Election 2020
IdleRich
IdleRich
I dunno how I missed this the other day, but Congress is now launching an investigation of the so-called Forensic Audit (Fraudit for short) in Maricopa county in Arizona.
For those who aren't totally up to speed on this, what's going on is that, in a county of Arizona called Maricopa, the Repubs in the senate decided to organise yet another audit to perpetuate the big lie. This seemed like a really stupid thing to do cos both state and county have been recounted and audited numerous times and no significant discrepancy whatsoever has been found. And more than that, the elections have been officially certified, the electors sent and - this is the important bit - Biden was declared the winner, sworn in and, if you have had your ear to the ground and been really plugged in to the byzantine minutiae of US politics, you may have noticed that he has been president for six months.
So this audit can't actually change anything. The entire purpose is to cast doubt on the validity of the election so that liars and dickheads can suddenly start blethering moronically about ballot box jiggery pokery (you may have seen @mixed_biscuits doing exactly that in the Wuhan thread today when he piled some of this idiocy on top of his usual but surprisingly persistent bonkerness, dsicrediting it just that little bit more) and it will no doubt be quoted repeatedly when fascist liars try and introduce more and more laws to prevent Democrats voting in forthcoming elections.
What is weird about the fraudit is that to do it they picked a company called Cyber Ninjas, a bizarre choice in that this company have no experience in any kind of election audit and are run by a guy who wrote some weird blog pieces about how he knew Biden had cheated. Seems a really strange choice cos everyone is obviously gonna bring that up and laugh whenever someone tries to get it treated seriously. I mean, why, i get they wanted to cheat and produce a really biased audit but why on earth didn't they get someone with a tiny bit of credibility to do it, it makes no sense why are they so embarrassingly shit at cheating?
Yes, even though a bit of paper that just says "There woz lots of cheating" will be good enough for Trump followers I don't get why they didn't try and raise the level so it could fool someone of almost average intelligence. Perhaps Cyber Ninjas have just proved more incompetent then anyone dreamed possible; on the first day they announced a methodology that used the wrong coloured pen or something and which would have instantly rendered everything they touched completely invalid, but someone felt sorry for them and managed to warn them before they actually did it.... though given everything that has happened since it might have been better for everyone if they had just been put out of their misery then. Since that day the fraudit has dragged on and on with them making stupid request after stupid request, damaging the machines so they can't be used again at enormous cost to the state, spending ages analysing the papers to see if they contained bamboo and thus pointed the finger at China (that's not a joke by the way, that is seriously something they have been doing) - even some of the Rs who voted for it have now said they regret it and if they had understood what a bunch of totally incompetent cunts Cyber Ninjas were they would never have done it (the clue was probably in the name though). The one "good" thing CNs have done to justify the money they have been paid is to occasionally drop the odd enticing tidbit along the lines of "We don't want to anticipate or prejudice the final results in any way, but we have just found a lorry with a billion illegal ballots in it all signed by someone called John Binden," each of which has been greeted by enormous cheers from inbred yokels with the stars and stripes tattooed incorrectly on their bellies.
So there is the backstory, but now Congress have finally stepped in....
https://oversight.house.gov/sites/d...an-Cyber Ninjas re Arizona Election Audit.pdf
They are asking for descriptions of their methodology, proof that they have followed it and also copies of any correspondence between the obviously totally neutral auditors and people such as Trump or Giuliani who might have a vested interest in the results. Sounds like bad news for Cyber Ninjas in that I am not sure that they can count to double figures or read words with more than one syllable and who, I doubt would be capable of producing a report proving that they had done the audit correctly even if they had done, which they obviously haven't.
For those who aren't totally up to speed on this, what's going on is that, in a county of Arizona called Maricopa, the Repubs in the senate decided to organise yet another audit to perpetuate the big lie. This seemed like a really stupid thing to do cos both state and county have been recounted and audited numerous times and no significant discrepancy whatsoever has been found. And more than that, the elections have been officially certified, the electors sent and - this is the important bit - Biden was declared the winner, sworn in and, if you have had your ear to the ground and been really plugged in to the byzantine minutiae of US politics, you may have noticed that he has been president for six months.
