The populace though managed to keep itself from descending into mayhem and pandemonium after 2016, and looks set to also unanimously accept the 2020 results without any widespread militant uprisings or civil wars (which were anticipated rather comically). — StreetlightX

Incensed by a Supreme Court ruling that further dashed President Trump’s hopes of invalidating his November electoral defeat, thousands of his supporters marched in Washington and several state capitals on Saturday to protest what they contended, against all evidence, was a stolen election.

In some places, angry confrontations between protesters and counterprotesters escalated into violence. There were a number of scuffles in the national capital, where four people were stabbed, and the police declared a riot in Olympia, Wash., where one person was shot. — NY Times 12 Dec 2020

*yawn* An inconsequential footnote to history, if it is remembered at all.

Frivolous was wrong word. Bogus. And while there may have been a few useful idiots in there - the overwhelming majority of Repubs signing on to those lawsuits knew (and know) that they were bogus.

Oh yes. That's the real issue here as you said.

Repubs singing onto the lawsuits and contuining to show public support for Trump makes perfect sense and is exactly what anyone in their position would do. They get to show public support for a figure extremely popular among their constituencies, while it cashes out into exactly nothing at the level of substance. This should not be some kind of surprise - their support of lawsuits guaranteed to fail is a feature, not a bug.

They get to show public support for a figure extremely popular among their constituencies, — StreetlightX

The showing takes place on TV and radios, both of which facilitate it because it makes money in advertising and subscriptions.

The media is kind of like a church where the story of the universe is told, evil is identified, the litany is spoken, and the congregation answers back with slogans like "Restaurants under siege from virus restrictions"

Locate yourself on the map provided, you are here.

People who don't watch the news have no identity. They're the real fools on the hills.

People who don't watch the news have no identity. — frank

So people without a TV don't have an identity? What does this even mean man? Even as part of your party I cannot make heads or tails from this statement.

Poetically speaking. One thing you might overlook is that people who are really struggling don't have a lot of time to carry signs and gripe in unison to the lead of CNN or whoever. They're trying to keep their heads above water. They're trying to deal with an addicted family member, the recent funeral of a son or daughter, the fact that they have medical problems...

It's the relatively ok people who need some way to vent their angst from whatever source, they are the ones who try to find some flame to follow, to make themselves feel like all their anger means something in the black dead universe.

They gather round Democrats and Republicans according to their social status, fling some feces at the other side and gobble up that warm feeling that they're doing something about climate change or the lack of job security, or racism, or whatever. Their anger is so strong, it's palpable isn't it? It can't all be for nothing.

It's a whole domain that a tourist can just walk away from, but the permanently invested have gaping psychological holes from manic depression or whatever their deal is. They're locked in and subservient to the news anchor until they die, I guess. I'm just speculating. I'm a tourist.

The goon show is coming to an end.

Isn't the formal process coming also to an end as the electoral college is meeting on Monday?

Surely fitting that the cases have been solved.

Yes, but, of course, there was never anything to the cases. They were, on the one hand, clownish attempts at pacifying Trump's ego and, on the other, a fundraising scheme to con his gullible supporters out of hundreds of millions, most of which will go straight into his pocket. So, who knows? This may continue regardless of where we are in the process and the continued futility of the cause.

He'll have another build the wall fundraiser, except this one will be to build a wall on Texas' nothern border.

Ha, yes, exactly.

the overwhelming majority of Repubs signing on to those lawsuits knew (and know) that they were bogus. — EricH

‘Honesty’ used to mean something to Republicans, I presume. If so those days are well and truly over.

Indeed. It is sad and a tragedy. I never thought I'd look back fondly at Barry Goldwater.

In a World where there are flat-Earthers and all kind of truthers around, this surely will continue. Trump needs his hardcore followers and this is the time when he is still in the White House to get the cult going.

I would agree. What is worrying from a philosophical point is that the media does away with any need for the courts - the media decides that the lawsuits are without merit even before the Supreme Court hears the case. This is curious. Of course they have their paid experts, like Trump has.

Also curious is the flat out (absolutist) view that there has been no voter fraud and no irregularities. The question is why no one ever says 'yes, there were errors in counting, however these are insufficient to decide the election' except for AG Barr has said in his statement.

State election officials say the county accurately reported its results after Election Day but that there was a mistake made during this week's recount. The error was caught, officials say, and was never at risk of affecting the vote totals reported for either Biden or Trump.
— CNN

Of course there were problems and 'errors', however this is not what is said in the macro view.

