(1) Rudy Giuliani vows lawsuits to expose Democratic election fraud: 'Do you think we're stupid?'(2) Incredible charges of voter fraud from Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell(3) Pennsylvania mailman says he was ordered to collect late ballots(4) Nevada whisleblower affidavit alleges disregard of mail-in signature verification(5) Republicans expand probe into Dominion Voting Systems after Michigan counting snafu(6) Gingrich: "You Are Watching An Effort To Steal The Presidency Of The United States"(7) Trump, RNC sue Arizona over rejected votes(8) Glenn Greenwald: America's Inability To Count Votes Is A National Disgrace... And Dangerous(9) Gridlock – Biden May or May Not Win, but Trump Remains ‘President’ of Red America(10) A New Civil War - Michael Vlahos(1) Rudy Giuliani vows lawsuits to expose Democratic election fraud: 'Do you think we're stupid?'https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/nov/4/rudy-guiliani-vows-lawsuits-expose-democratic-elec/By S.A. Miller - The Washington Times - Wednesday, November 4, 2020Trump campaign legal point man Rudolph W. Giuliani on Wednesday said Democrats were perpetrating a massive voter fraud in Pennsylvania and announced a lawsuit challenging the vote count.Mr. <https://www.washingtontimes.com/topics/rudolph-w-giuliani/>Giuliani said ballots were popping up from all over the place, Trump campaign election observers were prevented from observing the count and at least 100,000 ballots did not get checked by observers."They’re not going to steal this election. This will actually do the same by the people," Mr. Giuliani, a former New York City mayor who serves as President Trump’s personal lawyer, said a press conference in Philadelphia.He said it was inconceivable that Mr. Trump could be 500,000 votes ahead with more than 80% of the votes counted and not be declared the winner in Pennsylvania."Do you think we’re stupid? Do you think we’re fools? You know something, the Democrats do think you’re stupid and they do think you’re fools. And that’s why you get called deplorable and chumps," Mr. Giuliani said.Despite the legal actions by Mr. Trump’s campaign, his path to victory grew increasingly narrow Wednesday with projected wins in Michigan and Wisconsin for Democratic challenger Joseph R. Biden, putting him just six electoral votes away from the White House.Mr. Giuliani was joined by several top Trump campaign officials, including Eric Trump, former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi and senior adviser Corey Lewandowski.They accused Democrats of monkeying with the vote count in Pennsylvania because that was the key to a Trump reelection victory.Mr. Lewandowski declared Pennsylvania was "Trump country" and vowed that the campaign legal team would remain in the state until every vote was counted.Mr.Giuliani vowed more lawsuits."We’re going to continue the lawsuit here. We’re gonna bring a second one and then we’re going to bring a federal lawsuit," he said. "Quite possibly, we’ll do a national lawsuit and really expose the corruption of the Democratic Party. But this is beyond anything I’ve ever seen before."(2) Incredible charges of voter fraud from Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powellhttps://www.independentsentinel.com/incredible-charges-of-voter-fraud-from-rudy-giuliani-sidney-powell/By M. DowlingNovember 8, 2020President Trump still has a path to victory and it can only be determined by counting every single legal vote. We are not Venezuela yet.MSM and the Democrats have already held celebrations for the so-called President-Elect sleepy Joe, but he’s not yet. They know that. It’s only propaganda and bullying on their part. Ignore them. When the Supreme Court decides it’s over, it will be over, not before.THE POTENTIAL FRAUDRudy Giuliani, President Trump’s personal attorney, and Sidney Powell, Michael Flynn’s lawyer, joined Maria Bartiromo in separate interviews on Sunday Morning Futures today.  Rudy explained that he will drop a lawsuit in Pennsylvania tomorrow. He believes he will have five lawsuits by the end of the week. Giuliani also said ten states might be in contention.Mr. Giuliani said he has about fifty witnesses in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In Pittsburgh, he has about 300,000 ballots counted without Republican observers — illegally. The ballots were brought in bundles and it looked like they were trying to make up votes for Biden as he fell short in the count. [That’s an assumption] In one case, the Republican observers were allowed to move 6 feet closer but the counters moved further away.He said about 800,000 votes are being questioned.Ms. Powell listed a number of potential fraudulent issues. For example, they identified 150,000 ballots in the key states that only have a mark for Joe Biden. She said some people voting are dead.About the ballots with only Joe’s name, that seems systemic.  