So this audit can't actually change anything. The entire purpose is to cast doubt on the validity of the election so that liars and dickheads can suddenly start blethering moronically about ballot box jiggery pokery (you may have seen @mixed_biscuits doing exactly that in the Wuhan thread today when he piled some of this idiocy on top of his usual but surprisingly persistent bonkerness, dsicrediting it just that little bit more) and it will no doubt be quoted repeatedly when fascist liars try and introduce more and more laws to prevent Democrats voting in forthcoming elections.
What is weird about the fraudit is that to do it they picked a company called Cyber Ninjas, a bizarre choice in that this company have no experience in any kind of election audit and are run by a guy who wrote some weird blog pieces about how he knew Biden had cheated. Seems a really strange choice cos everyone is obviously gonna bring that up and laugh whenever someone tries to get it treated seriously. I mean, why, i get they wanted to cheat and produce a really biased audit but why on earth didn't they get someone with a tiny bit of credibility to do it, it makes no sense why are they so embarrassingly shit at cheating?
Yes, even though a bit of paper that just says "There woz lots of cheating" will be good enough for Trump followers I don't get why they didn't try and raise the level so it could fool someone of almost average intelligence. Perhaps Cyber Ninjas have just proved more incompetent then anyone dreamed possible; on the first day they announced a methodology that used the wrong coloured pen or something and which would have instantly rendered everything they touched completely invalid, but someone felt sorry for them and managed to warn them before they actually did it.... though given everything that has happened since it might have been better for everyone if they had just been put out of their misery then. Since that day the fraudit has dragged on and on with them making stupid request after stupid request, damaging the machines so they can't be used again at enormous cost to the state, spending ages analysing the papers to see if they contained bamboo and thus pointed the finger at China (that's not a joke by the way, that is seriously something they have been doing) - even some of the Rs who voted for it have now said they regret it and if they had understood what a bunch of totally incompetent cunts Cyber Ninjas were they would never have done it (the clue was probably in the name though). The one "good" thing CNs have done to justify the money they have been paid is to occasionally drop the odd enticing tidbit along the lines of "We don't want to anticipate or prejudice the final results in any way, but we have just found a lorry with a billion illegal ballots in it all signed by someone called John Binden," each of which has been greeted by enormous cheers from inbred yokels with the stars and stripes tattooed incorrectly on their bellies.
So there is the backstory, but now Congress have finally stepped in....
https://oversight.house.gov/sites/d...an-Cyber Ninjas re Arizona Election Audit.pdf
They are asking for descriptions of their methodology, proof that they have followed it and also copies of any correspondence between the obviously totally neutral auditors and people such as Trump or Giuliani who might have a vested interest in the results. Sounds like bad news for Cyber Ninjas in that I am not sure that they can count to double figures or read words with more than one syllable and who, I doubt would be capable of producing a report proving that they had done the audit correctly even if they had done, which they obviously haven't.
Leo
Well-known member
Sorting out Trump's comments on the Arizona audit
(more detail in the story, highlights below)
Former President Donald Trump issued three statements in two days falsely claiming that voting fraud and irregularities cost him Arizona’s electoral votes. Trump relied on comments made Thursday by contractors hired by state Senate Republicans to oversee a partisan review of the 2020 vote count in Maricopa County, which includes metro Phoenix.
County officials and elections experts say the claims are false and based on a misunderstanding of election materials, which they say creates an appearance of irregularities where none exists. Trump laid out his claims most specifically in a statement Friday night. A look at the irregularities he alleges in that statement:
TRUMP: “168,000 fraudulent ballots printed on illegal paper (unofficial ballots)”
THE FACTS: All of that is false. The ballots were not unofficial or printed on illegal paper, and even Logan never alleged they were fraudulent.
TRUMP, citing “74,000 mail in ballots received that were never mailed (magically appearing ballots).”
THE FACTS: No, there were no magically appearing ballots. He is alleging that the number of filled-out ballots received in the mail by election officials exceeded the number of people who had asked earlier for mail-in ballots, by 74,000. But that’s not at all what happened. The claim mischaracterizes reports created for political parties to track who has voted early so they can target their get-out-the-vote efforts.
TRUMP, claiming “11,000 voters were added to the voter rolls AFTER the election and still voted.”
