January 6

Discussion in 'Free Speech Alley' started by LSUTiga, Jul 27, 2021.

  1. Jmg

    Jmg Veteran Member

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    if these questions are unanswered, then how can you already conclude we almost lost our democracy?
     
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  2. Rex

    Rex Founding Member

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    I just answered that.
     
  3. kcal

    kcal Founding Member

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    https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/...executive-order-came-from-outside-white-house


    Trump 'draft executive order' came from outside White House
    | January 24, 2022 10:06 AM
    TRUMP 'DRAFT EXECUTIVE ORDER' CAME FROM OUTSIDE WHITE HOUSE. Last week, I wrote about Resistance excitement over a claim that Republicans "forged" phony Electoral College documents in an attempt to fool the world into thinking President Donald Trump won the 2020 election. It turned out there was much less to the story than met the eye. Now there is another seemingly sensational story about the period when Trump was still in office and refusing to accept the results of the election.

    Last Friday, Politico published an article headlined, "Read the never-issued Trump order that would have seized voting machines." The piece included the text of a White House "draft executive order," dated Dec. 16, 2020, that "would have directed the defense secretary to seize voting machines."

    There's no doubt it was an outrageous, dangerous, terrible, beyond-bad idea. Among all the bad ideas that floated around the Trump circle in the period between the Nov. 3, 2020, election and the Jan. 20, 2021, inauguration, it was perhaps the worst. But where did it come from? And was it taken seriously by Trump and his top aides?

    We know at least one source of the idea.In mid-December, former national security adviser Michael Flynn was publicly floatingthe idea of Trump declaring martial law and seizing voting machines. In a Dec. 17 appearance on Newsmax, Flynn said the president should "appoint a special counsel immediately" to oversee an election investigation. Then, Trump should "seize these Dominion and other voting machines that we have across the country" to search for "foreign influence" in the voting system. And finally, Flynn said, Trump "could also order, within the swing states, if he wanted to, he could take military capabilities and he could place them in those states and basically re-run an election in each of these states."

    It is hard to overstate the disaster such actions would have brought about. But again, it's just one man talking. Still, Flynn was part of a small group that included Sidney Powell, the main proponent of the great Hugo Chavez Venezuelan voting software theory. There were a few other adherents, but those two, Powell and Flynn, were certainly the best-known proponents of the "seize the machines" idea.

    So, the "draft executive order" was dated Dec. 16. Flynn appeared on Newsmax on Dec. 17. And on Dec. 18, Flynn and Powell went to the White House where they met with Trump and top advisers, including from the White House counsel's office. It was, according to a later account in Axios, one of the wildest meetings ever in the Trump White House.

    Powell, Axios's Jonathan Swan and Zachary Basu reported, "proposed declaring a national security emergency, granting her and her cabal top-secret security clearances and using the U.S. government to seize Dominion's voting machines." The meeting quickly turned into participants yelling at each other — the White House staff knew the Powell/Flynn ideas were dreadful and were angry that the two had even been let into the White House. Trump mostly watched and listened, according to the account. Powell and Flynn never returned to the White House.

    So now, there is word of a "draft executive order," which just happened to outline the key steps that Powell pushed for at the White House — appointment of a special counsel and an order for the secretary of defense to "seize, collect, retain and analyze all machines, equipment, electronically stored information, and material records" from the election.

    How did it happen? The process of drafting a real executive order originates in the White House and involves the White House counsel's office, the Office of Management and Budget, the Justice Department, and other officials. Was that what was happening here?

    No. According to a source familiar with the events in question, the "draft executive order" did not originate in the White House. It came, as they say, from outside the building. But — and this is important — it ended up becoming an official presidential record and thus has become part of the investigation mounted by House Democrats' Jan. 6 committee on Capitol Hill.

    It happened like this: Someone — it is not clear who — brought the draft into the White House. And if a document, no matter how kooky or irrelevant or whatever, is brought into the White House and is shown to a White House official, the Presidential Records Act requires that it be preserved and retained and ultimately sent to the National Archives as part of the official records of the administration. (That is done automatically for documents that are originated on White House equipment.)

    So the "draft executive order," which did not originate inside the Trump White House, became a presidential record of the Trump administration.

    Recently, the former president has been involved in a court fight with the Jan. 6 committee over some presidential records at the National Archives. Trump claimed that documents the committee wanted were protected by executive and other privileges. Last week, Trump lost the fight when the Supreme Court allowed the National Archives to give documents to the Jan. 6 committee. The documents were quickly handed over to the committee. And then — Voila! — comes word that there was a "draft executive order" under which Trump would have ordered the seizure of voting machines.

    The Politico report was careful to say that "it's not clear who wrote" the draft and that the order was never issued. And now, according to the inside source, it is clear that the document did not come from inside the White House. How seriously to take the whole thing depends on your perspective. Yes, the Powell-Flynn idea was awful. But at the same time, it was brought into the White House from the outside and did not come within 100 miles of becoming an actual executive order.
     
  4. Rex

    Rex Founding Member

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    The Washington Examiner is a hack wingnut site, but even if what they write is true in this circumstance, so what? Why would trump make it an official administration document unless he wanted to keep it in his hip pocket for potential use?

    "and did not come within 100 miles of becoming an actual executive order" shows just how desperate and hack the Washington Examiner is. Within the president's own documents at the Oval Office is well within 100 miles.

    I think Sidney Powell wrote it, by the way.
     
  5. Jmg

    Jmg Veteran Member

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    i disagree. can you put a likelihood any more precise than "almost" on how close we came to losing our country? 75%?

    given that we are willing to speculate wildly about things that didnt happen, do you think its possible, trumps attempt to become dictator would have been thwarted by the half of the population thta voted biden, plus the trump fans who didnt support him to the extent that wanted him as an unelected dictator?
     
  6. Jmg

    Jmg Veteran Member

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    i think the 100 miles was metaphorical
     
  7. Rex

    Rex Founding Member

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    Yes, as was my "a lot closer than 100 miles away". The draft executive order, once delivered to trump from whatever source, was never far away in any respect... metaphorically, literally, practically, physically, symbolically.
     
  8. Jmg

    Jmg Veteran Member

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    i see so what percent chance was it to be enacted?
     
  9. Rex

    Rex Founding Member

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    I'll let the Committee first investigate the matter.
     
  10. seabrookcajun

    seabrookcajun Founding Member

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    One thing is certainly clear. Trump was/is getting advice from a bunch of wackos. That is entirely Trump's fault.
     
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