Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
Disabled Alaskan Monarchist doomer
User ID: 2666
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
even John Roberts won't let it go.
Even after Rep Raskin and the Justice Department force Alito and Thomas to recuse themselves?
And besides, John Roberts can make his decision, and then let him try to enforce it.
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
It would lay bare for the world to see the motive with zero excuse.
So what? What does it matter if people see "the motive with zero excuse"? Let them see, and get mad, and stew impotently in their anger, doing nothing about it because there's nothing they can do about it.
Get Trump to Florida and say Molon Labe
And when they do indeed "come and take him," drag him back to NY and lock him up?
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
small well coordinated groups can do a lot of damage
Define "small"
and there are quite a lot of those floating around the US
Not if you exclude the Fed honeytraps, there aren't. Small groups, yes, but meaningful coordination is something us Red Tribers are fundamentally, constitutionally incapable of. If a group is "well-coordinated," it can only be because someone on the Federal payroll is providing said coordination.
Everybody knows how terrorist cells work
Not my experience, given some of the myths I encounter people believing about Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.
and America is full of cells
Only if you count a bunch of fat, out-of-shape beer-swilling losers who hang out occasionally as a "terror cell"
currently engaged in beer & fishing type activities
Because those are the only activities they're capable of, and always will be the only activities they ever engage in.
We're completely useless, powerless, and hopeless, and I've yet to see someone provide any believable evidence to the contrary.
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
Cops stop enforcing the law, people stop joining the military, that sort of thing.
So you just replace them with people who will.
I'm reminded of when Curtis Yarvin was on the Good Ol' Boyz podcast some time ago, where he first claimed that he "loves the 'chuds'," but then went on to argue that those same Red Tribe chuds are "worse than Morlocks" because the Eloi at least needed the Morlocks to maintain the machinery that supported their comfortable lifestyles, while "you can be entirely replaced with immigrants and automation," and just who do you think he was talking about warehousing in the Matrix in his "Virtual Option"?
And if you stop working, people eventually stop paying you, and then how do you keep your family fed and a roof over their heads?
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
Defection may be about to get a lot more popular.
Defection to where, exactly? And why would they want said "defector" anyway?
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
certain infrastructure knowledge could cause massive amounts of deaths, infrastructure costs, and/or economic costs
All of which would turn everyone against them and bring further crackdowns upon the entire Red Tribe.
and it only takes a couple highly-reported bad actors for the processes to become Common Knowledge as something that can happen.
And all it takes is making sufficiently severe examples of those bad actors (and their family, friends, and general associates) to make it Common Knowledge as something not worth trying.
not everyone in that field is low-capability.
"Capability" is useless without coordination. The lone actor accomplishes nothing. Only large, well-coordinated groups can get anything done.
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
Supremacy clause.
And who enforces that? Through what means?
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
There's a scenario I've seen postulated elsewhere, that I'm not sure how plausible it is as a possibility (not enough of an expert on the legal system). Specifically, judges can issue suspended sentences, where a defendant is spared jail time subject to abiding by certain conditions set by the judge. These conditions can include refraining from behaviors, contacts, etc. associated with the crime in question — such as giving someone convicted of a drug crime a jail sentence suspended on the condition they go to rehab, stay clean, stay away from known dealers/drug houses, etc.
Given that the 34 charges for which Trump is being sentenced are related to political campaign finance, the proposed scenario is that Judge Merchan gives Trump serious jail time, but suspends it on the condition that Trump refrain from running or campaigning for political office. That is, give Trump the choice of dropping out and letting the Republican convention four days later name someone else their candidate, or going to jail (where he dies — depending on your views and flavor of the scenario, either from old age after how ever many years, or from getting Epsteined before election day).
Is there some rule about sentencing that prevents this?
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
It's a bit of a mental splinter to me that the prosecution never had to really get its story straight, and that Chad and Lori have both been convicted, in part, on the theory that they masterminded the whole thing and the other party was merely a catspaw.
As I understand it, prosecutors are allowed to make inconsistent arguments so long as they're in separate cases — that they claimed "X" in one trial is no bar to claiming "not X" in another trial.
The theory behind broad presidential immunity is that without it any random prosecutor in the US could threaten the POTUS with prosecution after they leave office unless they do what the prosecutor wants.
Yes, and…? What's wrong with that? Particularly if you make sure only prosecutors on one side of the political divide are actually able to follow up on those threats (while the other team's guys get squashed for trying), then the establishment's hold on power gets even stronger, which is of course something the establishment would want.
Courts have given judges and prosecutors broad immunity already.
Courts give court officers broad immunity, huh? That doesn't necessarily mean they'd extend it to the other branches, does it?
There are a lot of broadly written laws that the government uses to go after people who are troublesome. They aren't applied broadly. You need to piss someone off and be enough of an outsider that they think it's safe to go after you.
