Good luck America

[happygeek]

Jolly good luck, indeed. I hope you don't need it, but watching from over the pond it looks like there are going to be some very short fingernails by tomorrow...

[AssertNull]

watching from over the pond it looks like there are going to be some very short fingernails by tomorrow...

Bizarrely enough it feels to me that non-Americans are more stressed out over our election than we are, our normally unflappable friends to the north in particular. My Canadian friend (possibly FORMER friend) swears he'll have nothing to do with Americans if we elect Trump. Had a similar, though less dramatic conversation with an Australian. Both said that if given the option, they'd trade their right to vote in their own countries for the right to vote in the American election because American leadership affects them more than the leadership of their own country.

Short fingernails indeed, worldwide. People with stock in whatever company manufactures Xanax must be making a fortune.

[Gribouillis]

To speak frankly, as non american, I don't have any opinion
about this election. Media in France support Clinton, whatever
that means to support someone when you don't have the right to vote.
I don't believe the media. I remember in 1980, they described Reagan
as a cowboy with rough edges, which he was not. I think he was a
great president. Of course, Trump's recording about women doesn't plead
in his favor.

One of our former presidents said that the next french president will
have to work with the next US president whoever that is, and it seems to
be the most reasonable opinion.

[Reverend Jim]

Early indications are for a Clinton win. If the Dems take back the senate it will likely be 51-49. If it goes 50-50 then the veep gets the deciding vote.

My expectations are that if Clinton wins, Congress will start impeachment proceedings on her first day in office.

HC - lesser of two evils. She may be despised, but she will probably be able to work on the international stage in a stateswoman-like manner. Trump will place US-Global relations back by decades. Not that he seems to care.

[Reverend Jim]

@diafol - If you are basing "despised" just on what you've seen in the media you should consider that this wasn't the perception of Hillary until she started running and the media started to give essentially unlimited free air time to the "smearer", Donald Trump. Based on her record she should have gotten a lot more respect than she did. Of course, the media had to create a horse race and with all the insanities that Trump continued to spew I suppose they had to level the playing field lest the Republicans scream "liberal media bias". Here is a short video the kind of sums up the two sides. Let's hear it for false equivalancies.

<This post originally had an extra piece that got copied from an email to someone else. It was not intended for Daniweb and has been deleted.>

[AssertNull]

My expectations are that if Clinton wins, Congress will start impeachment proceedings on her first day in office.

It would be incredibly ill-advised for them to do that. If the Republican Congressional leadership is smart, assuming she wins, they'll want to put this election, and Donald Trump, behind them, so the last thing they'll want to do is scream "rigged, let's riot, lock her up, impeach her", etc. That just makes them seem Trump-like. If she wins, it will be because the American people elected her, right or wrong, despite the existing allegations against her. To impeach her based on those allegations rather than anything she does as president is to reject the democratic process and the voice of the American people.

If they have any brains, they'll give the expected "The American people have spoken. We respect their voice" concession speech. If Trump wants to play the sore loser, let him. But I think Paul Ryan is going to breathe a sigh of relief tonight if Trump loses. There's no love lost between him and Trump. He wants this to be over and never have to look back. No way he'll move to impeach before she does anything wrong IN OFFICE. If he even remains Speaker.

[Reverend Jim]

If the Republican Congressional leadership is smart, assuming she wins, they'll want to put this election, and Donald Trump, behind them

Well, there's the problem. You have a party whose entire strategy post-2012 election was to block the dems from doing anything. This is a party that shut down the government, then shamed national parks employees for not continuing to work after their salaries were cut off. John McCain has said that the Republicans will block any Clinton Supreme Court nominee. The problem is that they are not smart. In 2012 Bobby Jindall said "we have to stop being the party of stupid". I haven't seen any sign of that yet.

If you are basing "despised" just on what you've seen in the media you should consider that this wasn't the perception of Hillary until she started running and the media started to give essentially unlimited free air time to the "smearer", Donald Trump.

