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Shouldn't even have to make the call. They should already be self-mobilizing. If doing everything possible to undermine faith in the democratic process (I'm not talking about lawsuits) isn't quite enough to classify you a "domestic enemy" of the Constitution, then refusing to abdicate would remove all doubt. Not that it would work this way in reality, but there should be 1.5 million members of the military moving on D.C. to honor their oath. I didn't vote for Biden and I'm no longer beholden to any oath, but I'd make the trip if it became necessary. The fact that the electorate put a person in power that would make these kinds of questions less than batshit crazy to entertain is an embarassment for the country. As Robert O'Neill said of Trump's desired military parade in D.C.: that's "3rd world bullshit". So is having to think about this. The international community has been watching 3rd world bullshit from the highest level of government in this country for 4 years. It does no favors to our status as the last standing superpower. China is surging economically but we have always had uncreachable high-ground over them (and others) from all other angles. We're a little less untouchable than we used to be and have nobody to blame but ourselves.

I think one example Obama created an enormous divide was when he decided to engage in race relations following the legal shooting of Treyvon Martin. Whether he had a moral obligation to do this or not, at this juncture, doesn't really matter. What happened fallowing that was the state sponsored support of a racial narrative that was diminutive to suburban and rural whites and a refusal to uphold the law. Trump absolutely was a counter-reaction to that. The cancel culture that ferminated in the United States skewed polling statistics and the idea of a silent majority began to gain momentum in whispered circles. I think the reason Democrats have a hard time seeing Obama as an exasperation of the divide was because in their own echo chambers everything was peachy. Trump being elected was a shock but they saw him as a charismatic cult figure that swayed millions of voters against the US. They don't realize he didnt sway anyone. They already felt marginalized. They were free to discuss it until Trump took power and really only a year or so after that. To Sua Sponge's point, fair. But if anything 9/11 could have been a great oppurtunity for healing. We probably pissed it away with Iraq 2.

You know, I think this was the best case scenario for a Trump loss. It might even be better than a Trump win, assuming the GOP can pick the right candidate for 2024. Trump loses, but the rest of the Republican political class wins, keeping the senate and gaining in the house, as well as picking up some state legislatures. That's a clear repudiation of the man, not the party. Keeping the senate means effectively zero progressive wishlist items will happen in the next two years. Biden, let's not forget, is a fool who was not-too-long-ago frustrating his party as VP for always trying to make deals with Mitch Mcconnell. I see that continuing. Biden's win was small, so not a mandate. And amazingly, Trump gained in all voter groups *except* white men. If you don't think there are some (D) strategists right now melting down over that, I've got something to sell you. A black Republican who speaks Spanish would obliterate what's left of the democratic coalition. Mail in balloting is here to stay, and even with the most mailed-in election in history, by far, Biden barely won. The previous (D) advantage in early and mail-in voting will evaporate once the (R) figure out they need to embrace it. No more crazy Trump tweets is a win for the country. I'm concerned about foreign relations, which was unfortunately Trump's strongest area, but at least the split government will temper any gross reversals. As stated, China is the threat. And some California and NY seats flipped, which should indicate restlessness amongst the victims of the high-tax low-freedom regimes that have controlled state policy for decades. Could have been a lot worse