THE FACTS: There’s nothing untoward about voters rolls growing after Election Day. The rolls are simply updated to reflect people whose provisional ballots are added to the tally after election officials verify that they were eligible to vote.
TRUMP, alleging “all the access logs to the machines were wiped, and the election server was hacked during the election.”
THE FACTS: That flies in the face of the evidence. Maricopa County’s election server is not connected to the internet and independent auditors found no evidence the election server was hacked.
TRUMP: “Arizona shows Fraud and Voting Irregularities many times more than would be needed to change the outcome of the Election.”
THE FACTS: Not so. The number of potential fraud cases is far smaller than President Joe Biden’s margin of victory in Arizona.
(more detail in the story, highlights below)
Former President Donald Trump issued three statements in two days falsely claiming that voting fraud and irregularities cost him Arizona’s electoral votes. Trump relied on comments made Thursday by contractors hired by state Senate Republicans to oversee a partisan review of the 2020 vote count in Maricopa County, which includes metro Phoenix.
County officials and elections experts say the claims are false and based on a misunderstanding of election materials, which they say creates an appearance of irregularities where none exists. Trump laid out his claims most specifically in a statement Friday night. A look at the irregularities he alleges in that statement:
TRUMP: “168,000 fraudulent ballots printed on illegal paper (unofficial ballots)”
THE FACTS: All of that is false. The ballots were not unofficial or printed on illegal paper, and even Logan never alleged they were fraudulent.
TRUMP, citing “74,000 mail in ballots received that were never mailed (magically appearing ballots).”
THE FACTS: No, there were no magically appearing ballots. He is alleging that the number of filled-out ballots received in the mail by election officials exceeded the number of people who had asked earlier for mail-in ballots, by 74,000. But that’s not at all what happened. The claim mischaracterizes reports created for political parties to track who has voted early so they can target their get-out-the-vote efforts.
TRUMP, claiming “11,000 voters were added to the voter rolls AFTER the election and still voted.”
THE FACTS: There’s nothing untoward about voters rolls growing after Election Day. The rolls are simply updated to reflect people whose provisional ballots are added to the tally after election officials verify that they were eligible to vote.
TRUMP, alleging “all the access logs to the machines were wiped, and the election server was hacked during the election.”
THE FACTS: That flies in the face of the evidence. Maricopa County’s election server is not connected to the internet and independent auditors found no evidence the election server was hacked.
TRUMP: “Arizona shows Fraud and Voting Irregularities many times more than would be needed to change the outcome of the Election.”
THE FACTS: Not so. The number of potential fraud cases is far smaller than President Joe Biden’s margin of victory in Arizona.
IdleRich
IdleRich
They want belief, it's kinda interesting cos the auditors will let slip something saying you know - as yesterday - we have identified 74,000 ballots that were postal votes that were not requested which instantly means those votes are questionable and the margin of Biden's victory was only 50,000 and so his victory in Maricopa County is officially unsafe.
And within about half an hour the officials from Maricopa County will explain what those votes are and how they are completely normal and the explanation will be totally clear, rational and plausible.... but that won't matter at all, cos Trump will have already tweeted (or got someone to tweet one of his stupid "official" statements for him as he is still banned) something about how there is now definitive proof that 750,000 votes were falsely counted for Biden in Maricopa and it's definite proof that he won Maricopa and so he won Arizona and so on... and now that is gospel truth in MAGA world. You will hear that number mentioned again and again and again for years - people will be popping up all over going but what about that 74k that was proven stolen in Maricopa by the forensic audit, how come nothing was ever done about it and how come our servile media never reported on it.
You know that thing about a lie going all the way round the world before the truth can get its trousers on? Well that's especially true in MAGA World and it's especially true if it's an outlandish lie about the election.
And within about half an hour the officials from Maricopa County will explain what those votes are and how they are completely normal and the explanation will be totally clear, rational and plausible.... but that won't matter at all, cos Trump will have already tweeted (or got someone to tweet one of his stupid "official" statements for him as he is still banned) something about how there is now definitive proof that 750,000 votes were falsely counted for Biden in Maricopa and it's definite proof that he won Maricopa and so he won Arizona and so on... and now that is gospel truth in MAGA world. You will hear that number mentioned again and again and again for years - people will be popping up all over going but what about that 74k that was proven stolen in Maricopa by the forensic audit, how come nothing was ever done about it and how come our servile media never reported on it.