Doesn't matter. The reality is that plenty of Americans hate her - I'm not arguing "fairly or unfairly". I was making the point that whether you like her or not, she will probably not end up making the USA a pariah state. Trump is pretty much guaranteed to f*** it up royally, unless he suffers a premature (CIA-induced) heart attack. I do find it remarkable (well no, not really) that he favours political isolationaism while profitting from internationalism with regard to his business ventures.

[Reverend Jim]

Click here for real time results

[Reverend Jim]

It's 22:21 CST and all I can say is what the #### is wrong with you people!!!!!

[AssertNull]

People with stock in whatever company manufactures Xanax must be making a fortune.

Now add Prozac to that list.

In six months, the people who VOTED FOR HIM will be the ones needing Prozac and wanting a voting do-over. He is going to be absolutely miserable in this job and the people who actually believed he had any intention of fixing their problems and voted for him because of that are going to be miserable too. Be careful what you wish for. He's going to tell people to jump, expecting them to respond, "How high shall I jump sir?", but in reality they're going to tell him no. No one's ever told him no before. He can't handle it. He's not going to build a wall, he's not going to deport 11 million people, he's not going to get manufacturing jobs back, he's not going to ban Muslims, he's not going to etc. etc. etc. This isn't a dictatorship.

If we're lucky, we'll just have massive gridlock for four years or, speaking of impeachment, he might do something to get himself impeached and go down in flames. I just hope he's unable to take everyone with him.

I really did not see this one coming at all.

[EDIT] Looking at the map, she could still pull this one off. Three states are neck and neck 50/50 coin tosses. If she gets all three, she ties or wins, so that's a 1 in 8 chance.

He he. You got your own little Brexit. When I thought it couldn.t get worse...

[Reverend Jim]

he might do something to get himself impeached and go down in flames

And then Mike Pence becomes president. Oh joy.

[happygeek]

How many president elects have been assassinated before they get sworn into office?

[Reverend Jim]

The big lie used to be that any kid could grow up to be president. It's not a lie any more.

[AssertNull]

How many president elects have been assassinated before they get sworn into office?

Zero as far as I can tell.

[Reverend Jim]

To better understand what has happened I suggest a reading of Poe's, The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether.

[Reverend Jim]

By the way, there are a lot of (still vacant) apartment blocks being built in my end of town (Winnipeg) if anyone is looking to relocate ;-P

I thought you were building a wall?!

[AssertNull]

I thought you were building a wall?!

The wall was probably intended to keep out Trump voters. Safe to say anyone fleeing to Canada would be a non-Trump voter. For now. In about six months, give or take, the Trump voters will start fleeing.

You know who's really depressed now, ironically? Gun store owners. They were all set to make record sales if Trump won. Hillary voters are seeing the Apocalypse, but unlike Trump voters, liberals don't tend to stock up on guns and ammo when they think the country is going to hell. Plus there's no fear now that the new president will ban AR-15s so there won't be a run on them.

Wasn't there a South Park episode where Donald Trump went to Canada, got elected leader, and a bunch of Canadians fled to the US until Trump built a wall keeping them in Canada?

[Agilemind]

The wall was probably intended to keep out Trump voters.

Trump voters would never stay. Unrestricted abortion, no guns, and gov't monopolies on booze and healthcare would scare them off quick. The only silver lining of this election is that Canada can do some serious head-hunting of all the rich educated talented people who now want to leave.

PS I may already be happening since several of my PhD holding friends have suddenly started seeing "immigrate to Canada" ads appearing on their FB accounts.

[Reverend Jim]

I just saw a Fox "news" correspondent on the Kelly File trying to interview someone who was protesting Trump's win. After a few seconds the protestor shouted "Grab Trump by the pussy", and then walked off. Megyn Kelly commented "You know, that's the problem. These people want people to listen to them and then they behave like that." Interesting. Trump behaves exactly like that for two years and gets elected but when a liberal protestor follows suit he is labeled as "sad". I guess irony died last Tuesday as well

So Trump has started his assault on Green issues by appointing to GW denier: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/donald-trump-energy-advisor_us_5736048be4b08f96c1830536

So, we can probably see Trump trying to cut out foreign ownership / shareholding in "US" oil companies, while reviving the coal industry and encouraging the world to burn, burn burn. What a c***.