Ms. Powell talked about the Dominion software problem in Michigan. Ms. Powell called it a glitch, but the Michigan Secretary of State now says it was human error and had nothing to do with the software.Dominion is owned by a friend and colleague of George Soros’s. Nancy Pelosi’s longtime chief of Staff is a chief executive at Dominion. Richard Blum, Senator Feinstein’s husband, is a significant shareholder.It makes one wonder. Why did they invest in it? Ms. Powell thinks they did it to steal elections.Perhaps it was just to make money.Ms. Powell added that the workers used an algorithm to flip votes to Biden and to others as well. Whether she has evidence of this or is making assumptions, we can’t say.Watch: {video}(3) Pennsylvania mailman says he was ordered to collect late ballotshttps://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/nov/7/pennsylvania-mailman-says-he-was-ordered-collect-l/By Stephen Dinan - The Washington Times - Saturday, November 7, 2020A Pennsylvania mailman has said in a sworn affidavit that he was ordered by supervisors to collect and submit late ballots, which he said supervisors then backdated so that they appeared to have been mailed in time.Richard Hopkins, who works in Erie, said he overheard a supervisor talking about the backdating operation, and letter carriers were told to pick up ballots through Friday, even though under Pennsylvania’s current rules ballots were supposed to have been mailed by Tuesday, though they could be delivered to election officials through Friday and still be counted."Postmaster Rob Weisenbach directed my co-workers and I to pick up ballots after Election Day and provide them to him," Mr. Hopkins said in an affidavit. "As discussed more fully below, I heard Weisenbach tell a supervisor at my office that Weisenbach was back-dating the postmarks on the ballots to make it appear as though the ballots had been collected on November 3, 2020 despite them in fact being collected on November 4 and possibly later."The affidavit was provided to the Trump campaign and released by Sen. Lindsey Graham, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, who vowed a probe."Mr. Hopkins is entitled to all whistleblower protections, and I will ensure they extend to other postal workers who may come forward with claims of [irregularities], misconduct, fraud, etc.," the South Carolina Republican said.A postal services spokeswoman said they became aware of the allegations on Friday."They were immediately referred to the U.S. Postal Inspection Service and the Office of Inspector General, and the matter remains under investigation," the spokeswoman said.(4) Nevada whisleblower affidavit alleges disregard of mail-in signature verificationhttps://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/nevada-whisleblower-affidavit-alleges-disregard-of-mail-in-signature-verificationby Emily Larsen, Political ReporterNovember 08, 2020 01:08 PMLAS VEGAS — An affidavit from a Nevada whistleblower alleges that election supervisors Clark County, which accounts for the vast majority of voters in the state, counted mail-in ballots despite concerns about whether signatures were valid.The whistleblower, according to a partially redacted affidavit obtained by the Washington Examiner, began working as a counting board member for the Clark County elections office in mid-October. On Nov. 6, the whistleblower stopped working as a ballot counter "due to concerns about how the votes were being counting [sic]." The affidavit has been sent to the Department of Justice."I personally witnessed disregard of signature verification as well as other irregularities," the whistleblower said in the affidavit. "While working, I observed a significant number of signatures on mail-in ballots I believe did not match the name and should have been reviewed. When I asked the supervisors, [redacted] and others, about it, instead of taking the ballots to verify the signature in the electronic database, the supervisor told me to push the envelope through without verification."Nevada lawmakers in August changed the law to send every registered voter a mail-in ballot, resulting in hoards of ballots being sent to old addresses or to deceased people.In one specific instance, the whistleblower said a voter reported on the envelope of a mail-in ballot that he or she no longer resided at the address on the ballot."This ballot should have been listed as a rejected ballot, but the supervisor instructed me to push the ballot through," the affidavit said.Registrar of voters in Clark County Joe Gloria responded: "The people on the counting board don’t have access to the signature map. So that’s work that takes place here in this building before it ever gets to the county. So I think that explains. I’m not completely familiar with what exactly the individuals was talking about in specific instances, but we we have an explanation for anything that he may have seen."The whistleblower initially came forward to the Nevada Republican Party, which has set up a system where the voters can report allegations of voter fraud, mismanagement, disenfranchisement, or other issues.President Trump's campaign and Republicans have flagged other alleged issues with counted ballots in Nevada, where ballot-counting continues as the president trails presumptive President-elect Joe Biden by about 31,500 votes.Last week, Republicans filed a lawsuit and forwarded a complaint to the Justice Departmen,t alleging that the county's election official failed to maintain the county's voter list sufficiently, resulting in 3,000 voters who had changed their address out of Nevada voting in this year's general election. The Clark County elections office has said that some of those names include voters in the military who can legally cast a ballot while living temporarily out of state.A federal judge on Friday blocked a Trump campaign attempt to invalidate the use of a machine that validated voter signatures on mail-in ballots.