2020 Election: Predictions, Results and Reactions

[Voronwë the Faithful]

35 Republicans voted in favor of the bill to create the commission. If an equivalent percentage of GOP Senators vote yes, the bill will fail. There are 211 GOP House members and 50 Senators, so the equivalent percentage of 35 House members is between 8 and 9 Senators, and ten would be needed to overcome a filibuster, assuming that all Democrats voted in favor (and I haven't heard of any, including Manchin, being against).

[Frelga]

If the media was 10% as liberal as the right likes to claim, the headlines would be asking what Republicans are trying to hide. 90

[N.E. Brigand]

For the bogus ballot recount in Maricopa County, Arizona, the Arizona state senate subpoenaed the county's voting equipment, which they delivered into the possession of Cyber Ninjas, the firm they contracted to conduct the audit (even though the firm has no experience auditing elections).

Cyber Ninjas now is finished with some of the equipment and is ready to give it back to Maricopa County.

But the Arizona secretary of state, after consulting with the U.S. Dept. of Homeland Security, has told Maricopa County that since the equipment left the county's custody and they have no way of knowing what Cyber Ninjas did to it, it has to be scrapped and replaced.

Fortunately for Maricopa, the state senate had indemnified the county for equipment that could be "damaged, altered, or otherwise compromised" by the auditing process, so the county won't be stuck with this bill. But given that Maricopa accounts for more than 60% of Arizona's population, Maricopa taxpayers there are ultimately going to be on the hook for a large share of this cost.

[N.E. Brigand]

At an event today, retired Lt. General Michael Flynn, the disgraced National Security Advisor to President Donald Trump who pled guilty to lying to the FBI during their investigation into his contacts with Russia, but who was pardoned by Trump before being sentenced (in another case where the Dept. of Justice needs to come clean and apologize to the courts for having made up a bunch of untrue stuff in an effort to let Flynn off the hook), said that Joe Biden's presidency should be overturned by a coup.

[N.E. Brigand]

Sunday saw a superseding indictment of several members of the Oath Keepers group for their part in the Jan. 6 insurrection. The indictment references communications between the members in which they indicated that some of them were going to wai toutside D.C., well stocked with ammunition, hoping that Antifa members would get into a fight with the Oath Keepers at the Capitol and that it would get violent enough that Pres. Trump would invoke the Insurrection Act and activate the militia, which they would take as their cue to enter D.C. as a military force.

I remember a story from a couple months ago in which someone shared photos of what looked like militia members on Jan. 6 gathered in a park in Virginia not far from D.C.

[N.E. Brigand]

At an event today, retired Lt. General Michael Flynn, the disgraced National Security Advisor to President Donald Trump who pled guilty to lying to the FBI during their investigation into his contacts with Russia, but who was pardoned by Trump before being sentenced (in another case where the Dept. of Justice needs to come clean and apologize to the courts for having made up a bunch of untrue stuff in an effort to let Flynn off the hook), said that Joe Biden's presidency should be overturned by a coup.

In 1935, Sinclair Lewis wrote a novel called It Can't Happen Here, about a demagogue who gets elected as U.S. president and then uses a paramilitary force to make himself a dictator.

Flynn yesterday was asked what prevented the U.S. from having a coup along the lines of what happened in February in Myanmar (that country's coup, in which the military removed the democratically elected head of government, has been the focus of obsession by some on the U.S. far right for months), and this is how Flynn replied:

"No. reason. I mean, it should happen here. No reason. That's right."

[N.E. Brigand]

According to New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman, former president Donald Trump has been telling associates that he expects to be reinstated in August. In light of the possibility of one of these phony election audits claiming that Trump actually won last year, and what we just heard from Mike Flynn, and I think there's a real chance of a second insurrection this summer. I hope it doesn't happen.

Edited to add:

Also notice how yesterday the Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov* yesterday said that the U.S. was persecuting the Jan. 6 insurrectionists. (Mind you, if Russian insurrectionists had attacked the Federal Assembly on Jan. 6, they probably wouldn't be alive today to stand trial.) I certainly wouldn't put it past Vladimir Putin to be egging Trump on.

*Lavrov is probably best known in the U.S. for meeting with Trump in the Oval Office the day after Trump fired FBI Director James Comey. In that meeting Trump told Lavrov and Russia's ambassador to the U.S. at the time, Sergey Kislyak, that Comey was a "nut job," that firing Comey had taken "great pressure" off him, and that he wasn't bothered by Russia's interference in U.S. elections. And Trump gave Lavrov and highly classified details about an operation in Syria that Israel believed made it possible for Russia to identify one of their agents inside ISIS.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Let me correct the former president:

former president Donald Trump has been telling associates that he expects to be reinstated indicted in August.

