November 27, 2020: Trump Tries Vengeful Dictator Route - Another Court Defeat

 

11/27/20: On Friday, we had Trump at his absolute worst, just a few short steps removed from unhinged, vengeful dictator. First, he tweeted out a new benchmark low for making way for Biden. “Biden can only enter the White House as President if he can prove that his ridiculous ‘80,000,000 votes’ were not fraudulently or illegally obtained. When you see what happened in Detroit, Atlanta, Philadelphia & Milwaukee, massive voter fraud, he’s got a big unsolvable problem!”

Judge Bibas blows up another Trump legal challenge to the vote.

 

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Just a few short steps removed from unhinged, vengeful dictator.

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So: F**k the vote. Trump would decide who sat in the White House after January 20. And, um … it would be him. 

Later, he referred to Brad Raffensperger, Georgia’s Republican Secretary of State, a man already facing death threats, as was his wife, as “really, really an enemy of the people.” That put the President of the United States firmly in “Vladimir Putin territory,” if only he could get his way. You know. Maybe throw a few “enemies of the people” off balconies or serve them radioactive tea. 

And later (see below), Team Trump would once again attack the judicial branch of the government. 

Because. Yeah. Trump wants to rule like Xi Jinping, or Kim Jong-un, his love-letter sending pal.

 

Honest to god! When Trump fired off the above tweet, about how the door to the Oval Office was still barred for Joe Biden, he was headed once more for his private golf course in Potomac Falls. 

Round #314 since taking office. 

By day’s end, however, it was clear that the man with the real problem was Lame Duck Don, himself.

 

In Pennsylvania another legal challenge to the results of the state’s election was blown out of court. 

 

“Voters, not lawyers, choose the President.” 

The Trump campaign’s continuing effort to prove “massive fraud” landed in the U.S. Third District Court. Writing for a three-judge panel, Judge Stephanos Bibas, a Trump appointee to the bench, with the concurrence of two other Republican-appointed judges, made short (relatively) work of the case. The three judges considered the evidence presented. “Free, fair elections are the lifeblood of our democracy,” Bibas wrote and tossed the hot mess out. “Charges of unfairness are serious,” he said in his ruling Friday. “But calling an election unfair does not make it so. Charges require specific allegations and then proof. We have neither here.” 

“Voters, not lawyers, choose the President,” Bibas wrote. “Ballots, not briefs, decide elections.”  

So: Trump’s legal team got smoked.

 

Still, Jenna Ellis, one of the few lawyers remaining still willing to continue the legal charade, responded to defeat, insisting, “The activist judicial machinery in Pennsylvania continues to cover up the allegations of massive fraud.” 

Three Republican judges. One appointed by Trump. 

At this point, trying to convince the president, or Ellis, or any of Trump’s cult-like fans that there is no evidence, that Bigfoot did not mail in fraudulent ballots, that the Loch Ness monster did not use computer software to steal votes, that Elvis and Tupac did not rise from the grave and vote, is no longer possible. It’s a cliché, but the purple Kool Aid has been mixed and guzzled down.

 

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AS FOR “rounding the corner,” as the president insists we are, in terms of the coronavirus, Worldometers reports that the U. S. has recorded 13.3 million cases (#1 in the world). Total U.S. deaths stand at 269,802 (also #1), almost 100,000 more than second place Brazil. 

Adjusting for population and tallying deaths per million, under Trump’s guiding, golfing hand we stand in seventh place behind only: 

Belgium: 1,397.

Peru: 1,079

Spain: 955

Italy: 888

United Kingdom: 846

Argentina: 836

United States: 813

 

Trump likes to claim that the whole world is suffering. That means we can’t blame him for anything that has gone wrong. Here are a few countries that are doing better (by far) in adjusted deaths per million: 

China 3 (hard to trust any numbers issued by an authoritarian government; we know)

New Zealand 5

South Korea 10

Japan 16

Australia 35

Norway 60

Finland 71

Germany 190

Greece 202

Israel: 309

Canada 312

Austria 320

Ireland 412.

  

POSTSCRIPT: Chris Krebs, Trump’s appointee to head the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency – fired last week for insisting the election was not rigged – has told 60 Minutes that fraud allegations made by the president and his allies are “farcical.” 

As for claims of manipulated ballots, with mysterious foreign nations involved, Krebs adds, “All votes in the United States of America are counted in the United States of America. Period.” 

The full interview will run Sunday evening. 

 

FUN FACT – WAKEUP CALL: Someone wakes up Republicans in Congress and they realize, now that Donald is going to get the boot, that they really care about reducing the federal deficit. 

They forgot the last four years. 

“I think we’ve got to understand that we’re going to be raising the debt ceiling in perpetuity if we don’t find a way to bend the curve,” Sen. Lindsey Graham tells reporters. 

“I think that’s kind of getting back to our DNA. ... I think spending, entitlement reform, growth and the economy are all things that we’re going to have to be focused on next year, and, yeah, I would expect you’ll hear a lot more about that,” said Sen. John Thune agreed. 

Sen. Kevin Cramer, from North Dakota, promises, this time Republicans are deadly serious about reducing the deficit! (See: 7/11-12/20 for some idea of Sen. Cramer’s ideas on federal spending.) 

 

FUN FACT #2: The autopsy into President Trump’s defeat finds hardening of the arteries in Trump’s head. 

With youth turnout surging in the recent election, he did worse in almost every state with voters in the 18 to 29 age group. In Pennsylvania, Mr. Biden had a 20-point margin with the youngest voters (vs. a 9-point lead for Hillary Clinton.) Biden beat Trump by 16 points in Wisconsin, whereas Clinton barely had a lead. Nationally, Biden won 61% of the vote from this group, vs. 37% for Trump. 

In four of the key battleground states, Arizona, Michigan, Georgia and Pennsylvania, younger voters gave Biden a margin of over 100,000. In Arizona, Michigan and Georgia, that alone, was enough for the win.