Having the President as Commander in Chief pretty much guarantees that they will blunder into stupid mistakes like that

Assuming that US foreign wars are “blundering into stupid mistakes” is a dangerous fantasy. History has shown time and again that the US is more than prepared to wage war on those states it chooses to without regard to the outcome, collateral damage, foreign relationships or cost. It’s also worth noting that many former US foreign and war correspondents are pointing out that many of the types of tactics and counter insurgency policies of the CIA and US military are now being employed by local and Federal US police and other agencies (Bortac for instance)  within the US mainland (Portland and Wisconsin)

Assuming that US foreign wars are “blundering into stupid mistakes” is a dangerous fantasy. History has shown time and again that the US is more than prepared to wage war on those states it chooses to without regard to the outcome, collateral damage, foreign relationships or cost

From what I understand, since Vietnam, the military leadership have tended to discourage Presidents from committing troops to deal with local problems because they know that nice tidy outcomes are very unlikely and that “boots on the ground” actually means American soldiers on the ground, some of whom will be shipped home in body bags. Problem is that some horrible atrocity appears on tv news and there’s a public outcry to do something about it (gassing of civilians in Syria, for example). The President is then under intense pressure to send in troops to resolve a situation that is unresolvable just by blowing shit up. Anybody with any sense knows that you need to commit thousands of troops for an indefinite period to stabilize the situation and then to rebuild the country, but voters have a lot more enthusiasm for blowing shit up than fixing things afterwards. So, you end up with a guy like Obama, who I think was quite genuine about extricating America from the quagmire it’s in, but it’s impossible to get out once you’re in.

The W. Bush administration were mind bogglingly stupid and incompetent in their Iraq catastrophe, but you need to remember that the American public and most Democratic politicians were in full support. Politically speaking, politicians had to support it. If they didn’t and it succeeded, they would have been politically finished. If they did support it and it failed, then everyone was in the same boat so they were safe.

A single member of Congress voted against the declaration of war after the Pearl Harbor attack, a pacifist by the name of Jeannette Rankin. It was the end of her political career. No politician wants to repeat that mistake.

On December 8, Rankin was the only member of either house of Congress to vote against the declaration of war on Japan.[37] Hisses could be heard in the gallery as she cast her vote; several colleagues, including Rep. (later Senator) Everett Dirksen, asked her to change it to make the resolution unanimous—or at very least, to abstain—but she refused. “As a woman I can’t go to war,” she said, “and I refuse to send anyone else.”[38]

After the vote, a crowd of reporters pursued Rankin into a cloakroom. There, she was forced to take refuge in a phone booth until Capitol Police arrived to escort her to her office,[39][40] where she was inundated with angry telegrams and phone calls. One cable, from her brother, read, “Montana is 100 percent against you”.[41] Rankin remained unapologetic. “Everyone knew that I was opposed to the war, and they elected me,” she said. “I voted as the mothers would have had me vote.”[42] A wire service photo of Rankin sequestered in the phone booth, calling for assistance, appeared the following day in newspapers across the country.[43]

While her action was widely ridiculed in the press, William Allen White, writing in the Kansas Emporia Gazette, acknowledged her courage in taking it:

Probably a hundred men in Congress would have liked to do what she did. Not one of them had the courage to do it. The Gazette entirely disagrees with the wisdom of her position. But Lord, it was a brave thing! And its bravery someway discounted its folly. When, in a hundred years from now, courage, sheer courage based upon moral indignation is celebrated in this country, the name of Jeannette Rankin, who stood firm in folly for her faith, will be written in monumental bronze, not for what she did, but for the way she did it.[44]

Three days later, a similar war declaration against Germany and Italy came to a vote; Rankin abstained. Her political career effectively over, she did not run for reelection in 1942.[7] Asked years later if she ever regretted her action, Rankin replied, “Never. If you’re against war, you’re against war regardless of what happens. It’s a wrong method of trying to settle a dispute.”[45]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeannette_Rankin#Second_congressional_term

A single member of Congress voted against the declaration of war after the Pearl Harbor attack, a pacifist by the name of Jeannette Rankin. It was the end of her political career. No politician wants to repeat that mistake.

Pearl Harbour was completely different from any of the recent conflicts the USA have been involved in. The fact that voting against war finished a politician’s career in 1941 is quite right. The war had to be fought.

I don’t think for a second that the Military Leadership has tried particularly hard to dissuade any 20th C US president (apart from perhaps the current) to go to war. In fact I tend to think to complete opposite. The US Chiefs of staff is filled to the brim with the sorts of supporters of the Project for the New American Century that got them into the mess they’re in now. They drunk the Kool-Aid of the message of “Pax Americana” probably harder than any other branch of the US state.