(5) Republicans expand probe into Dominion Voting Systems after Michigan counting snafuhttps://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/republicans-expand-probe-into-dominion-voting-systems-after-michigan-counting-snafuby Zachary Halaschak, Breaking News Reporter & Emily Larsen, Political ReporterNovember 08, 2020 11:29 AMDETROIT — Republicans are probing more Michigan counties and suggesting investigations in Nevada and Arizona to determine whether further Dominion Voting Systems technology errors caused votes to be counted incorrectly.Tony Zammit, communications director for the Michigan Republican Party, told the Washington Examiner on Saturday that the GOP is working across the Wolverine State to find out if other counties experienced similar issues to Antrim County."Our team is currently reaching out to county clerks across Michigan as well as going through election results in each of the counties which use this software to see how widespread this error may be," Zammit said.A failure to update software caused a glitch in one Michigan county, resulting in 6,000 votes erroneously being tabulated for Joe Biden rather than President Trump.Michigan Republican Party Chairwoman Laura Cox claimed during a Friday news conference that 47 of Michigan’s 83 counties "used this same software in the same capacity" as in Antrim County, where the temporary issue occurred. During the briefing, Cox also called upon counties that use the Dominion Voting Systems software "to closely examine their result for similar discrepancies."The voting systems provider has contracts in all of the key swing states in which Trump's campaign team is mounting legal challenges, and Republicans in two of those Southwestern states, Arizona and Nevada, also have their eye on the system."What does this mean for Nevada? We need answers," the Nevada Republican Party said in a tweet on Friday in response to a tweet about Dominion being used in the state."If there is a glitch that’s built into the software system, it’ll be shown and it’s easy to define that," Republican Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona, who has helped lead the charge for the Trump campaign election disputes in the state, told the Epoch Times. "I think this is a great exercise to get back the trust of the American people."A well-placed source with knowledge of the Michigan Republican Party’s post-election plans told the Washington Examiner that legal action related to Dominion Voting Systems is still on the table, although the individual did not provide further details.The Michigan Department of State pushed back on Cox’s claims, as well as those of Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel, who also spoke about Dominion Voting Systems. It laid the blame on human error because the update had not been performed."The erroneous reporting of unofficial results from Antrim County was a result of accidental error on the part of the Antrim County Clerk," the office said in a statement. "The equipment and software did not malfunction and all ballots were properly tabulated. However, the clerk accidentally did not update the software used to collect voting machine data and report unofficial results."The state went on to point out that even if the "error in the reported unofficial results had not been quickly noticed, it would have been identified during the county canvass."In Nevada, Clark County Registrar of Voters Joe Gloria did not address the Dominion voting system specifically but said that there are multiple measures in place to ensure accurate results, including a bipartisan certification board that includes citizens."All of our equipment here in Clark County is federally certified for use on the voting machine side as well as the tabulation software," Gloria told the Washington Examiner on Saturday. "We've done everything correctly. We're now performing our post-election audits where we have to get certified the software on our voting machines and also verify paper trails."The Washington Examiner reached out to Dominion for comment.The error with the voting system in Antrim County is just one of a series of issues and complaints that Michigan Republicans have lodged since Tuesday’s election. The state party has said the election results in Detroit might be compromised because it claims that absentee ballots were tabulated improperly.Trump’s team filed a lawsuit in Michigan court the day after the election, alleging that a plaintiff who was "credentialed and trained as an election challenger" was "excluded from the counting board during the absent voter ballot review process."Another lawsuit asserted that in Wayne County (where Detroit is located), some ballots that were unable to be read by a machine and thus had to be transposed by hand onto a new blank ballot were transposed with no Republican inspector present in violation of state law.The state GOP also said that it referred a whistleblower complaint to the Justice Department from a Detroit city employee who claimed that she was directed by other employees to improperly change the dates on ballots. The Washington Examiner reached out to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan.Courts in Michigan ruled against both lawsuits, and the Michigan Department of State has fervently and unequivocally denied claims of any wrongdoing in Detroit or elsewhere.(6) Gingrich: "You Are Watching An Effort To Steal The Presidency Of The United States"https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2020/11/05/gingrich_you_are_watching_an_effort_to_steal_the_presidency_of_the_united_states.htmlPosted By Ian SchwartzNovember 5, 2020{watch the video at the above link}Newt Gingrich said America is in crisis, likening the situation to Lincoln and Gettysburg, and warned we are watching the election being stolen in an interview Thursday night with FOX News host Sean Hannity."I think this is one of the great, this is a crisis in the American system comparable to Washington on Christmas Eve or comparable to Lincoln and Gettysburg," Gingrich said. "This is a genuine deep crisis of our survival."GINGRICH: I am the angriest I have been in that entire six decades. You have a group of corrupt people who have absolute contempt for the American people, who believe that we are so spineless, so cowardly, so unwilling to stand up for ourselves that they can steal the presidency. And we'll wring our hands, bring in a few lawyers, and do