I just finished a whole paper on the COVID-19 response and I'm convinced it couldn't have played out differently under any other leadership. Geographically, COVID played out in 3 regions. Asia, Europe, and the US. Asia had a fairly easy time suppressing it due to a combination of cultural and political factors. For China, it was a fantastic demonstration of Confucian principles for a better society and the suppression of human rights for the common good. This was a narrative they honestly wanted. In Korea and Japan, your average citizen has a higher level of social responsibility than in Europe or the US. So people have been comparing us to Europe. I've been in Europe since COVID began. (Almost, was actually in Asia as it started). What most people don't recognize, and if you talk to a German, Dutch, or Dane, they will tell you, is that they are tolerating lockdowns to the extent that they are because their countries run enormous social programs that have basically began paying people to not go to work. The effect on people's livelihoods has pretty much gone untouched. And because these countries do not have looming deficits, they have plenty of credit to borrow against to keep that going. The US is in a different pot. There is the balance of civil liberties and public health, the inadequacy of the CDC pandemic response plan (that was written under Obama by the way) and the inability to support masses of Americans long term from unemployment. I think the cards were against the US from the beginning to be the hardest hit. I do believe Trump earnestly was trying to not instill panic which is why he rejected visible signs of panic like masks. This is likely what his advisors were trying to tell him to do. However, I'm also strongly convinced that he has something like Asperger's syndrome, and he couldn't read the audience sensitively enough to realize this was having the reverse effect he thought it would. That said, Joe Biden is walking into a mine field and he doesn't realize it. The economic predictions are that the global economic collapse from COVID will actually function on a delay. 2023-2024 is the predicted year. The virus is also too far gone in society. He will never reverse the trends to a manageable level. Unless he somehow magically cures Corona in his first 6 months, I don't think he will survive the political fallout that is going to come from its wake.

Here are my observations on Conservative fears: 1.) A second Trump victory would have indicated a historic rejection of the Social Justice principles that have eroded the unity of our society for the last 20 years. It would have made it clear that those principles were not tolerable to the US electorate. This is probably the largest loss in this election for Conservatives, and will likely keep the country divided for another 2 decades. 2.) Should the Democrats take the Senate, speculation is high they will remove the filibuster and pass an assault weapons ban. 3.) Also removing the filibuster would allow stacking the Supreme Court. 4.) On a whole though, 2 and 3 don't look possible for this term. Its unlikely Democrats will get a strong mid term showing, and first mid terms for new party are usually a correction in the other direction. So I think chances are good they will not have either house in 2 years. 5.) The Democratic electorate largely believes this was a major victory. However, the House and Senate votes say otherwise. Democrats honestly have a large uphill battle to pass any meaningful agenda. 6.) Even if Biden does tap out year #2 and put K. Harris in, she wont have the congressional support to push a far left agenda. 7.) As a military member though, I am concerned about foreign involvement. Especially since Biden sat deuce for Obama, who was a very hawkish President. 8.) I'm also worried Biden will play us back into NATO/EUCOM, refocus energy on Russia when it needs to be on China, and remove emphasis from China overall. This would be an enormous failure in Global Security. Other than that, I don't think much will change in the next 4 years. I really hope to god though he doesn't get us into a foreign quagmire. That was one thing I was at least very confident in with Trump. It was very clear Trump was keeping us out of overseas debacles.

I know this is terrifying times for many of you, but you shouldn't be that worried about the "far left agenda". In reality across the US there were several very progressive candidates on the ballot and most of them lost by a wide margin. Even Biden as a fairly bland centrist democrat barely squeaked out a win against Trump, which I think shocked many on the left who were hoping for a bit of a blue wave. The democratic party won largely due in part to the moderate middle, so enacting "far left" policies is only going to guarantee a loss in 2022, and 2024. If history is any indicator the democratic party will play it safe by offering relatively centrist policies that have wide public support, and the senate will blockade any progress and blame the white house until you get another authoritarian in office to abdicate power to. As an added bonus we can go back to pretending to care about the defecit (yay for actual fiscal conservatism!). If by some freak of nature we take a tie in the senate, anything that gets signed into law will likely be struck down in courts, so again...nothing much to worry about. If Trump had lost in a landslide and we swept the senate, then I might agree that we are in for some progressive policy changes, but ultimately it's not likely to happen and the party isn't going to blow their political capital slamming their heads against a wall for the next several years. I'm a bit shocked the race was so close. Honestly goes to show how lucky we are Trump always doubles down on stupid and refuses to appeal to anyone not in his hardcore base. Seriously he could have walked out of walter reed and pretended to care about Covid for a month and probably swept Biden and then resumed business as usual. I just hope out of this mess we can have both sides meet and agree on an election security and voter rights law. Both of which are needed for us to have faith in our democratic process. If any of you have your doubts in the election process and the likelihood of voter fraud, I encourage you to get involved and volunteer to work the polls in the next election to see it for yourself first hand, and not just random twitter videos of people pretending to uncover rampant fraud. Educate yourself. Be part of the solution.

