Same as happened in 2000, we'll get 8 years of the guy who lost.
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We already had four years so technically we would only get another four.
Until SCOTUS says the constitution isn't constitutional and gives him a literal crown.
That's the scary part. They'll gladly approve his term limit extension.
He's been saying that if he wins, nobody will ever need to vote again.
The scary thing about elections is that, by design, nobody can ever "prove" they won.
Votes are designed to be anonymous. They have to be. If they're not, they're very vulnerable to manipulation. If someone can prove how they voted, then they can either be bribed to vote a certain way, or threatened to vote a certain way. If you can check that your vote was counted successfully for the candidate you chose, then someone else can check that you voted for the candidate they chose.
That means that, by design, the only security that elections can have is in the process. In a small election, like 1000ish votes or fewer, someone could supervise the whole thing. They could cast their vote, then stand there and watch. They could watch as other people voted, making sure that nobody voted twice, or dropped more than one sheet into the box. They could watch as the box was emptied. Then, they could watch as each vote was tallied. Barring some sleight-of-hand, in a small election like that, you could theoretically supervise the entire process, and convince yourself that the vote was fair.
But, that is impossible to scale. Even for 1000 votes, not every voter could supervise the entire process, and for more than 1000 votes, or votes involving more than one voting location, it's just not possible for one person to watch the entire thing. So, at some point you need to trust other people. If you're talking say 10,000 votes, maybe you have 10 people you trust beyond a shadow of a doubt, and each one of you could supervise one process. But, the bigger the election, the more impossible it is to have actual people you know and trust supervising everything.
In a huge country-wide election, there's simply no alternative to trust. You have to trust poll workers you've never met, and/or election monitors you've never met. And, since you're not likely to hear directly from poll workers or election monitors, you have to instead trust the news source you're using that reports on the election. In a big, complex election, a statistician may be able to spot fraud based on all the information available. But, if you're not that statistician, you have to trust them, and even if you are that statistician, you have to trust that your model is correct and that the data you're feeding it is correct.
Society is built on trust, and voting is no different. Unfortunately, in the US, trust is breaking down, and without trust, it's just a matter of which narrative seems the most "truthy" to you.
This makes me think we are on the same path as many countries who routinely have significant civil conflict every election cycle.
Not a great look for a country. Not a great group to join. Yet here we are.
You know how people outside the USA vote? They go there, show their ID, get a tick on the list of voters, and do the voting.
They can tell who votes. Your entire premise is based on a belief that votes are anonymous. They aren't. They are pretected from the public. If you have ever worked in election, which I have, you would know that. You have to cross reference if someone voted twice, are alive, or even registered in the county they voted in. There are computers that verify electronic bullets and there are batch audits. No one is ever allowed to be alone even with one ballet. Everything is done in a team. If your partner calls in sick, you're the third wheel to another team.
Just because the public doesn't know doesn't mean the government doesn't know.
Votes are anonymous. You can tell who voted, but not what they voted for. It's crucial for the fairness of elections that a vote cannot be definitively connected to the individual who cast it; if you could, you could coerce or retaliate.
And all of the things you mention are the trust OP is talking about. You were a trusted person in that situation. The process increases and validates trust.
If we're saying "Trump won" what do we mean? The election is certified and he gets to be sworn in? If that's the case then there is absolutely nothing that can be done. We'll have PBS and 60 minutes stories about what happened and we'll just have to suffer the reality that they got what they wanted.
If he claims to have won on Tuesday, but the results aren't in completely then there is room to argue. It would just be bluster, it wouldn't be officially recognized as a victory. When he does that it will be to ensure he can cry foul if the final results don't go his way. He 100000000% will be doing this.
I have just watched the Legal Eagle video about the various law-related things that happened around the 2020 election.
It served as a reminder that the plan had apparently been to claim to have won before all the votes were counted - something about doing so in the interim between two sets of votes being counted (I want to say mail-in versus in-person, but I might have misunderstood) and then act as if Trump had actually won at that point, thus giving legitimacy to any later cry of foul that was almost sure to be needed.
Which is precisely what Trump did.
... my point being that it would be foolish to assume it wasn't in the play book for this time around as well.
What I'm interested in seeing is if fox news will be willing to cast off any remaining semblance of fairness in favor of calling the election for him as well.
Remember Bush v Gore?
Just like that.
Nope, I was 3
They won't.
It's like MLK said - the white liberal will always prefer "a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice."
That's the whole reason they didn't bat an eyelid when Neo-Nazis and KKK-boys were marching under open police protection back in 2016 but collectively lost their shit when antifa showed up to physically confront them.
The premise here is that Trump loses but refuses to back down, attempting to forcibly claim victory. If Trump legitimately wins, there is a different path. Then...
Assuming multiple systematic failures occur simultaneously, including any of: actual voter fraud, fraudulent electors, congress refusing to certify, a captured supreme court acting in favour of Trump, or actual insurrection on or before Jan 6th.
I actually expect the US Military to step in. Every member is sworn to uphold the constitution. But if the constitution has been discarded, then I'd expect them to step in to restore it.
Failing that, the US likely fractures and we leave the Republic phase.
I actually expect the US Military to step in. Every member is sworn to uphold the constitution. But if the constitution has been discarded, then I'd expect them to step in to restore it.
Have you met the Oathkeepers?
If shit goes down, assume anyone with a uniform is going to throw in with the authoritarian despot.
I mean, Biden has the power to do whatever he wants now and could potentially overturn the results in the interests of national security or whatever. He won't, but it's nice to think that he could do something to avert a fascist takeover. Democrats will take the high-road into letting democracy die.
If Trump wins through fraud Liberals will find a way to blame third party voters and continue to blame them for the next four years, other then that they might complain.
depends how close it is and which state acts like shit