Is Pence a good guy? Most probably. Does he have experience? Yes. Does he have good judgement? No. If he did he never would have signed on to the Trump campaign who ended up trying to kill him.
I'm not looking for an argument, but I'll probably get one. My understanding was that a number of congress persons voted to object to the vote count in several states - not to overturn the election. This happened a number of times before, most recently after the 2016 election when seven far left democrat Representatives objected to state votes. The only difference is that the seven objectors in 2016 were unable to obtain the support of a Senator in order for objections to be voted on in the joint session.
If I'm wrong, I'll apologize but, I believe more precise language is needed before accusing people of acting illegally. We can infer motive, but it remains speculation until contested in a court of law.
"The only difference is that the seven objectors in 2016 were unable to obtain the support of a Senator in order for objections to be voted on in the joint session."
You're partially correct here. The seven objectors did find Senators to support their objections, which did not happen in 2016. For the first round (pre-insurrection), that list was:
* Josh Hawley, Missouri
* Ted Cruz, Texas
* Tommy Tuberville, Alabama
* Roger Marshall, Kansas
* John Kennedy, Louisiana
* Cindy Hyde-Smith, Mississippi
After order was restored, both Hawley and Marshall continued to object to PA's electors, while the four other Senators did not.
Now, where I think you're not entirely right is in your thought that the above was the *only* difference. There were several *other* significant differences by the time January 6th rolled around:
1. Clinton conceded to Trump on November 9th, the day after the election - effectively ending the contest. Trump still has yet to concede to Biden.
2. Trump and his proxies continued to argue that the election was stolen Jan. 6th and beyond.
3. Trump lobbied Michael Pence to not certify the election on Jan. 6th. Obama did no such thing, and it was Biden himself who told the Democratic House objectors that "it is over".
4. The transition to the Trump administration began on schedule and funds were released on time to the President-elect's team to start forming their new government. The Trump administration dragged its feet for several additional weeks and prohibited contact within the executive agencies with their Biden transition team counterparts.
Had Trump manned up and not acted like a petulant child who lost a contest fair and square, and afforded his successor the same courtesy the Obama administration granted him and his transition team, there would have been no Senators who would have objected to Biden's win. You'd still have a few nutjobs in the House, but that's par for the course as the Democrats themselves demonstrated in 2016.
The only reason why Hawley and Marshall continued to object was to score points with the Trump base. If either was actually serious about election integrity, they would have included Texas in their list of states they needed more information from, after a Republican governor made the same kind of unilateral decisions that Hawley et al. argued were the SOLE authority of the state legislatures.
So, there's a WORLD of difference between the Democratic nutjobs in the House objecting in 2016 and the concerted effort of the Trump administration and its allies to run out the clock to try and find a magic bullet that would overturn the election, keep them in power, and barring that, sabotage the efforts of their rightful successor.
(Comment edited to remove some math I was getting backward about margins.)
I'm sure you are correct but, my comment was directed at congressional procedure and the legality of the process. There was no vote to overturn the election. Everything that took place was procedurally correct and the never-Trumps should be happy with the outcome. The 2020 election is over. I'm just looking forward to Republican control of Congress after next year and two terms for President DeSantis after that.
There was no vote to overturn the election, but Team Trump (and that includes members of Congress) were doing everything in their power to try and find ways to ignore the results of the election. They failed to follow the proper procedure to send alternative slates of electors to Congress by the safe harbor date and they attempted to delay the certification of the election, which is set by law and is NOT NEGOTIABLE.
There was not an "overturn the election" vote, but Team Trump was arguing that the law that dictates when certain things must happen should be ignored while they attempted to try and find a new and novel legal theory (Kraken?) that would invalidate the election. Had Team Trump been successful in their efforts, the result wouldn't have been a grudging acceptance that Donnie won reelection - it would have been an ugly dissolution of our Union, all undertaken to satisfy a narcissist's vanity.
Sorry I totally ruined your holiday spirit. As I said, I was not looking for an argument and I certainly had no intent to make this about Trump. I conceded the election after the states certified the numbers. My thought when writing the comment was to point out that the objection process was covered by congressional rules and was handled accordingly. A second thought that I wish I had included is the folly of voting for democrats to punish Republicans and expecting something better. Democrats objected to the 2016 election (even, as you mentioned, after their candidate conceded) and Republicans objected to the 2020 election. No difference. Same thing.
Since you brought up, once again, how awful you think the 45th President is, I will point once again that you really did not get a better government by trading a President with a brash personality for an incompetent left-wing administration. We lost a pretty good economy, a border that was almost under control, and a military on its way to recovering from the Obama years. We are now a failing country. The primary task for the federal government is to defend the USA but we have hundreds of thousands of illegals coming in every month and a military which is regressing to the social experiment Obama wanted.
