How does democracy die?

[washparkhorn 9935]

4 minutes ago, Bozo_Casanova said:

I love these rugged western individualists who apparently need to extract the value of other people's property at a discount to make money. It's about as capitalist as the collective farms and oil wells in the soviet union. 

Comrade Casanova - welcome to the FDR wing of American politics. Jim Hightower would be proud of you!  Corporate socialism is still - socialism. It is typically defined by corruption among those with power.  

There is still a glimmer of hope for humans. 

[TwiceHorn 31283]

This is pretty much the way it was intended.  The electoral college is intended to be a firewall between the popular vote and the presidency.  If a state can require an elector to vote a certain way, the firewall is partially torn down.

It does still serve a bit of a firewall function without faithless electors, but it's much less.

Of course it was really supposed to keep a jackwagon like Trump out of office.

[Satchel 6908]

How does democracy die? Schedule F is a perfect example:

https://www.axios.com/2022/07/22/trump-2025-radical-plan-second-term

Former President Trump’s top allies are preparing to radically reshape the federal government if he is re-elected, purging potentially thousands of civil servants and filling career posts with loyalists to him and his "America First” ideology, people involved in the discussions tell Axios.

The impact could go well beyond typical conservative targets such as the Environmental Protection Agency and the Internal Revenue Service. Trump allies are working on plans that would potentially strip layers at the Justice Department — including the FBI, and reaching into national security, intelligence, the State Department and the Pentagon, sources close to the former president say.

During his presidency, Trump often complained about what he called “the deep state.”

The heart of the plan is derived from an executive order known as “Schedule F,” developed and refined in secret over most of the second half of Trump’s term and launched 13 days before the 2020 election.

The reporting for this series draws on extensive interviews over a period of more than three months with more than two dozen people close to the former president, and others who have firsthand knowledge of the work underway to prepare for a potential second term. Most spoke on condition of anonymity to describe sensitive planning and avoid Trump’s ire.

As Trump publicly flirts with a 2024 comeback campaign, this planning is quietly flourishing from Mar-a-Lago to Washington — with his blessing but without the knowledge of some people in his orbit.

Trump remains distracted by his obsession with contesting the 2020 election results. But he has endorsed the work of several groups to prime an administration-in-waiting. Personnel and action plans would be executed in the first 100 days of a second term starting on Jan. 20, 2025.

Their work could accelerate controversial policy and enforcement changes, but also enable revenge tours against real or perceived enemies, and potentially insulate the president and allies from investigation or prosecution.

They intend to stack thousands of mid-level staff jobs. Well-funded groups are already developing lists of candidates selected often for their animus against the system — in line with Trump’s long-running obsession with draining “the swamp.” This includes building extensive databases of people vetted as being committed to Trump and his agenda.

The preparations are far more advanced and ambitious than previously reported. What is happening now is an inversion of the slapdash and virtually non-existent infrastructure surrounding Trump ahead of his 2017 presidential transition.

These groups are operating on multiple fronts: shaping policies, identifying top lieutenants, curating an alternative labor force of unprecedented scale, and preparing for legal challenges and defenses that might go before Trump-friendly judges, all the way to a 6-3 Supreme Court

[brakeman 28253]

On 2/10/2020 at 10:24 AM, Bartles said:

 

Gawdamn, vote so that you still can.