Let's look at CNN's 'misinformation' page.

https://edition.cnn.com/business/live-news/election-2020-misinformation/index.html

Facts First: There's nothing inherently suspicious or mysterious about large batches of votes being reported late at night or even after Election Day.

OK, CNN, accepted, but I have no knowledge of how the elections system works, I suspect few really do. But I will take your word for it.

Facts First: There is no evidence supporting claims that poll watchers were shut out of the process. There have been some instances where poll workers did not understand the rules but for the most part, registered poll watchers have been allowed at polling places.

"For the most part?" Does that mean that there were cases where they were not allowed? No evidence?
What would constitute evidence in a place where photographs are probably not allowed?

Facts First: The brief is likely referring to viral video footage of a ballot counting location in Fulton County, Georgia. After a review of the footage, state and county officials determined the events in the video were part of the normal process, not fraud. Though observers weren't present at the time captured in the video, there was no announcement made telling them to leave,

OK, so CNN admit 'observers were not present' and this is normal. OK. This is covered up by the statement that 'no announcement was made telling them to leave'. Of course we have no evidence one way or another. Not having observers present is a serious issue is it not?

"In Michigan, which also employed the same Dominion voting system," the brief says, "on November 4, 2020, Michigan election officials have admitted that a purported 'glitch' caused 6,000 votes for President Trump to be wrongly switched to Democrat Candidate Biden."

Facts First: There was no technical glitch. It was human error and the issue was corrected and never affected the official vote total, according to state election officials.

A human error is even worse. Of course the issue was corrected. Makes you wonder about the human errors that were not corrected, however there is no way of knowing what the safeguards in place were.

The insinuation -- that mail-in ballots are potentially rife with fraud -- is one of the main themes touched upon throughout the lawsuit.

Facts First: Election experts have told CNN time and again that mail-in ballots are a safe form of voting and not subject to widespread fraud. There have been no reports from state election officials of either party of widespread voter fraud from mail-in ballots.

CNN fails to mention that the allegation is that signatures were not verified. Regardless of whether it was true or not, the allegations can only be met by a check if the signature verification actually did take place. It may have. However this is not the defense. The defence is that " Election experts have told CNN time and again that mail-in ballots are a safe form of voting" . I suppose experts have said that time and time again flying in an airliner is safe, but this does not mean there is no possiblity of something going wrong.

"There have been no reports from state election officials of either party of widespread voter fraud from mail-in ballots."

This does not meet the charge: that the election officials were part of the fraud. Of course they say there was no fraud.

As for the evidence: supposedly people committing crimes are supposed to leave evidence sufficient to throw their entire project into utter dissarray and get jail sentences for their agents. Surely they are smarter than that? There is such a thing as circumstantial evidence, and eye witness testimony, but these have to be met on their own merits, such a charging these people with lying, or admitting the statistical freaks that have occurred.

In the end "there was no voter fraud because CNN and Election Officials say so" does not cut it.

For the record, I do not claim to know what happened, time will no doubt tell. But people should already know thin defenses when we see them.

Also curious is the flat out (absolutist) view that there has been no voter fraud and no irregularities. The question is why no one ever says 'yes, there were errors in counting, however these are insufficient to decide the election' — FreeEmotion

It’s because people generally cannot handle subtlety. Intellectuals discussing these things in detail should be acknowledging those subtleties, yes, but general reporting for the general public needs to bottom line it for them, because they’re not going to bother trying to understand the subtleties and will just run with their biases instead.

If it’s the case that any irregularities in the electoral process (of which there are inevitably some) are negligible in the biggest picture, then what Joe Public needs to hear is that everything is fine. Because if you tell him all the details he’ll add a bunch of negligibles up into something way out of proportion.

Wow, you're really clutching at straws there.

Also curious is the flat out (absolutist) view that there has been no voter fraud and no irregularities. The question is why no one ever says 'yes, there were errors in counting, however these are insufficient to decide the election' except for AG Barr has said in his statement. — FreeEmotion

Actually, I saw it reported over and over in the media, that any irregularities were insignificant. And, what was reported by elections officials was that this was an election with an even lower degree of error than those in the past.