nothing. My hope is that President Trump will lead the millions of Americans who understand exactly what's going on. The Philadelphia machine is corrupt. The Nevada machine. The machine in Detroit is corrupt. And they are trying to steal the presidency. And we should not allow them to do that.First of all, under federal law, we should lock up the people who are breaking the law. To stop somebody from being an observer, you just broke federal law. Do you hide and put up papers so nobody can see what you are doing? You just broke federal law. You bring in ballots that aren't real? You just broke federal law.I am sick and tired of corrupt left-wing democrats who believe that we are too timid and too easy to intimidate, and therefore let us just go out and steal it. That's exactly -- no one should have any doubt.You are watching an effort to steal the presidency of the United States. And this is not about Donald Trump. This is about the American people. the American people have the right in an honest election with honest legitimate ballots to pick their leader or are we now just sheep to be dominated by these high-tech businesses, the news media, and the various political machines? And are we are supposed to surrender? I think this is one of the great, this is a crisis in the American system comparable to Washington on Christmas Eve or comparable to Lincoln and Gettysburg. This is a genuine deep crisis of our survival.(7) Trump, RNC sue Arizona over rejected voteshttps://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/nov/8/trump-rnc-sue-arizona-over-rejected-votes/By Alex Swoyer - The Washington Times - Sunday, November 8, 2020President Trump’s campaign and the Republican National Committee sued Arizona Saturday, claiming voting machines in Maricopa County rejected votes that were cast in person on Election Day.The lawsuit claims poll workers inaccurately instructed voters on how to override overvote ballots, where too many selections are made.The complaint says voters are supposed to have an opportunity to correct the error and that the campaign has witnesses who saw the problem."Poll workers struggled to operate the new voting machines in Maricopa County, and improperly pressed and told voters to press a green button to override significant errors," said Matt Morgan, general counsel for Trump 2020. "The result is that the voting machines disregarded votes cast by voters in person on Election Day in Maricopa County."The campaign wants overvoted ballots inspected.The Arizona filing comes as the president also has ongoing litigation in other battleground states, refusing to concede the election.(8) Glenn Greenwald: America's Inability To Count Votes Is A National Disgrace... And DangerousThu, 11/05/2020 - 18:20https://greenwald.substack.com/p/the-us-inability-to-count-votes-isThe U.S. Inability To Count Votes is a National Disgrace. And Dangerous.Nations far poorer and less technologically advanced have no problem holding quick, efficient elections. Distrust in U.S. outcomes is dangerous but rational.Glenn Greenwald  The richest and most powerful country on earth — whether due to ineptitude, choice or some combination of both — has no ability to perform the simple task of counting votes in a minimally efficient or confidence-inspiring manner. As a result, the credibility of the voting process is severely impaired, and any residual authority the U.S. claims to "spread" democracy to lucky recipients of its benevolence around the world is close to obliterated.At 7:30 a.m. ET on Wednesday, the day after the 2020 presidential elections, the results of the presidential race, as well as control of the Senate, are very much in doubt and in chaos. Watched by rest of the world — deeply affected by who rules the still-imperialist superpower — the U.S. struggles and stumbles and staggers to engage in a simple task mastered by countless other less powerful and poorer countries: counting votes. Some states are not expected to finished their vote-counting <https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/upshot/vote-counting-today-polls-election.html> until the end of this week or beyond.The same data and polling geniuses who pronounced that Hillary Clinton had a 90% probability or more of winning the 2016 election, and who spent the last three months proclaiming the 2020 election even more of a sure thing for the Democratic presidential candidate, are currently insisting that Biden, despite being behind in numerous key states, is still the favorite by virtue of uncounted ballots in Democrat-heavy counties in the outcome-determinative states. [One went to sleep last night with the now-notorious New York Times needle of data guru Nate Cohn assuring the country that, with more than 80% of the vote counted in Georgia, Trump had more than an 80% chance to win that state, only to wake up a few hours later with the needle now predicting the opposite outcome; that all happened just a few hours after Cohn <https://twitter.com/Nate_Cohn/status/1323814954533834753> assured everyone how much "smarter" his little needle was this time around].Given the record of failures and humiliations they have quickly compiled, what rational person would trust anything they say at this point? A citizen randomly chosen from the telephone book would be as reliable if not more so for sharing predictions. And the monumental failures of the polling industry and the data nerds who leech off it, for the second consecutive national election, only serve to sow even further doubt and confusion around the electoral process.A completely untrustworthy voting count is now the norm. Two months after the New York state primary in late June, two Congressional races were in doubt by what The New York Times <https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/03/nyregion/nyc-mail-ballots-voting.html> alled "major delays in counting a deluge of 400,000 <https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/03/us/politics/trump-mail-in-voting.html> mail-in ballots and other problems." In particular:Thousands more ballots in the city were discarded by election officials for minor errors, or not even sent to voters until the day before the primary, making it all but impossible for the ballots to be returned in time.It took <https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/04/nyregion/maloney-torres-ny-congressional-races.html> six weeks for New York to finally declare a winner in those two primary races for Congress.The coronavirus pandemic and the shutdowns and new votings rules it ushered in have obviously complicated the process, but the U.S. failure to simply count votes with any degree of efficiency, in a way that inspires even minimal confidence in the process, pre-dates the March, 2020 nationwide lockdowns. Even if one dismisses as aberrational the protracted, Court-decided, and still-untrusted outcome of the 2000 presidential election — only four national election cycles ago — the U.S. voting process is rife with major systemic failures and doubt-sowing inefficiencies that can be explained only as a deliberate choice and/or a perfect reflection of a collapsing, crumbling empire.Recall the mass confusion that ensued back in January, in the very first Democratic Party primary election in the Iowa caucus, where a new app created and monetized by a bunch of sleazy Democratic operatives caused <https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/iowa-democrats-kept-their-app-secret-to-prevent-hacks-instead-they-got-confusion-and-chaos/2020/02/04/fbd99654-4784-11ea-bc78-8a18f7afcee7_story.html> massive delays, confusion and an untrustworthy outcome. Later in the process, many Super Tuesday states — including California — were still counting votes weeks or even longer after the election was held (more than a week after the Democratic primary, California had <https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/12/super-tuesday-california-primary-results-bernie-sanders-wins.html> still only counted roughly 75% of the ballots cast, depriving Bernie Sanders of a critical narrative victory on election night).The 2018 midterm elections were also marred by pervasive irregularities. The Washington Post <https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/broken-machines-rejected-ballots-and-long-lines-voting-problems-emerge-as-americans-go-to-the-polls/2018/11/06/ffd11e52-dfa8-11e8-b3f0-62607289efee_story.html> noted "thousands of reports of voting irregularities across the country…. with voters complaining of broken machines, long lines and untrained poll workers improperly challenging Americans’ right to vote." ...And the full extent of the "irregularities" and treacherous outright cheating by the Democratic National Committee in the 2016 primary race between Clinton and Sanders was never fully appreciated given how pro-Clinton the press was. As just one example, "200,000 New York City voters" — many in pro-Sanders precincts — "had been illegally wiped off the rolls and prevented from voting in the presidential primary" (for one of the best-documented histories of just how pervasive were the shenanigans and cheating in the 2016 Democratic primary across multiple key states, listen to <https://soundcloud.com/trueanonpod/demonrats> this TrueAnon episode).However one wants to speculate about the motives for all of this, one thing is clear: it does not need to be this way. To eliminate all doubts about that fact, just look at Brazil.After the pervasive voting problems in the 2018 midterms, I wrote <https://theintercept.com/2018/11/07/the-remarkable-participation-and-efficiency-of-brazils-elections-proves-how-shameful-and-deliberate-is-the-chaos-and-suppression-in-the-u-s/> an article with my Brazilian colleague Victor Pougy describing the extraordinary speed and efficiency with which Brazil — a country not exactly renowned for its speed and efficiency — counts its votes.Brazil is not a small country. It is the fifth most-populous nation on the planet. Although its population is somewhat smaller than the U.S.’s (330 million to 210 million), its mandatory voting law, automatic registration, and 16-year-old voting age means the number of ballots to be counted is quite similar (105 million votes in Brazil’s 2018 presidential election compared to 130 million votes in the 2016 U.S. presidential election). And on the same date of its national elections, it, too, holds gubernatorial and Congressional elections in its twenty-seven states.And yet Brazil — a much poorer and less technologically advanced country than the U.S., with a much shorter history of democracy — holds seamless, quick vote counts about which very few people harbor doubts. The elections are held on a Sunday, to ensure as many people as possible do not have work obligations to prevent voting, and polls close at 6:00 p.m.For the 2018 presidential run-off election that led to Jair Bolsonaro’s victory, 90% of all votes were counted and the results released by 6:00 p.m. on the day of the election: the time the last state closed its polls. The full vote tally was available within a couple of hours after that. The same was true of the first-round voting held three weeks earlier — which also included races for governor, Senator and Congress in all the states: full vote totals were released by computer shortly after the polls closed and few had any doubts about their accuracy and legitimacy.Hundreds of millions of Americans went to bed on Tuesday’s election night seeing Trump in the lead in key states, with the data experts of major outlets