Neither does a candidate. No matter how many times he types in all caps like a Boomer.

Life is much easier if you just hate all politicians. Then you can just call them out whenever they say bullshit rather than trying to figure out how to defend their ridiculousness.

Oh.. is this better? If Biden wins, it's shenanigans. If Trump wins, it's vindication. Cause that's what we're doing right now.

I like your thought process here but we really need to start processing the trauma that China has likely already obtained supper power status on peer with us. They may not have the covnetional military quite there yet, but , if we look at Hybrid state theory via their Economic, Cyber, and Intelligence platforms, they have global reach. A good example was how they forced airlines to recognize Taiwan as part of the PRC. Another good example is how they forced American super businesses like Disney to recognize their claim to the 9 dash line. They spend equally on their military us, (when calculated for price parity and personnel costs) and they are only a couple years away from tech superiority to us. I'm only point this out because it's really important our next POTUS realise this and realise the rules have change on the global landscape. We aren't the only bad boy in town anymore. Out next POTUS needs to be super cognicent of that and realize we have to take a different approach now than world police.

I couldn't agree more with you on this. I don't think you should be able to run for president until 50, reason being you've actually lived some life to have experience on a large swath of subjects, yet young enough to still be "in touch" with younger people. No older than 65 because you're now officially too old to really be in touch with what is going on. Only my opinion. No data to back it up.

I think they're going to modify the immigration stance, and maybe finally push into place good, legal immigration changes. Perhaps take a look at the border in total (Canadian, increased human trafficking in ports). End "kids in cages" legislatively. Get rid of traitors names for US military bases. They'll definitely get back to caring about the deficit, and not robbing social security.

Uh, the “Great Divide” started before that. That was Newt Gingrich being Speaker of the House going all in on Bill Clinton for getting a blowie from an intern and lying about it. But the economy was great, Clinton was popular, and it backfired on Newt and he left the House. I think it would’ve continued, however 9/11 happened within the first two years of Bush Jr’s tenure, and the country came together when OEF/OIF kicked off. Now it’s turned into some tribalism between both parties. I think Trump losing is great for the GOP because they can stop faking that they support Trump’s policies and have an imposter as the face of the party.

I'm done trying to reason with you, make whatever childish claims you want. You don't read too well if that's what you got from his post. Stop being stupid, please, for the AF's sake. You continually cry about people not using reason, logic, data, etc., but it's crazy how the posts you complain about usually contain those exact things, then you never respond to any of it. Go away. You don't bring anything to the conversation. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I think we can stop with the coup porn and agree: "The Army is a broadsword, not a scalpel. Trust me, senator, you do not want the Army in an American city."

I know you are being dramatic, but the LAST thing that would restore confidence in the system is the military intervening to force a transition of power and civilian authority. Think about the precedent that would set.

You have a valid point. I'll pay up when I'm in the bar on Monday.

I think trumps tantrums grow more severe and indefensible by the minute. The man has never lost at anything, never been told "no," and as a result he will continue this classless flailing for as long as he can. It will accomplish nothing except turn off more moderate voters from republicans and delay conservatives from being able to take control of their party back.

How the media is currently celebrating Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network mobile app

Trumps ploy will be to delegitimize Biden's Presidency the same way Democrats worked to delegitimize Trump's through Russia Gate. This will have an interesting outcome though. With Russia Gate, Trump was put in a peculiar situation where he needed to assert he wasn't in collusion with Russia but be careful to investigate the matter too deeply in order to avoid bringing credence to a claim for delegitimization. The same thing will happen now with polling. The Democrats will continue to deny fraud happened but this is dangerous because if any fraud is found its going to implicate them, even if its minor. It won't change the election outcome but it will continue to keep a base of Republican voters energized for 2024.

AOC is calling for a list of names of those who supported the current President according to her recent Tweets. I seem to recall something like that from history class...

