stay tuned!

[iambiguous]

'Now the president is threatening another crisis, tweeting that we might have to delay the election because there could be mail-in voting fraud.

'In his view, either he wins or the election is rigged. He’s trying to make mail-in ballots socially unacceptable the same way he made masks socially unacceptable for the first five months of the plague.

'The Washington Post reports that backlogs at the U.S. Postal Service are causing some employees there to worry that the Trump lackey in charge, a top donor, is intentionally gumming up the works just in time for the election. It is astounding the corrupt lengths the administration seems willing to go to — destroying the Postal Service to win the election. Ben Franklin would be incensed.

As Axelrod notes, “Whatever happened back in the Bush v. Gore recount days will seem like the Garden of Innocence compared to what’s going to happen now. Trump is not going to walk to the rostrum and say, ‘The people have spoken and I accept their verdict.’’’

Even Trump’s closest allies in Congress, Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy, couldn’t stomach the idea of postponing the election, and both have swallowed a lot over the last three years. Trump’s little trial balloon blew up like the Hindenburg.'

Maureen Dowd

On the other hand, I'm actually beginning to think that Trump really will refuse to step down unless Putin and others can once again rig the election in his favor. After all, are the Democrats really a match for Vladimir when it comes to rigging elections?

As always though with things like this, it's not the moral or the political arguments that count, but what Trump can actually accomplish in regard to those who have the boots on the ground power either to stop him or to do his bidding.

[promethean75]

Like I was saying months ago... this guy is such a perfect moron I have trouble believing all this is by accident. It almost seems staged somehow.

[iambiguous]

'Gail Collins: You told me once you thought Trump was too cowardly to actually try to pull off a coup. I can’t tell you how much comfort I’ve been taking from that thought. So — just checking — is that still your opinion?

'Bret Stephens: Still is. What I think this tweet tells us is that Trump knows in his heart that he is likely to lose in November. He’s laying the groundwork not for a coup but for an excuse, both for himself and for his followers. It creates a mythology to explain defeat, attack Joe Biden and keep the Trump family relevant in the Republican Party. The fact that he’d pull a stunt like this is another reason it’s so important that he lose in a landslide in November.' NYT

Wow, just bringing up the possibility of a "coup" should Trump lose in November is unnerving. Then the question becomes, if he goes there, how will those in the military/"tactical teams"/police etc., react to orders from him to go there?

Though, sure, he could just be hinting in that direction in order merely to have that as an excuse should he lose. He does leave office quietly [more or less] and then immediately gets behind Don Jr. -- Ivanka? -- for 2024.

Stay tuned.

[Meno_]

Don't dismiss a wag the dog scenario, as commander in chief he may consider it as a final option.

Remember, he can not pardon himself against any civil or criminal prosecution once he leaves office, wasn't he the one to proclaim "lock her up" in reference to Clinton's problems.

Willing up a war scenario becomes easy to conjure among the type of constituancy that appears oblivious to anything but the virtues of this administration, and violence can commence at that point both nationally and/or internationally.

[iambiguous]

Uh-oh...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national ... Fstory-ans


'The government of China prefers that President Trump not win reelection in November, seeing the incumbent as “unpredictable,” and Russia is using a range of measures to try to “denigrate” the president’s opponent, former vice president Joe Biden, including selective leaks of information and efforts on social media, a top U.S. intelligence official said in a statement Friday.

'The statement by William Evanina, director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center, was notable for identifying three countries seeking to influence the 2020 election — China, Russia and Iran. But he portrayed Russia as the most active source of interference. Evanina also said that a Ukrainian lawmaker who has been in contact with Rudolph W. Giuliani, Trump’s personal lawyer, is part of a Russian disinformation effort.'

In other words, aside from all the accusations regarding what Trump might do to steer the election in the right direction [and what Trump claims the Democrats are up to], we have these "foreign powers" pitching in as well.

On the other hand, the stakes here for those who own and operate the global economy are enormous, aren't they?

"Show me the money", as it were.

Makes you wonder if how the high school civics texts portray democracy might have been a bit off.

You know, if there still are high school civics text.

Like back in my day.

[iambiguous]

Here's the part where we assume Trump loses the election but then refuses to leave office:

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/202 ... -coup.html

'Two retired Army officers have written an open letter to Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, basically urging him to mount a military coup if President Donald Trump loses the upcoming election but tries to remain in power on Jan. 20.

