The Election That Could Break America | Hacker News Reader

The Election That Could Break America

theatlantic.com

18 pointsxdze211 comments

It's tiring that the liberal elite of America is trying to force a worldview and mental-state that interprets every single moment and happening as a blaring 5-alarm emergency.

Suggesting (or even acting) otherwise is to become a target of verbal abuse and criticism.

Trump announces early victory, but mail in votes trickling in over the coming days reveal he lost. He claims fraud, and the case goes to the soon-to-be 6-3 GOP controlled Supreme Court.

America has lost.

Wouldn’t the actual votes not matter and the electoral college would decide the winner? They have discretion to vote however they want regardless of actual votes in most states.

Many states have enacted laws against the "faithless elector" scenario you are describing because previously there was no such penalty.

In those states, faithless electors face fines and possibly jail time if they do not follow the state rules for elector allocation and the will of the state's voters.

See the Wikipedia map: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faithless_elector

Here's where I'm at. Does some weird/shady shit happen? Yes. But one would think with all of the firings and forced resignations he's done, that would be a department he would 'clean up'?

Supreme Court justices do not have party affiliations. They were appointed by a president who is a member of a party, but that is all. They don't have to worry about offending that president, or that party, because they don't face re-election. They are independent - very deliberately so.

And Supreme Court justices go "against" the party that appointed them all the time. The most recent major example that I can recall with no searching: Justice Roberts voted with the majority to strike down Louisiana's restrictive abortion law.

Look, I'm concerned about how the election is going to go. I'm concerned about Trump claiming victory and fraud. (Of course, I'm also concerned about Biden claiming fraud/voter suppression if Trump wins.) But the GOP does not control the Supreme Court in the way that you fear.

I’ll add that the Electoral College ultimately ends up casting the votes that elect the president. If things really went sideways and completely broke, they could cast their votes against their state’s wishes.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faithless_elector

There was an interesting Supreme Court decision on that just this year. Basically, states can remove faithless electors.

https://www.npr.org/2020/07/06/885168480/supreme-court-rules...

I think the prognostications of fear, uncertainty and doubt will end up wrong. Twenty years ago we had a controversial close election that had to be decided by the supreme court. Plenty of people did not want to see Bush in the white house and the country did not collapse.

I think the main difference is that 20 years ago you didn't have right-wing militias prowling the streets and allying with police. https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2020/09/23/patriot-coalition...

Irregular pro-regime forces taking to the streets is something you might expect in the middle east, but its happening in the USA right now.

I don't think holding America hostage is a good election strategy. It didn't work in 2016 and I don't think it will work in 2020.

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