2020 US election - The fat lady is warming up in the wings

[Labster]

The lizardmen hid away Edison County to silence the survivors of the Bowling Green Massacre. It all fits, don’t you see?

[DHBirr]

The lizardmen hid away Edison County to silence the survivors of the Bowling Green Massacre. It all fits, don’t you see?

Crikey!  'E's on to us, Nigel!

[robkelk]

Another pro-Windrip lawsuit filed by Sydney Powell includes an affidavit alleging lots of voter fraud in Edison County, Michigan.  Problem:  There is no "Edison County" – not in Michigan, not anywhere else in the United States of America ... at least not in the U.S.A. that we inhabit.  In some other dimension where lizard-men really are secretly ruling, who can say?  Hisssss.

Is this not sufficient to have this particular person declared a vexatious litigant (and, if a lawyer, disbarred)?

[classicdrogn]

Your attempts to silence the voices of Reptillian-Americans are shocking and deplorable!

[hazard]

Is this not sufficient to have this particular person declared a vexatious litigant (and, if a lawyer, disbarred)?

No.

For one, courts are understandably quite hesitant to declare someone a vexatious litigant. For another, unknowingly making false claims is not a crime nor punishable by law, even in the case of slander and libel, so long as one had a valid reason to make those claims.

Now, if miss Powel has a habit of making false claims and poor research that would be reason for the bar association to consider disbarring her. If she consistently and deliberately wastes the courts' time with her litigation she may eventually end up declared a vexatious litigant, but by that time she's probably been disbarred already. Lawyers are protected, at least in part, from becoming vexatious litigants on account of them working on the behalf of the actual litigant.

Being this sloppy with her paperwork and research is likely cause for censure from the bar association though, which isn't the same as disbarment.

[Jinx999]

Based on my understanding of Section 230, I suspect that if it was repealed, twitter would be forced to block the twitter of everyone who was flagged for any reason, including Trump. Are there any expects who can clear this up for me?

[hazard]

Not an expert, but section 230 establishes that Twitter (and similar platforms) is not liable for things people say on their platform. They're also not liable for the consequences of being kicked off the platform.

It's not that Twitter would be forced to block everyone who was ever flagged for any reason. It's that Twitter would be legally responsible for everything people say on Twitter, and for any damages suffered by people who get kicked off Twitter by Twitter as a result of getting kicked off.

Twitter's entire business model would disappear, because oh boy, do people say shit on Twitter, and the company makes money by showing advertisements to everybody who visits. However, if some asshole says something that is legally a problem, Twitter can be sued for that and penalized. Revoking section 230 would basically destroy the entire social media economy, as well as every other site that permits the public to comment on their content without an employee looking over the message to see if it's compliant with the law before that comment is published.

[Jinx999]

You know the guy Trump just pardoned?

https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a3...stitution/

https://lawandcrime.com/2020-election/la...-election/

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article...l-law.html

He's calling for Trump to suspend the constitution and declare martial law.

I don't think there's anything more I can add to this. Any comment I could say is just superfluous.

[robkelk]

Woah. That sounds like sedition to me. If it is, then it wouldn't be covered by the pardon... unless your legal system is so thoroughly borked that legal action can be taken before commission of an act. Please tell me that your legal system isn't that thoroughly borked.

[hazard]

Nixon was pardoned for unspecified actions taken in a span of time. Theoretically at least I don't see how it would be impossible to do that.

[Black Aeronaut]

Woah. That sounds like sedition to me. If it is, then it wouldn't be covered by the pardon... unless your legal system is so thoroughly borked that legal action can be taken before commission of an act. Please tell me that your legal system isn't that thoroughly borked.

That's more in the realms of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.  While officers do have to say "How high?" when the President says "Jump", they are not obligated to follow an order such as "Shoot that guy on the corner - the one holding the picket sign."

Besides, Trump lost of a lot of face with the US Armed Forces when he tossed the Kurds to the wolves and then Jim Mattis resigned.  He'll have few, if any, officers that will be willing to follow such orders, and the ones that do feel so inclined will think better of it as they'll be part of a tiny minority.

[classicdrogn]

Back to the vexatious litigant thing, how many similar suits being filed and dismissed for lack of merit does it take to meet that criteria? Because I know of a certain cheeto who's racked up like thirty in the last month, if you're looking beyond who is physically standing in the courtroom presenting the complaint...

[hazard]

However many the court decides is too annoying to deal with.

[robkelk]

The fat lady is no longer warming up - she's now walking out onto the stage.

AP: California certified its presidential election Friday and appointed 55 electors pledged to vote for Democrat Joe Biden, officially handing him the Electoral College majority needed to win the White House.