There, that looks better.

(I don't actually expect him to be indicted in August, or probably ever, but I certainly think it is more likely than that he will reinstated, though I don't disagree with you that there is a significant chance that his supporters will take further crazy, dangerous actions. I think if there is an indictment it is more likely to be at the end of the year, and probably just against the Trump Organization, not against the former president himself.)

[Voronwë the Faithful]

At an event today, retired Lt. General Michael Flynn, the disgraced National Security Advisor to President Donald Trump who pled guilty to lying to the FBI during their investigation into his contacts with Russia, but who was pardoned by Trump before being sentenced (in another case where the Dept. of Justice needs to come clean and apologize to the courts for having made up a bunch of untrue stuff in an effort to let Flynn off the hook), said that Joe Biden's presidency should be overturned by a coup.

In 1935, Sinclair Lewis wrote a novel called It Can't Happen Here, about a demagogue who gets elected as U.S. president and then uses a paramilitary force to make himself a dictator.

Flynn yesterday was asked what prevented the U.S. from having a coup along the lines of what happened in February in Myanmar (that country's coup, in which the military removed the democratically elected head of government, has been the focus of obsession by some on the U.S. far right for months), and this is how Flynn replied:

"No. reason. I mean, it should happen here. No reason. That's right."

I've seen several calls for Flynn to be indicted for sedition for making this statement (which he claims he didn't make, despite it being on video), including one by Lt. Col. Yevgeny Vindman, an officer in the Army Judge Advocate General's Corps. Col. Vindman is the twin brother of Col. Alexander Vindman, who was one of the star witnesses in Trump's first impeachment. Both Vindman brothers were fired by Trump after he was acquitted in the first impeachment trial, but Col. Yevgeny Vindman was rehired by the Biden administration. He is offering to prosecute Flynn, which I think is wildly irresponsible thing to do, particularly if there is any chance that Flynn could be charged (as a retired General, Flynn is apparently still subject to the Uniform Code of Military Justice, though it appears to be somewhat of an open question.

[N.E. Brigand]

Writing in National Review, Charles Cooke says that multiple sources tell him that Haberman's reporting is correct, and not only does Donald Trump appear to truly believe that he will be president again by August, but he also seems to believe that former Georgia senator David Perdue and former Arizona senator Martha McSally will also be reseated to replace the men who defeated them, Jon Ossoff and Mark Kelly.

We never did learn why Trump made a secret surprise visit to the hospital in November 2019.

(Edited to correctly identify McSally and the opponent she lost to.)

[N.E. Brigand]

Per the New York Times today: in early January, President Trump's chief of staff, Mark Meadows, urged the Dept. of Justice to investigate various conspiracy theories about the 2020 election, including this one:

At the tail-end of his second term, President Barack Obama took money from one of the “pallets of cash” (which is part of a different right-wing conspiracy theory) going to Iran, funneling $400 million to people in Italy in exchange for help trying to “unravel the Trump presidency.” In exchange, an Italian general used a military satellite to upload software to American voting machines that would change votes from Trump to Joe Biden. Just like that, boom, Trump loses.

That's from a write-up at Media Matters for All, which was meant to show just how unattached from reality some Trump supporters had become.

But that story was almost entirely overlooked, because it was published at 12:48 p.m. on January 6, and within the hour it became clear that a number of Trump supporters had gone much farther off the deep end.

That Jan. 6 piece says "Luckily for those of us living in the reality-based world, major pro-Trump media organizations haven’t picked up this story -- yet." But now we learn that just the day before that story appeared, the White House asked Jeffrey Rosen, the Acting Attorney General, to look into it.

- - - - - - - - - -
Speaking of Jan. 6, the FBI informed Congress this week that they believe about 2,000 people participated in the insurrection, and that they expect to bring charges against approximately 800 of them. Also I gather that the Dept. of Justice is saying that the attack resulted $1.4 million in damages, and that they will be seeking restitution from the attackers. If all 800 are found guilty or plead guilty, that works out to about $1,750 per person.

[N.E. Brigand]

At an event today, retired Lt. General Michael Flynn, the disgraced National Security Advisor to President Donald Trump who pled guilty to lying to the FBI during their investigation into his contacts with Russia, but who was pardoned by Trump before being sentenced (in another case where the Dept. of Justice needs to come clean and apologize to the courts for having made up a bunch of untrue stuff in an effort to let Flynn off the hook), said that Joe Biden's presidency should be overturned by a coup.

In 1935, Sinclair Lewis wrote a novel called It Can't Happen Here, about a demagogue who gets elected as U.S. president and then uses a paramilitary force to make himself a dictator.