indicating that his victory in many of those states was highly likely. They woke up to the opposite indication: that Biden is now a slight favorite to win several if not all of those remaining key states. But what is clear is that it will be days if not longer before the votes are fully counted, with judicial proceedings almost certain to prolong the outcomes even further.No matter what the final result, there will be substantial doubts about its legitimacy by one side or the other, perhaps both. And no deranged conspiracy thinking is required for that. An electoral system suffused with this much chaos, error, protracted outcomes and seemingly inexplicable reversals will sow doubt and distrust even among the most rational citizens.The next time Americans hear from their government that they need to impose democracy in other countries — through wars, invasion, bombing campaigns or other forms of clandestine CIA "interference" — they should insist that democracy first be imposed in the United States. An already frazzled, intensely polarized and increasingly hostile populace now has to confront yet another election in the richest and most technologically advanced country on earth where the votes cannot be counted in a way that inspires even minimal degrees of confidence.(9) Gridlock – Biden May or May Not Win, but Trump Remains ‘President’ of Red Americahttps://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2020/11/07/gridlock-biden-may-or-may-not-win-but-trump-remains-president-red-america/Alastair CrookeNovember 7, 2020One clear outcome of the U.S. election was the collapse of the promised ‘Blue Wave’ – an implosion that marks the ‘beginning of the end’ to a powerful spell enthralling the West. It was the delusion which Ron Chernow, the acclaimed U.S. presidential historian, gave credence, as he contemptuously dismissed America’s "topsy-turvy moment" as purely ephemeral, and a "surreal interlude in American life":  No longer can it be said that there is one ‘normal’.  Win or lose the White House, Red Trumpism remains as ‘President’ for half America.Biden, by contrast, served as the prospect for Restoration – a return to a hallowed consensus in American politics – to a reassuring <https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-03120-8> ‘sanity’ of facts, science and truth. Biden, it was hoped, would be the agency over-lording a crushing electoral landslide that would terminate irrevocably Trump’s rude interruption of the ‘normal’.  Biden supporters were rallied, Mike Lind, the American academic and author has <https://www.anewcivilwar.com/post/the-impending-election-third-question-can-we-fight-a-decades-long-slide-into-empire> observed, around the idea of America moving toward a ‘managed’ society – based on ‘science’ – that would be essentially finessed and controlled by a managerial, expert class.Over time, Lind suggests, American society would begin to depart more, and more easily, from its republican roots, through a process already underway: via attempts to alter the Constitutional order, and other rules, to bring about a change in the way America is governed.The notion however, of what America – as Idea – now constitutes, has fractured into two tectonic plates, moving apart in very different directions – and likely to move even further apart as each ‘plate’ remains convinced that ‘it won’ – and the sweetness of victory has been stolen.The fracturing of the ‘One Normal’, by contrast, provides some kind of respite to much of the globe.The fact remains that the election has produced a result in which it is abundantly clear that one half of the American electorate precisely voted to oust the other half. It is gridlock – with the Supreme Court and Senate in the hands of one party, and the House of Representatives and White House (possibly) in the hands of the other.  As Glenn Greenwald <https://www.zerohedge.com/political/greenwald-americas-inability-count-votes-national-disgrace-and-dangerous> warns:No matter what the final result, there will be substantial doubts about its legitimacy by one side or the other, perhaps both. And no deranged conspiracy thinking is required for that. An electoral system suffused with this much chaos, error, protracted outcomes and seemingly inexplicable reversals will sow doubt and distrust even among the most rational citizens.Though the maths and maps suggests Biden will likely reach 270 Electoral votes, the old saying ‘It ain’t over ’till it’s over’, holds true. The electoral vote scenarios in the key ‘swing states’ would only apply if there is no litigation, fraud or theft.  However all three are in play – If you are stuffing the ballot box, you first wait to see what the regular vote is, so that you know how many votes you ‘need’ (<https://www.zerohedge.com/political/why-does-biden-have-so-many-more-votes-democrat-senators-swing-states> mathematical anomalies aside) to push your candidate over the top. Trump, somewhat rashly, gave out the GOP vote calculations at 02.30 on Wednesday, and hey-presto, loads of absentee ballots suddenly arrived at certain polling stations at around 04.00.  That seems to have happened in Wisconsin, where over 100,000 Biden votes appeared seemingly out of nowhere on a flash drive delivered by hand from a Democratic district. That put Biden ahead in Wisconsin – but litigation is in process. Likewise, it appears that a huge "absentee ballot" dump appeared in Michigan that heavily favored Biden.This is just the beginning of a new and more uncertain phase that <https://www.zerohedge.com/political/greenwald-americas-inability-count-votes-national-disgrace-and-dangerous> could go on for weeks. It may be that ultimately Congress will have to certify and make the final determination in late January. Meanwhile, there are some things we know with much higher certainty: The Republican majority in the Senate may hold until the 2024 election. So, even if Biden wins, his agenda will not hold through 2024.A President may emerge, but it will not be, as it were, a settled one: He or she cannot make claim to the ‘will of the majority’.  