The question really comes down to what is national security? It’s less and less an ability to act, and more an ability to have influence and deter. I agree we have to pick our influence and we’re spread out too thin. If I was king for a day I would slash the vast majority (talking 70%+) of operational funding for CENTCOM/EUCOM and tell them to figure it out. COCOMs are a DISASTER, where they request the world every time and have literally no incentive to be efficient with their resources. Instead, MAJCOMs are supposed to “push back,” which basically never happens in a meaningful way. This leads to Russia getting almost the same foreign policy effects as us by flying 2 flankers twice a day around in circles with a couple of S-400s on the ground. In comparison, we’ll fly 20-30 airplanes at a time 24/7 in those theaters. Now that’s a waste of money and time. We need to focus on credible deterrence, so take the vast majority of that money and funnel it into acquisitions - which needs to be unified at the SECDEF level so we aren’t all simultaneously working on the same thing. Improve our networks, cyber, space, and weapons for common integration. The rest of the repatriated money can go to training. I hate to say it, but we probably also need drones that can do the low end A-A mission so that we don’t have F-22s and F-35s bleeding money and longevity by intercepting airliners over Baghdad during 8 hour missions. The MQ-9 can basically already do 90% what the F-15E/F-16 would be tasked for in these theaters. Same thing goes for all the ground troops we have deployed to the theater over the last few years. Its almost a pointless expense when it comes to national influence. Downsize the army/marine AD side significantly, bring them into the reserves, save money with a loss of combat power - but it’s combat power that we likely won’t need in the extreme short term, so hopefully the gamble will work out. Tough decisions. But we have to stop wasting our time in theaters that net us nothing other than debt. Focus back up on credible deterrence and technology or else we are doomed to lose the long game to China.

This is true....so let me rephrase: All Trump had to do was produce semi-competent leadership on the pandemic. Seriously, if the man would have simply come out in support of masks he probably wins the election. But he couldn't bring himself to even say the words. Because he's an idiot.

I'm just shocked that your election map was way off. Seems like you have the current political climate "dialed in."

You sound as unhinged as Trump does on Twitter today. And before you go name-calling, I’m no leftist.

All Trump had to do was have a semi-competent response to COVID-19. He couldn’t even manage semi-competent.

You think Sua Sponte is Republican? That's as disingenuous as thinking there is no impropriety going on with the election. You all are jumping the gun on this one. Trump has not conceded yet and will fight this to the end. If there is impropriety found then he will win. I'm warning all of you lefties to be careful, you might be surprised when Dec. 14th comes.

Yeah his statements on unity were extraordinarily tone deaf given he came from the administration that started the great divide. It's political theater. He has no intention of unifying the US public.

And if he were to actually achieve bringing some of the country together, then here comes the left with the 25th amendment.

I’m concerned that Biden has tried to reach out to trump supporters in word only. He has already said he will make a sweeping amount of executive decisions to undo what trump has done. So reaching out doesn’t really mean what he thinks it means. It means he changes the things he and his party want while saying hi to the trump supporters and effectively saying hope you feel better and then going on his merry reduced mental capacity way.

He’s had multiple business fail. He just denies that he had anything to do with the failure, you know, like the amazing leader he is. The best. Everyone agrees.

States will soon certify their results and Biden will emerge as the the winner of the election. This is what news outlets are basically reporting. But you already know this.

Don’t we have a kitty here somewhere that requires a donation when you say that name out loud? I hope you at least spit on the floor after typing that.

Quoted for your effective research. Or maybe you choose to only see things that benefit your argument? I seem to remember a time when socialists took lists of names in history, didn't end up going very well... Wait, maybe that was the "old" history before it was re-written by the Left.

I never read that as trying to get a list of the 70M voters of his. I'm pretty sure shes referring to politicians. People like McConnel, Cruz, Graham, etc. tore Trump to shreds in public until he won the nomination, then he was the greatest thing that's ever happened to the country. They will 100% act like they never supported hum and claim they fought against him as soon as it helps them politically. But, to be fair, that's the game. I wish we could get rid of 99% of the people in DC and get people that actually care about the country in office, but that's never going to happen. I know this is preaching to the choir, but we desperately need term limits. Sent from my SM-N975U using Baseops Network mobile app

Please provide a link. Her twitter feed shows nothing like that. Look, I can do what you did: "I, Donald Trump, hereby and forthwith concede that I lost, and there were no shenanigans. I made all that up!" See, easy... ETA: reading the quote you attribute to her, what's wrong with that? Lindsey Graham should be forced to watch video of himself calling Trump all sorts of nasty things nonstop, until he was the President. Then, acting like he was the GOP's savior. Being shown their hypocrisy would be a good thing for them...