Exactly. Not a bug, but a useful feature, so why get rid of it?
Politically motivated charges are a civil rights act violation so surely the appeals courts will dismiss them quickly.
As we've seen in other contexts, the Civil Rights Act often means only what the left establishment wants it to mean, and punishing "violations" mostly goes in one direction.
Correcting every error would get them salami sliced as Trump toadies. One broad ruling would prevent them from having to make dozens of smaller rulings.
Or they can cave — to save their own necks/reputation — make no immunity ruling at all.
Edit: Do you still think the court would rule in favor of broad immunity after Alito and Thomas recuse themselves?
Democrats are desperate that Justices Alito and Clarence Thomas recuse themselves from any cases involving January 6, seeing as they're both insurrectionist sympathizers. Rep. Jamie Raskin, who you think would have embarrassed himself enough on the January 6 select committee, has an op-ed in the New York Times Wednesday explaining that recusal is not a "friendly suggestion." He argues that the Department of Justice can force Alito and Thomas to recuse themselves.
“This recusal statute, if triggered, is not a friendly suggestion. It is Congress’s command, binding on the justices, just as the due process clause is. The Supreme Court cannot disregard this law just because it directly affects one or two of its justices. Ignoring it would trespass on the constitutional separation of powers because the justices would essentially be saying that they have the power to override a congressional command.”
(More at link.)
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
if you have a link I'd appreciate it
Afraid not; it was years ago and over on Reddit (which I find terrible to try to search).
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
Given how the elections here in Anchorage (~39% of the state's population) just went, how Blue this city has become, how Lisa Murkowski keeps getting reelected, our replacement for the late Don Young…
…well, I won't say it's by any means certain, it's far from impossible.
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
The non-RINO Christian Right
A minority, and a shrinking demographic.
sneering subservient RINO elite wannabees
I also object strenuously to the use of the term "RINO" to characterize the GOP establishment. Because there's nothing "in name only" about them. Indeed, it's quite clear to me that — regardless of what GOP voters may want or think the party stands for — they are the Republican Party. Being a "RINO" "sellout" Outer Party fake-opposition is what the Republican Party is, what it has been for a long time. It's populist outsiders like Trump — and the sizable fraction of voters who support them — who are really Republicans "in name only."
it becomes clearer what lawlessness they will embrace to render him powerless, and how trivially they could trample over people like us who don't have a billion dollars and a TV show and buildings with our names on them.
Which is why we're going to lose. They can and will simply "trample over" all of us, and there's nothing we can do about it.
When the alternative is writing a blank cheque to godless, lawless evil
"But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also."
I've been told repeatedly that Christians are not promised worldly political victory, but that they will be handed over to be persecuted, that they will be killed, and that they will be hated by all (see Matthew 24:9). That the right must understand that, per Tolkien, history will only ever be "a long defeat" and that the only victory to be had is in the next life, by sticking to our values unwaveringly even unto torture and martyrdom; that one should indeed willingly embrace said martyrdom like so many saints of old.
Back at the old place, Hlynka argued that it was precisely this embrace of "principled defeat" in this life for the sake of the next that defines "right wing" and separates it from the left, and thus only those who believe in an afterlife can be on the right; and that, regardless of their political positions, atheists are all automatically "left wing" by definition.
And if they bring him down
There's no "if" about it.
the only ones left are sneering subservient RINO elite wannabees and a lawless brigade that makes its living destroying the lives and livelihoods of middle class Americans on principle... Well, imagine a boot stamping on a human face— forever.
Yes, I agree with that. That is what's going to happen. It's inevitable, and there's nothing anybody can do to stop it.
Death is the only escape.
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
There's not one person in this country who has decided this is the moment to hop off the fence, "Okay, now I won't vote for the man."
That's exactly what a number of Alaskan Republican voters did when Ted Stevens was railroaded, so I don't see why I shouldn't expect at least some of them to do the same with respect to Trump. After all, "Taking the high road" is the only thing that separates us from them, you see. We're the party of Law and Order, and only a Leftist would vote for a felon, so therefore anyone who votes for a felon has ceased to be One Of Us and has become The Enemy. Better to lose while keeping your Sacred Values than to damn your immortal soul to eternal hellfire for a mere election.
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
The "normiecon boomers" who are still awake right now to talk in friendly confines are wondering when the shooting's going to start.
And the answer, of course, is "never" because, as you note, it's always some unspecified "someone" who "shoots one of these judges/bureaucrats/politicians." Nobody's going to be the first to stick their own neck out; they're going to wait for someone else to get the ball rolling, and join in only once it looks like it isn't going to be nipped in the bud (which it would be).