Whomsoever is certified by Congress cannot truthfully say they represent ‘the nation’.  Consensus is fractured, and it is difficult to see any leadership that can bring Americans together as a ‘united people’."There is not a single important cultural, religious, political or social force that is pulling Americans together more than it is pushing us apart," David French <https://www.axios.com/2020-election-polarization-secession-87f600f0-f66a-495b-9329-bc370610955f.html> notes in a new book Divided We Fall: America’s Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation.  French — an anti-Trump conservative — argues that America’s divisions are so great, and the political system so poorly designed to handle them, that secession may eventually be the result: "If we keep pushing people and pushing people and pushing people, you cannot assume that they won’t break", he writes. (A <https://www.axios.com/poll-democrats-and-republicans-hate-each-other-racist-ignorant-evil-99ae7afc-5a51-42be-8ee2-3959e43ce320.html> 2018 poll found that nearly a quarter of each party – Democrat and Republican – characterized the opposing party as "evil").An ideological split, and the concomitantly contested America as Idea has huge geo-political implications, reaching well beyond America itself –  and <https://www.eurointelligence.com/column/trumps-shadow> principally for Europe’s élites.  European leaders did not see it coming when Trump was elected in 2016. They misjudged Brexit. And this year, they misread U.S. politics once again. They yearned for a Biden win, and they (still) fail to see the connection between the popular rebellion of Red under Mr. Trump, and the angry protests occurring across Europe against lockdown.Separating tectonic plates – more strategically – usually signal a kind of dualism that betokens civil conflict.  In other words, their separation and moving apart turns into an ideological struggle for the nature of society and its institutional fabric.Historian, and former War College Professor, Mike Vlahos <https://www.anewcivilwar.com/post/three-questions-to-consider-in-the-impending-election-first-question-are-we-rome> warns (echoing Lind), that, "there is, here: more of a hidden – and thus in a sense, occult struggle – by which over time, societies begin to depart more, and more easily, from their roots.  The western dominant élites presently are seeking to cement their hold over society [moving towards a ‘managed’ society]: To have full control over the direction of society, and, of course, a framework of rule that protects their wealth.""Quite to the surprise of everyone, and given that the Republicans are being represented by a billionaire who has a great many friends in Manhattan – the Wall Street donors to the two campaigns, <https://www.anewcivilwar.com/post/three-questions-to-consider-in-the-impending-election-first-question-are-we-rome> outnumber Trump’s donors for Biden by 5-to-1".Why, Vlahos asks, would Wall Street invest in a man – Biden – and in a Party, ostensibly seeking to move America toward this ‘managed’ progressive society?  Is it because they are convinced of a need radically to restructure the world’s economy and geopolitical relations?   Is this then Vlahos’ occult struggle?Many of the élite hold that we are at that <https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnmauldin/2017/05/31/mauldin-brace-yourself-for-the-great-reset/#ee9ce795d382> monumental inflection point at this moment –  In a nutshell, their narrative is simply this: the planet is already economically and demographically over-extended; the infinite economic expansion model is bust; and the global debt and government entitlement expenditure bubble too, is set to pop at the same moment.A ‘fourth industrial revolution’ is the only way by which to ‘square this circle’, according to this mindset. The Reset is purposefully aimed to disrupt all areas of life, albeit on a planetary scale.  Shock therapy, as it were, to change the way we humans think of ourselves, and our relationship with the world. <https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/great-reset-dummies> The Great Reset looks to a supply-side ‘miracle’, achieved through full-spectrum automation and robotics.  A world where the money is digital; the food is lab-grown; where everything is counted and controlled by giant monopolies; and everyday existence is micromanaged by ever-monitoring, ever-nudging AI that registers thoughts and feelings before the people even get a chance to make those thoughts.Mike Vlahos <https://www.anewcivilwar.com/vlahos-blog> notes that in a curious way this American story mirrors that of ancient Rome in the last century of the Republic – with on the one hand, the élite Roman class, and on the other, the Populares, as Red Americans’ equivalent:"This is in fact the dual story of Rome in the last century of the Republic, and it tracks very well — with the transformation going on today [in the U.S.] — and it is a transformation … The society which emerged at the end of the Roman Revolution, and civil war … had too, a totally dominant élite class."This was a new world, in which the great landowners, with their latifundia [the slave-land source of wealth], who had been the ‘Big Men’ leading the various factions in the civil wars, became the senatorial archons that dominated Roman life for the next five centuries — while the People, the Populares, were ground into a passive — not helpless — but generally dependent and non-participating element of Roman governance: This sapped away at the creative life of Rome, and eventually led to its coming apart."