[Agilemind]

Yup and the EPA will be worse than toothless: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/12/science/myron-ebell-trump-epa.html?_r=0

[Reverend Jim]

The GOP doesn't like Trump any more than I do so i suspect they will try to get rid of him as soon as possible. He still has charges pending for the Trump "University" fraud and the rape allegations of the 13 year old from a few years back so I wouldn't be surprised if they start impeachment proceeding ASAP. I'm sure the Dems would go along.

[Gribouillis]

Hmm. Politicians never want to get rid of power. I think the republicans will govern the US with Trump as president. Do you think they want to give power to the democrats ? Why don't you give him a chance to be a good president ? We still don't know what he will do, only what he said when he was a candidate. Democracy is designed to allow the people to choose fresh men for president, and I accept this.

For example in France, I don't usually like our presidents, but I won't support another system. What could it be ? Monarchy ?

[AssertNull]

He still has charges pending for the Trump "University" fraud and the rape allegations of the 13 year old from a few years back so I wouldn't be surprised if they start impeachment proceeding ASAP.

No, he does not. He was never "charged" with the rape of a 13 year old. He was SUED. There was never a criminal charge to my knowledge. The accuser has dropped the lawsuit.

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/11/donald-trump-rape-lawsuit-dropped-230770

Regarding Trump University, I'm not that familiar with it, but I believe the accusations are civil rather than criminal in nature and he was sued by private citizens. I believe the government was involved as far as telling him he could not use the word "University", but no criminal charges have been filed. In my opinion, these lawsuits need to be put on hold while he is office because the rights of 300 million+ Americans to have a full-time president outweigh the rights of private individuals to sue. We went down that road with Paula Jones. It was an abuse of the impeachment process. If he commits fraud or rape while in office that would have resulted in criminal charges if he was a private citizens, impeach away, but I'd be a hypocrite for writing this and having it apply to Hillary, but not Trump.

If she wins, it will be because the American people elected her, right or wrong, despite the existing allegations against her. To impeach her based on those allegations rather than anything she does as president is to reject the democratic process and the voice of the American people.

Agree with the below. I'll certainly be viewing him with incredible scrutiny and given his behavior, he doesn't deserve the normal "Honeymoon" period that most presidents are granted. But I do give him the clean slate regarding impeachment. We should impeach for "High crimes and misdemeanors" or "Breach of the public trust" for actions while IN OFFICE.

Why don't you give him a chance to be a good president ? We still don't know what he will do, only what he said when he was a candidate. Democracy is designed to allow the people to choose fresh men for president, and I accept this.

we don.t know what he.ll do.

Well I fully expect him to live up to his campaign promises. Anything less is a betrayal. Either way he.s a thoroughly loathsome creature. When France elects Marine and her henchmen to power and the other European states follow suit, we.ll see what a stable world we have then. What happened the last time the big countries had fascist/very right-wing govts? Oh yes, I remember now...

[AssertNull]

Well I fully expect him to live up to his campaign promises.

Before we can judge him on whether he lives up to his campaign promises, we have to figure out what they are. He has a long history of saying whatever the hell he wants to say at the moment, then if he doesn't want to be stuck with it, it was either not to be taken literally or an opening gambit in a negotiation (ie he doesn't intend for Mexico to pay for the wall, but that'll be his opening demand, they'll say no, and we'll negotiate from there) or... Take six Trump surrrogates, ask them what Trump's campaign promises were, and you'll get six different lists.

"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean- neither more nor less."

"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things."

"The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master-that's all."

Regarding my previous post, I said Trump shouldn't be impeached for offenses prior to being elected. One of his key campaign promises is to "drain the swamp" and it's clear to me that by that he means to go after people not only presently in the swamp (ie current government/power holders), but also those folks who used to be in the swamp (ie Hillary and others). Thus he promised to revisit the e-mail scandal, Benghazi, etc. etc., and "lock her up" for pre-election stuff.

If he actually does that, then fair's fair, Congress should investigate and impeach him for his pre-election scandals. I seriously doubt that will be necessary though. I'm confident he'll create plenty of new scandals.