'“If Donald Trump refuses to leave office at the expiration of his constitutional term,” they write for Defense One, a widely read national security site, “the United States military must remove him by force, and you must give that order.”'

To wit: we can discuss "philosophically" as, say, "political scientists" how nations like America are run "socially, politically and economically". But the bottom line historically always revolves finally around who has the actual military and police power to enforce any particular interpretation of any particular context.

Sure, that's become buried deep in the background in our modern industrial world. A world where "democracy and the rule of law" seem so deeply entrenched that nothing could possibly upend them.

But let a "crisis" [or crises] be deep enough and prolonged enough, coupled with an authoritarian leader chummy with national security factions of the MIC and, well, who the hell really knows?

Still, let's be optimistic:

'The fear that Trump will refuse to leave office, even if he loses the election, has been circulating for over a year now. I addressed the fear in a June 1 Slate column, arguing that Trump may want to lock himself in the Oval Office, but “he wouldn’t get away with it.” At 12 p.m. on Jan. 20, 2021, wherever Trump may choose to plant himself, all but a small retinue of security guards will abandon him, the nuclear launch codes will change, his Cabinet secretaries and ambassadors will lose all authority, and the entire U.S. military establishment will pivot away from ex-President Donald Trump to salute President Joe Biden. “The principle of civilian control is hammered into American officers from the time they’re cadets,” I wrote, “and the 20th Amendment of the Constitution states, ‘The terms of the President and Vice President end at noon on the 20th day of January’—no ifs, ands, or buts.”

'The Secret Service will escort Mr. Trump out of the office. If a mob of Trump’s favorite sheriffs and militias block the doors and circle the White House—if, in short, a few tanks need to roll down Pennsylvania Avenue to restore order, then it will be Biden, the duly elected and sworn-in commander in chief, who gives the order.'

Stay tuned...

[Meno_]

If a security risk can override the politically divisive intelligence, ( military, FBI, CIA, Interpol, them a guy like Trump may see this as easy entrance into a nuclear issue.

Using nuclear in a very general sense.

Murphy's law suits well with the kind of constituancy he relies on, for remember it hasn't been that long ago that the FBI director was brought to task and let go, and other assets were equally dealt with. harsh blows of the kind which formerly were in inconceivable.

[iambiguous]

Using nuclear in a very general sense.

Here, however, we can only imagine a particular president in a particular context with access to the football codes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_football

What could he do with those nuclear warheads all the way up to an election that he sees he is clearly going to lose?

Wag the dog? At home in regard to antifa...or abroad in regard to the "terrorists"?

What orders would or would not be obeyed?

On the other hand, given the existence of the "deep state" [in whatever manner it is imagined] even here -- especially here? -- shit will unfold behind the curtain that none of us here are likely to have access to.

[Meno_]

The 'Deep State' could incite a reversely manufactured scenario, where a sent black mail could divide military type intelligence and conquer.

This may fit the fodder of the overused distinction between fact and fiction, the accounted root of which may be lost by now. Any incidence could be invented as trigger, and the nuclear option could be initially used as a hidden possibility, as it always had

The neo Kantian approach of centering , a recurrent mode of procedure applied , could literally explode the 'is' and the 'ought', figuratively reducing the difference between a dialectic between the material and the quasi trace of the spiritual.

This mix, utilizes simplified reconstitution of familiarly resembling motives.

Trump is famous of this kind of amphitheatre of absurdity, as the incident that created an effective sense of incredulity, when he bible thumped in midst of the protestations. .

This theater appears nowadays as an unstoppable trainwreck in the making.

[iambiguous]

Then this part:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/13/opin ... e=Homepage

'Last week, NPR’s Lulu Garcia-Navarro asked Joe Biden whether, if elected, he could envision Donald Trump being prosecuted. Biden replied that the prosecution of a former president would be a “very, very unusual thing” and probably “not very good for democracy.” The former vice president said he would not stand in the way if the Justice Department wanted to bring a case, but when Garcia-Navarro pressed him, he suggested she was trying to bait him into a version of Trump’s threat against his 2016 opponent: “Lock her up.”'

Clearly, to the extent that Trump feels threatened -- in a truly existential sense -- by the prospect of prosecution after leaving office, is the extent to which staying in office "by any means necessary" becomes a prospect that cannot be ignored.

If Biden wins the election for the White House and the Democrats retake the Senate, will the Democratic Party "establishment" go the way of Gerald Ford in pardoning Nixon? In other words, claim that for the good of the country it is time to "heal old wounds" blah, blah, blah and go back to reconfiguring the crony capitalist "deep state" juggernaut so as to reflect the days before Trump.