… today American inequality is as great as in the period right before the French Revolution, and is mirrored in what was happening to Rome in that long century of transformation. The problem we have right now, and which is going to make this revolution more intense, is I think, the cynical conclusion and agenda of Blue to just leave behind the Americans they do not need [in the New Economy] – which is to say all of Red America, and to put them into a situation of hardship and marginalization, where they cannot coalesce, to form a rival — as it were — Popular Front."What I think what we are seeing here [in the U.S.] is profound: American society – emerging from this passage, is going to be completely different.  And frankly, it already feels different. It already feels – as it has felt for the past four years – that we are in a rolling civil war norm now, in which deep societal strife is now the normal way in which we handle transfers of power.  Issues will be [momentarily] resolved, with the path of society [painfully] staked out through violent conflict. That is likely to be our path for decades ahead."The problem with that in the shorter term, is that there is still enough of the nation aroused and ready to fight this process. The problem: Can the last energies of the Old Republic still be harnessed against this seemingly inevitable, transformation?"(10) A New Civil War - Michael Vlahoshttps://www.anewcivilwar.com/post/three-questions-to-consider-in-the-impending-election-first-question-are-we-romeMichael VlahosNov 1, 2020Three Questions to Consider In the Impending Election. First Question: Are We Rome?A Conversation between John Batchelor and Michael VlahosJB: The question we have been pursuing for years is: Are we now in a civil war? Two thousand years ago the Romans invented civil war, and then spent the next century reflecting upon it.We go back and forth between the current events in America and our reading about how the Romans dealt with turmoil and disruption and factionalism. I pose to you that it is no longer adequate to just stay in our 18th or 19th century American mental maps — one called the Revolution, and one called the Civil War — but we must look to our Roman analogy.Our last conversation turned on the Roman civil war, from approximately 130 BCE to the rise of Octavian, who became Augustus the emperor. In these last days before the election, we are looking at two factions.One faction is very much in keeping with the pattern of the senatorial class, the Optimates — that would be Mr. Biden, of the Senate, of the Vice Presidency, a man who represents the interests of the center, Rome or Washington — the other, a billionaire, a developer in Manhattan, who we would have to say represents populism, the Populares. Are you satisfied that you have the frame correct for these last days before the election?MV: The Roman framework works, in part I feel because it captures a kind of dualism in what we call civil war, but which we could just as well call revolution. In other words, there is an ideological struggle over the nature of society and of leadership, and of the institutional fabric of our American world.But there is also, more hidden, thus in a sense occult, a struggle in which the dominant, aristocratic or elite class seeks to cement its hold over society: To have full control over the direction of society, and, of course, a framework of rule that protects their wealth.This is in fact the dual story of Rome in the last century of the Republic, and it tracks very well — or rather, we track very well — with the transformation going on today — and it is a transformation. The essential heart of the Roman Revolution and its many subsidiary civil wars was that the entirety of society that had existed in the second century [BCE] and before, the society that had defeated Hannibal, against all odds, a society that was so resilient and so balanced — in the sense that different groups and classes were effectively integrated together — that society emerged at the end of the Roman Revolution and civil war under an emperor-system, and a totally dominant elite class.This was a new world, in which the great landowners, with their latifundia [the slave-land source of wealth], who had been the Big Men leading the various factions in the civil wars, became the senatorial archons that dominated Roman life for the next five centuries — while the People, the Populares, were ground into a passive — not helpless — but generally dependent and non-participating element of Roman governance — and this sapped away at the creative life of Rome, and eventually led to its coming apart, and then a second transformation in the 5th century and after.I think this passage is very much in contrast with the short and spasmodic civil wars of Modernity, which are very often upheavals that didn’t last: The French Revolution lasted less than a generation, while the Russian revolution wore itself out and disintegrated in three [excruciating] generations.What I think what we are seeing here is more profound, so that the American society coming out on the other end of this passage is going to be completely different — and frankly it already feels different. It already feels, as it has felt for the past four years, that we are in a rolling civil war norm now, in which deep societal strife is now the normal way in which we handle transfers of power, in which various issues are [momentarily] resolved, and through which the path of society will be [painfully] staked out. It all is to be done through violent conflict, and it is likely to be our path for decades ahead.