Of course, she still has an encore scheduled next month in Georgia, for the Senate seats there.

[GethN7]

Woah. That sounds like sedition to me. If it is, then it wouldn't be covered by the pardon... unless your legal system is so thoroughly borked that legal action can be taken before commission of an act. Please tell me that your legal system isn't that thoroughly borked.

That's more in the realms of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.  While officers do have to say "How high?" when the President says "Jump", they are not obligated to follow an order such as "Shoot that guy on the corner - the one holding the picket sign."

A pardon cannot cover every single thing not specifically related to the pardon. Nixon was pardoned for anything pertaining to Watergate. If he knocked over a bank afterwards, the pardon would not cover that.

Also, that bit about the UCMJ is true. Trump cannot order any military officer or enlisted man to do anything that would be considered unlawful. Trump can lawfully order them into combat against a declared foe. He cannot order the execution of any random person he does not like without clear evidence of treason worthy of being shot on the spot as the only practicable remedy under law.

[RMH999]

This may slow down some of the lawsuits...

Giuliani tests positive for Covid according to Trump.

[Bob Schroeck]

Double-whammy for Trump tonight:

In a one-line response with no reported dissenting votes, the Supreme Court denied a request from Pennsylvania Republicans to block certification of the state's electoral votes.

And...

The House passes the annual defense bill without the changes Trump demanded, with a lopsided majority that makes it veto-proof.

The Supreme Court's response is being reported as pretty much the death knell for Trump's attempt to stage an autocoup, along with the safe haven deadline today, but apparently there are plans to basically try to fight things all the way through to the official report of the vote on the Senate floor in early January.

[GethN7]

Double-whammy for Trump tonight:

In a one-line response with no reported dissenting votes, the Supreme Court denied a request from Pennsylvania Republicans to block certification of the state's electoral votes.

And...

The House passes the annual defense bill without the changes Trump demanded, with a lopsided majority that makes it veto-proof.

The Supreme Court's response is being reported as pretty much the death knell for Trump's attempt to stage an autocoup, along with the safe haven deadline today, but apparently there are plans to basically try to fight things all the way through to the official report of the vote on the Senate floor in early January.

At this point we've entered last-ditch Hail Mary pass territory, and barring the latest SC hearing sponsored by Texas going through, and that's all she wrote at this point from where I'm sitting.

Whatever happens, so be it, I just want this to be over.

[robkelk]

We all want it to be over... except for one petulant spoiled brat who insists on dragging things out.

[GethN7]

We all want it to be over... except for one petulant spoiled brat who insists on dragging things out.

As I said earlier, expecting Trump to lie down and meekly accept defeat is unrealistic, even if he is wrong. Actually, especially if he's wrong, let me correct that.

The only difference between throwing in the towel immediately and after he exhausts all attempts at challenging things is that in the latter case, if he loses then, everyone can tell him "I told you so". That is, assuming he doesn't snatch victory from the jaws of defeat somehow. Not optimistic of that myself at this point, but it is a possibility one must factor in. Rutherford Hayes got the presidency thanks in part to a last-second SC Hail Mary pass too.

At this point though, I'm refraining from betting odds on that though.

[Jinx999]

I've seen analysis of the Texas case. It's flummery with added hot air on a base of fantasy with a liberal coating of bad statistics and a cherry of lies on top.

https://twitter.com/questauthority

[classicdrogn]

Entirely par for the course, in other words.

[nemonowan]

We all want it to be over... except for one petulant spoiled brat who insists on dragging things out.

You are forgetting the elephant in the room: the longer he drags things out, the more bank he makes from his deluded followers. The last I heard was that he was at $200 million and counting.

There is literally no benefit for him in conceding, and no downside in dragging things out. Except for shame and he has none of that.

[robkelk]

We all want it to be over... except for one petulant spoiled brat who insists on dragging things out.

You are forgetting the elephant in the room: the longer he drags things out, the more bank he makes from his deluded followers. The last I heard was that he was at $200 million and counting.

There is literally no benefit for him in conceding, and no downside in dragging things out. Except for shame and he has none of that.

There are plenty of downsides to dragging things out - your country's deteriorating reputation on the world stage, the growing divisiveness in your federal political system that makes it impossible for emergency measures to be instituted to save lives, the promotion of personal opinions above actual facts, and so on.

And one that's much less important because it only affects one person: he's showing that he can't be trusted to abide by the terms of a deal that he made. Alas, that's probably the only one he cares about if he cares about any of the downsides at all.

[Bob Schroeck]

Those are downsides for the country, not for him. And we all know how dedicated he is to the good of the country, which is to say, not at all.

I haven't checked the news yet this morning, has he started threatening to fire the Supreme Court yet because they didn't do as he wanted?