Plus, to be anything more than useless lone-wolf terrorism would require organization — solid, pre-established coordination — and, as a Disqus commenter over at Instapundit put it, we've been breeding such things out of the Right (in favor of "I just want to grill" passivism and "don't tread on me", "I don't answer to nobody; if someone orders me to breathe I'll suffocate myself to death to spite them!" individualism) for decades.
Trump has no support left to lose he didn't already lose 3 years ago.
The example of Ted Stevens suggests otherwise.
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
That's an argument that it will not win; it's not an argument against doing it.
So, what, does the unarmed man of my analogy point his finger and shout "pew, pew" then?
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
At some point, that portion hits critical mass, and then things go badly.
And I still have little idea what this is supposed to look like, and everything that's suggested seems rather implausible to me. The only remotely plausible "critical mass" outcome, in my view, is a parallel to the German Peasants' War; and even that requires a level of unrest I find implausible. A bunch of Wacos and Oklahoma Cities — the latter followed by prosecutions and crackdowns — seems more likely.
"Not with a bang, but a whimper" and all that.
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
and not just a handful of columnists.
I'm talking about people I know personally, fellow Alaskans, who acted similarly in the Ted Stevens case — including one person who argues that if you vote for "a convicted felon" God will literally damn you to hell for it.
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
On the bright side, I believe this conviction will make it quite a bit more likely SCOTUS hands down a more expansive presidential immunity case which will bar this prosecution.
Can I ask your reasoning why?
With this conviction, I believe they're more likely to adopt a more expansive view in order to make sure the holding squelches these sorts of state-law prosecutions.
But why would SCOTUS want to "squelch" this?
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
to nearly the same extent as they did pre-2020.
Yes, but even though that belief is smaller, there's still enough to get Biden through, particularly given all the ovine Boomer Republicans who aren't going to vote for "a convicted felon".
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
Suffice to say, if he’s re-elected,
Except this has now guaranteed that won't happen.
things could get interesting for democrats real fast.
How so? An Attorney General is only one man; how much could he do with the entire rest of the Justice Department (and probably much of the court system) actively opposing him?
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
No president would get re-elected in an environment of high inflation after trust in institutions was permanently lost after footage of them transparently lying to justify losing their nutty over the chink virus.
Sure they can. If nothing else, you can just make up election results saying they won from whole cloth, declare those "the official result" and punish any "election denier" who dares to claim those numbers are anything but 100% true and accurate.
But, like @The_Nybbler says below, you almost certainly don't need to go that far. Just use control of the media and the institutions to ensure enough of the peasant masses are marinaded solely in your official narrative, and enough of them will go along. Particularly if the other candidate is currently rotting in a cell somewhere.
I guess the big question is ‘what happens next?’
I think @The_Nybbler has it: a bunch of "law and order" Boomer Republicans refuse to vote for "a convicted felon," and Biden wins. Just like happened here in Alaska with Ted Stevens — yes, the conviction (in that case) was a product of egregious prosecutorial misconduct (in conspiracy with FBI agents to withhold exculpatory evidence), and was quickly overturned on appeal… but not until after the election was already lost.
We're about to see total Democrat dominance at the Federal level bigger than that of the mid 20th Century — no conservative "Dixiecrats" to "cross the aisle" or Eisenhowers getting through. Just ever-more-triumphant Blue Tribe as us Reds continue dying out, until we finally go extinct, and disappear forever.
Edit: And, in support of the 'Republicans are going to keep on "taking the high road" rather than engage in tit-for-tat lawfare,' I link former governor of Maryland, and current GOP candidate for US senator for that state, Larry Hogan on Twitter:
Regardless of the result, I urge all Americans to respect the verdict and the legal process. At this dangerously divided moment in our history, all leaders—regardless of party—must not pour fuel on the fire with more toxic partisanship. We must reaffirm what has made this nation great: the rule of law.
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
16d ago
There is very little argument to Republicans against goose-for-gander here,
Except the only one needed — it won't work. Because they lack the power of the left, lack the means to strike back. It's like arguing that an unarmed man being shot at should "shoot back" at his attacker with the gun he doesn't have.
The Dems have all the power, all the institutions. We on the right are an already-defeated remnant, doomed to feeble, pointless lashing out as we go to our inevitable doom.
(Maybe it would be better to just spare ourselves the suffering and end it all, like the equally-doomed Sicarii at Masada.)
No, but most of the "normie Republicans" I know are (at least in a nominal "Christmas and Easter" sense). And I'm repeating the arguments some of them give (over and over) for why it's better for Republicans to "stick to our values" and keep losing than to "descend to our enemy's level" by retaliating tit-for-tat. They like to quote Mark 8:36 a lot.
I, personally, am one of those atheist right-wingers that Hlynka claimed doesn't exist.
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