was one vote higher at 14,164.

Ed and me dun good.