Flynn yesterday was asked what prevented the U.S. from having a coup along the lines of what happened in February in Myanmar (that country's coup, in which the military removed the democratically elected head of government, has been the focus of obsession by some on the U.S. far right for months), and this is how Flynn replied:

"No. reason. I mean, it should happen here. No reason. That's right."

I've seen several calls for Flynn to be indicted for sedition for making this statement (which he claims he didn't make, despite it being on video), including one by Lt. Col. Yevgeny Vindman, an officer in the Army Judge Advocate General's Corps. Col. Vindman is the twin brother of Col. Alexander Vindman, who was one of the star witnesses in Trump's first impeachment. Both Vindman brothers were fired by Trump after he was acquitted in the first impeachment trial, but Col. Yevgeny Vindman was rehired by the Biden administration. He is offering to prosecute Flynn, which I think is wildly irresponsible thing to do, particularly if there is any chance that Flynn could be charged (as a retired General, Flynn is apparently still subject to the Uniform Code of Military Justice, though it appears to be somewhat of an open question.

I agree with you that Yevgeny Vindman shouldn't have said that.

And speaking of military brothers, today Michael Flynn's brother, General Charles Flynn, was put in charge of U.S. Army Pacific, the component of the Army that overseas that military branch's troops in Hawai'i, Alaska, Japan, South Korea, and other locations in and adjacent to the Pacific Ocean.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Rep. Mo Brooks of Alabama has finally been served with the lawsuit filed by Rep. Eric Swalwell against Brooks, former president Trump, Trump's son Donald Trump, Jr. and Rudy Giuliani, alleging that they incited the 1/6 insurrection and interfered with Swalwell's official duties in doing so. The suit was filed in early March, and the Trumps and Rudy were cooperative in accepting service, but Brooks has refused to cooperate. Eventually, the PI that Swalwell had hired tracked down Brook's wife. Brooks is now accusing them of breaking into his house to serve her which Swalwell's team denies.

I doubt this lawsuit will be successful, but it could succeed in obtaining additional information about the Trumps, Giuliani and Brooks actions, and keep the topic in the spotlight heading into the mid-term elections.

[Frelga]

The angry Brooks tweeted a photo of his laptop (not a screen shot) with a tab open to a section of the law on criminal trespass. And his password taped to the screen. It went up at 10:41am and was still up 12 hours later.

Because irony is so dead even the Necromancer can't revive it, Brooks serves on the House Armed Services subcommittee on Cyber, Innovative Technologies, and Information Systems.

[N.E. Brigand]

I've seen several calls for Flynn to be indicted for sedition for making this statement (which he claims he didn't make, despite it being on video), including one by Lt. Col. Yevgeny Vindman, an officer in the Army Judge Advocate General's Corps. Col. Vindman is the twin brother of Col. Alexander Vindman, who was one of the star witnesses in Trump's first impeachment. Both Vindman brothers were fired by Trump after he was acquitted in the first impeachment trial, but Col. Yevgeny Vindman was rehired by the Biden administration. He is offering to prosecute Flynn, which I think is wildly irresponsible thing to do, particularly if there is any chance that Flynn could be charged (as a retired General, Flynn is apparently still subject to the Uniform Code of Military Justice, though it appears to be somewhat of an open question.

I agree with you that Yevgeny Vindman shouldn't have said that.

And speaking of military brothers, today Michael Flynn's brother, General Charles Flynn, was put in charge of U.S. Army Pacific, the component of the Army that overseas that military branch's troops in Hawai'i, Alaska, Japan, South Korea, and other locations in and adjacent to the Pacific Ocean.

Hmm. Per a new Senate report about security failures on January 6, multiple witnesses say that Gen. Charles Flynn was among those in the Pentagon that day who opposed calling in the national guard to quell the insurrection.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I'm curious, are you suggesting that the Biden administration is somehow pandering to Trump supporters by promoting General Charles Flynn? Or just bending over backwards to seem "fair"? Or just presenting information with no particular agenda? Other than his supposed participation in the phone call in which Lieutenant General Walter E. Piatt, Director of the Army Staff, said he could not recommend the request for the National Guard be approved on January 6 (which Gen. Flynn says he does not recall), I don't recall him ever generating any kind of controversy at all, unlike his brother, who Obama famously fired and then warned Trump against hiring. Is your opposition to his promotion (if in fact you are opposed to his promotion) based on anything else that he has done in the past, or just because he is his brother's brother?

[N.E. Brigand]

The Biden administration is being scrupulously fair. I hope it doesn't come back to bite them. Gen. Charles Flynn may very well be a stand-up fellow. However, U.S. military statements were initially evasive about whether he'd even been involved in the response to the insurrection. And that set off alarm bells for me.