You know that thing about a lie going all the way round the world before the truth can get its trousers on? Well that's especially true in MAGA World and it's especially true if it's an outlandish lie about the election.
blissblogger
Well-known member
Reconstruction or Partition, these are the options
federal troops overseeing election process OR relocation of population to separate federations of compatible-reality states
federal troops overseeing election process OR relocation of population to separate federations of compatible-reality states
IdleRich
IdleRich
As you probably know, the really thorough and professional audit in Maricopa is still rumbling on. Dominion refused to give them their routers I think and some other stuff too so the senate subpoenaed them and also some other people - but sadly it's not a real subpoena ordered by a judge and so all the people involved completely ignored it.,
So on 27th the Repubs behind the fraudit came up with a cunning idea to get them to obey, they did exactly the same thing again.
Chuck Callesto: BREAKING REPORT: Arizona State Senate Just Served MARICOPA COUNTY, AZ A New Round of Subpoenas...
Wendy Rogers: BREAKING: The Arizona Senate issues two more subpoenas today. One to the Maricopa Board of Supervisors and one to Dominion. I would not blow these off!
This scared the Maricopa County board so much that, obviously quaking in their boots, they told them to get fucked with a letter containing a few memorable lines such as "The board has real work to do and little time to entertain this adventure in never-never land. Please finish whatever it is you are doing and release whatever you are going to release" - and they also made sure to mention that the reason it was taking forever and going nowhere was cos the company they employed was filled with incompetent idiots.
I actually think that the line "be prepared to defend any accusations of misdeeds in court" which comes at the end there is quite important and gives quite a good clue as to what is going on and why it's taking so long to finish. I feel that Cyber Ninjas have painted themselves into a corner here in that they have sucked up loads of money, time and other resources and they carry the hopes of the nutters of the Trump party in their hands.
If CB complete their audit and announce that they have found no evidence of any fraud then, contrary to MAGA's claims to just want to know that the election was fair, I think it far more likely that they will suddenly find themselves the target of immense Trumpleton ire, there will be howls of anger about the wasted money, possibly even demands that it is returned. And seeing as the company have surely not been performing anything like a proper audit then those claims may even have some merit, they may find thesmselves in all kinds of legal trouble. and also the usual attacks from the Trumpshere going right up to death threats and so on.
So what's the alternative? Find some fraud, only one small problem, they can't find any cos there wasn't any and also cos it is doubtful that they possess the skill set to find it even if it did exist.
Well, I guess they could make it up but seeing as they are already warned by Maricopa and we know the DOJ is watching this like a hawk, this may not look particularly attractive either, best to just keep on spinning it out and maybe use the profits to flee the country when that becomes unsustainable.
So on 27th the Repubs behind the fraudit came up with a cunning idea to get them to obey, they did exactly the same thing again.
Chuck Callesto: BREAKING REPORT: Arizona State Senate Just Served MARICOPA COUNTY, AZ A New Round of Subpoenas...
Wendy Rogers: BREAKING: The Arizona Senate issues two more subpoenas today. One to the Maricopa Board of Supervisors and one to Dominion. I would not blow these off!
This scared the Maricopa County board so much that, obviously quaking in their boots, they told them to get fucked with a letter containing a few memorable lines such as "The board has real work to do and little time to entertain this adventure in never-never land. Please finish whatever it is you are doing and release whatever you are going to release" - and they also made sure to mention that the reason it was taking forever and going nowhere was cos the company they employed was filled with incompetent idiots.
I actually think that the line "be prepared to defend any accusations of misdeeds in court" which comes at the end there is quite important and gives quite a good clue as to what is going on and why it's taking so long to finish. I feel that Cyber Ninjas have painted themselves into a corner here in that they have sucked up loads of money, time and other resources and they carry the hopes of the nutters of the Trump party in their hands.
If CB complete their audit and announce that they have found no evidence of any fraud then, contrary to MAGA's claims to just want to know that the election was fair, I think it far more likely that they will suddenly find themselves the target of immense Trumpleton ire, there will be howls of anger about the wasted money, possibly even demands that it is returned. And seeing as the company have surely not been performing anything like a proper audit then those claims may even have some merit, they may find thesmselves in all kinds of legal trouble. and also the usual attacks from the Trumpshere going right up to death threats and so on.