Here we can only check in from time to time with Biden, Schumer and Pelosi and see where the soundbites take us.

[iambiguous]

Then there's this...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics ... Fstory-ans

'President Trump said Thursday that he does not want to fund the U.S. Postal Service because Democrats are seeking to expand mail-in voting during the coronavirus pandemic, making explicit the reason he has declined to approve $25 billion in emergency funding for the cash-strapped agency.

'“Now, they need that money in order to make the post office work, so it can take all of these millions and millions of ballots,” Trump said in an interview with Fox Business Network’s Maria Bartiromo. He added: “Now, if we don’t make a deal, that means they don’t get the money. That means they can’t have universal mail-in voting, they just can’t have it.”

'Trump has railed against mail-in balloting for months, and at a White House briefing Wednesday, he argued without evidence that USPS’s enlarged role in the November election would perpetuate “one of the greatest frauds in history.”'

A sign of just how far he is willing to go to stay in office. And it's not even September yet!

On the other hand, maybe the Trumpworld folks here can provide us with ample evidence to back up his claims.

Let's all exchange political prejudices [rooted in dasein] with as many actual facts as we can.

[Ecmandu]

Then there's this...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics ... Fstory-ans

'President Trump said Thursday that he does not want to fund the U.S. Postal Service because Democrats are seeking to expand mail-in voting during the coronavirus pandemic, making explicit the reason he has declined to approve $25 billion in emergency funding for the cash-strapped agency.

'“Now, they need that money in order to make the post office work, so it can take all of these millions and millions of ballots,” Trump said in an interview with Fox Business Network’s Maria Bartiromo. He added: “Now, if we don’t make a deal, that means they don’t get the money. That means they can’t have universal mail-in voting, they just can’t have it.”

'Trump has railed against mail-in balloting for months, and at a White House briefing Wednesday, he argued without evidence that USPS’s enlarged role in the November election would perpetuate “one of the greatest frauds in history.”'

A sign of just how far he is willing to go to stay in office. And it's not even September yet!

On the other hand, maybe the Trumpworld folks here can provide us with ample evidence to back up his claims.

Let's all exchange political prejudices [rooted in dasein] with as many actual facts as we can.

I would not want to be Trump. He’s been trying to destroy democracy around the globe (including the US) since he became president. But now the pressure is REALLY on him!!!

He will be sent to prison for obstruction of justice if he loses. If he wins.... he can probably destroy destroy democracy enough to stay out of prison entirely.

Even the elites who always wanted to destroy democracy (and did about 30 years ago) see trump as a liability. *shh... people aren’t supposed to know that yet trump!*. If trump continues on this path of revealing that democracy no longer exists, not because he said it, but because he’s such a colossal asshole... the elites will have no choice but to make an example of him.

[Meno_]

Then there's this...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics ... Fstory-ans

'President Trump said Thursday that he does not want to fund the U.S. Postal Service because Democrats are seeking to expand mail-in voting during the coronavirus pandemic, making explicit the reason he has declined to approve $25 billion in emergency funding for the cash-strapped agency.

'“Now, they need that money in order to make the post office work, so it can take all of these millions and millions of ballots,” Trump said in an interview with Fox Business Network’s Maria Bartiromo. He added: “Now, if we don’t make a deal, that means they don’t get the money. That means they can’t have universal mail-in voting, they just can’t have it.”

'Trump has railed against mail-in balloting for months, and at a White House briefing Wednesday, he argued without evidence that USPS’s enlarged role in the November election would perpetuate “one of the greatest frauds in history.”'

A sign of just how far he is willing to go to stay in office. And it's not even September yet!

On the other hand, maybe the Trumpworld folks here can provide us with ample evidence to back up his claims.

Let's all exchange political prejudices [rooted in dasein] with as many actual facts as we can.

I would not want to be Trump. He’s been trying to destroy democracy around the globe (including the US) since he became president. But now the pressure is REALLY on him!!!

He will be sent to prison for obstruction of justice if he loses. If he wins.... he can probably destroy destroy democracy enough to stay out of prison entirely.

Even the elites who always wanted to destroy democracy (and did about 30 years ago) see trump as a liability. *shh... people aren’t supposed to know that yet trump!*. If trump continues on this path of revealing that democracy no longer exists, not because he said it, but because he’s such a colossal asshole... the elites will have no choice but to make an example of him.

Or worse.

[iambiguous]

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