That they now may be something of a reluctant restraining force on Trump is only in part to the recognition that he’s a moron, and perhaps more to do with their own political futures. Once “political normality” is back in place, I fully expect the US to start interfering in other countries once again.

I don’t think for a second that the Military Leadership has tried particularly hard to dissuade any 20th C US president (apart from perhaps the current) to go to war. In fact I tend to think to complete opposite.

Nope. This was a major issue during the Clinton administration (Bosnia, Somalia, etc.) The Chiefs of Staff were very reluctant to get involved in local conflicts because they knew how intractable they are, whereas the civilian leaders were much more enthusiastic.

In the planning for the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the military guys warned that it would probably take 500 000 troops to be confident of success, whereas Donald Rumsford had a hare-brained idea that they could drop 50 000 troops into Baghdad and the country would greet them as liberators.

Civilian leaders are naturally biased towards the most optimistic outcomes and discount the difficulties. Military leaders are trained to look at the worst-case scenarios, so the smart ones are much more cautious.

Pearl Harbour was completely different from any of the recent conflicts the USA have been involved in. The fact that voting against war finished a politician’s career in 1941 is quite right. The war had to be fought.

That’s right as far as it goes, but the political calculation is very short term. If the Iraq invasion had succeeded, anybody who voted against it would have suffered the same fate as the woman who voted against war against Japan and Germany. If it failed, everybody was in the same boat, so that was the safe vote. In the U.S., Congressional elections are every two years, while one third of the Senate face an election every two years (for six year terms). To survive in politics, you have to keep an eye on the next election. The success or failure of the Iraq invasion was something that wouldn’t be known until after the next election, so voting against it was a very risky proposition for a politician.

There’s an old saying that “If a monkey falls from a tree, he’s still a monkey, but if a politician loses an election, he’s no longer a politician.” The only thing they can afford to care about is their next election.

Nope. This was a major issue during the Clinton administration (Bosnia, Somalia, etc.)

Bush had sent 25,000 troops to Somalia, the conflict there predated the Clinton administration, and it was the Clinton administration that had set limits on US involvement in any UN peacekeeping force becasue of the subsequent military failures. (clearly they were not enthusiastic militarists at this point). The Military was initially sceptical of involvement in the Balkans only because they saw no obvious strategic gains, and yet were still content to bomb it in 1999 when the US wanted Milosevic to come to the negotiating table.

I don’t think you can separate the internal politics of the US and the external use of the Military in US politics, the two go hand and in hand, and even have effects in State politics because of the nature of the US military-industrial complex.

Wow!

"What you are saying is an outrageous defamation! … I want you to apologize to me" — Rudy completely melted down after Kennedy compared his handling of Hunter Biden's purported laptop with the Steele dossier pic.twitter.com/iydKm5RpC2

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 28, 2020

A real hint of ‘enough of this bullshit’ is creeping into Fox programming.

A real hint of ‘if Angry Uncle doesn’t win we no longer have any influence’.

How long does it take USA to declare a result after polling day (not withstanding Court challenges etc)? Is like UK where the result is declared overnight after polling closes?

Candidates can claim victory at whatever point they wish, although their opponents don’t have to concede, even if the numbers are overwhelming.

Normally there are enough votes counted to give a firm indication of the state of the electoral college fairly quickly, but this year, given the quantity of mail-in voting and the likely very high turnout, things are different.

But if Trump is ahead on the night (mail-ins tend to favour the Dems), he will declare victory and the epic shitshow of his presidency will roll on towards the Supreme Court he has now stuffed with Republican hacks for this very purpose.

The amount of attempted voter suppression going on is remarkable. GOP officials trying to get mail-in ballots ruled out unless they are received by election day, regardless of the date stamp on the envelope, postal services being hobbled to try to assist this, plus the normal rabble of MAGA idiots and thugs picketing voting places.

The US is in a very bad place right now. It’s possible they could lance the boil in November, but there remains an ocean of pus and decay to be pushed out.

What worries me is that if Trump challenges the election results then that could be a dog whistle to the meatheads to get their ARs out.

Is that a video of America’s Mayor inviting a news reader round to his office to look at [alleged] child pornography? Yikes!

You’d think that if Giuliani was in possession of a laptop containing those sort of images then he’d have turned it over the appropriate law enforcement authority. That’s what any sane person would do. If he’s sitting on such a thing (and I don’t believe that he is for a moment) then using it as political capital would constitute withholding evidence.

