Ok, everybody had their fun saying Biden should just disappear his political enemies because it’s allowed now. It’s a new day, and those jokes are all old now, and also they’re cynical and stupid and counterproductive.
Democracy is on the ballot. Stop fucking acting like it’s already gone.
Because if you and enough people decide it’s already gone, it is. It’s like watching Peter Pan where you, the audience, have to clap and say you believe in fairies for them to exist, except it’s real.
My concern is this: if Roberts is willing to do this, we have to consider that he's willing to invalidate election results that support Biden.
Maybe he is and maybe he isn't. But the risk is enough that I think we have to find any way to reform the court before the election.
Well, SCOTUS just gave Biden the tools.
EO that says: 4 new seats. Recess appointment 4 justices in. Hope that Congress is too broken to stop when they reconvene.
But of course, that means not clapping for the fairy. At least for a little while.
It’s important to note that this would both backfire electorally and also not work practically. There’s more to seating some more justices than just Biden not getting prosecuted for doing it illegally after he leaves office.
Right! Biden is like “there’s four new justices now” and the court is like “lol no there’s not” and every paper is like “senile Biden believes he’s a king” and the house impeaches him and probably honestly the 25th amendment is invoked.
What Roberts and his court have done is made it very clear that there is no institution we can trust to keep our Democracy for us. All of them can fail if we vote badly. The only thing that will protect us is electing good people to office. All the offices. That's the only actual safeguard.
Right. There’s lots of people like where’s our project 2025? And it’s making sure republicans don’t have power. That’s it. There is not a thing we can do to keep them from using the power they gain once they’ve gained it, no clever lawyering to prevent its exercise.
I think the court signaled, as you note, that they won’t defend democracy, and also that they *will* defend Donald Trump. They prattle on about history and say that if they don’t grant immunity then presidents will be getting prosecuted by successors all the time, but it’s never happened before now!
I'm not entirely convinced they are wrong. Their message is consistently "stop voting for assholes." And "if only you hadn't voted for assholes, this wouldn't be a problem." And yeah, I mean, true.
If that's true, and I agree that it is, then we can't rely on voting either. The Republicans are already signalling that they will ignore the election.
That's why I'm suggesting that Biden use his powers as the executive to take control of the other branches now, by force if necessary.
I mean, we *can* rely on voting. Because we have a Dem executive who can oversee transfer of power to another Dem executive etc etc etc until the threat is gone.
We also still control the Senate. We need to keep controlling the Senate.
Yeah, I think this is still basically true. There are impediments to voting, and a very close election is at extreme risk of shenanigans. But winning, and winning by a sizable margin, is by far the simplest path here.
This is a coup you’re talking about. An overthrow of the system of government we say we’re trying to save and we’re aghast that the court won’t defend. The question of how we save democracy can’t be answered with “we can’t and we shouldn’t.”
Yes. I'm talking about a coup. Pelosi and Pence already did a coup to save democracy once.
And I'll ask, what is your alternative? What happens when Roberts declares Wisconsin and Arizona for Trump?
Every option looks awful, as far as I can tell.
The Roberts SCOUTS has made no actual signal that they don't respect elections or laws. They said that the COURTS are not going to fix bad laws or bad elections. Those are different things and that distinction matters going forward.
Well if you control the legislature you can always pass laws that do more to constrain the system and the executive.
So if you want "more" then the next step is still the same. Pass better laws.
You need control of government, and the ability to govern. Winning elections is the biggest chunk of this. Not everything on its own, but the big piece.
Step 1, win elections. Step 2, keep winning them until the GOP is forced to change their behavior. Step 3, fix the laws so they actually work to constrain the executive.
I am definitely not on board with "abuse executive power for as long as we have the executive." That's a bad plan.
How about
Step 1: abuse the executive power, and if that would lose you elections,
Step 2: suspend elections, and if people have a problem with that,
Step 3: military force
Its foolproof.
It’s a fair warning. Especially to the Good Guys. Though perhaps not inevitable.
The question posed (eg Drezner’s substack) is what about if the Bad Guys did it and it didn’t lose them elections.
Yeah - I mean, I do think we should not shy away from using and even working to expand constitutional authority where it's beneficial and necessary. And especially, we shouldn't allow dated traditions (blue slips, say) to limit us.
But that's not just swinging randomly.
Do I think there are spots we could be slightly more ruthless? Yes. Do I think we also have to very carefully pick and choose the places we do it so that there's a bright line between us and them? Also yes. Very yes.
my own feeling on this is that, if I'm gonna do a revolution, I'd much rather have a sympathetic, or at least fecklessly liberal, government in power than a ruthlessly murderous authoritarian one. This is just basic strategy; why pass up the opportunity to elect who my enemies are?
No, that is despair talking, and it is less than helpful.
We controlled the legislature(barely) for two years and got:
- Climate Action
- Jan 6th Com
- Infrastructure
- Free tests/masks
- Lowered drug prices
- CHIPs Act
- Funding for Ukraine
And that doesn't even show what he did WITHOUT it.
Yeah I checked that guys TL after he gave me the "no YOU don't understand" nonsense and immediately realized he was not worth taking seriously. It's a bad timeline.
We're not doomed if we recognize it's time to do more than vote harder.
I live in Kansas. I'll vote for everything to the left of R, but only local elections are affected by my ballot.
I can effect local change. But my state goes to the orange turd regardless of how hard I pencil in the oval.
Right but local government is also important! Municipal and county governments are starving for committee members! I have a local elected official I like who I *just found out* is a trump supporter because he's genuinely good at local government! Change often starts small.
That's by definition not a safeguard. Its the process that safeguards are meant to protect. Its also not at all sustainable. Which is why safeguards were thought up. Though they seems to have been poorly structured and very weak.
What definition of safeguards are you using? Be specific.
The safeguards that exist are impeachment, legislative action, guidance by his cabinet, guidance from regulatory agencies and court orders.
Safeguards are not infallible or infinite. Just like seatbelts and airbags.
They are remarkably similar to seatbelts and airbags... we just found out that the seatbelts are made of yarn and the airbags are just pillows full of saw dust and your response is... "just drive good" 😂. Either way, that's a shit plan and a lot of people die.
"win every election for the rest of time" has an extremely low probability of working. it takes a very cursory understanding of elections and probability theory to understand this is a recipe for almost inevitable fascism.
