Mourning in America - Trump Year One: November '16 to

Where we're going, we don't need ... laws.

I don't get how this doesn't come off as scary. The guys with guns surrounding the President at public events are supposed to be officers of the law. These guys are loyal to Trump -- not as the holder of an office, but as a person -- and they're accountable to no one. Who's going to stop these guys from beating down a protestor and saying "he made a move towards the President?"

x1000

I assume secret service shooting someone vs. private security doing it would offer distinct legal challenges.

And now you hit on the main point. Trump's attitude towards the law is "make me." Ask yourself this: if Trump's guys beat the hell out of a peaceful protestor in public, and the city cops try to arrest them, and Trump's people refuse to comply, who backs down?

‏@nytimes
Sylvester Stallone suggested that he was not interested in taking an arts-related job in the Trump administration

@DougHenwood
Maybe Ted Nugent is available

This is his opportunity to cross the aisle and see if Tipper's interested.

It's not too late
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/81/BruceWillis_-_ReturnOfBruno.jpg

Inching toward an Archduke Ferdinand moment:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/gunfire-wounds-russian-ambassador-in-turkey-reports-say/2016/12/19/ae32d1c8-c608-11e6-85b5-76616a33048d_story.html

Today's electoral college vote is forcing me to recognize that I perhaps quite seriously have some PTSD from election night that is now being triggered. Feeling flashes of that same intense dread.

I was going to post about the shooting in Turkey. the photos are ... striking

http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/19/europe/turkey-russian-ambassador-shot/index.html

I assume secret service shooting someone vs. private security doing it would offer distinct legal challenges.

And now you hit on the main point. Trump's attitude towards the law is "make me." Ask yourself this: if Trump's guys beat the hell out of a peaceful protestor in public, and the city cops try to arrest them, and Trump's people refuse to comply, who backs down?

This seems like the run up to a coup. A president whose own security team has a rivalrous relationship with national security forces? Come on

This also ties into his antagonizing of the CIA. He is trying to create factions within the government and bully different agencies into proving their loyalty to him. He may be illiterate but he knows how to exploit an advantage.

Really dont understand how this has gotten this far. This guy is an obvious gangster.

I was going to post about the shooting in Turkey. the photos are ... striking

he really dressed sharp

Ask yourself this: if Trump's guys beat the hell out of a peaceful protestor in public, and the city cops try to arrest them, and Trump's people refuse to comply, who backs down?

i don't see the cops arresting anyone in the president's security team tbh.

If Trump is smart he'll try to stay tight with police unions. FOP endorsed him. That's one reason why I question whether he'll really go through with his deportation and sanctuary city defunding plans -- police rely on a lot of federal funding, and also generally don't want to spend their time assisting with deportations rather than focusing on local crime.

i don't see the cops arresting anyone in the president's security team tbh.

Exactly. And once that's seen not to happen, how does that affect people's ability to dissent visibly?

More like 'do they assist in the cover-up, suppression of on-site media, etc., or do they just maintain a respectful silence about the whole affair'?

Although if I were to make a prediction, I'll bet he tries to find an equivalent of the carrier deal in deportations -- something showy and headline grabbing that will please the base but not move the needle much.

I think every time Trump does something that presidents have not previously done, or doesn't do something that previous presidents have done, why those things have typically not been done or done becomes pretty obvious.

@ZaidJilani
Chuck Schumer congratulates Trump's pick for Secretary of the Army, who is also a Schumer donor

https://twitter.com/ZaidJilani/status/810914918409048068

lolol

the kinda guy who gets Chuck's respect

"Viola joined the New York Mercantile Exchange in 1982 and was its chairman from 2001 to 2004. But he owes his fortune to Virtu Financial, the electronic-trading outfit he founded in 2008. The company — which uses powerful computers to make large numbers of transactions at very high speeds — turned a profit on 1,484 of its first 1,485 days in operation. Michael Lewis, in 2014 his book “Flash Boys,” pointed to Virtu’s winning streak as evidence that high-frequency traders have a huge informational advantage over other investors. Viola took the company public in April 2015."

http://www.forbes.com/sites/chasewithorn/2016/12/19/five-things-to-know-about-vincent-viola-trumps-billionaire-pick-for-army-secretary/#5eefd44f6547

ty Morbs for the new display name

that is a good one

Should I start a thread that is just like "put your direst predictions/conjectures for the Trump years here"? Because I have a million of em but I don't want to just gum up this thread with my panicky mental chess game.

keep it in here imo

we already have a lot of dire trump/right wing emergence/facism threads

Ok, here's my newest fear: Executive branch, via chamber of commerce, controls the Census Bureau. I'm sure there are currently some safeguards/layers of independence in place, but wouldn't it be nice if the GOP could further entrench its gerrymandered majority by fucking with the census itself?

BTW GOP raised fears about Obama doing the same when he tried to take more control of the census in 2009, so it's on their radar.

Then after that the GOP will rid our drinking water of fluoride.

yeah that or a "what is your religion" question xxp

The Census is always a political football under best of circumstances -- historic tendency to undercount minorities, immigrants, urban populations in general. Not that anyone would want to do that on purpose for electoral advantage...

so, faithless electors are defecting on...Hillary? what the hell is going on here?

of course they are

Link?

ugh smh

i just see one elector doing that - in maine, switching from clinton to sanders

https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/politics/2016/12/19/maine-elector-says-vote-for-sanders-maine-elector-says-vote-for-sanders/rzVD3ijtgKObvn5dbvzddN/story.html

I mean the idea of defecting is dumb and dangerous but Trump's complete failure to divest himself or even divulge ANYTHING about his businesses or investments is (IMO) sort of the exact reason this system exists? So dumb.

http://komonews.com/news/local/wash-states-electoral-college-prepares-to-vote-as-protesters-gather-in-olympia

OLYMPIA, Wash. - Members of the Electoral College in Washington state cast their votes for president as protesters gathered at the Capitol on Monday.

Eight of the 12 members voted for Hillary Clinton, three voted for former Secretary of State Colin Powell, and one voted for Faith Spotted Eagle, a Native-American elder from South Dakota.

eh no it's not

i've seen reports from washington and minnesota too but i can't c/p right now

xpost
then his vote was ruled out of order and he switched his vote to clinton.
i guess there was a similar situation in minnesota, too:

Update: 2:55 p.m. ET: Another elector in Minnesota tried to defect from Clinton. Muhammad Abdurrahman, a former Sanders DNC delegate, cast a ballot for the Vermont senator but was removed from his office and replaced by an alternate who voted for Clinton as per Minnesota law before the state’s official totals were submitted.

http://www.salon.com/2016/12/19/maine-electoral-college-voter-defects-from-hillary-clinton-to-bernie-sanders/

so, faithless electors are defecting on...Hillary? what the hell is going on here?

Ha ha

this owns

someone was chaning from clinton to kasich

whatever, fuck all those people. looks like WW3 is breaking out. do we choose erdogan or putin? why not just eat a cyanide tablet

The people defecting from Clinton to Colin Powell or Kasich are doing so under the misguided belief that there are Republican electors with enough moxie to dump Trump, throwing the election to the House, and giving them a moderate Republican in third electoral place they can vote for. It's like throwing a bunch of laterals as time runs out. Everybody who thinks this situation is funny can fuck right off btw.

Why why why why

tbf most of them announced their attentions ahead of time, this is not surprising

@newtgingrich
Watch the alligators lose today as the electors vote. Draining the swamp begins in January.

@jeremyscahill
I feel like this is a coded message to some sleeper cell

the sharks are in the jacuzzi

the silver lining of this electoral college news is that at least the EC will be irrelevant within a decade