It’s all getting a bit silly now, the Republican Party and it’s media affiliates like Hannity etc are in complete meltdown.

Plenty of support for Trump to do all sorts of military things, I think.

Ha ha, chopper fail, Russian chopper on flag. Prob Russian grenade launcher too. (I know it’s a photoshop Rambo image BTW)

Seems the American Psychological Association have announced the definitive diagnosis of Angry Tinkerbell’s mental state, and I apologise in advance for the profanity in the URL…
http://www.newsbiscuit.com/2020/10/29/trump-diagnosed-as-being-a-****/
A more serious assessment of what his toxic, malignant narcissism could lead to if he loses here…
https://www.salon.com/2020/10/28/trump-narcissism-psychology-election-loss-pathology-personality-disorders/

I see a red wave. pic.twitter.com/LBxfPJ9pV1

— Steve Kean (@steventkean) October 30, 2020

All getting very interesting!

For those concerned that Hillary was ahead in 16 and “the polls were wrong..” the article linked to below covers it very succinctly. In brief though if they are as wrong this time as they were four years ago, Biden still wins, albeit not by a landslide. They’d have to be significantly worse than four years ago (& even then they still got the popular vote more or less right, it was Trump flipping the rustbelt that nobody saw happening) for Trump to win.

Given that they’ve spent the last four years tightening up their methodologies, this is somewhat unlikely. Can’t rule it out 100% of course, but still very unlikely.

Anyway, Grauniad article below, I’ve got fingers tightly crossed and will be having a sleepless night on Wednesday night!

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/oct/29/polls-us-election-2020-biden-harris-can-they-be-trusted

"Your prince, the Prince of Darkness: Joe Biden."

That's a line for the ages.

— Fergal Reid (@fergalreid) October 30, 2020

The tactics of Assert, Double Down and Deflect that have served people like Giuliani well since 2016 aren’t winning over undecided voters. I wonder how many Trumpets are dumb enough to take Giuliani’s assertion that he has proof of wrongdoing serious given that Giuliani has so far failed to provide any proof of wrongdoing.

Holy shamoly, that video is plain bat sh/t nuts. Like something out of goodfellas.

“You want proof? You want proof you motherfing cucksocker? I’ll give you proof. I’ll rant and rant and rant and rant. Then I’ll rant some more”

Unbelievable. Stinks of desperation. I guess when he learned that Tucker had somehow lost the goldplatedwithfingerprintstimestampsandsignatures only copy of the proof, it sent him off his rocker.

Imagine, you spend years gumshoing around the world taking down the biggest corruption scandal on the face of the planet and one talkshow host destroys it all.

Enough to drive a man to drink.

Either that or it’s the actions of a man seeing the real likelihood of a Dem president a Dem House and a Dem Senate, and who knows that if that’s the case, well….the Feds are going to be paying him a visit sometime very soon..

When this thread started did we not used to have some trump supporters on here?  Have even they gone

I really wish we could alter the swearfilter on this thread so we could saw what we think without it being asterisked out

Anyway, Grauniad article below, I’ve got fingers tightly crossed and will be having a sleepless night on Wednesday night!

There’s a strong change of long delayed results due to the way that absentee ballots are counted, there’s also a risk that exit polls will be significantly out due to the fact that more republicans vote in person that democrats.

All in all its going to be very unclear, until it isn’t.

Could be a good night to binge watch the west wing on all 4.

#Bartlettforamerica

I love the mental gymnastics that allow people to simultenously believe in Sleepy Joe and the Do Nothing Democrats, and Joe Biden The Prince Of Darkness, and the Democrats Who Will Kill God. Either one is quite hard to believe, but both at once, that’s impressive.

When this thread started did we not used to have some trump supporters on here? Have even they gone

I’m pretty sure that at least two have been banned for generally being horrible and abusive, while most of those prepared to give Trump the benefit of the doubt in 2016 will have seen the shtshow that’s happened since. There’s another who likes to pop in for a quick non-sequitur every now and again, but noone takes them seriously.

As other have said before, I’ll breathe a sigh of relief only *if* Biden & Harris win next week. I suspect that the GOP camp are launching an exercise of damage limitation by bolstering their message to their core voters and settling for domination of the Supreme Court. Even if Trump wins, the effects of their super-spreader rallies will make the winter very bleak for many.

A big unknown is how many votes will actually end up being counted. There will be people who intend to vote but won’t make it due to voter suppression tactics. People have to queue for hours as polling stations have been slashed, and many of the poor cannot afford the time off work. And some people won’t be able to physically get there. Then there are people who will have asked for a mail in ballot then end up missing the deadline or otherwise deciding to vote in person – this ends up being a provisional ballot and this may not be counted (I think anyway).