This does not meet the charge: that the election officials were part of the fraud. Of course they say there was no fraud. — FreeEmotion

Why don't you just come out and say what your hinting at. More than half the American population were part of the fraud. They all conspired to 'illegally' throw Trump out of the office which he righteously deserves. Of course all those people will insist that there was no fraud, just an election. So, why do you believe that there was fraud? Because mailed in votes were counted in the middle of the night? If it happened after midnight it must be evil.

As for the evidence: supposedly people committing crimes are supposed to leave evidence sufficient to throw their entire project into utter dissarray and get jail sentences for their agents. — FreeEmotion

The problem here, is that we cannot just suppose that people were committing crimes without any evidence that crimes were committed. Do you see how backward that is? The election did not go my way, therefore crimes, (many many crimes required to swing elections in numerous states) were committed. Therefore I accuse everyone involved in carrying out the elections in four states as possibly having committed these crimes. You're all potentially criminals, and I'll try you all in court, until you rat each other out. Back to reality, no evidence that any crimes were committed, and no one is ratting each other out, so that's further evidence that no crimes were committed.

This does not meet the charge: that the election officials were part of the fraud. — FreeEmotion

To make a blanket accusation of "election officials" in this way, without a shred of evidence, is extremely defamatory, corrosive, and ought to be punishable, if made by a person of authority like the president.

Yes, but, of course, there was never anything to the cases. They were, on the one hand, clownish attempts at pacifying Trump's ego and, on the other, a fundraising scheme to con his gullible supporters out of hundreds of millions, most of which will go straight into his pocket. So, who knows? This may continue regardless of where we are in the process and the continued futility of the cause. — Baden

There are two theories we can work from here:

1. The Republicans all know that Trump lost but they're willing to pacify him by pretending otherwise so that they don't face his wrath. They realize that these efforts to interfere with the election results will amount to nothing, so they see no danger in attacking the core of American democracy, and they see their support of Trump working to their political advantage. This theory casts the Republicans as pragmatists with little conscience, but it does not suggest the Republicans would actually do something that mattered, like issuing a court ruling in favor of Trump, refusing to certify the election, or casting their electoral college votes inconsistent with the voting results.

2. The Republicans really want to overthrow this election because it is based upon fraud, but they are being thwarted by institutional barriers and by a handful of men and women (most notably judges and some Republican elections officials). While they may realize all their efforts to change this election result was a long shot, they truly believe in the justice of their mission.

My instinct is to think it's #1, but #1 requires that I impose my worldview on those of another world. That is, to accept #1, I must assume that no one could possibly believe the election was rigged. That probably is not really the case though. I also don't think that those Republicans who have been complicit in the efforts to overturn the election did so only because they believed their efforts would fail. That is, I think they are pragmatists, but I don't think they chose the road to pragmatism because they instinctively knew their attempts to overturn a valid election would fail so they were able to do as they did with a clear conscience. I think they wouldn't have had any difficulty sleeping if they actually did overturn the election.

While those in the #2 camp are nutjobs, at least they appear to be men and women of conscience. I would like to think that if this election truly had been rigged, that I would be one of those who threw every obstacle in the way of Biden being sworn in.

And so I'm left with the truth, which is that there is no evidence of election rigging and so anyone who says there is or who attempts to invalidate a fair election should be thwarted. Why people might be motivated to argue one side of the other probably varies from person to person, but it's largely irrelevant at the end of the analysis. The question is who do you want in office moving forward: Those who side with the truth or those who don't.

We could keep proliferating categories, I guess. Some of it is like the kid who plays along with the Santa myth because he really wants to believe it as much as he knows it's not true. More of it is a kind of trolling recalcitrance, "I know but I'll be damned if I'll admit to you I know". Some of it is cynical political gameplaying, and yes, there are a few full on QAnon-type nutjobs who are rallying for a cause they truly believe is righteous.

And so I'm left with the truth, which is that there is no evidence of election rigging and so anyone who says there is or who attempts to invalidate a fair election should be thwarted. Why people might be motivated to argue one side of the other probably varies from person to person, but it's largely irrelevant at the end of the analysis. The question is who do you want in office moving forward: Those who side with the truth or those who don't. — Hanover

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we cannot just suppose that people were committing crimes without any evidence that crimes were committed — Metaphysician Undercover

That's kind of what I'm thinking as well. Guilty until proven innocent?

