Trump's second impeachment.

Let's go through Trump's second impeachment trial, from least contriversial to more contriversial. These are my thoughts on the matter, after having watched much of the trial. Let's go through these one at a time.

1. There was a riot at the Capital Building when the Congress was meeting to certify the election.
2. President Trump spoke at that rally. He did use the word "Fight" 20 times, and encourage the crowd to march to the capital building. It is worth noting that he said "I know that everyone here will soon be marching over to the Capitol building to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard."
3. Before President Trump started speaking, a crowd was already forming at the Capital Building. Some of those individuals had already crossed barriers before he started speaking.
4. President Trump was challenging the results of the election.
5. Of the many court cases, over 60, only 1 was ruled in Trump's favor. That was to allow observers closer to the ballot counters in Pennsylvania. Many courts, both high and low, conservative and liberal, were involved in this judgement.
6. President Trump had repeatedly said the only way he could lose was if there was some kind of unfair play involved.
7. President Trump, while he didn't specifically call for the rally, became involved with it. The date and time was changed to correspond to that of the time of the counting of the Electoral College votes.
8. President Trump sent some tweets after events started happening. These did call for respecting police, staying "peaceful". 2 hours after it started he called for "No Violence".
9. The worst parts of the violence at the Capital were planned before the day.
10. Many of the rioters believed they were following President Trump's orders.
11. His last tweet of the day, set just after 6:00 pm "These are the things and events that happen when a sacred landslide election victory is so unceremoniously & viciously stripped away from great patriots who have been badly & unfairly treated for so long. Go home with love & in peace. Remember this day forever!"
12. President Trump didn't request the national guard to reinforce the Capital when it was under attack.
13. President Trump condemned the actions a week after the attack, after he was impeached for a second time by the House. That speech, in my opinion, is what he needed to do on Jan 6 in the evening.
14. It was known before the attack that there was a possibility of things getting out of hand. The national guard was activated, but was not present at the attack itself at the capital.
15. There have been two proposed standards for judging incitement. The one that I will judge is that of the defense, the Brandenburg test. This calls for two items. I have included a third that the Impeachment Managers included in their test as well.
    • The speech is “directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action,”
    • The speech is “likely to incite or produce such action.”
    • The speech was willful.
16. We know that the second was true, as it did produce some action. The first is a bit more questionable. An argument could be made that he tacitly encouraged it, which would be the first point. The last point, the willful, is the hardest to know.
17. Trump's tweets after the rally show that to at least some extent he was pleased with it, and expected it.
18. There was considerably intelligence that something bad might be happening, but the details seem sketchy, at least in the public view.
19. He was trying to intimidate at the very least Vice President Mike Pence and several Republican senators to question the results of the election and try to overturn them.

In conclusion, I will say that President Trump at best was ignorant of the mob's intent, and at worst was tacitly approving. He didn't seem disappointed by the actions taken until well after the day. The central question is really, did President Trump incite the riot? I think President Trump was deliberately fanning the flames. I don't think it was his ultimate desire to cause the riot, but he does seem pleased with it. He was trying to intimidate people to overturn the results of the election. There are still too many questions to before he could be convicted in a court of law. If he were still in office, I would support him being removed from office. And I certainly support continued investigation. I think there's enough to warrent the social media bans as well, even if Trump didn't intend it his words are inciting. What would I do if I were a US senator when voting? I think it would be worth convicting him to send a message to future Presidents that trying to intimidate Congress to change the results of an election is not acceptable. Even "primarying" a canidate that certifies the lawful election should be considered, while that is an excellent recourse in some situations, it should not be used to alter the certification of an election, in my opinion. There is a time and a place for challenges, and some exceptional cases might be challenged when counting the electoral college votes, but those should be extremely exceptional. The courts should really decide before that happens.

Mail in ballots and other forms of voter fraud

There is a considerable difference of opinion between Republicans and Democrats about mail in balloting in the United States. Let's look deeper at the issue.

First of all, rules about voting in general are set up by each individual state, with some oversight by the Federal Government. The oversight is pretty small, mostly to the level of ensuring the ballot is fair. They do specify the date, the first Tuesday after the first Monday. It is set as such to not be on the first day of November. Tuesday has been election day since the beginning of the country, primarily to allow for travelling to the election site on Monday and be back by Wednesday to continue working on their farms. The rules are very loose, just a framework really. They primarily allow one to provide aid if disabled, ensure that everone of legal age can vote, and ensure that blatent discrimination does not happen.

The vast majority of states allow absentee voting, which is voting whereby one can vote before election day. This can be done either in person at specifically designated areas, or via mail in balloting. 10 states automatically will mail to all eligible voters, including mostly states that tend to vote Democractic, but at least a few battleground and even some Republican leaning. Many states require an excuse to request a mail in ballot, although this year COVID-19 fears is considered a valid reason. Some states allow one to request a ballot online, others require one to physically mail in a request. In every instance, a voter must be registered prior to requesting a mail in ballot.

The concern expressed primarily by Republicans is over voter fraud. To be certain, voter fraud can and does happen, although the amount of it is highly questionable. According to the Brennan Center, the actual amount of voter fraud sits at 30 votes/ million votes cast. The closest Presidential election in recent history was the election of 2000, where George Bush won with a 537 vote count with almost 6 million votes. At that rate of fraud, even that super close election did not have its count altered.

The easiest way that one could commit voter fraud would be to vote in person and mail in a ballot, but every state checks for that, and in fact most of the fraudlent votes are something along those lines. There is more of a question if the votes should happen in different states, but that is a very difficult problem to resolve. In my opinion, if one moves one's state of driver's license they shoudl automatically revoke the old state's voter registration as well, but this does not happen. In fact, once I had moved several years prior, received a jury summons to appear across the country, informed them that I had moved, and then the voter registration office from that state requested that I mail in a form to cancel my voter registration in that state! For that state, Arizona, one can do many election related things online, it was strange that this couldn't be. In any case, I just did nothing, and presumably am no longer registered. This makes sense because in many states one is registered to vote at the same time one receives a driver's license. In fact, as it is federal law to offer voter registration to eligable voters when receiving such an ID card it seems it could be tracked.

Another point of some interest. If a voter does not actually vote for a number of years they are placed on an inactive voter list. That list requries additional ID to vote. The ID must contain an address, a driver's license would be fine, proving they still live in the precint.

The other claim that often comes from Republicans is that of illegal immigrants voting. It turns out that pretty much every state does not allow for those who are not US citizens to vote. One does not, however, have to provide a birth certificate, state identification (Driver's license, etc), or other similar form of ID to prove they are eligable. Still, this seems to be limited, although it does happen. According to this paper, although if caught they could be charged with a crime. And there is enough evidence to do so, given enough time. Most states require some form of photo ID, which acts to counteract that. In North Carolina, a state which does not require showing ID to vote, a total of 19 cases of foreigners voting were brough to court, of 4.7 million votes cast. Many do end up inadvertently registered to vote, when they receive a Driver's ID card, but most correctly do not actually vote, as that would be illegal.

I will save it for another day on why such talks are so persistant, and why the Democrats in general push for more voting. But from all reports, while voter fraud can and does happen, the actual number of cases is in the dozens per million votes cast, and is not really significant.