Lots of shit can still happen.

The provisional ballot thing is a concern. Especially with those who requested postal votes and then decide to go in person. As I understand it each state can decide how they respond, for instance they could cancel the postal and issue them with an in-person. Or make it provisional in which case they only come into play if it’s close. Guess which option most Republican controlled states are going for..

Which in turn could lead to some interesting court cases..

However, after months thinking and worrying about all of this I’m going to come off the fence and say that Biden (aka The Prince of Darkness) will win and win big. Enough so that it will be done and dusted on the day

(I touched wood after writing this. Just like Rudi..)

Quote from Philly DA…

“We’ve never really had to be concerned that a bunch of knuckleheads were going to show up to the polls with guns,” Krasner said. “If they do it this time, they’re going to have a problem.”

Full article
https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/523584-philadelphia-da-warns-uncertified-poll-watchers-to-stay-away-ive-got-a

Meanwhile, the supreme court is continuing to rule that they shouldn’t change any invervene with regards to state electoral rules, meaning that among other things, postal votes received after 8pm on election day won’t count in Wisconsin. Not that the count ends at 8pm on election day, or anything, it’s just their arbitrary limitation that probably isn’t that big of a deal normally, but is a bit more of a big deal when there’s a pandemic on and people aren’t receiving their ballots in time, and the mailing of ballots is likely to be delayed.

So, it seems like all decisions of this sort, unless they’re actually unlawful/constitutional, are in the hands of local courts.

I love the mental gymnastics that allow people to simultenously believe in Sleepy Joe and the Do Nothing Democrats, and Joe Biden The Prince Of Darkness, and the Democrats Who Will Kill God.

It’s Doublethink straight out of the 1984 playbook:

If you want to keep a secret, you must also hide it from yourself. Doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them. Until they became conscious they will never rebel, and until after they have rebelled they cannot become conscious.

I love the mental gymnastics that allow people to simultenously believe in Sleepy Joe and the Do Nothing Democrats, and Joe Biden The Prince Of Darkness, and the Democrats Who Will Kill God.

https://www.faena.com/aleph/articles/umberto-eco-a-practical-list-for-identifying-fascists/

8. The enemy is both weak and strong. “[…] the followers must be convinced that they can overwhelm the enemies. Thus, by a continuous shifting of rhetorical focus, the enemies are at the same time too strong and too weak.”

I love the mental gymnastics that allow people to simultenously believe in Sleepy Joe and the Do Nothing Democrats, and Joe Biden The Prince Of Darkness, and the Democrats Who Will Kill God.

See also the people who passionately believe the government is tyrannical and its power should be massively curtailed, but then cheers the police for murdering black people and beating up protestors they disagree with, and cheers a president who won’t say if he will accept the results of an election.

.@jaredkushner and @IvankaTrump demanded we take the billboards down.

They threatened to sue @ProjectLincoln for “enormous” sums.

In honor of their demands, here is the boat we hired, on its way to Mar-A-Lago.

And our digital billboard truck circling Trump Tower in NYC. pic.twitter.com/pZmqvRIrvL

— Ron Steslow (@RonSteslow) October 30, 2020

WP with Doug Bernheim, @zdgroff and @seb_otero: The Effects of Large Group Meetings on the Spread of COVID-19: The Case of Trump Rallies

Matching and regression analysis suggest that the first 18 Trump rallies likely resulted in > 30,000 cases & 700 deaths. (1/N)#EconTwitter

— Nina Buchmann (@NinaBuchmann6) October 30, 2020

Any suggestions for the donald j trump presidential library?
First up, a McDonalds menu.

Any suggestions for the donald j trump presidential library?

I think there’s fairly genuine concern that the Trump administration will try to shred and burn as much of the incriminating evidence as they can before the Biden administration takes over. There may not be much left to actually put in a library. Maybe whatever prison he ends up in can let them use a supplies closet for his library.

Not sure if this is the most ****ed up thing of the day, let alone the week, but it’s pretty ****ed up.

2/ there’s also this spreadsheet of possible celebs to be part of the campaign. The writer appears to be gop/incel adjacent. The whole is sneering but also kind of sad because the description of basically everyone they want is basically “hates Trump” pic.twitter.com/rS5uPbXrtd

— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) October 31, 2020

It coulda been the jungles of Guyana. pic.twitter.com/IKvxkZ1aIH

— Marc Shkolnick (@mshkolnick) November 1, 2020

Any suggestions for the donald j trump presidential library?

The Washington Post have already built it and its fully stocked ; The Fact Checker Database