So what's the alternative? Find some fraud, only one small problem, they can't find any cos there wasn't any and also cos it is doubtful that they possess the skill set to find it even if it did exist.
Well, I guess they could make it up but seeing as they are already warned by Maricopa and we know the DOJ is watching this like a hawk, this may not look particularly attractive either, best to just keep on spinning it out and maybe use the profits to flee the country when that becomes unsustainable.
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IdleRich
IdleRich
And it appears that at around about the same time a group called American Oversight which is some kind of pro democracy pressure group or something (maybe something to do with Marc Elias I dunno) has been trying to get documents from the legislature in AZ which reveal the processes used in the fraudit, plus the funding and answer a load of other questions and have asked a judge to order their release - which has now been done. I will of course be expecting the GOP to comply fully and speedily with this extremely serious legal request and will no doubt be extremely outraged if they try and wriggle out of this or treat it with the same dismissive frivolity as Maricopa County treated their subpoena.
IdleRich
IdleRich
I think that I mentioned that when I was younger my entire childhood was totally ruined by the way that all the kids of my ages in the village loved WWF and watched it all the time. One aspect of it that used to irritate/amuse me was when there was some sort of "incident" (The Big Boss Man hit Hulk Hogan with a chair or some shit) and they would do these sort of official press conference type statements where someone in a suit would discuss the investigation and give a ruling with appropriate sanctions and so on. But the pseudo-seriousness of the presentation was always undercut by the bizarre names of the competitors - you cannot give a serious conference if you're talking about The Undertaker, Bushwhackers and Wrestlemania etc
I was reminded of those utterly ridiculous clown shows when I saw this video from AZ Rep Chair Dr Kelli Ward. Specifically it's the way that she undercuts this supposedly serious release with phrases such as "radical liberal democrat" or "swamp scum democrats" and both "lapdog media". and "fake news media" which she is shocked to note has been "even attacking the Arizona state senate" -wonder where they got that idea?
I was reminded of those utterly ridiculous clown shows when I saw this video from AZ Rep Chair Dr Kelli Ward. Specifically it's the way that she undercuts this supposedly serious release with phrases such as "radical liberal democrat" or "swamp scum democrats" and both "lapdog media". and "fake news media" which she is shocked to note has been "even attacking the Arizona state senate" -wonder where they got that idea?
IdleRich
IdleRich
Also watching that, I'm struck by how "fake news" has become arguably Trump's most successful coinage. It has become a word in its own right, in Republican circles it has literally replaced "news" - they use "fake news media" automatically and without pausing, in any situation where they might previously have said news. It has succeeded, surely far more than Trump ever imagined in that it is being used successfully to completely dismiss whatever they like without even any sop to engagement. Fake news media as a descriptor is endlessly useful as you can dismiss anything you want utterly and effectively, there is no comeback, no defence, once labelled as such the story is gone.
At least in that particular echo-chamber, although the problem with that is the more time you spend in one hermetic world the less effective you become once outside it.
At least in that particular echo-chamber, although the problem with that is the more time you spend in one hermetic world the less effective you become once outside it.
Leo
Well-known member
so many of the guests on Fox News do nothing more than string together a half-dozen anti-Dem buzzwords and catch phrases like that, regardless of what the topic is. the goal is to reinforce the stereotypes, and give low-info viewers some repetitive points they can latch on to.
it's like top-40 songwriters who drop proven hooks into a pop song.
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IdleRich
IdleRich
Was thinking about that the other day with some ghettotech mixes we were listening to and how things like "big booty bitches" have become a single word. Bigbootybitches and Fakenewsmedia are the same in that respect. I suspect Dr Kelli Ward would disagree - but that is cos she is not as smart as you or Traxman or even me for that matter.
Leo
Well-known member
@IdleRich want to make sure you're up on the latest...
Jeffrey Clark, Trump-appointed DOJ official, claimed Chinese thermostats changed votes in 2020 election, reports say
Jeffrey Clark, Trump-appointed DOJ official, claimed Chinese thermostats changed votes in 2020 election, reports say