We always need the full story. The truth is in the details. Surface similarities are very misleading.
I was talking to a science fiction writer the other day about the Gospel - discussing the Isaiah 9 passage Steve quotes - the Son who will be born who is God, King and Savior. How often do we see this scenario in fiction!! And yet this gentleman wouldn't even consider it as TRUTH. He gave me all the usual arguments, with copious examples, about how all religions are the same and everyone worships the same God. That, of course, is not true at all - but it is possible to make a flimsy, shallow case for this point and feel like you have expressed deep, eternal mysteries.
It's the Truth that sets us free. Shallow arguments will not cut it in the end.
Blessed Christmas to all. May we be filled with the presence of the child who set us free, and may we dwell with him eternally in the Kingdom of God.
Steve, I don't get your reference to Raphael Warnock as an example of the church shifting to the political. Doug Collins, was a pastor, too. Had he defeated Kelly Loeffler in the run-off, would you have referred to him? And then there is Republican Jody Hice, who was a pastor until 2013 when he stepped down to run for US representative to Congress for the 10th district and who voted to overturn the November 3 election results and to nullify the votes of 10s of thousands of voters in his district.This same pastor--turned-Republican congressman, on the morning of Jan. 6, urged supporters to “FIGHT” and stated “This is our 1776 moment." This same pastor-turned -Republican congressman who is now challenging (with Donald Trump's endorsement) GA Secretary of State, Brad Raffensberger, who had the temerity to affirm the integrity of Georgia 's 2020 election results.
You are correct, when you say "what we do at church has also shifted to the political" and I submit those church actions gave us Donald Trump, brought us to Jan 6, and where we are, today. I'll take a Raphael Warnock over a Doug Collins, Jody Hice, and Mike Pence, any day. At least, Warnock respects the concept of the separation of church and state. I believe what we are looking at here is wheat and chaff.
This is Steve. Those are also good examples. I know Jody Hice was a pastor, but thought Doug Collins was a lawyer (and a darned good one). Now I know it’s not unbiblical for a lawyer to also be a pastor, but it is surprising if he was both.
Is Pence a good guy? Most probably. Does he have experience? Yes. Does he have good judgement? No. If he did he never would have signed on to the Trump campaign who ended up trying to kill him.
I'm not looking for an argument, but I'll probably get one. My understanding was that a number of congress persons voted to object to the vote count in several states - not to overturn the election. This happened a number of times before, most recently after the 2016 election when seven far left democrat Representatives objected to state votes. The only difference is that the seven objectors in 2016 were unable to obtain the support of a Senator in order for objections to be voted on in the joint session.
If I'm wrong, I'll apologize but, I believe more precise language is needed before accusing people of acting illegally. We can infer motive, but it remains speculation until contested in a court of law.
"The only difference is that the seven objectors in 2016 were unable to obtain the support of a Senator in order for objections to be voted on in the joint session."
You're partially correct here. The seven objectors did find Senators to support their objections, which did not happen in 2016. For the first round (pre-insurrection), that list was:
* Josh Hawley, Missouri
* Ted Cruz, Texas
* Tommy Tuberville, Alabama
* Roger Marshall, Kansas
* John Kennedy, Louisiana
* Cindy Hyde-Smith, Mississippi
After order was restored, both Hawley and Marshall continued to object to PA's electors, while the four other Senators did not.
Now, where I think you're not entirely right is in your thought that the above was the *only* difference. There were several *other* significant differences by the time January 6th rolled around:
1. Clinton conceded to Trump on November 9th, the day after the election - effectively ending the contest. Trump still has yet to concede to Biden.
2. Trump and his proxies continued to argue that the election was stolen Jan. 6th and beyond.
3. Trump lobbied Michael Pence to not certify the election on Jan. 6th. Obama did no such thing, and it was Biden himself who told the Democratic House objectors that "it is over".
4. The transition to the Trump administration began on schedule and funds were released on time to the President-elect's team to start forming their new government. The Trump administration dragged its feet for several additional weeks and prohibited contact within the executive agencies with their Biden transition team counterparts.
Had Trump manned up and not acted like a petulant child who lost a contest fair and square, and afforded his successor the same courtesy the Obama administration granted him and his transition team, there would have been no Senators who would have objected to Biden's win. You'd still have a few nutjobs in the House, but that's par for the course as the Democrats themselves demonstrated in 2016.
The only reason why Hawley and Marshall continued to object was to score points with the Trump base. If either was actually serious about election integrity, they would have included Texas in their list of states they needed more information from, after a Republican governor made the same kind of unilateral decisions that Hawley et al. argued were the SOLE authority of the state legislatures.