Biden and the Dems will make a big mistake if they try and interpret this as a mandate on the nation’s decision to go along with far left initiatives. This election was purely a mandate on Trump. The squad already calling for the most progressive agenda in US History.

I wish you guys could just put up or shut up with credible, hard, real evidence of the "level of shenanigans" put into play, especially of the magnitude claimed. Even Trump's own party (if you can ever claim he was GOP) recognizes how silly and childish this looks. But by all means, continue ignoring facts and reason. It makes you guys look even better... Oh, you're a mod, you going to delete this? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Yes, "equality" is not giving any person an advantage over another. It's about equal opportunities, not equal results. Harry Callahan said it best...

Trump has been the only president in my lifetime who avoided starting a new conflict or invading another country. Who are we going to pick a fight with now since it's returning to "normal."

Congrats to Biden. trump has no one to blame but himself. They made a huge strategic error on the first debate trying to bully Biden and portray him as weak. Made trump come off as rude. Also his tone post corona virus should have softened instead he doubled down. but more importantly when will the gambling websites pay out daddy put some nice money on a Biden victory.

The sad thing is everybody are so emotionally invested in programs, we can't even have the discussion about what to cut. People just lose their minds when you bring up their pet thing and refuse to even consider it. For example, Service Academies, two ground branches, EUCOM, etc. Just watch how much flak I will draw for mentioning those few items. I personally think DoD could take a massive cut without significantly endangering our national security IF AND ONLY IF we were willing to make the hard choices.

You guys would rather think the average Biden voter - not just Antifa and BLM - could be part of a giant conspiracy that stretches across America to falsely deny Trump the presidency than realize that mail in ballots have literally always been more blue than red. You think the government is absolutely inept and can’t accomplish anything, but at the same time you believe that 5+ states can all get away with massive, simultaneous, and complicated voter fraud on a scale that isn’t even within an order of magnitude of anything seen before. You believe this just because the president says it’s happening. Not Fox. Not AP. Not any normal news outlet, just the president. Put some more faith in your average friend that voted against Trump. The thing that’s actually messed up is that our President is trying to disenfranchise regular voters just because they are not in his favor. It’s messed up to declare victory when you have less than 220 electoral college votes on the first night and declare fake news to anything opposing this. It’s messed up to push for lawsuits to stop the counting on states you have a lead in while pushing lawsuits to continue the counting in states you’re losing. I voted by mail, as is my right in the state I’m registered in, and I intend to keep that right. Have an iota of integrity, and just take the results. One side hasn’t said anything of the sort. One side will do whatever it takes to ensure a win, even if that is destruction of faith in the literal American system that is the same as it has been for the last many decades. This election isn’t new, and the problems associated aren’t new. Remember GWB in 2000? I’m sorry that you potentially are going to lose, but we need to pull together and support the actual system of democracy.

imagine writing all this, but unironically

You know what's also sad? Seeing a sitting President act like a toddler throwing hissy fits at pressers because he's losing, or about to lose, states claiming it was voter fraud. Remember, it's only fraud if you're losing or about to lose a state. Make sure to "stop the vote counting" if you're winning. Make sure to yell at Murdoch though, who told you he wasn't retracting the calling of Arizona. But he's probably under a lot of stress, due to all the debt he's about to owe Deutsche Bank after the election. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-deutsche-bank-exclusive/exclusive-tired-of-trump-deutsche-bank-games-ways-to-sever-ties-with-the-president-sources-idUSKBN27J0G0

Thanks for your service Evil. I think we crossed paths a time or two over the past 14 years. Don't be too much of a stranger. Your company has been much appreciated.

Welcome to the Check-of-the-Month Club brother. 🍺

Not sure about academy, but I know of two contracted ROTC cadets who had to go to basic. Both had already completed ROTC field training.