Someone had grabbed some footage, taken out some frames, added red arrows and circles, and added their comments, pointing out alleged criminals and "suspect" or "anomalous" behavior. As far as I can tell, none of the vote-handlers have been taken in and questioned. Wouldn't they at the very least be "persons of interest" or something? The allegations are kind of serious. By the way, the red arrows and circles looks like something you might find on UFO conspiracy theory sites. I don't think the footage counts as material evidence of a crime really; it's too pareidolic, too many different hypothetical narratives could be put on top of it; nah, they were likely just doing their jobs, with America tensely waiting.

The law needs material evidence, yes? Either there is none, or someone is withholding something. These lawsuits and theories go back, just about to when the counts had come in (that's not counting Trump's 2016 postulates of course).

• Suppose there isn't really much, no material evidence, which would explain the lack thus far.
Then what's the reason for the flurry of lawsuits? What's made Powell et al (apparently) believe Trump won?

• Suppose someone is withholding material evidence.
Then why hasn't it been provided, ending the waste of time/resources, getting conspirators questioned (and prosecuted), perhaps securing Trump a 2^nd term (which presumably is the goal)?

What is it that everyone supposedly is missing here...?

This should not be some kind of surprise - their support of lawsuits guaranteed to fail is a feature, not a bug. — StreetlightX

According to Disraeli, "[t]here is no act of treachery or meanness of which a political party is not capable; for in politics there is no honour." It seems he was right, and I suppose you are as well. But what's of greater concern is there are people who believe that the unsupported allegations made in these legal actions are true and that their rejection by the courts is just another part of the "steal."

The Republicans all know that Trump lost but they're willing to pacify him by pretending otherwise so that they don't face his wrath. They realize that these efforts to interfere with the election results will amount to nothing, so they see no danger in attacking the core of American democracy, and they see their support of Trump working to their political advantage. This theory casts the Republicans as pragmatists with little conscience, but it does not suggest the Republicans would actually do something that mattered, like issuing a court ruling in favor of Trump, refusing to certify the election, or casting their electoral college votes inconsistent with the voting results. — Hanover

I think that's probably right. They're playing along, trying not to get 'the base' offside, trying to avoid being machine-gunned by Trump on Twitter, but knowing that it really isn't going to go anywhere. In a way, it makes Trump look even more pathetic - manipulated by cynics for their own gain, while in his mind, they're supporting his cause.

What's made Powell et al (apparently) believe Trump won? — jorndoe

From everything I've read about Sidney Powell, she's seriously delusional, bordering on the psychotic. Part of the whole dynamic around the Trump bandwagon is that he pulls others into his delusions. That's his only power, actually. Everything else he tries turns to s***t.

As now the election results are official, Barr steps out.

Now Trump is truly in La-la-land, if it comes to the elections.

How many days is it? Still over a month to go with Trump. That's not much.

In a way, it makes Trump look even more pathetic - manipulated by cynics for their own gain, while in his mind, they're supporting his cause. — Wayfarer

This is how I’ve always looked at Trump. He’s a loud, attention-getting, useful idiot to the people in actual power, or rather worse still, the paid puppets of those people (for the real career politicians like McConnell are in turn just the puppets of the billionaire class). He’s a puppet of puppets, doing a song-and-dance routine about how he’s got no strings, completely unaware of the irony there. The really sad part is how much of the audience actually believes that song and dance.

The so-called 'conservative media' - not that they're actually conservative in any real sense - are bullshit magnifiers of the first degree. They pump the media landscape full of lies and then the Internet provides a never-ending hall of mirrors in which they're ampflified. Honestly the things that these people will believe are just mind-bogglingly nuts.

That said, I don't think anyone put Trump into power. Murdoch apparently thought negatively of Trump prior to his being elected but then of course had to pony up to him once he was President. Besides, Murdoch supports Fox because it makes him money, not because he believes anything on it. The Republican establishment didn't want Trump in the beginning, but they ended up being like one of those unfortunate girls in the change room who couldn't resist his clutches.

It's all been a massive f*** up and waste of four crucial years while the planet hurtles towards an emergency. Let's hope some semblance of order can be restored.

(I wonder if Twitter will freeze the RealDonaldTrump account on 21 Jan, and the Feds sieze the content on the grounds of it being protected records. That would really be a nice final twist of the knife.)

That said, I don't think anyone put Trump into power. — Wayfarer

Right, I didn't mean to imply that anyone did. That's where the "useful idiot" part comes into play. They're making use of him, once he's there, but even they still see that he's an idiot, and didn't want him there in the first place.

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