So, there's a WORLD of difference between the Democratic nutjobs in the House objecting in 2016 and the concerted effort of the Trump administration and its allies to run out the clock to try and find a magic bullet that would overturn the election, keep them in power, and barring that, sabotage the efforts of their rightful successor.
(Comment edited to remove some math I was getting backward about margins.)
I'm sure you are correct but, my comment was directed at congressional procedure and the legality of the process. There was no vote to overturn the election. Everything that took place was procedurally correct and the never-Trumps should be happy with the outcome. The 2020 election is over. I'm just looking forward to Republican control of Congress after next year and two terms for President DeSantis after that.
There was no vote to overturn the election, but Team Trump (and that includes members of Congress) were doing everything in their power to try and find ways to ignore the results of the election. They failed to follow the proper procedure to send alternative slates of electors to Congress by the safe harbor date and they attempted to delay the certification of the election, which is set by law and is NOT NEGOTIABLE.
There was not an "overturn the election" vote, but Team Trump was arguing that the law that dictates when certain things must happen should be ignored while they attempted to try and find a new and novel legal theory (Kraken?) that would invalidate the election. Had Team Trump been successful in their efforts, the result wouldn't have been a grudging acceptance that Donnie won reelection - it would have been an ugly dissolution of our Union, all undertaken to satisfy a narcissist's vanity.
Sorry I totally ruined your holiday spirit. As I said, I was not looking for an argument and I certainly had no intent to make this about Trump. I conceded the election after the states certified the numbers. My thought when writing the comment was to point out that the objection process was covered by congressional rules and was handled accordingly. A second thought that I wish I had included is the folly of voting for democrats to punish Republicans and expecting something better. Democrats objected to the 2016 election (even, as you mentioned, after their candidate conceded) and Republicans objected to the 2020 election. No difference. Same thing.
Since you brought up, once again, how awful you think the 45th President is, I will point once again that you really did not get a better government by trading a President with a brash personality for an incompetent left-wing administration. We lost a pretty good economy, a border that was almost under control, and a military on its way to recovering from the Obama years. We are now a failing country. The primary task for the federal government is to defend the USA but we have hundreds of thousands of illegals coming in every month and a military which is regressing to the social experiment Obama wanted.
No holiday spirit ruined - I just get twitchy when it comes to The Former Guy.
Hope you're having a good evening and even better tomorrow.
We traded a truth challenged coup plotter for yet another democratic recovery. At least that's what reality says.
We always need the full story. The truth is in the details. Surface similarities are very misleading.
I was talking to a science fiction writer the other day about the Gospel - discussing the Isaiah 9 passage Steve quotes - the Son who will be born who is God, King and Savior. How often do we see this scenario in fiction!! And yet this gentleman wouldn't even consider it as TRUTH. He gave me all the usual arguments, with copious examples, about how all religions are the same and everyone worships the same God. That, of course, is not true at all - but it is possible to make a flimsy, shallow case for this point and feel like you have expressed deep, eternal mysteries.
It's the Truth that sets us free. Shallow arguments will not cut it in the end.
Blessed Christmas to all. May we be filled with the presence of the child who set us free, and may we dwell with him eternally in the Kingdom of God.
Steve, I don't get your reference to Raphael Warnock as an example of the church shifting to the political. Doug Collins, was a pastor, too. Had he defeated Kelly Loeffler in the run-off, would you have referred to him? And then there is Republican Jody Hice, who was a pastor until 2013 when he stepped down to run for US representative to Congress for the 10th district and who voted to overturn the November 3 election results and to nullify the votes of 10s of thousands of voters in his district.This same pastor--turned-Republican congressman, on the morning of Jan. 6, urged supporters to “FIGHT” and stated “This is our 1776 moment." This same pastor-turned -Republican congressman who is now challenging (with Donald Trump's endorsement) GA Secretary of State, Brad Raffensberger, who had the temerity to affirm the integrity of Georgia 's 2020 election results.
You are correct, when you say "what we do at church has also shifted to the political" and I submit those church actions gave us Donald Trump, brought us to Jan 6, and where we are, today. I'll take a Raphael Warnock over a Doug Collins, Jody Hice, and Mike Pence, any day. At least, Warnock respects the concept of the separation of church and state. I believe what we are looking at here is wheat and chaff.
This is Steve. Those are also good examples. I know Jody Hice was a pastor, but thought Doug Collins was a lawyer (and a darned good one). Now I know it’s not unbiblical for a lawyer to also be a pastor, but it is surprising if he was both.
I believe he pastored Chicopee Baptist Church for 11 yrs or so.
Yep. https://www.simonandschuster.com/authors/Doug-Collins/188518159