In this as in a number of other situations about which I've made a stink here lately, I see the risk of bad actors gaming a system that was never designed to accommodate their behavior. (This one less than the others: I'm not sure Charles Flynn, even if the suspicion that he shares his brother's dangerous views has any basis in fact, can cause a whole lot of trouble overseeing this Pacific command. In fact, I would entertain the notion that he was deliberately promoted to this position so as to get him into a role where he cannot affect domestic affairs.) For five years, we have been repeatedly told that our system is robust and can withstand attacks, and it may very well be that we'd be in an even worse place if good people decided that the dangers were so great that it was necessary to break the rules. But looking ahead, here's where I fear we are headed: in November 2024, Joe Biden wins the popular vote and enough states by a margin similar to his victory in 2020. But this time, Congress is in Republican hands, as are state legislatures in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Those states award their electors to the Republican candidate, based on phony claims of fraud. And then Congress certifies those phony slates on Jan. 6, 2025, even though Joe Biden was the real winner.

I don't know what needs to be done to avoid that fate, and I worry that the steps necessary to prevent it could have even worse ramifications.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I do not think those are unreasonable concerns, much as it pains me to say so.

[N.E. Brigand]

Hmm. Per a new Senate report about security failures on January 6, multiple witnesses say that Gen. Charles Flynn was among those in the Pentagon that day who opposed calling in the national guard to quell the insurrection.

Speaking of that Senate report, Mitch McConnell says that it proves there was no need for an independent bipartisan commission to investigate January 6, since Congress can unearth any outstanding mysteries on its own.

But the Washington Post reports that in order to get Republicans to sign off on this report, Democrats had to agree to minimize any language about the role Donald Trump played in causing the insurrection.

[N.E. Brigand]

At some point in the past, I had heard of the "Conservapedia" website, launched in 2006 with the goal of countering Wikipedia's supposed bias against the right. Until writer Ben Dreyfuss mentioned it today, I had no idea the site was still around.

As Dreyfuss notes, it's fascinating how the site, already rather skewed, has changed in the wake of Donald Trump's presidency; he shows how the pages for John McCain and Mitt Romney, which flattered those men in 2008 and 2012, respectively, are now filled with scorn. And here's a bit of how last year's election is described (I elide the end note numbering):

United States presidential election, 2020

Democrats nominated segregationist Joseph R. Biden, commonly known as the "Architect of Mass Incarceration" of minorities. His running mate, Kamala Harris, hired corrupt Democrat election attorney Marc Elias to run her primary campaign. Marc Elias was the paymaster of Christopher Steele in what has been described as the biggest political scandal in modern American history. Both Biden and Harris are descendants of slave owners. Harris has promised riots will not stop before or after the election.

Credible rape allegations, Biden-China collusion, and failing cognitive skills of the Democrat nominee were largely ignored by the liberal biased mainstream media. Former Sanders co-chair Nina Turner said voting for Joe Biden is like "eating half a bowl of s***." Biden additionally has been caught up in the Obamagate and Ukrainian collusion scandals.

There's even a section titled "Biden Junta."

(Speaking of inedible cereal, New York Times columnist Jamelle Bouie today offered a new installment in his video series of breakfast cereal reviews, this time featuring a Kellogg's cereal found only in South Korea: Green Onion Chex.)

Curious to learn more about how the site grapples with reality, I scanned the Joe Biden page, where I read that:

Joseph Robinette “Joe” Biden, Jr. (born November 20, 1942, see: Biden's age), is the current occupant of the White House. His right hand henchman, chief-of-staff Ron Klain, has tweeted that 68% of Americans are correct in their belief that American elections are rigged. Biden is a 10% shareholder in a company that is a partner of the government owned Bank of China and Chinese military. The government of China itself has murdered 80 million of its own people throughout its seventy year plus existence, and is far more powerful than the Nazi regime or Soviet Union ever were.

Joe Biden signed 42 executive order diktats in his first week after seizing power. Four weeks into the junta, several collaborators sought to relieve Biden of sole responsibility to launch a nuclear strike due to his diminished mental capacity. Since assuming the White House office, Biden has become increasingly incoherent.

At the top of that page, there's a "see also" listing for "Biden Crime Family." And here is the photograph on the Biden page:



However, the explicitly political pages may not really capture the site's ethos. This is one of its most frequently viewed articles:

Counterexamples to Relativity:

The theory of relativity is disproved by numerous counterexamples, but is promoted by liberals who like its encouragement of relativism and its tendency to pull people away from the Bible. Here is a list of 52 counterexamples: any one of them would show that the mathematical theory is incorrect:

You'll have to read the list for yourself.